Background on One Nation’s Impact on Elections and Politics

Earlier this week I appeared on the ABC’s ‘Politics Now’ podcast with Patricia Karvelas talking about the history and electoral performance of One Nation. I discussed how it burst on to the political scene initially before fading away until Pauline Hanson returned to the party a decade ago.

You can find the podcast at this link.

For the podcast I compiled a briefing note on One Nation’s emergence, early spectacular performance, its disappearance in the early 2000s, and how its has performed since re-entering national politics a decade ago. This post adds some additional detail to the original brief. I have written this post largely from my memory of covering these elections and have verified most of the numbers used.

In my opinion, One Nation has seen off most other political rivals to the right of the Coalition and has established itself as the fourth force of Australian politics. The big three are Labor and the Coalition dominating the centre ground of Australian politics, while the Greens having established themselves as a competitor to Labor on the left of politics.

Having doubled its Senate numbers in 2025 courtesy of Coalition preferences, One Nation now appears established to the right of the Coalition on the political spectrum. Is it a threat to the Coalition electorally? Will One Nation become a permanent fixture in the Senate? Will the next Coalition government find One Nation a force it must accommodate in the Senate, as Labor has learned to do with the Greens?

With One Nation now polling double digit support since the 2025 election, does One Nation provide an electoral opportunity for the Coalition? Or as often happened in One Nation’s early years, is it a threat to the Coalition, and in particular the National Party?

Pauline Hanon’s Arrival – 1996 Federal Election

Hanson was elected in 1996 to represent the Ipswich based seat of Oxley, previously Labor’s safest Queensland seat. Hanson had been disendorsed during the campaign for her comments on Australian Aborigines but remained on the ballot paper with Liberal Party beside her name. As I well remember from the election night coverage, Hanson was elected in a 19% swing against Labor, by far the largest swing at the 1996 election.

In her maiden speech on 10 September 1996, Hanson railed against money spent on Aboriginal welfare, criticised multiculturalism, and gained headline coverage with her statement “I believe we are in danger of being swamped by Asians”. Ahead of the 1998 Queensland and Federal elections, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation was registered as a political party.

As background for what happened in 1998, I should point out that two of the biggest in the first term of the Howard government were Indigenous affairs and gun laws. Howard attracted criticism from some for refusing to say ‘sorry’ to the stolen generation. Indigenous affairs was also a big issue following the High Court’s Wik judgment that saw the Howard government put forward a ‘10-point Wik plan’ to amend the Native Title Act. Gun law reform flowing from the Port Arthur massacre was an issue that caused resentment in the National Party’s heartland.

1998 Queensland Election

The Goss Labor government had been re-elected at the 1995 Queensland election, but with only a 1-seat majority. When Labor’s 16-vote victory in the Townsville seat of Mundingburra was overturned by the courts, Labor lost the subsequence by-election in early February, the first week of the 1996 Federal campaign. Nationals Leader Rob Borbidge took over as Premier leading a minority Coalition government. The Borbidge government suffered defeats on the floor of parliament, lost ministers to various scandals, and also faced unrest for backing Howard’s gun law reforms after the Port Arthur Massacre.

Borbidge also supported the 10-point Wik plan. The legislation was delayed in the Senate by Tasmania’s Brian Harradine who opposed four of the points. Rumours swirled of a possible double dissolution and a ‘race’ based election later in the year. In the meantime, a Queensland state election went ahead in June 1998.

Notes on the disastrous result appear below, but two important events in the last week of the election campaign are worth noting.

First, Borbidge took up a full day of his final campaign week to visit the Century Zinc mine in the state’s far north west to spruke the importance of the 10-point Wik plan. His trip was pushed down the news bulletins by Hanson’s announcement in Brisbane that she didn’t care about the Wik plan, she proposed to simply abolish Native Title. The state and federal Coalition were losing control of the issue.

On the Wednesday before polling day, Howard spent more than an hour in mid-evening doing talk-back radio with Stan Zemanek on Sydney station 2UE, Zemanek’s program networked across rural Queensland. It was a sign that the Coalition’s support was haemorrhaging across the state.

The Nationals and Liberals announced before the election that they would recommend preferences to One Nation. There was criticism that this would help elect One Nation MPs. Queensland Nationals Senator Bill O’Chee dismissed the criticism as ridiculous as National and Liberal preferences would never be distributed. He was badly wrong on that point. O’Chee would go on to lose his Senate seat to One Nation at the 1998 Federal election.

Some number on the 1998 Queensland Election

One Nation polled 22.7% of the vote, more than either the Liberals 16.1% or the Nationals 15.2%. One Nation won 11 seats, five once safe seats from the Nationals where the Nationals slipped to third, and 6 from Labor on Liberal and National preferences. Labor won 6 seats from the Liberals, but the One Nation gains were enough to leave Labor short of a majority.

In the chaos, two conservative Independents helped Peter Beattie form a minority Labor government. Federal Coalition figures informally advised Borbidge against trying to form government.

Far from One Nation finishing third and acting as a conduit of preferences to the Coalition, One Nation had savaged the National Party’s base. Taking a principled position on gun reforms and the Wik plan undermined the National position as one Nation took more populist positions that appealed to the National’s base.

1998 Federal Election

In the week after the Coalition’s Queensland state election disaster, the Howard government abandoned the four disputed points on amendment to the Native Title Act. The government wanted to stop talking about the issue. Within weeks Howard upended the political debate by announcing a tax reform package including the introduction of the GST. One Nation’s attempts to enter the tax debate proved comical.

Liberal Party Director Andrew Robb also announced that the Federal Coalition would put One Nation last on how-to-votes, a position Labor had already announced. The decision blocked Hanson from winning the new seat of Blair at the 1998 election when 83% of National preferences, and 75% of Labor preferences, elected Hanson’s Liberal opponent.

One Nation polled strongly enough to fill a quota and elect a Queensland Senator. In four other states the party led on the primary count but anti-One Nation preferences deals elected Australian Democrat Senators.

2001 Western Australian election

The Court government was defeated on the back of a series of local scandals, a backlash against a CPI petrol excise rise due to the GST, and by a surge in One Nation support. The National Party vote was halved, and One Nation’s decision to put all sitting members last on how-to-votes badly damaging the Coalition. Labor was swept into office with a comfortable majority. One Nation electing three upper house members

2001 Queensland election

Held one week after the WA election, Peter Beattie’s scandal rocked government was re-elected in a landslide. Nationals Leader Rob Borbidge had announced his party would not recommend preferences to One Nation, but was humiliated in the campaign as sitting National members cut their own deals with One Nation. Labor adopted a new slogan, “Just Vote 1”, taking advantage of optional preferential voting. It split non-Labor support with a huge increase in “exhausted” preferences, Labor winning 24 extra seats.

All 11 One Nation members had split from the party in the previous term, most forming a new party, the City-Country Alliance led by former One Nation leader Bill Feldman. Labor’s advertising played on the instability that would be produced by a Coalition government backed by One Nation. One particularly memorable ad had Coalition Leaders Borbidge and Joan Sheldon trying to drive a car with Hanson and Feldman attempting to drive from the back seat.

One Nation’s support plummeted on 1998, but still polled 8.7% and elected three members. But its vote in urban areas collapsed in Labor’s favour, Labor recording a record result on the Gold Coast by winning 7 of the 9 seats.

Interregnum – 2004 to 2013

One Nation largely disappeared. Hanson left the party and her name was removed from the party’s title. She polled strongly as a Queensland Senate Independent in 2004 and came close to winning a NSW Legislative Council seat as an Independent in 2003 and 2011. Returning to One Nation, Hanson came very close to winning her local state electorate of Lockyer at the 2015 Queensland election.

2016 Double Dissolution

Hanson’s name again became One Nation’s prefix at the 2016 double dissolution election. Hanson and Malcolm Roberts were elected to the Senate from Queensland, and the lower double dissolution quota also saw the party win seats in WA and NSW. Of the four elected One Nation Senators, Rod Culleton (WA) and Malcolm Roberts (QLD) were disqualified as candidates. Roberts’ replacement by re-count, Fraser Anning, did not sit as a One Nation Senators after taking his seat. Brian Burston (NSW) also joined the long list of elected members who split from the party.

2017 Western Australian Election

With the Barnett Liberal-National government struggling to win re-election, the Liberal Party organisational wing brokered a preference deal with One Nation, a deal not supported by Premier Barnett. The deal resulted in Barnett being peppered with questions every day about One Nation’s latest policy announcement, much to Barnett’s annoyance. It was another example of how doing a preference deal with One Nation can divert attention from the Coalition’s campaign messages.

One Nation polled 5% in the lower house and 8% in the Legislative Council where the party elected 3 MLCs.

One Nation Preferences

Snubbed for preference deals in its early days, One Nation usually recommend preferences against sitting members. At the 1998 Federal election, overall preferences split evenly, 54% to the Coalition in 1998 and 56% in 2001. At the 2001 WA election, preferences against sitting members hit the Liberal and National Parties hard.

While the increasing number of candidates on ballot papers meant that One Nation drifted up from last position on how-to-votes, the Coalition continued to deny One Nation preferences in both the House and Senate.

But One Nation became strategic with its preferences. While only contesting 15 seats at the 2016 election, most in Queensland, the party’s recommendation of preferences to Labor defeated Liberals Ewen Jones in Herbert and Wyatt Roy in Longman.

Since 2019 One Nation has actively recommended preferences to the Coalition. The party’s preferences flowed around 65% to the Coalition in 2019 and 2022. The flow increased to 75% in 2025 as One Nation support rose to 6.4%, its highest since 1998.

The rise in support and preference flows probably reflects an increase in Coalition deserters to One Nation in 2025. It also reflects One Nation re-structuring its how-to-votes early in the campaign to list the Coalition with a second preference rather than further down the ticket behind right wing parties.

There is only one seat where the Coalition decision to put One Nation ahead of Labor mattered. In the NSW seat of Hunter, Labor’s Dan Repacholi was easily re-elected, but the preference choices of National voters flowed 83% to One Nation. Hunter is the last of Labor’s old mining seats and covers an area where One Nation have polled strongly at state and federal elections since re-emerging.

Senate contests

2025 was the first half-Senate election where One Nation elected Senators from outside Queensland. In the 1990s the party polled more strongly but used to be blocked by group voting ticket preference deals. The new Senate system introduced in 2016 has made it easier for the party to turn its primary vote into Senate seats.

Significantly the 2025 election was the first where the Liberal Party included One Nation in its preference recommendations in all states. Around 60% of Coalition voters gave preferences to One Nation compared to only 30% previously. (See detailed figures below.) One Nation came from behind to defeat Labor and win the final Senate seat in both NSW and WA on Coalition preference flows. The WA seat would probably have been won by One Nation on the weaker preference flows from 2022, but the margin of One Nation’s NSW victory is almost entirely due to the changed how-to-vote.

The table below is based on ballot paper data, but Coalition preferences were only actually distributed between Labor and One Nation in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia. The data shows dramatically the difference in preference flows produced by the Coalition’s change of recommendation. Note that Queensland was the only state that had included One Nation in its Senate preference recommendations in 2022, though it was also done in some seats in NSW and WA.

Distribution of Coalition Senate Preferences between Labor and One Nation, 2022, 2025

	2022 Election			2025 Election
State	ALP	ONP	Exhaust	ALP	ONP	Exhaust
New South Wales	23.9	30.5	45.5	18.2	65.6	16.7
Victoria	25.9	21.4	52.8	21.7	61.6	16.7
Queensland	20.9	66.2	12.9	20.6	69.8	9.6
Western Australia	28.4	34.4	37.2	22.8	64.2	13.1
South Australia	28.7	19.2	52.1	25.1	61.8	13.1
Tasmania	37.7	42.0	20.4	33.4	57.4	9.2

(Note of clarification. The above table includes only above the line (ATL) preferences which on the mainland covers more than 90% of ballot papers.)

One Nation’s vote base

One Nation always polls more strongly in the country than the city. In 2025 it polled around 5% in metropolitan seats and 8-10% in rural and regional areas. The party always polls more strongly in Queensland, WA and SA compared to NSW and Victoria.

In urban seats, One Nation has always polled more strongly in outer suburban Labor seats, but tends to draw more support from Liberal candidates in these unwinnable seats. With the exception of the Queensland election in 1998, all seats where One Nation wins or polls strongly are in rural and regional areas and overwhelmingly National and Liberal seats. As mentioned earlier, Hunter is the one federal seat where to date One Nation has threatened Labor.

And the evidence of those 1990s elections is that when One Nation’s vote goes up, it goes up faster in rural and regional seats. The party’s rise in recent nationwide polls has been at the expense of the Coalition, not Labor. Past results suggest the rise will be greatest in National and rural Liberal seats, especially those in Queensland. If the current poll trend continued, there are rural seats where One Nation will finish second on primary votes and poll above 25%.

Like Labor relying on Liberal preferences to defeat the Greens in some traditionally safe Labor seats, so may National and Liberal members rely on Labor preferences to win seats. As did a number of senior Queensland state MPs in 1998 and 2001.

Is One Nation now Australia’s Fourth Party?

One Nation’s rise appears to be re-shaping the nation’s party system. Labor and the Coalition dominate the centre-left and centre-right. The Greens poll double digit numbers on the left and deliver preference flows above 85% to Labor. Having seen off various Clive Palmer parties, and rejected Palmer’s overtures in 2025, One Nation appears to have settled into an established position to the right of the Coalition.

The Coalition’s problem, more precisely the National Party’s problem , is how to compete against One Nation without becoming an enemy of the party’s voters? But getting too close to the party could backfire for the Liberal Party in urban electorates, especially the more multicultural seats that dominate in Sydney and Melbourne.

As Colin Barnett found out in 2017, becoming associated with One Nation can lead to the Coalition being asked to rule out support for One Nation policies.

But What Issues?

In its early days One Nation tapped into resentment on Indigenous issues and migration, and to a lesser extent a backlash against gun law reform. The party’s success in Queensland in 1998 was heavily concentrated in areas of relative decline compared to the rest of the state. These areas were often lowest for migrant presence and not in areas reliant on overseas tourism.

What are the issues today? Net-Zero and Immigration? The problem for the Coalition is that whatever it comes up with as a policy position, One Nation can always trump the Coalition with a simple slogan and simplistic policy, such as the promise to abolish Native Title in 1998. Attempting to lure One Nation voters into supporting the Coalition always runs the risk of the voters finding simpler One Nation positions more attractive.

What does the Coalition do about net-zero? Trying to produce a nuanced new policy focused on increasing supply or dealing with rising prices, risks being trumped by a promise to abolish net-zero with no solution on supply and price. (I am using trumped with its card-playing meaning.)

Then there is immigration. Any attempt to produce a well thought through Coalition policy based on reducing immigration numbers could be undercut by demands it be lowered further, or paused to zero for a few years, or there be changes to the source nations of migrants.

Also, if the Nationals move in One Nation’s direction, where does it leave the Liberals? Teal candidates plastered North Sydney in 2022 with posters accusing Trent Zimmerman of always voting with Barnaby Joyce. Joyce was told to stay in his electorate in 2025. Could the Nationals trying to head off a re-emergence of One Nation create the same Liberal dilemma in 2028?

Does One Nation have a Future Without Pauline Hanson?

The big unknown. One Nation shriveled between 2004 and 2013 when Hanson was not associated with the party. For all the party’s success in electing members, the party has consistently lost those members after taking their seats. The party has a terrible record of losing members through disputes with Hanson or with key people who have organised the party. And sometimes just clash of egos.

Mark Latham became the party’s face in NSW in 2019 but that has ended with acrimony. Will the talk of Barnaby Joyce joining One Nation go the same way? Where would a Joyce defection leave the National Party? Where would Barnaby Joyce in a prominent position in One Nation’s campaign leave Liberals trying to win back once safe urban seats from Independents?