One Nation leader Pauline Hanson used her first address to the National Press Club to put immigration and housing affordability at the centre of her pitch to Australian voters, calling both the country’s most pressing problems.
Speaking in Canberra on 17 June, in her first appearance at the club in a 30-year political career, Hanson urged that migration be slashed to help ease the housing crisis, promised action on the cost-of-living crisis and pledged more spending on homelessness.
The speech landed as her party’s standing rises. Polling now puts One Nation’s primary vote ahead of both Labor and the Coalition, and the latest Resolve poll has Hanson ahead as preferred prime minister after she outpaced Anthony Albanese in Newspoll this week.
She attacked Labor’s budget changes to negative gearing and the 50% capital gains tax discount, arguing the reforms would hurt ambitious young people, and labelled Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ defence of the plans “pathetic”.
She also pledged to axe SBS and turn the ABC into a subscription service in capital cities, with regional services protected, and said abortion should be banned after 20 weeks, with exemptions to protect the mother’s health.
Her 51-minute address did not go uninterrupted. A banner planted by activist group GetUp appeared behind the podium, saying she had opposed a pay rise for workers while taking a $100,000 pay rise herself, and the press club later referred footage of the stunt to federal police and apologised to her.
Reaction split on party lines. Greens leader Larissa Waters called the speech “incoherent hatred,” while Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said One Nation stood against every cost-of-living measure his government had introduced.
Sources
- Pauline Hanson says Australia ‘must be monocultural’ in National Press Club speech | Pauline Hanson | The Guardian
- Pauline Hanson monoculture claims: One Nation leader demands end to multiculturalism, calls climate change a hoax in National Press Club speech
