Pauline Hanson has been caught in a tense hot mic moment after a media conference in Adelaide, where the One Nation leader was heard calling a reporter a “nasty b****” after one of her staffers told the journalist to “shut up”.
The exchange unfolded after Senator Hanson appeared before media on the sidelines of an oil and gas producers event. She had been questioned about One Nation’s stance on fracking and offshore drilling, along with the party’s Senate candidates, when media adviser Richard Henderson suddenly brought the press scrum to an end.
“We’re done, thank you. No, no, no. Shut up. We’re done,” Mr Henderson said to the journalist as Senator Hanson turned to leave.
The reporter then responded, “Did you just say shut up?”
Footage showed Senator Hanson and those with her walking away from the media pack. She then began speaking with MP Barnaby Joyce, who told her she had done “very well”.
Moments later, Senator Hanson was heard saying: “I said you’re the nasty b***h.”
Mr Henderson and Mr Joyce then laughed, and Senator Hanson turned back and said: “Do you want me to go back and I’ll tell her?”
It is not the first time an off-mic encounter involving Senator Hanson and the press has drawn attention.
On the eve of the Farrer by-election, her chief of staff James Ashby was filmed removing ABC regional journalists from a campaign event.
“Bye bye to the ABC,” Mr Ashby said, before adding: “See you later guys.”
A puzzled Senator Hanson then asked why they had to leave.
“Why, if they’re local ABC? Rural and regional?” she asked him, according to the video footage.
Mr Ashby replied: “Because they’re reporting back to ABC Canberra.”
Hanson then responded: “They shouldn’t have gone.”
Senator Hanson was in Adelaide to outline One Nation’s new gas policy. Earlier in the day, she said a federal government under One Nation would take a 30 per cent equity stake in what she described as Australia’s “miracle” new gas projects, in a proposal inspired by Norway.
Speaking at the Australia Energy Producers conference in Adelaide on Thursday, Senator Hanson said One Nation wanted “more gas”, not less, and was proposing a “genuine partnership with the gas industry, from exploration through to production and decommissioning”.
“One Nation’s policy will drive more exploration, more development, and more production without pushing out smaller Australian producers,” she said.
She said ownership rights would be “100 per cent owned” by a new Commonwealth special investment vehicle and the Australian National Wealth Investment Corporation, which would “direct its share of oil and gas to Australia’s greatest benefit”.
Any profits generated from Australia’s equity ownership, she said, would be placed in a sovereign wealth fund to “reinvest and grow”.
