Pauline Hanson says she is emboldened by the growing support for One Nation as it prepares to field candidates at the Western Australia and Queensland elections, arguing the party continues to confront issues the major parties won't touch.
Senator Hanson also revealed she has had her first meeting with Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, who recently said she should not be appeased and labelled her a right-wing extremist doing the work of Islamic State by dividing people.
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Pauline Hanson - 20 years on
The One Nation leader has delivered her maiden Senate speech. See how it compares to the one she delivered two decades ago.
The senator told Fairfax Media her party's fortunes were improving "because I have been listening to people for a long time. I knew their concerns and I've actually taken that to Parliament".
A Monday poll suggested One Nation's support had quadrupled nationwide since the July election as the four senators have established themselves in Parliament with provocative first speeches urging, among other things, a ban on Muslim migration.
"It is rewarding to see after I've been fighting to get back into Parliament for 18 years and I'm very pleased with it but the real poll is on election day. But it is encouraging," she said.
"We are gearing up to stand candidates in the Queensland state election and we are hopefully wanting to stand candidates for the WA state election in March."
Senator Hanson - who has attracted the ire of the Labor Party for her anti-Muslim rhetoric - also said she and her three upper house colleagues last week met with Mr Shorten, who requested ongoing consultations.
"And that's the first time I've had a meeting with him. And he's quite prepared, and asked, to have further meetings with us on a regular basis," she said.
The parties discussed their mutual interest in a royal commission into the banks. Senator Hanson said the Labor leader was pleasantly surprised by her position and "asked me to have further talks with his shadow ministers and his staff".
Mr Shorten recently wrote to all crossbenchers seeking their support for a royal commission and a spokesman said "we will work with all the independents when it comes to legislation, providing information and briefings".
"But we won't be going against our values or horse trading," he said.
Senator Hanson also praised Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's responsiveness to One Nation and said the party wants to find the "middle road" by talking with both sides.
This week's Newspoll found One Nation was attracting a six per cent primary vote nationwide, up from 1.3 per cent at the election, as well as 10 per cent of the vote in Queensland.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is already wary of the threat posed by the insurgent party, which draws much of its support from the Sunshine State, at the state election due in 16 months.
Support for the right-wing party is expected to be strong in regional areas and boosted by the introduction of compulsory preferential voting.
In WA, the party intends to register and field candidates for the March election and could secure upper house seats if the 55,000 first preference Senate votes it received in the state at the federal election are any indicator.
Figures from both major parties have said that the they have to sell the benefits of multiculturalism, migration, globalisation and trade to the public to combat the attitudes of One Nation.
One Nation's four Senate votes are key to the success of the government's centrepiece industrial relations legislation but Senator Hanson refused to show her hand on the matter.
She said wide-ranging discussions were ongoing and that "we've been doing our homework", although Senator Malcolm Roberts recently suggested the party would back the bills.
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