One Nation is hardly new on the parliamentary scene. What’s new is that disgruntled voters — while still believing change comes through the ballot box — are breaking with the major political parties. Both the Labor and the Coalition say they are listening, while the cost of living continues to soar. One Nation, spruiking anti-establishment rhetoric and claiming to stand up for battlers, seeks to capitalise on anger within the electorate. Yet its program and voting record deliver only for the wealthy.
Since Pauline Hanson was first elected to parliament in 1996, she has made headlines by scapegoating migrants, people of colour and First Nations people, and peddling other right-wing ideas. She formed One Nation in 1997. The following year, the right-wing populist party won 11 seats in the Queensland parliament after capturing 22.7 percent of the primary vote — outpolling the Coalition. Since that peak, it won three seats in Western Australia in 2001 and again in 2017. In 2022 it secured its first seat in Victoria. At the federal level, it elected four senators in 2016.
At the May 2025 federal election, One Nation won just 6.4 percent of the vote. But this year it has experienced a surge in the polls and some electoral success. It won four seats in the South Australian state election — again outpolling the Liberals. It then achieved another first: securing a federal lower-house seat in a by-election.
The party is not only benefiting from voter disgust with the major parties. Right-wing populism is being boosted as a viable alternative by the mainstream media, while socialist solutions are ignored. This is partly the result of decades in which the Coalition and Labor have normalised racism through tough border controls and anti-refugee measures. Both have also fanned Islamophobia by conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism and demonising the Palestine movement.
Peddling monoculture and much, much more. In June, polls showed support for One Nation peaking at 31 percent, but by the end of July it had dropped to 25.5 percent. Some voters considering One Nation clearly had second thoughts after Hanson’s well-publicised speech to the National Press Club revealed on her policies.
Hanson’s speech put her plan for a monoculture Australia front and centre. She also called climate change a hoax, blamed the net zero target for increasing energy costs, pledged to scrap government subsidies for renewables and announced she would shut down the Department of Climate Change. The Senator demonstrated how out of touch she is with working women, bagging parental leave, childcare and working-from-home arrangements. She expressed scepticism about the existence of a gender pay gap and vowed to sack the Sex Discrimination Commissioner.
Next came a broadside against transgender rights, including the bizarre claim that “transgender ideology” has penetrated every aspect of government. The Senator pledged to abolish the Special Broadcasting Service and make the Australian Broadcasting Corporation a subscription service in the cities. She also announced that One Nation would abolish the National Indigenous Australians Agency and scrap all programs designed for First Nations people.
Hostility to workers featured heavily in the speech. Hanson promised more powers for bosses to fire “lazy” workers. One Nation has a long anti-worker voting record. Its MPs have voted against legislation making it easier for casual workers to become permanent, as well as laws giving greater rights to gig workers. One Nation also opposed laws expanding the functions of the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency to include silica — which, inhaled, causes serious lung damage. It also said No to measures to help unions address wage theft.
Hanson recently generated more controversy when she called domestic violence “a two-way street.” She has long supported misogynist men’s rights groups, regularly making victim-blaming comments about domestic violence. She argues that women weaponise false allegations of violence from intimate partners in the Family Court.
In an interview on Sky News, Hanson outlined her priorities for her first 100 days if she were to win a majority. As well as “shutting down” all Welcome to Country ceremonies, she vowed to reduce government spending by slashing for the National Disability Insurance Scheme funding.
Hobnobbing with the elites… Pauline Hanson’s political brand is to present herself as a plain-speaking, everyday Australian and political outsider. Yet her party is being bankrolled by the richest person in the country, mining magnate Gina Rinehart. The billionaire gifted Hanson a plane worth $2.1 million. In July, Rinehart financed a holiday to Sicily for herself and Hanson, where they stayed in lavish hotels and attended a luxury fashion show.
Last November, Pauline travelled with Gina to Florida in the magnate’s private jet. There Hanson spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference, calling for defence spending to be increased to five percent of GDP and funded through slashing the public sector.While in town, the duo took the opportunity to attend Trump’s exclusive Great Gatsby-themed Halloween event at Mar-a-Lago.
Other donors happy to slip six-figure donations to One Nation include property developers, stockbrokers and employer organisations.
…and neo-Nazis. One Nation wants to be seen as mainstream. It is not an expressly fascist party seeking to completely crush working-class organisation, but Hanson and her ilk seem to care little about associating with neo-Nazis. The party provides fascists with a welcoming milieu in which to organise and recruit.
In July, Hanson generated a media storm after appearing on a podcast alongside Tommy Robinson, where she praised the White Australia policy that had been officially dismantled in 1975. Robinson founded the far right English Defence League, which mobilised the National Front and football hooligans into a violent street movement.
Last year Hanson, along with Warren Pickering — the newly minted leader of the party in Victoria — and Queensland Senator Malcolm Roberts, were all happy to address crowds infested with neo-Nazis at far-right March for Australia rallies. All are right at home in One Nation, which is riddled with rusted-on conspiracy theorists.
Let’s get organised! Despite One Nation’s anti-establishment appearance, it is a dangerous outfit that will do nothing to ameliorate the distress pushing some voters toward it. Beneath the rhetoric of doing something for the battlers, One Nation’s voting record and policies would deliver a windfall for its capitalist backers. Working-class voters fed up with political business-as-usual should instead consider the solutions that socialist candidates offer.
Also needed is a broad, democratic and bold united front. Agreed principles will be essential to unify the resistance and appeal to all of Hanson’s scapegoats. Rank-and-file trade unionists, in all their diversity, have a crucial role.
It is time to challenge the stale campaigns peddled by the trade union bureaucracy whenever an election is in the air. Any strategy that funnels activists into a Vote Labor campaign woefully misses the mark. Albanese publicly characterises One Nation as a party offering anger and slogans rather than real solutions. Yet this government continues the shift to the right, normalising the One Nation agenda through, among other things, plans to slash immigration.
When far-right white nationalists organised a “Put Australia First” anti-immigrant rally in Melbourne last November, “No house? No job? Blame capitalism, not migrants!” was the message on a Freedom Socialist Party placard that received coverage in the mainstream media. Pauline Hanson travelled from Queensland to speak, and the far-right rally, which also featured a live cross to Tommy Robinson in the UK.
To build a tenacious fightback capable of defeating right-wing populism, we need to fight for solutions to the very real economic pain driving voters towards it. That means uprooting capitalism.
