From the office of ROLAND ROCCHICCIOLI

PAULINE Hanson owned and operated a fish-and-chip shop in Ipswich. I wager they were the best in Ipswich! She was married at sixteen, a mother at seventeen, and built everything she has became without privilege, connections, or anyone particularly interested in whether she succeeded — or failed.

Had circumstance gifted Hanson a more formal education, she might easily have been another Margaret Thatcher — the grocer’s daughter who terrified Westminster. The iron, in both women, was always there.

Hanson’s tenacity delivered One Nation its first federal lower house seat in its thirty-year history. David Farley swept the NSW electorate of Farrer winning fifty-seven per cent of the two-candidate-preferred vote — ending a seventy-seven-year Coalition incumbency and reducing the Liberal primary vote from forty-three per cent to an anaemic eleven. It was not a protest. It was an unadulterated verdict.

Farrer is the mirror shattering. The question is whether Liberals examine the shards and, finally, see themselves — or hire a consultant to explain — “the mirror was always the problem”.

The Senator resonates because she speaks her truth. She stood before the cameras and said in the only language she has spoken, ever: “I don’t take any shit.” Five words no majorparty politician could say — and mean.

Margaret Thatcher said, “In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.” The political resolve is etched into Senator Hanson’s face — not the manufactured conviction of the focus-grouped and media-trained, but the genuine article — forged in a life that demanded everything — and long before it offered her anything. For thirty years she has refused to pretend otherwise. She is belligerent for a cause. She is — support her or not — an Australian patriot — a woman who has believed — with an inconvenient, frustrating constancy — the major parties have forsaken the majority of Australians.

Hanson was scorned — cruelly — when she admitted linguistic ignorance of xenophobia. Australians ridiculed her naïve, “please explain”. John Howard — only the second sitting Australian prime minister — ever — to lose his seat — dismissed One Nation as an “accident”. He questioned policy and cautioned Hanson’s views risked dividing Australia. The crow calling the raven black!

The major parties have governed not as the people’s servants but as their entitled landlords — extracting compliance, demanding loyalty, and offering contempt in return. They have lied with the smoothness of long practice; broken promises with the indifference of tearing-up parking tickets; and eye-balled the voter and explained — with breathtaking hubris — why the lie was actually in their best interest.

Farrer was not surprising. Farrer was inevitable. Politicians have mistaken incumbency for mandate; party machinery for public trust; and the absence of voter rebellion for satisfaction. They have hollowed the democratic covenant and filled the void with spin, faction deals, leadership coups, and blatant careerism.

They promise the world — and give you an atlas! Now they wail about a “bloodbath” and — speaking with the pained sincerity of the recently born-again — for the need to rebuild voter trust. Good luck — after years of obfuscating, lying, breaking promises, and summarily dismissing the Australian public as if we were too intellectually concussed to notice.

Pauline Hanson noticed — and reminded us — repeatedly. She spoke in a language people understood. No obfuscating — no bullshit — just deeply held conviction.

That’s why she’s winning! Contact: [email protected]