‘We’re sick of the lot of you’: Pauline Hanson backlash only fuelling One Nation

All right, we'll get into some of that polling today.One Nation, of course, regaining the ground it lost last month, now sitting level with Labor on a 30 per cent primary.This is News Poll, so a very reputable poll.The Coalition's also seen a two -point boost.It's still well behind, though, on 19 per cent.The Prime Minister is in the lead, Anthony Albanese as preferred PM.

Pauline Hanson sitting ahead of Angus Taylor.Joining me now to discuss this and a whole lot more, Senior Fellow at the Menzies Research Centre, Nick Cater, and former Liberal MP, Nicole Flint.Welcome to you both.Nick, you've written beautifully today in The Australian about the rise of Hanson and One Nation.You really pulled it apart.You're sceptical, yes, of her long -term ability to lead, but you're saying that she's there and she's strong and she's continuing to stay high in the polls because she's filling gaps that are absent on the right.

Yeah, I mean, I wrote in The Australian more than a year ago after the last election that there was a Farage shaped hole, if you like, opened up in the electorate.You know, more than a third of people voted none of the above.They were looking for a force like reform in the UK to turn to.There didn't appear to be one at the time, but it's since emerged that it's Pauline Hanson and One Nation.Everybody who voted none of the above, certainly on the centre right, has gravitated to One Nation.And they're not going away, Peter.

I think the people who think that Pauline Hanson's words or actions in the last week or so are are going to spell the end for her.I've read that in the nine newspapers.They clearly don't understand what she represents.It's the none of the above vote.It is the we're sick of the lot of you vote.They've had it with the mainstream political parties.

It's going to take a lot to win them back.And a few headlines about Pauline Hanson's indiscreet remarks is not going to budge these polls one iota in my view.

Yeah, Nick, I just played those remarks, Nicole Flint.I just played those remarks at the top of the program.There was a response, we hear it across most of the commercial media, but there was also a strong response today from Greens Senator Sarah Hanson -Young.Let's listen.

She will try to slip and slide like the trickiest politician.And Pauline Hanson has been in politics for 30 years.30 years.She is tricky.She's one of the trickiest politicians out there.She says that she knows exactly what she's doing.

Now, this is interesting, Nicole.This is coming straight out of focus groups here, because for a long time, they've tried to claim that Pauline Hanson was naive, that she was stupid, that she's sort of a blunt instrument, that she's coarse, all of those things.Now they're reminding people that she's not new.She's been there for 30 years.So, you know, don't don't just adopt the shiny, bright thing.But also that she's tricky, that she's cunning, that this is all very practised.

So there's a shift now.The Greens are taking her on.There's certainly been a shift with the prime minister.The coalition, I think, is still not sure at all how they play her.Do they attack her?Do they leave her out of the conversation?

And the mainstream media who want to sell eyeballs and newspapers, well, they're certainly running her at the top of their headlines most nights.Give me your sense of things.

Well, I wouldn't trust anything that Greens have to say to start with, Peter.And in terms of people who have had a very long career in politics, Sarah Hansen -Young is one of them.So I think that's a little bit rich coming from her.Look, I think also I would say to viewers, and I'm sure they're doing this themselves, have a really careful look at what the reports are actually saying and the allegations that are being made about what Senator Pauline Hanson says versusthe facts of what she said.I think that on occasions she doesn't express things as well as perhaps she could.

But when it comes to immigration in particular, which the current debate seems to be focused around, we know that she is reflecting the genuine concerns of a lot of Australians that we have a real problem with the level of immigration at the moment, with Labour letting in one and a half million people more than we have living in Adelaide in a few short years, that we are welcoming people who don't necessarily share our values, who don't respect our Judeo -Christian values, our Westminster parliamentary system, things like equality for women.They don't respect other cultures.And we have seen that Jewish Australians in particular feel really unsafe.And that is not an outcome we want for Australia.So I totally understand why people are interested in what Senator Hanson has to say, particularly on immigration.And it's a really big challenge for the coalition to get across as well.

And this is, of course, played out, Nick Cater, as you know, in the United Kingdom.It's played out a little bit in the United States.But I think the best parallel is in Britain.They pushed away this immigration issue.They buried the cultural concerns.So not just the numbers coming in, but the change of the culture by some of the people coming into the country.

They've pushed this away for many, many years.And now they have this outbreak with Farage and, you know, beyond him and many others speaking out.And it's a it's a It's a big, big problem for the two major parties over there.You have that playing out in Australia, Nick, and the more that you push this away and you pretend it's not a not a genuine debate to have, it will just go underground.I mean, I think the genie's out of the bottle.I think Australians are desperate for this debate to be had on adult terms.

and they want it to be a fair and genuine and temperate debate, absolutely, but they don't want it shut down.

No, exactly.I mean, most Australians, the polling will show you most Australians are still solidly in favour of immigration.Most Australians have no problem with the fact that we take migrants from just about every country in the world.They do have a problem with those who don't want to come here and become Australian and want to try and turn this country into something else.That's what we have a problem with.That's what we've got to focus on.

But they do have a problem with the numbers and the sense that things are out of control.We don't have the illegal migration problem that we had back in 2013 when the Gillard government left, thank goodness.But we have an equally difficult problem to deal with, and that's the number of temporary migrants coming in, particularly on student visas, people who are staying on and bridging visas.It's creating this whole pool of three million people in Australia, but not part of it, on temporary visas of one sort or another.That didn't used to exist, and that's what's giving people the sense that this is out of control.And they simply want it brought back under control and then they can support the policy again.

But this is going to play right into One Nation's hands.But I do think that the coalition have actually been doing well on this.I just don't think that they've been necessarily heard above the noise.

Right.A quick one for both of you before I go.Nick Cater.These revelations today, I started at the top of the program talking about what I had observed overseas, but I also then talked about Victoria and why the Victorian state election in November is actually an election that everyone in Australia should care about.Because if Victoria continues to fail, every Australian will bear the consequences.These revelations that the former Victorian Labor Treasurer Tim Pallis sought a federal government bailout on a rescue plan in 2024 only just

these problems?

Well, they do, because, you know, I mean, the Victorian government is claiming that it's financially secure and the rest, but it has the largest borrowing per capita of any state, per capita of any state in the country.Spending is out of control.It's giving money away to the Scots, for goodness sake, to run the Commonwealth Games.But at the bottom line is if the state of Victoria goes broke, It is the Commonwealth that bails it out.It is the rest of us.And so this will have an enormous, it's already having an enormous impact on our economy more broadly, but it will have a direct impact if Victoria gets into such trouble that it needs a bailout.

And that's not entirely off the cards right now, Peter.