The number of citizenship applications approved increased 80 per cent last year, compared to the previous year,
Federal Government says more than 145,000 migrants had their citizenship by conferral applications approved in 2018-19.
This figure is an increase of about 64,000 from 81,000 in 2017-18.
Immigration Minister David Coleman said in a statement that improvements such as encouraging online lodgements and increasing the efficiency of citizenship processing had contributed to the increase.
“Australian citizenship is an immense privilege, and fundamental to our national identity,” Mr Coleman said.
“I have been working over the past 12 months to ensure citizenship applications are managed as efficiently as possible, while also maintaining the integrity of the program.
“We have invested $9 million into our systems and staff, established a taskforce to focus on complex cases, and increased the number of citizenship appointments available for applicants to attend interviews and sit the citizenship test.”, he added.
The time between an applicant attending a citizenship interview and the finalisation of their application has also been halved.
