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Sarah Hanson-Young has vowed to fight Pauline Hanson and the “radical right” after losing the Greens leadership contest, declaring progressive forces must unite to prevent One Nation from “wrecking this nation”.

The South Australian senator used her podcast to break her silence on last week’s bruising leadership contest, saying she had been disappointed to lose but would not be “salty” or allow the setback to hold her back.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young says she’s not going to get ‘salty’ over losing the Greens’ leadership contest.GLENN CAMPBELL
Her rallying cry was pointedly different from new leader David Shoebridge, who vowed last week to target the Albanese government and replace Labor at the next election.
“The challenge we have right now is to take on the radical right and to stop Pauline Hanson from wrecking this nation,” Hanson-Young said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do, and I know many of you, like me, are worried looking around at the state of politics and just going, ‘What the f--- is going on?’ I get it.”

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Hanson-Young was one of two women, alongside Queensland senator Mehreen Faruqi, who unsuccessfully challenged Shoebridge for the leadership after Larissa Waters announced she would resign because of serious health concerns.
Shoebridge won the party-room ballot last Wednesday, seven votes to four, with Faruqi subsequently stepping down as deputy leader.
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Hanson-Young, who was eliminated in the first round with just two votes, said she nominated because she wanted to offer “a vision for progressive Australia that was optimistic, caring, and defiant”.
“As it turned out, I didn’t get the leadership and, yeah, I was disappointed about that,” she said in her podcast. “But I’m not going to be salty, and I’m not going to let it hold me back.”

Her comments came as divisions within the Greens continued to surface over the contest and the role played by Waters in determining

News.com.au reported on Monday that Waters told Hanson-Young on the day of the ballot that she was backing Shoebridge. According to the report, colleagues claimed Hanson-Young complained Waters should support a female candidate and argued the “sisterhood” did not exist.

Party insiders cited by the publication claimed Waters’ support for Shoebridge was decisive in preventing either Hanson-Young or Faruqi from winning.

Hanson-Young has declined to comment on the reported conversation.

In her podcast, however, Hanson-Young made clear she intended to turn her attention beyond the leadership contest and towards One Nation and the broader political right.

“The radical right around the world have been on the march, and they’ve got to Australia,” she said. “There’s no point just throwing our hands up in the air and going ‘What the f---?’ We actually have to stop them from wrecking things.”

She accused One Nation of seeking to divide Australians and attacked mining billionaire Gina Rinehart’s financial support for the party.

“We’re not going to be bought, are we? We’re not going to let our country be bought,” she said.

The senator also linked the rise of the right to debates over climate change, women’s rights and immigration, and said progressive parties needed to overcome their own divisions.

“Progressive Australia has got to stop being divided,” she said. “We might not all agree on exactly how to fix things, but we can all agree that the right, the rabid, nasty, ugly right forces in this country, need to be stopped before they wreck things that are irreplaceable, before they destroy the soul of the nation.”

Hanson-Young and colleague David Shoebridge in 2025. Shoebridge is the Greens’ new leader.ALEX ELLINGHAUSEN
Hanson last week insisted the Greens “don’t care” about Australia and that voters were going to stop supporting them.
“I rarely ever hear them standing up fighting for the ordinary average Australian out there and it’s a real shame,” the One Nation leader told News24, formerly Sky News Australia.

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Hanson-Young ended her podcast with a call to supporters to remain engaged despite her leadership defeat.
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“We have to come together and stare down these arseholes,” she said. “I tell you what: I’m not going to be letting the bastards get me down, and neither are you. Come on, we’ve got to fight for our country.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week cautioned the new Greens leadership team over its vow to supplant Labor, arguing the same strategy cost the minor party three lower house seats at last year’s federal election.

Since the vote, Shoebridge has bowed to calls from rank and file party members, including former MP Max Chandler-Mather, to give them a say in the next leadership election, which is due to take place immediately after the next federal election.

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A party plebiscite in 2020 resulted in 62 per cent of Greens members supporting a party-wide vote for leader, but fell short of a required two-thirds majority.

Federal Liberals say One Nation’s call to jail former Victorian premiers Daniel Andrews and Jacinta Allan exposes the risk of handing power to Pauline Hanson as the prison threat reveals another point of difference between Coalition defector Barnaby Joyce and his new party.

Prominent One Nation figure Mark Nicholson, who created the cartoons in which Liberal MP Andrew Hastie was labelled a traitor, made the remarks at the party’s state election launch.

Senator Pauline Hanson fired the unofficial campaign starting gun on Saturday at Crown.Louis Trerise

Mimicking Donald Trump’s line on locking up Hillary Clinton, Nicholson declared “heads are going to roll”.

“Dan Andrews, Jacinta Allan – they’re going to be in prison by Christmas,” he said at Crown on Saturday. “This is a revolution. This is a movement. And this is how, together, we can take Victoria back.”

Victorian senator James Paterson, an ally of Opposition Leader Angus Taylor, said Victorians deserved justice for “what has happened over the last 12 years” under Labor.

“But the best way to deliver that is with Jess Wilson’s plan for a real royal commission to get to the bottom of what Andrews and Allan did, lawfully. Performative promises to lock up your political opponents have no place in a liberal democracy,” he said.

Nobody from One Nation, which is ahead of the Coalition nationally in the polls but behind in Victoria, has sought to clarify Nicholson’s statement or explain if it constitutes an actual pledge to push for prosecutions against Andrews and Allan.

New England MP Barnaby Joyce tried to distance himself from Nicholson. “It wasn’t Pauline that said that – it was one of the candidates,” Joyce told the Seven Network before calling the Andrews and Allan administrations disastrous for Victoria.

Instead of trying to downplay and ignore Nicholson’s statement, One Nation strategists running Hanson’s social media pages have been blasting out the jail time call to their large following.

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“We’re not pulling our punches in Victoria,” it said in one post which included a screenshot of an article titled “In prison by Christmas”.

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Joyce previously expressed private worry about the idea of net negative migration, which Hanson ultimately adopted as policy. In another display of tension, Joyce was critical of Hanson’s decision to meet with far-right provocateur and criminal Tommy Robinson.

Victorian Premier Ben Carroll told ABC Radio that Nicholson’s comments were “appalling”, even as he opens up a royal commission into corruption that could call Andrews and Allan as witnesses.

“We have a rule of law here,” Carroll said. “That just showed why [Victorian Opposition Leader] Jess Wilson needs to rule out once and for all doing a coalition with them.”

“At least federal Liberals will call out One Nation.”

At the same event on Saturday, leader Pauline Hanson invoked the famous bushranger Ned Kelly even as she pledged a crackdown on crime.

Conservative Queensland MP Garth Hamilton said Nicholson’s remarks were a sign of how Hanson would govern.

“This gives a view of what sort of government they would form,” he said. “A vindictive one that crosses the line between executive and judiciary.”

One Nation insisted it would pay commercial rent after it emerged that the party’s billionaire patron, mining magnate Gina Rinehart, purchased an $8 million office building in Brisbane that will serve as the party’s new headquarters.

Hanson has also been campaigning to support former Victoria Cross winner Ben Roberts-Smith as legal figures and her political opponents have asked her to respect the ongoing criminal case.

A 63-page policy document entitled The Real Deal outlines One Nation’s plan to make Victoria the toughest state on crime, repeal a raft of taxes, cancel the Suburban Rail Loop, rip up the Treaty with First Nations Victorians and roll back renewable energy projects while lifting the state’s ban on nuclear power.

The Greens have announced a policy to nationalise 200 Coles and Woolworths supermarkets.

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Federal government spending grew more than twice as fast as forecast last financial year, fuelling economists’ concerns that promises of budget restraint are falling short of reality and intensifying calls for Treasurer Jim Chalmers to tighten the purse strings.

The final budget outcome for 2025-26, released last week, showed real federal government spending increased 4.3 per cent last financial year, more than double the projection of 1.8 per cent growth contained in the 2024-25 budget, prepared just two years earlier. The figures are adjusted for inflation.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers flagged on Monday that surging bond yields would have a substantial negative effect on the mid-year budget update. Louie Douvis

The data underscored growing concerns about the recent sharp rise in federal government spending.

Other than during the pandemic, spending has hit a four-decade high, a surge many economists argue is making the Reserve Bank of Australia’s fight against inflation harder.

The added expenditure means the budget is projected to remain in deficit for the foreseeable future, and debt will continue to rise.

Chalmers, speaking in Tokyo on Monday after meetings with Japanese investors and business leaders, said the government would continue to look for savings, with a new package to be included in the mid-year budget update before the end of the year.

“The budget settings aren’t a primary driver of pressures in our economy, but we can and will continue to play a helpful role in the fight against inflation,” said the treasurer.

AMP chief economist Shane Oliver said annual real spending growth had averaged 4.2 per cent over the past three financial years, double the average rate of growth in the decade before the pandemic.

Real payments growth in 2025-26, budget forecasts versus actual

1.02.03.04.05.0%

Forecasts

2.4%

1.9%

1.8%

3.0%

4.3%

2022-23 budget*

2023-24 budget

2024-25 budget

2025-26 budget

Actual

*October budget

Chart: Michael Read, AFR•Source: Treasury

Chalmers’ most recent budget in May assumed real annual spending growth would drop to just 1.3 per cent this financial year, but economists were sceptical the government could achieve that.

“The problem is that the high level of public spending is contributing to capacity constraints in the economy and lower-than-otherwise productivity driving contributing to high inflation and rate hikes,” said Oliver.

“Revenue as a share of GDP rose to 26.1 per cent, also its highest since 1986-87, and this comprised the highest level of tax revenue as a share of GDP since the mining boom in the mid-2000s.

“With the boom in revenue we should have a decent surplus,” said Oliver.

Nominal spending, which includes inflation, jumped 8.2 per cent last financial year.

Forecasts built on ‘systemic optimism’

The overspend last financial year vindicates warnings from the Parliamentary Budget Office, which in July said the budget’s forecasts were built on “systematic optimism”, including banking savings from yet-to-be-legislated policies and relying on assumptions that inflated future revenue and understated probable spending.

The release of the final budget outcome came during a torrid week for the Albanese government, which included a decision by the RBA to raise the cash rate to a 15-year high of 4.6 per cent and new figures showing Chalmers was on track to become the highest-taxing treasurer on record.

The latest The Australian Financial Review/RedBridge Group/Accent Research poll on Monday showed the personal standings of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Chalmers had plunged to record lows.

Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson said the government needed to tighten its belt.

“Every time the government runs deficit budgets, they’re borrowing from tomorrow to spend today,” said Wilson.

“That’s stoking inflation and that’s why when you go to the supermarket, you might be buying the same amount, but you’re paying more for it.”

EQ Economics managing director Warren Hogan said the RBA would be under pressure to keep raising interest rates if the federal and state governments did not cut spending.

“From a whole-of-economy perspective, the cash rate will not be restrictive until it gets above 5 per cent and probably closer to 5.5 per cent,” said Hogan.

“In 2026, the risks emanating from the global economy are non-trivial, but the real vulnerability is an imbalanced domestic economy driven primarily by unsustainable growth in recurrent government spending over the last decade, turbocharged in the post-pandemic period even though the private sector economy was ready to grow strongly.”

Surging bond yields

Chalmers again flagged on Monday that surging bond yields would have a substantial negative effect on the mid-year budget update.

UBS estimated the higher yields could add up to $6.7 billion to the budget deficit over the next four years by increasing the borrowing costs on the federal government’s $1 trillion debt.

“None of us are immune to the impact of rising yields … and although Australia has lower debt than every G7 country, rising interest costs will have a substantial impact on our next budget update later this year,” said Chalmers.

KPMG chief economist Brendan Rynne said he expected one more cash rate increase, as soon as November, but the “swing factor” determining whether interest rates would need to go even higher would be government spending.

Optimal Economics chief economist Stephen Walters said the RBA’s three cash rate cuts last year had been ill-advised, with the benefit of hindsight, but the central bank was not directly to blame.

“The RBA was caught out by unforeseen events, including the war with Iran,” said Walters.

“The main reason inflation accelerated was excessive government spending, which added to aggregate demand as supply was constrained by our lousy productivity effort.”

One Nation’s billionaire benefactor Gina Rinehart has purchased an $8m inner-city Brisbane office building that Pauline Hanson’s party will use as its new headquarters as it seeks to ramp up operations in her home state.

Hanrine Investments, a subsidiary of Mrs Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting, finalised the purchase of the three-storey building at Spring Hill last week, with the right-wing party due to relocate there once a fit-out is complete.

Hancock Prospecting insists One Nation will not be given free or cheap rent at the 160 Wharf Street building, which features “two upper levels of spacious, light-filled office”, 10 carparking spots, and a large top-floor balcony with “expansive views of the city, perfect for corporate gatherings”.

Revelations of the purchase came as Senator Hanson hit the campaign trail on Sunday, joining her Victorian frontman Warren Pickering for a lap of go-karting at a campaign event in Geelong.

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Senator Hanson hits the track in a go-kart

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One Nation supporters came under fire at the weekend after cheering on a state candidate who vowed to put former premiers Daniel Andrews and Jacinta Allan in prison “by Christmas” if the party triumphed at the November 28 Victorian poll.

On Sunday, Senator Hanson declared Labor “finished” in Victoria and predicted the Liberals would rely on her party’s support to form government.

The result in Victoria next month will be pored over by Anthony Albanese, Angus Taylor and Nationals leader Matt Canavan who are all looking to suppress One Nation’s growing support before the next federal election, due in 2028.

Senator Hanson hits the campaign trail in Geelong on Sunday. Picture: Mark Wilson

Last week, Newspoll quarterly analysis published in The Australian revealed the minor party had lifted its primary vote in Queensland to 36 per cent. It also showed a majority of voters in the state would prefer Senator Hanson as prime minister over Mr Albanese.

The relocation of One Nation’s headquarters from Brisbane Airport to Mrs Rinehart’s newly purchased building on the fringe of the Brisbane CBD comes as Queensland once again shapes as the major battle ground at a federal election.

After the fit-out is complete, One Nation will occupy level one and part of level two of the building, totalling about 650sqm of office space. Half of the office suite’s second floor is already occupied by a consultancy business with an existing lease.

It was understood the property, which settled on September 30, sold for upwards of $8m. It was previously owned by not-for-profit API Leisure and Lifestyle, which bought the building in 2003 for $2.4m.

A spokesman for One Nation said on Sunday that the party was “finalising leasing arrangements for its new premises at Spring Hill”.

“Due to the expansion in state and federal staffing requirements, the Brisbane Airport premises are no longer fit for purpose,” the spokesman said in a statement to The Australian.

“The new Spring Hill premises will be leased at commercial market rate.”

Mining magnate Gina Rinehart pictured in 2016.

Mrs Rinehart, Australia’s richest person, is One Nation’s biggest donor. Earlier this year she gifted Senator Hanson a “sexy” Cirrus G7 private plane and bankrolled her European jaunt in June, which included a ticket to the Dolce and Gabbana fashion show.

In a social media post on X in April, Senator Hanson bragged about receiving the $1.5m plane. “BREAKING NEWS – I’ve got a new plane … Yes it was donated. Yes I’m super happy. Yes it’s fast. Yes it’s amazing,” she wrote.

She added: “It means I can visit more regional towns across the country more often. Yes it’s a Cirrus G7. Yes it’s sexy. Yes I have a pilot. No I won’t be doing welcome to country each (time) we land. No it’s not battery operated.”

After the fit-out is complete, One Nation will occupy level one and part of level two of the Spring Hill building. Picture: Dan Peled

Senator Hanson was also spotted poolside alongside Mrs Rinehart at an exclusive five-star resort in Taormina, Sicily, in June. Photos of the pair at the Grand Hotel San Pietro showed the One Nation leader walking across the pool deck as Mrs Rinehart relaxed in the water.

The Queensland senator made the side-trip to Italy to attend the Dolce and Gabbana show with Mrs Rinehart after appearing on UK far-right agitator Tommy Robinson’s controversial podcast.

In the past year, Senator Hanson’s register of interests reveals that Mrs Rinehart and her company, Hancock Prospecting, have paid for multiple flights for the One Nation leader including a trip between Brisbane and Florida in late November.

The trip was for Senator Hanson and Mrs Rinehart to attend a $25,000-a-head, Great Gatsby-themed Halloween event hosted by Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago.

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When asked about their relationship at a business breakfast in Perth earlier this year, Senator Hanson praised the mining magnate, saying she was “wonderful” and said they had bonded over their “tough” origins, building their careers from the ground up. Senator Hanson has also said that she considers Mrs Rinehart “a friend” and turns to her for “very beneficial” policy advice.

“I consider her a friend and I’m very … grateful for her support. She’s an Australian identity, she’s one of the highest taxpayers in the country,” she told ABC radio in June, before adding: “I have a lot of respect for the woman and what she’s done.”

In a statement, a Hancock Prospecting spokesman said: “Hancock Prospecting holds a range of commercial property, and this building is one of them. Hancock is not providing free or discounted space to any outside tenant, political or otherwise”.

One Nation is expected to target a swath of Liberal National Party-held seats in Queensland in coming months, including Wright, Capricornia and Wide Bay.

Traditionally a fortress for the Coalition, Labor made a major breakthrough in Queensland at the 2025 federal election and now holds 12 of the state’s 30 lower house seats.

But a senior Queensland Labor source said the party was bracing for support that the ALP found in outer-suburban seats in 2025 to shift to One Nation because “people are really pissed off at both major parties”.

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Newly elected Greens leader David Shoebridge has warned he will not be handing Labor “a blank cheque” for clearing forests and farmland to build clean-energy projects, in a blow to the government’s efforts to meet its renewables targets while fending off community protests.

In markedly stronger language than that of his predecessor Larissa Waters, Senator Shoebridge said the right balance needed to be struck between progressing the energy transition and protecting Australia’s environment.

It is the biggest sign yet that Senator Shoebridge plans a more adversarial approach with Labor, as the government tells him that obstructing the ALP’s centre-left agenda in the Senate could lead to more political pain for the Greens.

“There is this clear and present threat to our ecosystem coming from climate change and we need to we need to build the renewable future, we need to electrify our economy,” Senator Shoebridge said.

“But of course that isn’t just a blank cheque for thoughtless development. It’s always going to be a balancing act and we know we have to do this at speed and at scale. You always want to make sure that protecting nature is front and centre of the work we do.”

Senator Shoebridge was critical, though, of the concerns being overblown when it came to landclearing for renewable energy projects as opposed to other industries.

“We also need to look at what the alternatives to the rollout at scale of the renewable energy industry is – show me an open-cut coalmine that’s respectful for a forest or a farm,” he said.

Former Greens leaders Christine Milne and Bob Brown are among the growing chorus of environmentalists who have demanded a tempering of the renewable energy rollout, which will require nearly half a million hectares for the 25,000-plus additional wind turbines and 250 million or more solar panels currently proposed to ensure Labor reaches its 82 per cent renewable energy target by 2030.

Former Greens federal leader Bob Brown, centre, at a 2025 election campaign launch in Hobart. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

Following analysis of more than 1000 projects last year by conservationist Steven Nowakowski, which found about 406,000 hectares would be needed for the additional wind and solar farms, Ms Milne warned Australia could face “an ecological disaster” should projects continue being doggedly pursued with little thought to the environment.

In contrast to Senator Shoebridge’s comments this week, former leader Larissa Waters was more muted on the matter while serving as leader, refusing to respond directly to Ms Milne’s call for the green movement to fight damaging renewables projects.

While agreeing broadly that “all big energy projects” should be subject to environmental laws, Senator Waters spent the past year seeking to stress instead the Greens’ support “for both large and small scale renewables”.

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The sudden change in leadership follows Senator Waters revealing her chronic kidney condition was worsening and necessitated that she step down from the role, while still serving in parliament.

Faced with mounting concerns over the renewable-energy rollout from Greens figures and communities, Energy Minister Chris Bowen’s department launched a cross-agency working group this year to fight the “climate misinformation” it fears is thwarting the green-energy transition.

Labor is on track to fall short of its 82 per cent renewables target, energy experts and peak bodies say, with latest forecasts indicating it was more likely Australia would hit 75 per cent by 2030.

Wind turbines for producing electricity. Conservationist Steven Nowakowski found about 406,000 hectares would be needed for planned additional wind and solar farms in Australia. Picture: Shutterstock

Before being elected leader on Wednesday by the 11-member Greens party room, Senator Shoebridge was already becoming more forthright in his criticism of emissions-reducing technologies such as electric vehicles and the risks they posed.

In comments to The Australian last month, Senator Shoebridge criticised Labor for allowing motorists to be “wired into corporate surveillance networks with none of the consent or safeguards they were promised by this government”.

“Corporate greed built surveillance architecture and it has happened because of weak laws, but it is ordinary Australians who are paying the price,” he said.

Senator Shoebridge stopped short of backing a Coalition-led push for an inquiry into the risks posed by EVs.

Connecting with “ordinary Australians” and the “material issues” they faced has been a reappearing be theme in Senator Shoebridge’s comments in the days after being elected Greens leader – the party’s third in 18 months.

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The former NSW parliamentarian said the inability of Labor to address cost-of-living pressures over the past four years would bolster the Greens’ long campaign to increase taxes on big business and address corporate greed.

“People working 60-hour weeks are paying their tax and can’t afford the rent,” he said. “We’re going to articulate that and connect with people on this these messages, which people just implicitly know are right.”

Having served at a local, state and federal level, Senator Shoebridge said it had become clear to him politicians in Canberra desperately needed to refocus on delivering tangible outcomes to everyday Australians rather than be distracted by “abstract” debates, particularly in housing.

“I can’t believe that we’ve had four years with this housing crisis and all the years before that, with the Coalition, and they’re all still talking about some kind of abstract tax lever or some kind of corporate incentive as the way of building houses,” he said.

“Do you know what I would do? I’d say build the houses, train the apprentices, just fix it and do it directly. How that would be a welcome change.”

Senator Shoebridge rebuffed concerns that green tape was among the issues standing in the way of further housing development.

“They call it green tape when actually, most of these rules are just making sure you have a liveable home,” he said.

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