The implosion of One Nation's Western Australian branch days before the state's election is no real surprise. This is not just because we have seen this party self-immolate before, but because the tensions have been escalating throughout the campaign.
For weeks candidates and staff have complained about poor organisation and a distant autocratic head office, while support has fallen from over 13 per cent to about 8.5 per cent.
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Hanson facing discrimination lawsuit
Two axed One Nation officials intend to take legal action against Pauline Hanson for alleged age discrimination.
Though Western Australia has a system of fixed four-year government terms, the party did not secure the necessary 500 members to register in WA until late October and One Nation leader Pauline Hanson did not conduct candidate interviews until just before Christmas.
Even the eventual announcement of candidates was botched. Hanson was unable to say in which order the upper house candidates would be ranked and media were not provided full list of candidates until hours after the event. One Nation, still portraying itself as the new third force in Australian politics, was able to field only 45 candidates for the state's 59 lower house seats.
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The vetting process might have been patchy too. This week the ALP's Sam Dastyari made merciless fun online of some of those selected, starting with one who has advocated for a separate white South African state, another who offered cures for cancer and homosexuality, and a third who fretted about gays using Nazi mind-control techniques in their campaign for marriage equality.
Last month two candidates – Dane Sorensen and Sandy Baraiolo – were dumped after criticising the preference deal the party cut with the Liberal Party. Baraiolo claimed she later received phone threats. The deal rankled many candidates, who in keeping with One Nation's outsider identity were not comfortable supporting the incumbent premier Colin Barnett.
It cost them support too.
When Hanson visited Mandurah in the state's south west on Monday, one local, Chris Quirk, turned out to wish her well but said he would not be voting for her.
"Before Pauline Hanson said she would give her preferences to the Liberal Party, we were going that way, but as soon as she said that, I'm sorry, a vote for Pauline would then keep the man in power and Colin Barnett we do not want to keep in power," he said.
As the polls fell it must have become clear to some of lower house candidates that they had no chance of winning and were in effect being used to hand out how-to-vote forms for the upper house campaign.
Last week campaign staff griped to Fairfax Media that too many decisions had to "go through Queensland". There was talk of problems with how-to-vote cards and difficulty getting material approved for distribution.
In Mandurah, One Nation signage was only going up on candidate Doug Shaw's campaign office on Tuesday, even though the building had been operating as his headquarters for over a month.
Last Friday the candidate for Kalamunda, Ray Gould, quit, saying the party had broken faith with supporters with its deal and offered too little support to candidates.
"I've had enough," he told the ABC. "Nothing has been upfront, we haven't been told the truth from day one.
"I'm talking to voters and they say, 'We like Pauline Hanson but she's done a deal with the Liberals and she can't be trusted.'
Yesterday morning when Fairfax Media sought to confirm rumours of more trouble, One Nation staff in Canberra and WA denied the suggestion.
Then came the press conference.
Ron McLean and wife Marye Louise Daniels, associates of Hanson for 20 years, were dumped as state president and secretary of One Nation and expelled from the party.
The pair have engaged a lawyer to file an anti-discrimination claim against Hanson for allegedly telling McLean he was "too old" to run for a seat.
"She said, 'Ron, I'm sacking you from the position on [the] agriculture [ticket], I believe you're too old and you'll be 91 when the term's finished'."
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