Pauline Hanson Officially Won Four Seats In The Senate And Now Wields A Whole Lotta Power

Despite initially being laughed off, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party has secured four seats in Australia’s new Senate.

By comparison, the Coalition has 30, Labor has 26, the Greens have nine and Nick Xenophon Team has three as a result of the most recent election.

Independents – including Derryn Hinch (!), David Leyonhjelm, Jacqui Lambie and Family First’s Bob Day – fill in the gaps to make up the Senate’s 76 seats.

One Nation ultimately picked up two seats in Queensland, one seat in Western Australia and one more in New South Wales.

And guess what? Their newest appointee, Queensland's Malcolm Roberts, has already called for a section of the Racial Discrimination Act to be repealed.

As a result of the final count, the SMH has called One Nation “a major force in Australian politics.”

That’s because the Coalition will have to rely on the eleven independents to get its legislation through the Senate (and, if you recall, the double dissolution election was specifically held to retool the Senate in a more Coalition-friendly manner, though that didn’t exactly pan out). Given that One Nation is now a voting bloc of four, they could wield significant influence over the next three years.

(Note that the make-up of the Senate is different to the House of Representatives, where the Coalition notched the bare minimum number of seats to claim a majority: 76.)

Wondering what Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party actually stands for? We’ve written previously about her “20 years of notoriety” and what her return to politics means for Australia.

But, if you want a basic idea of the Hanson Four's ethos, One Nation is advocating for a royal commission into both Islam and climate science. Hanson also wants to “abolish multiculturalism” and install “surveillance cameras… in all Mosques and schools”.

(NSW’s One Nation senator, Brian Burston, recently told New Corp, "We're a Christian country, I know we have some Jews as well … but the Muslims, they kneel five times a day and it's not how we are in this country.")

Over the weekend, SBS aired a documentary about Pauline Hanson entitled Please Explain, which she streamed herself watching on Facebook Live.

Around 2,600 people are watching Pauline Hanson, watching the Pauline Hanson doco on @SBS #inception #gogglebox pic.twitter.com/fyIPjufjAN

— Matthew Doran (@MattDoran91) July 31, 2016

Yes, this is Australian politics in 2016. Stay tuned for more Hanson news, because she is not going anywhere.

A somewhat awkward moment during filming. Pauline Hanson: #PleaseExplain! - Sunday 8.35pm on SBShttps://t.co/XK4fMpyDjj

— SBS Australia (@SBS) July 29, 2016

Photo: Facebook.