WA One Nation candidates disendorsed by party for failing to 'reach standards'
Updated
One Nation has officially disendorsed two of its candidates for failing to reach required standards, just a fortnight out from the March poll, in what a political analyst has described as a rare move.
Candidates for the rural Lower House seat of North West Central, Dane Sorensen, and southern Perth seat of Thornlie, Sandy Baraiolo, have been removed from One Nation's online candidates' list.
State leader Colin Tincknell told the ABC the party had "no choice" but to cast out their former candidates.
"Both those candidates didn't reach the standards that we need, so we had no choice but to disendorse them," he said.
"I think both of them would've liked to have continued, but like I said we have a set of standards that all the other 50 candidates were fitting into.
"Unfortunately these two weren't able to do that so Pauline Hanson made the decision to disendorse them."
Preference deal 'not why candidates dumped'
Earlier this month, Mr Sorensen had publicly spoken out against a contentious preference deal with the WA Liberals, along with fellow candidate for Collie-Preston David Miller.
At the time, Mr Sorensen called the deal shambolic.
It prompted a response from One Nation leader Pauline Hanson who told candidates if they did not like it they should not stand under her name.
Ms Hanson and Mr Tincknell organised a teleconference call with its then 52 candidates on the evening of February 16, in which the point was reinforced.
However, Mr Tincknell said the decision to drop the pair was not connected to disagreement over the preference deal.
"These issues were completely unrelated to that," he said.
"I wish them all the best, but I won't go into specifics, no."
Mr Sorensen disputed this.
"Unless he can tell you what the reason was, it would only be fair to accept that we were vehemently against the preference deal showing us to be supporters of the Liberal party," he said.
He said Ms Hanson called him on Tuesday afternoon to let him know of his disendorsement.
She later sent him a letter to confirm the party's position in writing.
"I was probably too outspoken and made my opinions felt in language that probably wasn't appreciated," he said.
"But I'm a bloke from the bush, anyone from the bush would know I was just stating my case."
However, he said he would still support One Nation and Ms Hanson.
One Nation name still on tickets
The candidates will now run as independents, but as the disendorsement occurred after nominations to the WA Electoral Commission closed, the pair will continue to appear on the Lower House tickets under the Pauline Hanson One Nation banner.
Once nominations close there is no provision under the Electoral Act to remove a candidate's name, or the name of the party which endorsed them.
Political analyst Peter Kennedy said it was an unusual situation.
"Once the nominations close the candidates names are locked in on the ballot paper and it's very rare for this sort of thing to happen," he said.
"In this case I suspect it won't create a huge problem because in one sense the party's name's already on the ballot paper next to the candidates, and that's what people will see when they come to vote," he said.
"One Nation thrives on controversy and the decision to disendorse the two candidates just a couple of weeks out from the poll just adds to the controversy.
"One Nation becomes better known and so do the candidates, it might even boost their votes."
Ms Baraiolo could not be reached for comment.
Topics: government-and-politics, political-parties, wa, thornlie-6108, paraburdoo-6754, cue-6640, denham-6537, tom-price-6751, meekatharra-6642, onslow-6710, exmouth-6707, carnarvon-6701
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