Citizenship Minister Alan Tudge says migrants should sit an Australian “values” test before being granted permanent residency.

Speaking in London at a meeting of the Australia/UK Leadership Forum, he argued that “further consideration” should be taken before granting permanent residency to over 100,000 migrants a year.

The Turnbull Government has cut the annual permanent migration intake from 190,000 to less than 163,000 this year, and is proposing stricter language tests on prospective citizens.

“Diversity can be great, but not when it includes those who want sharia law and will use violence to achieve their ends,” Mr Tudge said.  

“Tolerance is generally a good principle, but we should not be tolerant of FGM [female genital mutilation] or child marriage or women being prohibited from learning English, studying or even driving.”

People are already required to sign a values statement before entering the country, pass a citizenship test and pledge allegiance if they want to be a citizen.

Mr Tudge, who also holds the Multiculturalism portfolio, said the tests do not assess whether people actually understand “Australian values”.

He said English language skills tests should be extended to include these “values”.

“We place an emphasis on Australian values as the glue that holds the nation together,” Mr Tudge said.

“We do this through requiring people to sign a values statement before coming into Australia, satisfy a citizenship test and pledge allegiance before becoming a citizen.

“The weakness of this, however, is that we presently have few mechanisms to assess people against their signed statement.”

Mr Tudge said Australia could be on the path to a “European separatist multicultural model”.

He had called for a “muscular” defence of Western liberal values, and accused rising identity politics of legitimising “practices and behaviours which should be deemed intolerable”.

“Hence, it takes years for some Western countries to even take a strong position against something as barbaric as female genital mutilation,” he said.

Mr Tudge said Australia has to pull “our ship back” to the “Australian integrated path”.

“Some of the challenges to social cohesion that we are facing today are similar to ones that the UK is facing, such as ethnic segregation and liberal values being challenged,” he said.