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Values crucial to Hanson's vote

By Gary Johns - posted Thursday, 2 March 2017


In net terms, One Nation is picking up well-educated conservatives in Liberal seats, less well-educated Liberals and Labor voters in Labor seats, and all three in Nationals seats.

If the Greens are a phenomenon of a split on the Left side of politics, Pauline Hanson's One Nation is a phenomenon of the split on the Right side of politics.

There is, of course, more than One Nation in the new political marketplace.

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Catherine Hanrahan's (ABC) analysis suggests that the One Nation vote is higher in areas with more Australian-born voters, higher in disadvantaged suburbs, higher in areas where fewer voters are tertiary-educated, with a weak negative correlation between the number of votes for One Nation and the local Muslim population. I think the latter is nothing more than a co-variation of the earlier measure, Australian-born vote.

Nevertheless, some Muslims are clear about One Nation; seven Perth-based imams are instructing their flock to vote Green in the Legislative Council at the WA election next month. The Greens are running a Muslim convert, Toni Pikos-Sallie, who "fears bigotry" from Hansonites.

Strewth, a Muslim Green calling someone a bigot. But I digress.

The Hanrahan analysis indicated that Nick Xenophon's support in South Australia is far more broadly based and less class-related. It is, of course, biting into Labor's vote, and is straight-out protectionist.

Jacqui Lambie's support is class-related but she also has support, for example, among indigenous voters, something that is not apparent for One Nation.

So different events are going on to explain the entire scatter to independents in the Senate.

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Clearly, the big party duopoly is breaking down because there are fewer blind loyalists. And this is a good thing. The market is now footloose and searching for other people to represent their views. There will be many false turns: Clive Palmer comes to mind.

The major parties will need to rely on the independents, who will pick off various constituencies using no more than crude incantations.

There is also change afoot at the policy end.

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This article was first published in The Australian.



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About the Author

Gary Johns is a former federal member of Parliament and served as a minister in the Keating Government. Since December 2017 he has been the commissioner of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission.

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