2016] The Protection of Stateless Persons in Australian Law 403 I INTRODUCTION The problem of statelessness is not only a legal problem resulting in the inability to exercise rights. It is a problem of identity under the law.1 The protection of stateless persons has long been a focus of concern of the international community. From the 1920s until the end of the Second World War, the plight of all those displaced — whether refugees or stateless persons — was understood in terms of a shared predicament, namely being outside their country of origin or former habitual residence, and lacking protection.2 In the aftermath of the Second World War, the legal status of ‘persons who do not enjoy the protection of any government’ was given early consideration,3 and it was recognised that action was needed ‘to ensure that everyone shall have an effective right to a nationality’.4 The resultant report, A Study of Statelessness,5 noted the importance of both improving the protection of stateless persons, and eliminating statelessness in the future. This required the creation of a legal status for stateless persons, as well as efforts to improve domestic nationality laws, facilitate naturalisation and better regulate territorial settlements. As a result, the United Nations (‘UN’) established the Ad Hoc Committee on Statelessness and Related Problems whose mandate was to consider the desirability of a ‘revised and consolidated convention relating to the international status of refugees and stateless persons’, and ways to eliminate future statelessness.6 The Committee almost immediately separated out the question of the resolution of the status of refugees, on the one hand, and stateless 1 Carol A Batchelor, ‘Statelessness and the Problem of Resolving Nationality Status’ (1998) 10 International Journal of Refugee Law 156, 181–2. 2 See, eg, Guy S Goodwin Gill, ‘The Rights of Refugees and Stateless Persons’ in K P Saksena (ed), Human Rights: Perspectives and Challenges (in 1900’s and Beyond) (Lancers Books, 1994) 378, 389–90; Guy S Goodwin-Gill, Introductory Note: Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons (2017) United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law <http://legal.un.org/avl/ha/cssp/cssp.html>. For a thorough overview of the history of the interrelationship between the protection of refugees and stateless persons at international law see Michelle Foster and Hélène Lambert, International Refugee Law and the Protection of Stateless Persons (Oxford University Press, forthcoming). 3 United Nations Commission on Human Rights, Report of the Commission on Human Rights: Second Session, UN ESCOR, 2nd sess, UN Doc E/600 (17 December 1947) 16 [46]. 4 ESC Res 116 (VI) (D), UN ESCOR, 6th sess, UN Doc E/777 (12 March 1948, adopted 1–2 March 1948) 18. 5 A Study of Statelessness, UN Docs E/1112, E/1112/Add.1 (August 1949). 6 ESC Res 248 (IX) (B), UN ESCOR, 9th sess, Supp No 1, UN Doc E/1553/Corr.1 (8 December 1949, adopted 8 August 1949) 60.