Pauline Hanson spent much of her Wednesday morning press conference railing against migrants and multinational resource companies before introducing an Indian-born former Adani mining executive as her number two Queensland senate candidate.
The One Nation figurehead – who has also secured LNP defector George Christensen for an unlikely Senate tilt – announced on Wednesday she would have a candidate in all 151 lower house seats at the May 21 poll.
She also rolled out a number of familiar talking points, including a broadside against the forecast increase in Australia’s migrant intake to 235,000 by 2025.
Shortly after introducing Muthuraj ‘Raj’ Guruswamy as number two on the Queensland senate ticket, she declared opening the country to more migrants a year would be a slap in the face to people who have lost their jobs because of jab mandates.
Hanson has long held an anti-immigration stance, telling parliament in her maiden speech in 1996 that the nation was in danger of being “swamped by Asians.”
On Wednesday she said lifting the migrant while shunning antivaxxers intake was akin to “throwing good Australians on the scrapheap”.
The Senator also threw her support behind Queensland’s coal industry and the construction of new coal-fired power plants “so that we can bring more money into the country” while bemoaning the fact that Qatar was making more money of is gas fields than Australia was.
“We are a resource rich country, yet we fail to actually impact on that … when we are the largest exporter of LNG gas,” she said.
“Other countries around the world, like Norway, have made a lot of money out of their resources and we’re just giving it way to multinationals.”
Guruswamy, a well-connected mechanical engineer who was born in India, is currently the Asian-Pacific managing director of neurohaptic technology firm Biowin.
But in the five years to October 2018 the naturalised Australian was Adani Mining’s general manager of corporate affairs.
Adani, of course, is the Indian-owned company behind the controversial Carmichael Coal mine that has recently been completed in Central Queensland.
The mine is set to produce 10 million tonnes of coal each year that will be sold to customers across the Asia-Pacific region.
“I think this is a great opportunity that is provided by Pauline to see what I can do to assist in Australia getting back to its glory days in terms of manufacturing, getting into the resource sector,” he said on Wednesday.
George’s big payout
Meanwhile, Christensen is set to get a $105,000 payout even if he fails to nab an unlikely Senate spot for One Nation at the federal election.
Hanson on Wednesday announced Christensen would be One Nation’s number three senate candidate for Queensland in a stunning backflip on his political retirement.
He will run for the upper house and not his old Mackay-based seat of Dawson he represented as a member of the Liberal National Party for almost 12 years.
LNP figures Matt Canavan and Barnaby Joyce have already expressed disappointment in Christensen’s defection, with the former labelling the act “cowardly”.
Mr Christensen's tilt at the Senate comes almost a year after he announced his retirement from federal politics, and six days after he quit the LNP because it had “failed to take action against vaccine mandates”, veered away from its conservative roots, and announced a 2050 net zero emissions target.
The 46th Federal Parliament was dissolved just three days ago.
It is not clear when exactly Senator Hanson approached Mr Christensen to try and continue in Canberra with One Nation – or when he made the decision himself – but he told media he always knew he did not want to run again in Dawson.
“That decision was made, that decision came and went,” Mr Christensen told media in Brisbane.
“But (Hanson) did ask me if I would join her Senate ticket and I said yes because after having a look at the One Nation policies, around these issues that I am passionate about, vaccine mandates, the response to government around Covid, which was a complete and utter overreach.”
Mr Christensen has increasingly drifted to the far right fringes of parliament and has been a vocal supporter of ‘pro freedom’ causes, something that has often caused headaches for his senior government figures.
He retained Dawson in 2019 with a hefty margin of 14.6 per cent after a strong showing for the LNP in the Sunshine State.
That said, Mr Christensen’s return to federal parliament at this stage appears unlikely, according to ABC election analyst Antony Green, who says One Nation needs to poll a minimum 28.6 per cent of the below the line in Queensland to secure three Senate seats, or more likely 35 per cent.
One Nation’s previous highest Queensland vote was 14.8 per cent in 1998.
But even if Mr Christensen is unsuccessful he is still in line for a fat payday.
He stands to get a taxpayer-funded payout equivalent to six months salary even if he loses –equivalent to $105,000 – under resettlement allowance rules.
Christensen said he had checked with the clerk of parliament and said he would have been entitled to the payout anyway.
Senator Hanson chided journalists at a Brisbane press conference who suggested Christensen wxjmtzywas an outside chance at winning a Senate spot after herself and Guruswamy.
“Why do you want that negativity?” she said.
“I tell you what if I had your negativity I wouldn’t be where I am today.”
Mr Christensen himself said he was happy to campaign even if it meant boosting support for Senator Hanson and Guruswamy.
“If the only job that I do is helping Pauline get back in there in the Senate, and maybe bringing a friend along with her in Raj Guruswamy than that’s the job done, because Pauline has been a warrior for common sense conservative issues,” Mr Christensen said.
It is almost a year ago to the day that Mr Christensen first flagged he was leaving politics to spend more time for his family.
He told the Courier Mail on Wednesday he should have joined One Nation “a long time ago” after realising their beliefs and views matched his.
Senator Hanson said candidates like Mr Christensen were needed as Australia battles cost of living pressures.
“Politicians have lost touch with the average person out there. Not being able to pay their bills. They are struggling, no doubt about it,” she said.
Mr Christensen’s salary as Dawson MP was about $211,000 and he got a $45,000 allowance for his electorate.
