Pauline Hanson may have an enormous media profile, but One Nation’s falling support is exposing the widening gulf between political attention and electoral credibility. Hanson’s latest European road show – attacking multiculturalism, Muslims, transgender people, net zero and supposedly shadowy “globalists” – shows how far the party depends on grievance politics rather than practical answers to Australia’s housing crisis, stagnant wages, deteriorating public services and rising cost of living. Culture-war rhetoric can generate headlines, but it won’t build homes, improve hospitals or challenge the economic policies that have deepened inequality.
Hanson’s claim to represent the forgotten Australian battlers also becomes harder to sustain when she appears alongside far-right activist Tommy Robinson, attends an exclusive Italian fashion event and socialises with mining billionaire Gina Rinehart. Questions about who funded or facilitated the trip only bring that contradiction into focus. Meanwhile, the Nationals and sections of the Liberal Party are adopting much of the same language about migration, “woke institutions” and left-wing globalists, apparently convinced that imitating One Nation offers a path back to government after repeated election defeats.
Hanson’s confused position on the White Australia policy, enthusiasm for Donald Trump-style immigration enforcement and comments describing domestic violence as a “two-way street” reveal the deeper problem: almost every social change is presented as a threat, while corporate power, wealth inequality and political failure escape scrutiny. The Australian media may concentrate on Barnaby Joyce shouting at his dog or Hanson’s latest tirade, but voters are capable of seeing right through the charade.
If One Nation has reached its political high-water mark and now starts to fall away, it may be because grievance without solutions eventually runs out of room to work in – and because Hanson cannot indefinitely pose as the champion of ordinary Australians while keeping company with the billionaire class.
