The bookies were right, unfortunately. For the first time since 1996, Pauline Hanson has captured a seat in the House of Representatives via the democratic process, and this time it wasn’t in Queensland.
For political punters, it was interesting watching Sportsbet as the Farrer by-election campaign unfolded. Just weeks ago, the bookies had One Nation’s candidate David Farley and community independent Michelle Milthorpe running neck and neck. Then the Liberals and Nationals decided to commit political harakiri by preferencing One Nation ahead of Milthorpe, and Farley pulled steadily ahead, finding himself in what was correctly predicted to be an unassailable position.
Labor didn’t run a candidate in this by-election, and most of the people who voted Liberal last time jumped ship directly to One Nation. The Nationals increased their vote slightly, perhaps helped by Matt Canavan’s swag stunt, but it was a long way from the glory days of their former Farrer representative Tim Fischer.
The whole catastrophe was brought on by the Liberals’ decision to knife their first female leader, Sussan Ley, before she’d even settled into the role, supposedly because she was so unpopular, although she managed to comfortably hang on to Farrer for 25 years. Now Ley’s replacement Angus Taylor is plumbing new depths of unpopularity and irrelevancy.
On election night, Ley quoted Taylor’s own words back at him with interest, saying the Farrer result showed the Liberal Party needed to change or die.
Dodgy tactics and dirty tricks
These included corflutes containing lies about political donations to Michelle Milthorpe’s community-driven campaign (she actually only received 2 per cent of her campaign finances from Climate 200) and others pledging One Nation’s support for alleged war criminal Ben Roberts-Smith, the subject of a current legal investigation, which didn’t stop him being pictured in full uniform, complete with poppies, on PHON advertising material.
The scale of Gina Rinehart’s financial contribution to One Nation’s result in Farrer, while clearly substantial, will not be known for some time, if ever. Interestingly, the informal vote was way down on last time, suggesting a more focused electorate, and one determined to send a message to Canberra.
Gina’s latest sock puppet, David Farley, showed signs during the campaign of not wanting to stay in his box (he understands the science of climate change, for example), which must have worried his PHON minders, although his first words on election night came straight from the populist playbook.
‘We’ve got to address immigration. It’s as simple as that,’ he said. ‘We don’t want other countries bringing their culture into ours. We need Australia for Australians.’
Ah, Australians, who are those people again? Clearly not anyone who arrived after the British apart from ‘good quality, assimilating migrants’, or the original inhabitants (entirely unmentioned), although the PHON party DJ later cranked out Goanna’s land rights anthem ‘Solid Rock’ and ‘You’re The Voice’, which Farnesy donated to the Voice campaign.
For her part, Pauline Hanson immediately declared what had just happened ‘a win for the rest of Australia’.
Implications and questions
One Nation’s lack of a coherent policy platform doesn’t seem to matter to their angry, disenfranchised supporters, but it seems premature to jump on the bandwagon that sees Pauline Hanson as some kind of orange second coming, or pestilential plague, depending on your mindset.
Farrer has always been a profoundly conservative place, which never voted Labor. The results of this by-election will be much more alarming to the Liberals and Nationals than to the government. There are also lessons for community-based independents. Despite the substantial resources ranged against her, and the lack of any party structure, Michelle Milthorpe managed to win over 28 per cent of the primary vote.
One Nation still has no legislative power, and remains a sideshow in the Senate, but they certainly have some remarkable political momentum, helped by extraordinary levels of media coverage from the old empires of Seven, Nine, Ten and Sky.
Still, questions abound. There’s no guarantee that David Farley will last a whole term as a One Nation representative, or manage to work effectively with Barnaby Joyce in the Reps. He’s dallied with various political parties in the past. Will he jump ship like so many of Pauline’s other recruits?
There’s an expectation in some quarters that the Farrer result, and what happened recently in South Australia, will ripple across the borders of Victoria for the forthcoming state election.
Perhaps Queenslanders aren’t so different after all? Can One Nation get organised and cohesive enough to threaten Labor federally? Will little Paulines be popping up at every local council election across the country over the next few years? Will Barnaby take over and run the whole thing into a tree one drunken night?
Federally, Anthony Albanese is probably safe for now, as Australia’s old opposition goes the way of the Tories in the UK, but he also has the example of Sir Keir Starmer staring him in the face to remind him of what can happen to a leader who is Labor in name only, and fails to take the country with him.
In the near future, much will depend on the boldness or otherwise of the government’s budget, to be announced tomorrow.
Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning filmmaker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.
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