Pauline Hanson says two nuclear reactors should be built on Australia\u2019s east coast, but insists One Nation\u2019s policy is nothing like Peter Dutton\u2019s failed push to build plants during his unsuccessful election campaign.<\/p>\n
Campaigning in Victoria ahead of the November state election, the One Nation<\/a> leader went beyond the party\u2019s published policy, which calls for $6.8bn to be spent on construction of one reactor, to be built at a site supported by community consultation.<\/p>\n Hanson also called for taxpayer funding to keep coal-fired Loy Yang power station outside Traralgon operating, as well as construction of \u201ca couple\u201d of new nuclear plants as part of a push for a \u201cdiversity\u201d of power supply.<\/p>\n \u201cThe reactors need to happen,\u201d Hanson said on Monday.<\/p>\n \u201cBut we need that diversity of power. Keep your coal-fired power stations going.\u201d<\/p>\n Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email<\/a><\/p>\n She distanced herself from a plan to build seven taxpayer-funded nuclear plants that was previously proposed by the Coalition. That policy, which suggested having two of the plants use small modular technology, fell flat with voters ahead of the 2025 election.<\/p>\n One Nation\u2019s policy says nuclear energy would support industry and take pressure off older energy infrastructure, while creating high-skill jobs. Their $6.8bn price tag is based on projected costs for two nuclear reactors being built in South Korea.<\/p>\n Labor opposes lifting the Howard-era moratorium on civil nuclear power in Australia, while the Coalition wants to remove the ban to allow the private sector to pursue developments.<\/p>\n Tony Wood, an energy and climate expert at the Grattan Institute think-tank, said any move to repeal the moratorium would spark a new fight about nuclear.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the moratorium was lifted tomorrow, no one is going to go out and build a nuclear power station. It would need huge amount of government support and take a long time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cYou couldn\u2019t pick up a nuclear power station from South Korea and drop it in the Latrobe Valley. You\u2019ve got a whole regulatory process, you\u2019ve got a whole investment process and you\u2019d have to bring out the entire workforce because there\u2019s only one or maybe two universities that do any sort of nuclear science these days in the university courses.\u201d<\/p>\n Wood said the $6.8bn price tag could be low, noting the Hinkley nuclear development in England was costing at least \u00a335bn, or about $66bn Australian dollars.<\/p>\n \u201cI think nuclear might eventually be part of Plan C or D but I don\u2019t see it being part of Australia\u2019s Plan A,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n War of words with PM<\/p>\n The unveiling of the policy came after Labor\u2019s historic loss in Western Australia\u2019s Secret Harbour byelection<\/a>, where One Nation\u2019s Luke Herdegen secured the party\u2019s first lower house seat in the state\u2019s parliament.<\/p>\n After the byelection result, Anthony Albanese<\/a> told Queensland Labor\u2019s state conference that One Nation was \u201cdangerous, divisive and downright dishonest\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019ll say anything and do anything to win votes. Bend any facts. Peddle misinformation and disinformation. Turn Australian against Australian,\u201d the prime minister said.<\/p>\n \u201cParties like One Nation have no serious answers to our problems.\u201d<\/p>\n In a significant spray on social media, Hanson on Monday said Albanese\u2019s comments \u201ccrossed a line\u201d, and that \u201cwords have consequences\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThat is how political violence is incited,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cAnthony Albanese says we need to turn down the heat and violent rhetoric in our political discourse. Meanwhile, he and his treasurer are pouring petrol all over it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe real danger to Jim [Chalmers] and Albanese is that the people of Australia are coming for their government \u2026 at the ballot box.\u201d<\/p>\n But the attorney general, Michelle Rowland, threw her support behind Albanese\u2019s characterisation of One Nation, saying she considered the party to be dangerous in multiple ways.<\/p>\n \u201cI think some of One Nation\u2019s elements, particularly where they have been recruiting or otherwise giving a platform to extremist views, \u2026 that is dangerous,\u201d Rowland said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it is also dangerous, at a time when social cohesion has never been more important, to trade on the politics of division.\u201d<\/p>\n Hanson is no stranger to making controversial comments.<\/p>\n She plans to take a fight with a fellow senator to the high court, after losing an appeal to a federal court ruling<\/a> that she racially discriminated against the Greens\u2019 Mehreen Faruqi by telling her to \u201cpiss off back to Pakistan\u201d.<\/p>\n Hanson also came under fire in February<\/a> after she disputed whether \u201cgood Muslims\u201d exist. The Australian federal police confirmed they had received multiple complaints about the comments, but determined Hanson\u2019s comments did not breach hate laws<\/a>.<\/p>\n This article was amended on 31 August 2026. One Nation\u2019s Luke Herdegen won the party\u2019s first lower house seat in the Western Australian parliament, not Rod Caddies as a previous version stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pauline Hanson says two nuclear reactors should be built on Australia\u2019s east coast, but insists One Nation\u2019s policy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":875365,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-875364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=875364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/875365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=875364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=875364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=875364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}