While Pauline Hanson was expelled from the Liberal Party in 1996 for her public attacks on Aboriginal people, there is little doubt that she would be readily at home in the modern day Liberal National Party.
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Queensland LNP MP George Christensen speaks at rallies organised by racist white power groups with impunity. Senior South Australian Liberal Cory Bernardi gained the support of the Senate for an inquiry aimed at inflaming the nonsensical hysteria regarding halal foods. Peter Dutton, now described by some as the senior Conservative in the LNP, used his position as Immigration Minister to attack all refugees for both stealing jobs and bludging on welfare. Worse, such stridently and determinedly divisive rhetoric is now being seen as defining modern-day conservatism.
Of course there is nothing new in Australian politicians seeking to use racism, attacking minorities and inflaming divisiveness for political advantage. Sometimes our country has been fortunate to have strong enough political and community leaders to speak out and emphasise the fact that we are better together – most notably when Malcolm Fraser showed that large numbers of Vietnamese refugees could be effectively resettled in Australia and provide great long-term benefit to the country. At other times, our leaders – and our own courage and unity as a society and a nation - have failed us.
The efforts of wartime leader Billy Hughes – some would say our worst Prime Minister ever in terms of the social and economic harm he caused – in not just promoting existing anti-Asian rhetoric but deliberately inflaming divisiveness between Catholics and Protestants would take a generation to repair. And after all, our nation was founded on the White Australia Policy. But as writer George Megalogenis has effectively shown, the times when the divisiveness and fear based on race or religion have taken hold in Australia have also been the periods when economic downturn and social inequality have become more entrenched.
Pointing out the holes in One Nation's policies and the economic harm that comes from overtly attacking people based on their race or religion doesn't alter the fact that existing economic policies are already causing major damage. Labor and especially the Liberal/National Parties are already failing vast sections of the community, including many of those voting for Hanson's party.
There is growing inequality within Australia and between regions in Australia. Once inequality in wealth, income and access to services such as health and education reaches the scale that it now has, it causes ongoing economic harm, running the risk of creating a further downward spiral.
As a lifelong Queenslander who has been involved in third party politics since before Pauline Hanson first appeared on the public stage, I've been closely engaged with trying to counter her efforts and the many other political parties and players who have sought to use racism and social division for political advantage.
At times some right-wing populist parties have gained a big enough surge in popularity to win seats in Parliament, but have almost always then had great difficulty putting their populism into effective practice. Whether things will be different this time remains to be seen, although in Hanson's case things are certainly different from when she was elected the first time around in 1996.
There is no way the LNP will be able to outdo the smaller parties when it comes to attacking migrants and minority groups, and unless they explicitly eschew this sort of politics - which unfortunately they are instead showing more and more signs of embracing – there is a real prospect that they will further enhance economic and social harm.
Andrew Bartlett is a former Queensland Senator and spokesperson for The Queensland Greens
