While opinion polls show Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (PHON) ahead of the Coalition, how substantial or transient this is remains a political question.
The ABC, using election analyst William Bowe’s figures, charted the rise of PHON from when its vote in the House of Representatives was below 5%, climbing to just over 6% last year, to its recent 27%.
The dramatic rise began last May, after the Coalition scored its worst-ever election result, with a -3.85% national swing.
With Sussan Ley as leader, PHON was polling 25% to the Coalition’s 20%. Under Taylor, the Coalition is matching PHON at 23%.
The latest Newspoll, conducted February 5-8 from a sample of 1234, had Labor on 33%, One Nation 27%, the Coalition on 18%, the Greens on 12% and “others” on 10% of primary votes.
While debate rages over whether PHON could overtake the Coalition at an actual election, similar developments in other Western countries makes the prospect seem possible.
In the United States, “MAGA Republicans” aligned to President Donald Trump have taken over the Republican party. Garden variety Republican politicians have had to demonstrate personal loyalty to Trump to maintain their seats or advance their careers.
In Britain, the far-right Reform Party has been polling well ahead of all other parties for close to a year and dozens of prominent Conservative Party members — including shadow cabinet members and current and former members of parliament — have switched to Reform. It is plausible that Reform could be elected to a Coalition government at the next election.
Australia’s electoral system privileges the major parties, and includes preferential and compulsory voting. This makes it more challenging for an insurgent party (right or left) to overtake the major parties.
However politics, rather than electoral technicalities, will determine what happens.
The Liberals are still internally divided over how much they want to embrace Hanson’s right-wing populism. although Taylor is indicating he would like to resuscitate John Howard’s racist anti-immigration focus, he is baulking at PHON’s call for Trump-like protectionist measures.
The faction, led by Andrew Hastie, wants the Liberals to go that way. Taylor told the ABC’s February 16 Four Corners that the Liberal Party had to abandon its former support for “globalisation”.
Hastie is said to be favored by the conservative Advance lobby group, which is cashed up because of generous donations by Gina Rhinehart and several other Australian billionaires.
Former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, a moderate conservative who is unhappy with Taylor’s ascendency, believes the Liberals cannot win by “showing yourself to be even more tough or anti-immigration than [Hanson]”. Turnbull is urging the Coalition to plant itself in the “political centre” to try and take ground from Labor.
No matter how far right the major parties’ policies go, Hanson will always trump them. She affirmed this recently while answering a question about Taylor’s promise to be “tough” on immigration.
“The big issue that we have is from the fundamentalist Islamic countries,” Hanson said. “Did Angus Taylor say he will target migrants that are coming from those countries? Did he say he’ll put a stop to it?”
She told Sky News on February 17: “If we open up the borders and let more of them into the country we’re going to suffer … I’ve no time for the radical Islam.”
Labor and the Coalition have both stolen policies from PHON. Taylor was coy on the ABC’s 7.30 on February 16, about a leaked Liberal immigration policy which would prevent people from parts of countries seeking citizenship here. However, he didn’t say he opposed it.
The next day Albanese said Labor would not help repatriate women and children in refugee camps in northern Syria, because of their “links” to Islamic State (IS). Some have said they were forced to travel to Syria, and that many of their children were born in IS camps. Four Australian women and 13 children were repatriated in 2022, with Labor’s support.
Meanwhile many, especially younger people, continue to look for alternatives to the major parties, as the cost-of-living and housing crises bite hard.
Taylor and Hanson blame migrants, and specifically those from certain countries, for the structural problems caused by capitalism. They, like Labor, refuse to adopt meaningful solutions.
Isaac Nellist, a housing campaigner and Socialist Alliance candidate in the March 2027 NSW elections, told Green Left that Taylor’s promise to restore “the dream of home ownership” to younger generations “rings hollow”.
“The ratio of house prices to median wages in the early 2000s has shot up from four to more than eight times today,” Nellist said.
“But Taylor does not want to cut the landlord tax concessions that raise house prices; he wants to leave it to the market to ‘increase supply’. Neither does he support expanding public housing and he certainly doesn't want wages to double. So he has no solution for the housing crisis.
“He agrees with Hanson’s blame on migrants, but even the housing industry bosses say Australia needs more workers from overseas to build the houses Australia needs.”
Nellist said scapegoating migrants for political problems “only stirs hate and divides people”.
He said it’s a deflection from asking why governments keep enabling billionaire greed and “what we can do to win or real solutions to pressing problems, including the housing and cost-of-living crises, war, racism and the climate crisis — which One Nation and many current Liberal politicians dismiss as a ‘hoax’.”