Strip club footage that ended in Steve Dickson’s resignation leaked ‘without consent’
Video of One Nation’s Steve Dickson in a strip club ended in his resignation today. But the secret footage was never meant to be seen.
In a stunning development, the news network that secretly filmed One Nation’s Steve Dickson inside a US strip club has said it never wanted the covert footage released.
Al Jazeera spent three years investigating One Nation, secretly filming the political party in Australia and the US, but it says this latest footage was “not in the public interest”.
The footage formed part of an investigation called How To Sell A Massacre that exposed One Nation’s Queensland leader Steve Dickson and chief of staff James Ashby plotting to water down Australia’s gun laws.
The explosive investigation revealed senior One Nation figures trying to bag millions of dollars in political donations from America’s largest gun rights lobby, the NRA.
But last night — one month after the NRA damning footage was released — Nine’s A Current Affair dealt another blow to One Nation, airing the US strip club footage collected by Al Jazeera’sundercover reporter.
Mr Dickson resigned last night after the A Current Affair report aired and he was exposed for making lewd comments and gestures in a strip club in September last year.
Al Jazeera has now “condemned” the A Current Affair report, claiming it did not give consent to the footage being released.
“Images obtained by an undercover reporter working for Al Jazeera have appeared on an Australian network without the consent of Al Jazeera Media Network,” the network’s investigative journalism director Phil Rees said in a statement.
Mr Rees said Al Jazeera made the decision not to put the footage in its How To Sell A Massacre investigation as it did “not consider it in the public interest”.
“Despite Al Jazeera’s own decision not to publish the images, they have now been published without our consent,” Mr Rees said. “Al Jazeera condemns the unauthorised use of its material.”
HANSON STORMS AWAY FROM REPORTERS IN HEATED EXCHANGE
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson stormed away from a press conference after answering questions about her Queensland leader being forced to resign over leaked strip club footage.
One Nation’s Queensland leader Steve Dickson handed in his resignation late last night after he was caught on camera in a lewd video in a US strip club appearing to grope and proposition exotic dancers and make racist remarks.
In the footage aired by A Current Affair last night, the married 56-year-old says at one point, “I’ve done more Asian than I know what to do with”.
Speaking to reporters from her home this morning, Ms Hanson said she was “both shocked and disappointed at the vision I was forced to watch”.
Ms Hanson said Al Jazeera had “conveniently” given the tapes to A Current Affair less than three weeks out from the federal election but she was unable to “ignore or condone” the footage.
“I am both a mother of three boys and the only female leader of a political party in this country. I wouldn’t tolerate my own children behaving this way towards women,” Ms Hanson said.
The press conference quickly turned heated when Ms Hanson was asked about Mr Dickson already being embroiled in a scandal from a month ago — when he was caught on camera trying to get funds from the NRA.
The former Queensland leader and Ms Hanson’s chief of staff James Ashby were exposed in a three-year Al Jazeera investigation in March by an undercover journalist posing as an NRA lobbyist.
“Sorry. They were not talking to the NRA. That was to the Al Jazeera journalist. Sorry. You’re wrong,” Ms Hanson said.
As the reporter attempted to tell Ms Hanson she “couldn’t argue” her candidate had tried to get funding from the NRA for her party, the One Nation leader stormed off.
One Nation’s NSW leader Mark Latham briefly addressed his colleague’s resignation on Sunrise this morning.
“He has no future in politics anymore and Pauline Hanson has made that crystal clear. There is not much more you can say about it, is there? It is pretty clear cut,” he said.
Before walking away, Ms Hanson described Mr Dickson as a “family man” and said he was “deeply upset” about being caught visiting a strip club.
“I’m not going to judge him any further. It is a family matter. I never got involved with Barnaby Joyce’s issue, or Cheryl Kernot, or the other politicians. And don’t forget that Kevin Rudd himself visited a strip club,” Ms Hanson told reporters.
Mr Dickson has since released a statement over the footage, apologising for his behaviour and saying it was not a “true reflection” of him.
“The footage shown does not reflect the person I am. It shows a person who was drunk and not in control of his actions and I take full responsibility for allowing that to happen,” Mr Dickson said.
He said he had immediately told his wife Debbie the day after he visited the strip club in September 2018 and admitted he had “little recollection of the night”.
Mrs Dickson is standing by her husband.
“I am deeply remorseful for the hurt that I have caused her, my family and the people that support me,” Mr Dickson said.
“I am also deeply remorseful for my disrespectful comments towards women.”
DICKSON CAUGHT IN LEAKED STRIP CLUB FOOTAGE
In the footage, Mr Dickson appears to continually grope a stripper’s breasts, places one-dollar notes inside her G-string and remarks about one of the girls, “Now that young lady has a wonderful set of cahoonas”.
The footage, secretly filmed in a Washington club by broadcaster Al Jazeera, was screened on Channel 9’s A Current Affair, which broadcast it for the first time.
In the video, Mr Dickson says: “Mate I haven’t been to one of these for a long time.”
After that he says, “you know what’s good about this?” and then makes a remark about seeing “titty”.
One dancer, in whose G-string beneath the table he appears to be planting dollar notes while he whispers in her ear exclaims, “he’s so demanding … he says you haven’t touched my ****”.
Mr Dickson remarks: “I am going to give her my address. She can come and *** me.”
He says of one dancer, “she’s ******* beautiful”.
As he leaves the club, Mr Dickson yells at the women, “Australia … you are beautiful, stunning”.
The scandal comes after he was filmed secretly by the same undercover Al Jazeera crew discussing guns with the American gun lobby.
Following release of that footage, Ms Hanson described Ms Dickson as a family man and “a “friend”.
Mr Dickson, 56, is a former Liberal MP for the Queensland electorates of Kawana and Buderim, on the Sunshine Coast.
He served as sports, national parks and racing minister for former Queensland premier Campbell Newman between 2012 and 2015.
ONE NATION EMBROILED IN MONTHS OF SCANDAL
Hanson’s acceptance of Mr Dickson’s resignation comes a month after her party was embroiled in a separate scandal — when One Nation was exposed trying to water down gun laws.
The explosive investigation revealed senior One Nation figures trying to bag millions of dollars in political donations from America’s largest gun rights lobby, while softening our gun control laws.
One Nation’s James Ashby and Steve Dickson both fronted the cameras to explain their conduct in the undercover footage. The pair were the central figures in the investigation.
Australian reporter Rodger Muller went undercover with Al Jazeera as part of a three-year investigation into how the National Rifle Association (NRA) attempts to promote gun ownership.
The results of the investigation spawned a documentary called How To Sell A Massacre, exposing One Nation’s efforts to solicit money from US gun advocates just weeks before Australia’s federal parliament banned foreign donations to political parties.
Hanson has repeatedly said she wants all of the Al Jazeera footage released after it not only exposed the NRA contact but also Mr Dickson’s behaviour in the Washington strip club.
Hanson also fell victim to the publication’s hidden cameras, appearing to suggest the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, where a gunman shot and killed 35 people at the Tasmanian former prison colony, was a government conspiracy.
RELATED: One Nation leader Pauline Hanson exposed by hidden camera
In one video released by the news network, Senator Hanson is secretly filmed saying she has “a lot of questions” about Port Arthur.
“An MP said it would actually take a massacre in Tasmania to change the gun laws in Australia,” Senator Hanson tells Rodger Muller, an Al Jazeera journalist who for three years pretended to be the leader of a fictitious firearm advocate group called Gun Rights Australia, an identity he established to infiltrate One Nation.
“Haven’t you heard that? Have a look at it. It was said on the floor of parliament.”
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