“Yesterday they crossed a line,” One Nation leader Pauline Hanson said on Monday, aiming at Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Treasurer Jim Chalmers. She posted the statement on X a day after both men used a Queensland Labor conference in Brisbane to go after her party.
Albanese told delegates that “hard right populists” were advancing around the world, “peddling politics that is dangerous, divisive, and downright dishonest”. He added: “We simply must defeat them. We owe it to history.” Chalmers separately warned of a possible future alliance between the Liberals, Nationals and One Nation, which he called a “dangerous and divisive coalition of chaos”.
Hanson said describing democratically elected opponents as “dangerous” or a “threat to our country” risked leading people to see them and their supporters as legitimate targets. “Words have consequences. That is how political violence is incited,” she said.
She also accused Albanese of hypocrisy. He had called in January for Australia to “lower the temperature of debate in this country across the board”, and again in February after a bomb threat forced him out of The Lodge for a time. “Meanwhile, he and his Treasurer are pouring petrol all over it,” Hanson said. In the same statement she argued that the real danger was the government’s “incompetent economic management” pushing up rent, mortgages and bills.
The Widdecombe case
Hanson pointed to the killing of the British politician Ann Widdecombe as a reason to be careful with language. Widdecombe, a former Conservative cabinet minister later linked with the Brexit Party and Reform UK, was found dead at her home in Devon in July. Joshua Kerry, 28, has been charged with her murder, and prosecutors allege a targeted hammer attack.
The link to rhetoric is not established. British authorities have not said she was killed because of political language aimed at her. The Crown Prosecution Service said investigators are still examining the accused man’s motives, including a possible political or terrorist connection, and police said earlier there was no evidence at that stage that the killing was politically motivated. Kerry has not been found guilty of anything.
The polling behind the fight
The exchange follows a Newspoll by Pyxis Polling & Insights for The Australian that put One Nation on 30 per cent of the primary vote, Labor on 29 and the Coalition on 19. About 1,243 voters were surveyed. A RedBridge poll released the same Monday was tighter: Labor 29, One Nation 28, Coalition 22, with Labor ahead 52-48 once preferences were applied.
One Nation also won the Secret Harbour by-election in Western Australia on Saturday. Luke Herdegen took a safe Labor seat with close to 40 per cent of first preferences, giving the party its first lower-house MP in the state’s parliament.
Albanese still leads as preferred prime minister, on 46 per cent to Hanson’s 31 and Opposition Leader Angus Taylor’s 23, and he leads Hanson 56-44 head to head. Victoria votes in November and New South Wales in March 2027.
