One Nation eyes more seats after by-election triumph
One Nation has warned it will come for more seats as the coalition struggles to emerge from the rubble of a historic byelection result.
David Farley swept to victory in the growing Farrer electorate in southern NSW on Saturday night, ending the coalition’s 77-year reign in the federal seat.
With more than 80 percent of the votes counted, Mr. Farley had easily defeated independent Michelle Milthorpe with more than 57 percent of the preferred vote of the two candidates.
“One Nation has reached the end of its beginning. We’re heading towards the ceiling from here,” he said Saturday night to a room filled with cheers and applause.
It was One Nation’s first federal lower house election victory since its founding by Pauline Hanson in 1997, and she had a message for the major parties.
“We are coming after other seats,” Ms. Hanson said.
Former National leader and One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce also suggested that the political earthquake would spread.
“Western Sydney here we come,” he said.
“Australians hear the noise coming from the bush and then it reaches the city as a bushfire.”
The by-election was triggered by the resignation of long-serving MP Sussan Ley following her sacking as Liberal leader by Angus Taylor in February.
Support for the coalition has fallen to 12 per cent of the Liberals’ primary vote and the Nationals’ below 10 per cent.
Ms. Ley had more than 43 percent of the primary vote when she won the seat a year ago.
Liberal leader Angus Taylor said the Liberals needed to take their medicine and learn hard lessons.
“For a very long time, we have been a party of interests, not a party of faith,” he said.
Liberal deputy leader Jane Hume acknowledged voter confidence had been broken by the coalition splitting twice and said it would take time to rebuild.
But Ms Ley said it would be wrong to attribute the result to ruptures in the coalition and called on Liberal leaders to accept defeat with humility because voters “never get it wrong”.
He echoed the “change or die” slogan that Mr Taylor used after the leadership spill in February.
“Three months later, the outcome in Farrer shows that this statement is more true today than ever before,” Ms Ley said.
Labor chose not to contest the by-election.
Finance Minister Jim Chalmers described the result as a “bloodbath” and said it showed the coalition had to join One Nation to compete.
“I think there can be no coalition government in the future without One Nation,” he told ABC News on Sunday.
Farrer covers more than 126,560 square kilometers and fills the south-western corner of NSW.
The largest population center is Albury, located on the NSW-Victoria border.
The race, which has become a two-way contest between a minor party and an independent party, signals a broader shift in voting away from the major parties.
In the 1960s, more than 70 percent of Australians voted for the same party at every election.
By 2025, that number has fallen to one-third, according to the Australian Election Study.
“Australian voters have become increasingly volatile,” Griffith University senior lecturer Sarah Cameron, the study’s lead researcher, told AAP.
“Most people do not feel close to the major political parties and are increasingly willing to shift votes from election to election.”
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