Rita Panahi:
Joining me now is Deputy Executive Director at the Institute of Public Affairs, Daniel Wild. Dan, this is a shocking poll for Labour and it’s a shocking poll for the coalition. And it just shows you the smear campaigns against One Nation are not landing.
Daniel Wild:
One Nation vote is now largely locked in until the next federal election. Obviously there’s enough Australians who just think the political system isn’t working and they’ve given their adjudication that they’re probably going to vote for somebody different. As you indicated, the two major parties are on less than 50% of the primary vote at a record low now. And it is incredible. And like we’ve been talking about, this is the new normal. I just think that the established parties and politicians need to get acclimatised to the fact that things are not going to go back to the old days where you had two parties taking two thirds or more of the vote, at least for the time being. So I think that this will be the system that we have, a very fragmented system, very much a European style political system for some time until the country gets the change that it needs.
Rita Panahi:
And it’s incredible that we could have that given we have a preferential system, which is a big advantage to the major parties. How safe is the Prime Minister, Dan? Is the coalition’s pitiful performance, their terrible numbers, the only thing that’s keeping the challenges at bay?
Daniel Wild:
No. I mean, no one is ever safe in Canberra. I can guarantee you that. There’s another 70 or 80 people on the government benches that want to be the Prime Minister. So this is a ceaseless activity of Canberra. Look, I think that they will probably cut Albanese some slack given he did lead the party to a monstrous victory, though on the back of a very low primary vote. Look, the main threat is actually from One Nation in many respects. We saw what happened in Western Australia. We saw what happened where I am in South Australia where One Nation took a lot of the Labour vote in the outer suburbs. We know that New South Wales Labour is under the pump and also in Victoria. So clearly Labour federally and Albanese specifically don’t know how to deal with the threat of One Nation. So there will be the temptation by Labour to replace Albanese with somebody who’s considered more able to deal with the One Nation threat. But I don’t think anything’s going to change probably until the next election, if not beyond.
Rita Panahi:
Now Anthony Albanese arrived in the US and there was no one there, Dan, to greet him from the Trump administration. No red carpet for Albo. And then in New York, he copped this question from Latika Bourke, and credit where it’s due, this was a doozy. This is the best question I have heard posed to the Australian Prime Minister.
Latika Bourke:
Prime Minister, here in New York on Wednesday night, you will receive an award for being a global citizen. Don’t you feel like a bit of a fraud accepting this award when at home you screwed up the response to the worst massacre since Port Arthur? In the polls, you are taking Labour to one point shy of Julia Gillard when you rolled her and your net negatives are worse than Scott Morrison.
Anthony Albanese:
No.
Rita Panahi:
That’s all he could say. “No.” It was a fairly petulant response. You would think he would want to answer that in a more fulsome manner, particularly given there would’ve been international media present, Dan.
Daniel Wild:
Yeah, he doesn’t like it when the carefully curated pack of media sycophants don’t just ask their questions. I mean, you know how it works. They’re all there. They get the questions in advance of what to ask and there’s a very subservient media. So I thought this was a great question. I liked it. You saw Albanese in his true colours thumbing his nose, looking down upon her, refusing to engage. I mean, imagine if this was a conservative leader so disrespectfully taking the question of a female journalist. You would’ve heard, “Oh, this is misogyny. Oh, they don’t take women seriously.” But when it’s Albanese with his two melons and everything else, he gets away with it because of a recalcitrant media. So I don’t understand why don’t more journalists do this? I mean, this is actually what journalists are supposed to do.
Rita Panahi:
Well, absolutely. They all want to have that moment, that viral moment when it comes to politicians like Donald Trump. But when it’s Anthony Albanese, it’s almost like they police each other. Well, certainly like that with Dan Andrews back in the bad old days of the COVID lockdowns and the daily press conferences. Anyone who stepped out of line there and asked some tough questions copped it from the rest of the media pack. Now let’s look at some of the attacks against One Nation. Former Master Chef host, Melissa Leong has branded Pauline Hanson an orange head demon as she accused the One Asian leader of making Asian Australians feel unsafe. Have a listen.
Melissa Leong:
And then if you think about everything that the Orange Haired Demon has done in the last 12 months alone, you asked that question again, do you think Australia is racist?
Rita Panahi:
Dan, what impact do you think that commentary will have? Will it land or is it just going to be dismissed as more whinging?
Daniel Wild:
No one cares. I mean, I’ve seriously never heard of this person until just now. And she seems to have done well in life. I mean, I assume being a co-host of a fairly major television programme, I mean really, you really feel beset by racism and that you’ve not had opportunities to get ahead in life? It just doesn’t weigh up now. I’m not going to diminish if she has been subject to any unfairness, then that’s not right. But you would look at her life on a whole and say she’s done pretty well because that’s the kind of country we are. We’re a country where if you have a go and you do the right thing and you’re successful, you’ll get rewarded for it. That’s overwhelmingly what our national story is all about. I don’t understand why people like this feel the need to weigh in.
Of course, have an opinion, but when you start getting very personal and vitriolic, I just think it diminishes the other things that this individual has done in their career. And I just don’t think it’s going to… I mean, it will probably have no impact, but if it has any impact, it’s actually going to help Pauline Hanson and One Nation rather than hinder them, I imagine.
Rita Panahi:
And another lefty commentator, Peter FitzSimons, has published a piece in the Sydney Morning Herald where he’s essentially gloating about mass migration soon making white Australians a minority in Australia and that how this is going to damage One Nation in upcoming elections. One, it’s very presumptuous, this notion that migrants will not vote for One Nation. In fact, the polling seems to indicate otherwise, particularly when it comes to certain migrant groups. But what about these notions that Australians or Anglo-Saxon Australians will soon be a minority in their own country?
Daniel Wild:
Well, I think it’s very divisive, this nonsense that’s pedalled by the elite media type people like Bandana Man who are always trying to engage in some kind of divisive campaign, whether it’s a republic, whether it’s a voice to parliament. Now he’s gloating this idea that one cohort of Australians are going to be a minority. And you have people in this debate that actually look at the demographic change and they’re alarmed by it and then they’re told that they’re conspiracy theorists. So this is a classic example of this is not happening and it’s good that it is. So if someone brings it up, they’ll say, “No, no, that’s not happening. You’re making this up.” And then you have someone like FitzSimons that says, “Yeah, this is happening and this is a very good thing and it’s your turn to cop it now.” This is the kind of divisive nonsense that actually causes nations to crumble and decline.
If he can’t see the fact that our values as Australians go beyond our skin colour, I know it’s hard for him because he was a chief advocate of the Voice to Parliament, so he’s obsessed with skin colour. But if you don’t understand that our values go beyond skin colour and racial background and ethnicity, then I think you’re the problem, not the rest of the country.
Rita Panahi:
Now, before you go, I’ve been wanting to speak to you about this one. So Joseph Banks, a great figure in Australian history, took part in Captain James Cook’s first great voyage to this country. He was a strong advocate for British settlement in New South Wales, the colonisation of Australia. He is one of the founders, you could argue, of modern day Australia, but have a look at the way the New South Wales State Library has described this explorer. This is what sits below his portrait. It says, “He paved the way for invasion, dispossession, and colonisation, and his legacy is cultural theft, colonial violence, and enduring loss.” Dan, they also said in this caption, they accused Banks of being an obsessive specimen collector who took vast numbers of indigenous cultural belongings, plants, and animals without consent. What do you think of all this?
Daniel Wild:
Well, it’s a disgrace and the curators or the administrators, whoever’s responsible, need to be fired for this clearly. There’s nothing wrong in giving an accurate assessment of Australia’s past and the individuals involved, but to provide that little snippet in a way that is very politically charged and also factually incorrect is a disgrace for an institution that should be actually showcasing Australia’s history, not only to Australians, but to the many visitors that come to learn about our country. And you’re going to tell them that we’re basically a backward racist country built on stolen land and invasion. It’s a total complete disgrace. Someone needs to be brought to answer about why do they think this was appropriate? On what basis have they made this assessment? So this is a problem. I mean, many of our cultural institutions are doing the wrong thing. They’ve been taken over by activists, and sadly, Australians are now developing cultural amnesia where we’re forgetting who we really are.
Rita Panahi:
The fact that they felt confident enough to put something this radical as the caption under his portrait to me is wild. It just shows you how captured these institutions are by this far left thinking, because yes, those sorts of people have often served in those sorts of roles, but they’ve had the good sense just to temper their activism a little bit. Now they seem to just be running wild. Daniel Wild, thank you so much for your time.
This transcript with Daniel Wild talking on The Rita Panahi Show – News24 from 21 September 2026 has been edited for clarity.
