Like or loathe her, Pauline Hanson raises national issues that need airing

Pauline Hanson is a survivor and nobody’s fool but the haters come out in force when someone dares to discuss her human side — as Jessica Rowe discovered the hard way.

Pauline Hanson has plenty of haters, but she’s a survivor and airs issues that need to be raised. Picture: Peter Lorimer

Australia desperately needs politicians like One Nation leader Pauline Hanson in our parliament.

Voters know this and keep electing her — first in the lower house in federal parliament and now as a Queensland Senator.

In a time of lousy leadership by career political figures with little or no real-life experience, Hanson — whether you loathe or love her, or something in between — raises national issues that need airing.

She’s real.

Pauline might not be the most sophisticated elected representative we have ever had in Canberra but she sure is a survivor and her critics need to look a little bit deeper.

One of the easiest commentating roles in this country is to bag Pauline, call her a racist, label her xenophobic – she famously didn’t know on a TV interview what it meant and, don’t worry, most of the people laughing at her had to look it up as well.

To call her a survivor is an understatement.

She may not be as sophisticated as most politicians but Senator Pauline Hanson is real and speaks her mind. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

Pauline has faced death threats by the bucket load, was forced to have federal police protection wherever she appeared to speak publicly. She has been thrown in jail and then released after just 11 weeks of a three-year sentence.

She blames Liberal heroes John Howard and Tony Abbott for her conviction for electoral fraud, a sentence later quashed.

Hanson doesn’t need me to stick up for her and I have never considered voting One Nation and at one stage even sued – and won — over comments one of her One Nation candidates made about me.

I have been commenting on and interviewing Pauline for 21 years. The last time I spoke to her on radio was this week and we laughed about the absurd image of our Prime Minister Scott Morrison making a curry on his barbecue at The Lodge during his Canberra quarantine.

Pauline and I both agreed steaks are better suited to barbecues than eggplant curry.

Twenty-one years ago, though, it was no laughing matter between us. I was presenting the Drive program on 3AW and Hanson was standing for a Queensland Senate spot after forming One Nation and losing her lower house seat back in 1998.

Hanson had peaked early in her political career but her inflammatory comments about Aboriginal welfare and Asian migration had severely narrowed her public support, slumping from a high of 22 per cent back to about 5 per cent.

Pauline has always been happy to play the media game and if you wanted a headline 20-odd years ago you’d whack Pauline on air for an argument.

On that occasion we went at it like we always did back then, and I said thanks for coming on and went on to the next interview.

Steve Price has agreed with Senator Hanson plenty of times, including famously on the Today Show over tourists being able to climb Uluru.

Sadly, for Pauline — and in the end more sadly for me — she had failed to hang up her mobile phone correctly and the station in Melbourne was still rolling tape on her conversation.

Throwing to a commercial break my producing team were collapsing in laughter and I asked what was up and they explained that they had listened in to her conversation with someone driving her around.

Turns out (and Pauline narrowly lost that Senate bid) that she had told her driver and I am paraphrasing here, something like “see that’s how you do it. Have an argument with people like Price, say a few outrageous things and they give you more airtime”.

Hanson was, of course, spot on but being a bit of a smart-arse back then and having a federal Senate candidate on tape revealing her political tactics, I couldn’t resist turning the secretly taped exchange between Pauline and driver around.

So we played it over and over and laughed to anyone who wanted to hear it about this hillbilly and the way she thought she could play the media.

As I said though, Pauline is nobody’s fool. She reported me to ACMA, the then media authority, who threatened 3AW with a breach of its licence unless we immediately apologised.

The grovelling came the next day and it taught me a valuable lesson about Senator Hanson – never, ever underestimate her.

We have traded blows many times since and agreed plenty of times, as well — including famously on the Today Show over tourists being able to climb Uluru. That little exchange sent the Twitterati brigade into a meltdown.

The keyboard critics and Hanson-haters were at it again last week when one of the nicest people on the planet, Jessica Rowe, conducted an absorbing podcast chat about a side of Pauline her haters want the media to ignore – her human side.

Well, talk about a pile-on. It eventually led to Jessica, mindful of her own wellbeing, asking the podcast company that I work for five days a week to take it down.

I’m not Jessica and I haven’t spoken to her for years, so I have no idea the damage the critics were doing to her mental health with their over-the-top attacks.

I wish she had seen fit to stare down her critics, including Australian of the Year Grace Tame. I have nothing but regard for Grace’s campaign for victim’s rights and the vital right to be free to speak out even when those truths are hard to hear.

One of the nicest people on the planet, Jessica Rowe, did a podcast about Hanson’s human side and paid the price. Picture: Instagram

The irony shouldn’t be lost here. Pauline Hanson Queensland Senator and One Nation party leader has the same right to be heard even if you disagree with what’s she saying, and the words she is using are hard to hear.

Pauline is tough and brave to many — a racial bigot to others — but she has always and will always be true to herself.

I’ll continue to interview her when I wish to and I’ll pull her up when I disagree with what she is saying. That’s how the media in this country has always worked.

People who want to silence those they disagree with, to rip them down, insult them and then attack those who simply believe both sides deserve to be heard, are wrong.

Last time I saw Pauline face to face was at her home in Queensland. She agreed to let me interview her at home which is rare.

When we had finished she dished up some banana cake and a couple of cold beers. I never told her this but the cake tasted about as good, I suspect, as that barbecued curry the PM dished up last weekend did.

LIKES

• Bunnings sausage sizzles are back in NSW. Time to fire them up here.

• Fingers crossed, family visits to be allowed at 70 per cent double dosed.

• Schools returning even if for limited days.

• Ron Barassi proudly holding the 2021 Premiership Cup.

DISLIKES

• Any dithering over the sale of poppies by the RSL in the CBD for November 11.

• Calls to ban petrol powered mowers and other garden tools.

• Being forced to watch the funeral of a beloved aunt online instead of in person.

• Nonsense of forcing retailers to open to outdoor selling only – crazy!

Australia Today with Steve Price can be heard live from 7am weekdays via the LiSTNR app.

Originally published as Like or loathe her, Pauline Hanson raises national issues that need airing