Pauline Hanson and One Nation have refused to amalgamate with Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party preferring to support the Liberal Party at the upcoming federal election.
According to a News Ltd report Hanson told Palmer One Nation is not for sale after an attempt by Palmer to trademark several politically-themed names, including “Clive and Pauline Party”, in an pre-emptive attempt to merge his lacklustre UAP with Pauline Hanson’s ON.
Cairns News ran an online campaign urging KAP, UAP and PHON to merge in 2023 and now it seems at least they did have a half-hearted attempt.
This attempted merger follows a 2024 meeting attended by Hanson, Liberal sidekick James Ashby and Katters Australian Party to join forces, which Hanson may have agreed to provided she was “the boss.”
Cairns News has advocated for several years that Hanson and Ashby are defacto members of the Liberal Party and now it has been openly admitted by One Nation.
https://cairnsnews.org/2024/09/28/investigation-ashbys-attempts-to-smear-kap-with-more-porkies/
For any switched-on freedom group members this Liberal alignment is an anathema to the very origins of One Nation but in any case Pauline has nearly always sided with the Liberals in parliament.
She is close to WA mining magnate, Liberal Party and One Nation donor Gina Rinehart, some say too cosy after Hanson attended an invitation-only mining industry Christmas Party in Perth.
At the Queensland state election held in October One Nation stood a candidate in each of the 93 seats but not one was elected, drawing accusations the party exists only to vacuum taxpayer election funding of $6 per vote over four per cent of the total vote tally in each electorate. One Nation managed 248,334 primary votes but the total sum has to be calculated electorate by electorate where candidates received over four percent.
https://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/qld/consol_act/ea1992103/s225.html
One Nation managed just eight per cent of the primary vote in Queensland which translates into a tidy sum for the party’s coffers. How much of this revenue will be returned to candidates is unknown but in previous elections most candidates have been left out in the cold after spending many thousands of dollars of their own money campaigning.
Independent candidates are eligible to apply to the Queensland Electoral Commission for funding but those standing without membership of a registered party get only three dollars per primary vote for over four per cent revealing how the parties collude, to discourage independents from running.
Hanson says she will stand a candidate in every federal seat at the election due by May, but polls are not giving the outspoken Senator much hope. Hanson had her chance to do something positive for millions of disenfranchised voters but the giddy horse has just bolted.