Mark Latham is dumped from the role of NSW One Nation leader by Pauline Hanson
Mark Latham is dumped from the role of NSW One Nation leader by Pauline Hanson
- Mark Latham Dumped as Leader of NSW One Nation
Pauline Hanson has dumped Mark Latham as the NSW division’s One Nation leader.
In an extraordinary intervention, Ms Hanson wrote to members of the party’s NSW leadership team to disband the state executive formerly led by Mr Latham.
Under the party’s constitution, a new secretary of state has been installed, with Ms Hanson as leader of the party.
This means that the party has no official leader in the state parliament, where it has three seats in the upper house.
In the letter, Ms Hanson said she was ousting Mr Latham because the party had failed to live up to expectations in the March state election.
Pauline Hanson has dumped Mark Latham as the NSW division’s One Nation leader
“In the March 2023 state election, there was a 14 percent swing from our party votes from the previous election,” Ms. Hanson wrote.
“There is still no good explanation as to why this happened given that we had two MLCs in the state parliament, a fully resourced NSW affiliate and disillusioned Conservative voters leaving the Liberal party… these are serious questions that need to be addressed. ‘
Mr Latham had confidently predicted before the election that One Nation would take seats in regional NSW, expectations that were not met.
The party received only 1.8 percent of the vote with a swing of 0.7 percent, but failed to win any seats in the Legislative Assembly.
Ms Hanson and Mr Latham seemed to be at odds over comments the latter made about homosexuality and gay Sydney Greens MP Alex Greenwich.
Mr. Latham’s explicit and ludicrous description of homosexuality was strongly condemned by Senator Hanson.
“I want you to know that I don’t condone them (the comments) and neither do my MPs or fellow party members,” she said.
“I think they’re disgusting.”
However, Mr Lathan claimed during a radio interview in Sydney that he had not received personal disapproval from Ms Hanson, who he said as ‘a woman’ would have difficulty understanding his feelings on the subject.
‘Pauline never called me at any point; I haven’t had any contact with her,” Latham told Chris Smith.
“I guess as a woman she doesn’t understand how straight men feel about this.
“She hasn’t contacted me and I’m not apologizing so I’m not resigning anywhere. I’m not apologizing or backing off.”
More to come