Guardian Essential poll: voters reject key One Nation policies but support still high

Australians have emphatically rejected some of One Nation’s key policies, including shutting down SBS and ending multiculturalism, with voters raising concerns over Pauline Hanson’s closeness to billionaire mining magnate Gina Rinehart and whether the party has the skills needed to run the country, according to a new poll.

But even as the latest Guardian Essential poll finds voters have major reservations about Hanson and her party, more than half of respondents said they were either definitely or at least considering voting for One Nation at the next election.

The Guardian Essential poll of 1,017 voters was conducted last week – after Hanson’s controversial press club speech – and found One Nation’s primary vote dropping two points, to 26% from last month’s 28%. Labor’s primary vote ticked up one point, to 30%, while the Coalition remained on 23%. Those movements are within the margin of error of the poll, but are consistent with several other published polls this week – Newspoll, Redbridge and Roy Morgan, among others – which found a slight increase in Labor’s vote and a slight decrease for One Nation.

One Nation’s primary vote has consistently risen each month, with Hanson recording far higher net approval ratings than prime minister Anthony Albanese or opposition leader Angus Taylor.

But after a fortnight of media scrutiny on Hanson and her party’s policies, following her press club speech, Australians have resoundingly rejected many of One Nation’s key proposals.

Peter Lewis, executive director of Essential Media, said this month’s poll suggested One Nation’s poll may be “plateauing”.

Only 15% of respondents supported Hanson’s calls to privatise the ABC, with just 11% agreeing to shut down SBS. Following Hanson’s calls for a “monoculture” in Australia, only 20% said they’d support ending multiculturalism.

Just 18% support withdrawing Australia from the United Nations, while only 18% supported calls to review workplace laws to give employers more power. Slightly higher numbers said they would support stopping abortion after 20 weeks (26%) and stopping the renewables transition to instead focus on fossil fuels (25%).

More broadly, only 29% of Australians said abortion should be legal in all cases – down 12% from the last time Essential asked this question in November 2024. In this most recent poll, another 42% said abortion should be legal in most cases; conversely, 19% said abortion should be illegal in most cases and 9% that it should be illegal in all cases.

In total, 72% said abortion should be legal in some or all cases, down 7% since November 2024. Another 28% said it should be illegal in some or all cases, up 7%.

Despite concern over One Nation policies, many Australians are still keen or curious to vote for Hanson’s party. Some 29% of people said they would definitely vote for One Nation at the next election , with another 23% saying they would be open to it, for a total of 52%.

Only 27% of respondents said theywould definitely vote for Labor, with another 23% open to it, for 50% total. Only 18% said they would definitely vote for the Liberals and just 8% said the same for the Nationals.

But in one bright spot for the Coalition, larger numbers of Australians said they were open to voting for those parties, potentially representing “soft” One Nation voters who could be won back by Taylor. Some 32% of people said they would be open to voting Liberal, and another 36% said the same for the Nationals.

Among people saying they were open to, or definitely, voting for One Nation, immigration was cited as their key driver, followed by sentiments about the major parties not listening and wanting to give another politician a go. The third-highest driver was concern about the widening gap between rich and poor.

But conversely, asked what their concerns were about One Nation, 51% of respondents said they were concerned that One Nation did not have “a team of skilled people to run Australia”.

Some 50% said they were concerned about One Nation being backed by Rinehart, while 45% were concerned that One Nation would “turn Australians against each other”.

Albanese’s net approval ratings improved slightly, but remain in negative territory; the prime minister’s approval rating went up one point to 38%, with his disapprovals down three points to 51%, but his net approval remains at minus-13.

Taylor also ticked up, despite his party’s vote not improving. His approval rating went up three points, to 36% while his disapproval remained at 37%, for a net approval of minus-one.