The Bank of Pauline Hanson: $400k in unexplained debts to One Nation founder

One Nation publicly reported racking up $400,000 in debts to its leader and financial backer Pauline Hanson over the past decade without corresponding records to show she had lent the money in the first place.

A tally of known payments by Hanson plus the debt figures suggest the party founder has offered loans totalling nearly $1 million since her campaign to re-enter parliament in 2016.

But the Queensland senator, who is asking voters to trust her right-wing reactionary party with the national economy, has avoided questions about the commercial arrangements, including the interest she has charged.

Both Hanson and One Nation have refused to answer detailed inquiries from this masthead about the apparent record gaps and the opaque business structure of the party, which reported raking in $5 million in a matter of days this year as part of its “Fire the Liar” campaign.

“All loans by Senator Hanson have been appropriately recorded,” a party spokesman said in a brief statement.

“Past campaigns have required loans provided by Senator Hanson to bolster federal campaign budgets when banks would not consider lending to the party.”

One Nation’s books are overseen by Alex Jones, who became the party’s national treasurer at 18 years old and later pleaded guilty to electoral fraud in 2022 for backdating funding claims, with no conviction recorded.

Hanson, who used party funds to pay for luxury accommodation on a recent trip to Europe, remains an official representative dealing with Queensland and Australian electoral watchdogs, an uncommon position for a party leader.

“I put my money where my mouth is and back my party and my candidates,” she said in 2019 when questioned about her lending.

That year, the party reported owing Hanson $100,003 as at June 30. It had earlier received two lots of $50,000 from her.

But Australian Electoral Commission records show an additional $353,503 debt to Hanson arose the same year, with no incoming payments that would appear to explain the sum.

A similar situation arose in 2018. This time, a One Nation entity filed accounts to Queensland’s Office of Fair Trading showing a $48,300 “Loan – Pauline Hanson”.

But the party reported no transactions to Queensland or federal electoral authorities that would indicate Hanson had first transferred money across. The same electoral records make no mention of a debt to the founder.

University of Queensland emeritus professor Graeme Orr said loans had to be reported, according to two sections of the Commonwealth Electoral Act, and that “parties are to declare the amount of a loan as a receipt”.

Hanson, who famously ran a fish and chip shop before becoming a politician, has repeatedly reached into her own pocket before elections, according to party accounts.

One Nation declared $190,000 in loans from Hanson in the first half of 2016. It later told Queensland’s electoral commission this money was a commercial loan used to fund that year’s federal election campaign, and Hanson had received $3810 in interest.

However, other records show she received $213,000 as a “loan repayment” – $23,000 more than she had lent. The party then paid Hanson another $23,600 for a “Hyundai Imax Wagon purchase”.

One Nation and Hanson declined to answer questions about the loan repayment, the rate of interest and whether the senator should have declared any interest income publicly. Senate guidelines suggest senators should declare income above $5000 a year.

Even as One Nation has grown in prominence, taking in hundreds of thousands of dollars in merchandise sales and donations each year, it has continued to borrow from Hanson.

In 2024-25, it told the AEC it had borrowed $245,000, a figure that was in the vicinity of the senator’s salary that year. But it is unclear which of One Nation’s various business entities was transacting with Hanson.

Years of overdue financial accounts filed by an entity called One Nation Queensland Division Inc last month suggest it operates far beyond the borders of the Sunshine State. It has received millions of dollars in merchandise sales, donations and electoral funding, including federal funding.

Despite the “Queensland” in its name, the party calls it “the national division”. It has recorded previous loans from Hanson.

But David Gilchrist, a professor of accounting at the University of Western Australia, said he could see no proper record of a $245,000 loan in the entity’s newly filed accounts.

“Anyone that knows how to read a cashflow statement would assume that there were no financing activities during the year,” Gilchrist said. “They’d assume there were no loans from anybody and there were no loans to anybody.”

Gilchrist said a $245,000 loan would be a material transaction, both because of its size and the fact it came from a senior party official. “It does seem to be a breakdown in transparency,” he said.

A party spokesman said “One Nation undertakes annual compliance and financial checks through third-party audits”.

Hanson has previously defended her lending. In 2019, she said the $100,000 she had lent was to cover a federal party shortfall after it transferred money to the NSW wing for a state election. “It wasn’t in an Aldi bag, it wasn’t in a brown paper bag, it was all registered,” Hanson told Nine’s Today program.

But the party’s frequent loans between different branches or divisions have produced their own record gaps.

In 2022, One Nation told the electoral commission in Queensland that it had paid off a loan to its national division with a $666,709 transfer. The party disclosed no such payment when it filed its return to the AEC.

The electoral commission is examining whether a number of business entities, either directed or part-owned by Hanson, should have been registered as official associated entities of the party.

These include a film production business as well as Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Limited, a public company run by Hanson and two party officials.

Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Limited rents the national headquarters near Brisbane airport and took ownership of the $1.5 million plane donated by billionaire backer Gina Rinehart.

The company’s constitution, filed with the corporate regulator ASIC, identifies itself as One Nation’s national constitution.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.

Remove items from your saved list to add more.

License this article

Patrick Begley is an investigative reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X or email.James Hall is the News Director at the Brisbane Times. He is the former Queensland correspondent at The Australian Financial Review and has reported for a range of mastheads across the country, specialising on political and finance reporting.Connect via X or email.AdvertisementAdvertisement