‘I wouldn’t move to Victoria’: Pauline Hanson speaks at Melbourne anti-immigration rally

3 months ago 19

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has addressed a crowd at an anti-immigration rally in Melbourne’s CBD, speaking at Flagstaff Gardens during the Put Australia First protest on Sunday.

A small group of counter-protesters interrupted Hanson’s speech with a loudspeaker, but they were roughly forced away by other protesters and police.

Pauline Hanson speaks to a crowd in Melbourne at an anti-immigration rally.

Hanson told the crowd not to fight and continued her speech.

“I’m not from Victoria and, to tell you the truth, I wouldn’t move to Victoria,” Hanson said.

“I’ll stay in Queensland, thank you very much.

“We have our problems there but when I see what the Labor Party has done to this state...and the Liberals have not been much better. They don’t fight. I see it all the time.”

She assured the crowd that One Nation would be running candidates in the Victorian election next year.

Hanson’s speech came days after she created fresh controversy by wearing a burqa in the Senate last Monday. She was later suspended from the Senate for seven days.

On Sunday, counter-protesters had earlier gathered at the State Library on Swanston Street to protest the anti-immigration rally.

The Put Australia First demonstrators assembled in Flinders Street before marching to Flagstaff Gardens.

The two rallies coincide with the introduction of Victoria Police’s greater powers to conduct on-the-spot searches for prohibited weapons.

The new search powers were tested outside the State Library during the rally by counter-protesters. Six officers stopped a man wearing a grey hoodie to search his bag. A crowd gathered around chanting, “No justice, no ban. No racist police.”

The man’s bag was emptied on the forecourt and deemed safe.

Under the declaration, officers can conduct pat-down or wand searches of people without a warrant, search vehicles and force people to remove face coverings in the designated areas of the CBD, Southbank and Docklands.

Police officers use new search powers at the Unite to Oppose the Far Right protest in Melbourne on Sunday.

The expanded powers will be in force until May 29, 2026.

During violent clashes between police and counter-protesters on October 19, police were assaulted with rocks, glass bottles and rotten fruit. Two officers were taken to hospital.