Pauline: power of her personality keeps her in the headlines

Pauline Hanson. Picture: Alix Sweeney.

When Pauline Hanson first came to national attention it was because of her anti-Asian stance. She would have thrived under the White Australia policy that governed our immigration posture for several decades. Both major parties found comfort in a policy that guaranteed Australia would be overwhelmingly white.

We were even a bit wary of allowing southern Europeans in because they were not Persil white. The need for labour, skilled and unskilled, for projects such as the Snowy Mountain Scheme forced the abandonment of supremacist policies.

The old Yugoslavia was the source of many of these new Australians, which reminds me of a question: why is it that Croatians and Serbs could live together in relative peace while Tito was alive but immediately resorted to killing each other upon his death?

For Hanson, her early years in politics were occasionally difficult but she has worked assiduously to get across the major issues. It is always going to be difficult trying to be a one-woman band. Her efforts to create a real party behind her have never recovered from that American strip joint that one of her male deputies was discovered enjoying to the full.

Without a real party structure, it is difficult to stay in the national spotlight for long. Nonetheless, the power of Hanson’s personality has been sufficient for her face to be featured in the newspapers of every capital city in the country.

Mark Latham saw his chance and linked up with her. That should give him enough votes to survive another election in NSW. In the other states, however, it is likely that getting candidates elected to parliaments will be a continual struggle.

Hanson will go down in history as the redhead who almost made it to the top. Perhaps we should not be too surprised at the massacre she and her party suffered at the last Queensland election. When she is not running, the mob is not interested in supporting her underlings.

As a federal election approaches Labor must again be concerned about her impact. While Hanson’s vote could be as low as 4 per cent, that still represents a considerable hurdle for Labor. If preferences break 3 per cent to 1 per cent, in favour of the Coalition, as I would expect, it will be a tall order for Labor to win.

Now that Craig Kelly has demeaned himself by aligning with Clive Palmer, he will be a senior conservative voice lost to the cause. If you line up with Palmer, you have self-administered the kiss of death.

It is true Kelly had already disgraced himself with his anti-vaccination mutterings. He had many views that were similar to Hanson’s, but she has a better nose for what the public will stomach, and she is well aware that Palmer is considered beyond the pale.

Up until his vaccination stance, I had believed the parliament needed a few free-wheelers like Kelly, but that view has now changed completely. Few will mourn when he loses his seat.

When independents have to be relied on by a major party, trouble begins immediately brewing. No one can forget that 17-minute harangue from Rob Oakeshott, the member for Lyne, when he was elected a few years back. His speech wandered all over the political landscape, as he well knew this was his moment in the spotlight and that such a moment might never come again.

In the end he put us all out of our misery and supported Julia Gillard. Oakeshott can never be forgiven for that performance. Having to seek permission from someone like him before embarking on any major policy must have been terribly annoying for Gillard but she handled it with her customary dignity.

Scott Morrison made his name as immigration minister and was famous for stopping the boats that had carried thousands of illegal immigrants to our shores. It would have been a political collision of great dimension if a few independents such as Oakeshott and Kerryn Phelps were in the parliament at that time.

Fortunately for Morrison, he faced no such impediments. The old saying “you can have the argument, give me the numbers” is probably worth repeating now.

Our voting system favours Hanson because she can get enough primary votes to get up towards the Senate quota of 14.7 per cent in a half-Senate election.

It is hard to see her being beaten in Queensland. If she does eke out enough votes, then the confusion that envelops her will be around for some time to come.

Hanson, Latham and confusion. They go together like birds of a feather.