One Nation’s surge in popularity, up to a 22% primary vote in the latest Guardian Essential poll after outrage over Pauline Hanson’s comments about Australian Muslims, has been largely explained as a Coalition problem: disillusioned Liberal or National voters, exhausted with conservative chaos, parking their vote with another rightwing party. But this week’s Essential poll, showing 45% of Labor voters surveyed were open to voting for One Nation, holds warning signs for the government too.
The mood inside Labor could be summarised as alert, but not alarmed. Ministers are already sharpening their attack lines on One Nation – its opposition to Labor’s cost of living and industrial relations policies, Hanson’s ties to Gina Rinehart – but the government is cognisant that a bread-and-butter focus on tax, housing and social issues is needed to plug any leakage to the rightwing populist party.
