Pauline Hanson wears burqa in Senate chamber for second time

Wong asked the president to rule Hanson’s behavior was disorderly, citing Liberal senator George Brandis who scolded the One Nation leader the last time he wore the outfit on the Senate floor.

“We’re all here. We have the great privilege of representing people of all faiths in our states… and we have to do it properly,” Wong said. “The disrespect you are now displaying is unbecoming of a member of the Australian Senate.”

Hanson was ordered to remove the clause and leave the chamber or face suspension, and the Senate voted overwhelmingly to impeach him.

Hanson was heard telling Lines: “You’re so vile, you’re not doing your job properly.”

Hanson eventually left the room. Many people in the public gallery applauded as he left.

Hanson first wore a burqa to the Senate chamber in 2017. Its new attempt to ban the burqa was criticized earlier on Monday by Australia’s Islamophobia ambassador Aftab Malik, who said the move would worsen harassment, rape threats and violence against Muslim women in Australia.

“It is frustrating to see Australian Muslim women’s clothing choices constantly linked to national security concerns. Islamophobia is at record levels in Australia, with Islamophobia described as ‘unprecedented’ by Register Australia. Muslim women in particular are facing the brunt,” Malik wrote in a statement to this imprint.

“Eight years after Senator Pauline Hanson last called for a ban on the burqa, she is proposing it again. This would deepen existing safety risks for Australian Muslim women who choose to wear a hijab, headscarf or full face and body-covering burqa.”

Hanson’s office did not release a copy of the motion before it sought to table it in the upper house on Monday afternoon, but an October press release from his office said the move was set to mirror similar bans in France. Hanson was not given permission by the government to introduce the bill.

“This is all about helping to better ensure the security of the Australian community. This should be the first responsibility of any government, and any government that does not prioritize these measures does not deserve that title,” Hanson said.

Hanson has been campaigning against burqas since at least 2002, and in 2014 she stated that she was “uncomfortable with the burqa and was even against the veil”, claiming that “people whose faces are fully covered, including women, are known to have hidden bombs underneath them, and these have been detonated in terrorist acts in various parts of the world, such as Chechnya.”

Hanson made headlines in 2017 when she wore a burqa to the Senate, demanding the Coalition government ban the burqa.

“In light of this nation’s national security, [the government] Considering the 13 national threats against us thwarted through terrorism, will you work with me to actually ban the burqa in Australia? he asked.

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Hanson was reprimanded by both the then Coalition government and the Labor Party for this demonstration.

Malik noted past estimates that fewer than 250 women in Australia wear burqas and said this action would directly threaten women’s safety.

“They already face harassment, rape threats and violence, not because of what they do, but because of what they wear. Veiled Muslim women have long been easy targets of bigotry and intolerance towards Muslims. A proposed burqa ban would further brand them as outsiders and encourage harassment and abuse,” Malik said.

“All women should be free to decide what to wear and what not to wear,” she said.

Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi, who is also Muslim and is mired in a racial libel case against Hanson, told this imprint that One Nation “has nothing to offer Australians apart from exhausting culture wars and hollow publicity stunts”.

“Nearly 10 years after Hanson’s pathetic burqa display in the Senate, One Nation has reversed its racist, Islamophobic policymaker and achieved a burqa ban once again,” Faruqi said. “The idea that the government should regulate what a woman can and cannot wear should never be up for debate. Parliament should clearly reject it.”

One Nation’s poll hits record high with 12 per cent primary vote in last election Unfreeze Political Monitor take advantage of this masthead and achieve record popularity in News Corp’s News Poll and AFR Redbridge/Accent surveys too. Hanson is actively aiming to recruit Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce; He himself said that One Nation by this imprint had “a purer form of understandable conservatism”.

Joyce continued to stay away from the National Party chamber as MPs returned to parliament on Monday and reiterated that he would wait until parliament was on its feet to make any decisions about a possible move towards One Nation.

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