Although firm senate election figures may not be known for up to a month, it appears Pauline Hanson has been successful in her bid to return to federal parliament as a Queensland senator - she may even be joined by other One Nation candidates.
Based on the strength of One Nation's results in lower house seats across Queensland, it seems all but certain that the party's leader will secure at least one seat in the Senate.
“There’s a big mood-swing on against the major parties, and people are fed up,” she said earlier on election day. "People want Australian values, they want their culture, they want their way of life."
This election, the former fish and chip shop owner has been squarely focused on Islam and Muslim Australians.
“Islam does not believe in democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of the press or freedom or assembly,” a campaign press release reads.
One Nation’s platform calls for a Royal Commission into Islam, a ban on Islamic head-coverings, and for surveillance cameras to be installed in all Mosques and Islamic schools.
Source: Facebook
Like Donald Trump in America, Ms Hanson has pledged to halt further immigration into Australia from Muslim refugees and migrants.
Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie told ABC local radio that One Nation’s policies were too extreme to consider any sort of preference deal.
The divisive politician burst onto the national scene in 1996, winning the Queensland seat of Oxley in the same election that rolled Paul Keating and delivered the Prime Ministership to John Howard. She held the seat for just one term.
Ms Hanson appeared on the ballot paper as a Liberal candidate, but before the March polling day she was dis-endorsed by the party. She went on to co-found and lead the controversial political party, One Nation.
In her explosive first speech in parliament, she portrayed herself as a non-politician who’d experienced her fair share of “life’s hard knocks.”
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has possibly won two senate seats in Queensland. Source: AAP
“I won the seat of Oxley largely on an issue that has resulted in me being called a racist. That issue related to my comment that Aboriginals received more benefits than non-Aboriginals,” she said.
Ms Hanson also took aim at Asian immigration in the speech. “I believe we are in danger of being swamped by Asians,” she said, ”they have their own culture and religion, form ghettos and do not assimilate.”
Ms Hanson supports the legalisation of medicinal marijuana and a plebiscite to determine the issue of same-sex marriage – though she has previously stated her opposition to same-sex marriage, and the adoption of children by gay and lesbian Australians.
She supports a conscience vote if the matter isn't to be determined through a plebiscite.
