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Staff reporter
Updated ,first published
One Nation’s thumping victory in Saturday’s Farrer byelection has made headlines overseas, with foreign media highlighting leader Pauline Hanson’s admiration for US President Donald Trump and the growing electoral support globally for populist right parties.
Hanson’s candidate, David Farley, wrested the regional NSW electorate from Coalition hands for the first time in its 77-year history, delivering One Nation its first lower house seat in an election in its three-decade history. A triumphant Hanson promised her minor party would seize on the momentum to deliver action on a gas tax and lower immigration.
London’s Telegraph has been the most dramatic in its coverage, saying Australia’s mainstream political parties have been put on notice by the country’s “flame-haired answer to [Nigel] Farage”.
Farage’s populist Reform UK party delivered a catastrophic defeat to the governing Labour Party and the Conservatives in local UK elections last week, with British voters rallying to his call for a hard line on migration and welfare.
“Reminiscent of Mr Farage, Ms Hanson is a one-woman show who has capitalised on discontent in traditional parties, triggered by the cost of living and mass migration,” the Telegraph said.
“Like Mr Farage, Ms Hanson has been a staunch supporter of Donald Trump, even when his policies bordered on hostile acts against her country.”
And like Farage’s Reform UK, One Nation might not need backing from the mainstream if its rise continued before the federal election, the Telegraph said.
Hanson’s love for Trump and his brand of populist rhetoric has also been the key focus of The New York Times’ coverage of One Nation’s win in Farrer.
Many of Hanson’s positions were closely aligned with Trump’s messaging, the paper said, adding that she praised the US president’s policies and said she wanted to mirror them in Australia when she spoke last year at the Conservative Political Action Conference at Mar-a-Lago, in Florida.
In her victory speech on Saturday, she struck a Trumpian note, the Times reported.
“I don’t want Shariah law on our doorstep. I want true people that want to come on board to be Australians, and join us in this journey of making our country the greatest country in the world again,” it quoted Hanson as saying at her party’s celebration.
While drawing parallels with the growing popularity of right-wing politics in Europe, the Times’ coverage did point out the sketchy political track record of One Nation.
“At the same time, the populist surge in Australia is not yet at the levels seen in Britain, and One Nation has a chequered history when it comes to keeping the party together and organising on a national level, raising questions about whether it can endure as a movement,” the newspaper said, citing Frank Bongiorno, a historian and professor at the University of Canberra.
The BBC said the result was a clear sign that voters were moving away from traditional political parties in Australia, and a test for new Liberal leader Angus Taylor and new Nationals leader Matt Canavan. Taylor’s party recorded a paltry 12 per cent of the vote in a seat it had held for 25 years.
Elsewhere, Al Jazeera said while Farley’s victory did little to affect the balance in the lower house of parliament, it was in line with growing electoral support for populist right parties globally.
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