Liberal Senator Alex Antic has urged the Coalition to stop attacking One Nation and focus on defeating the Albanese government, after Opposition Leader Angus Taylor’s broadside against Pauline Hanson’s party.
Speaking on Sky News on Friday, Senator Antic said he disagreed with Mr Taylor’s attitude towards One Nation – which the Opposition Leader predicted on Thursday would bring an “eternity of pain” if it was elected to government.
Mr Antic distanced himself from his boss’ comments.
“I don’t think it’s helpful to be crossing swords with One Nation,” he told Sky News host James MacPherson.
“We shouldn’t be enemies.”
On Thursday evening, the Opposition Leader spoke at the Sydney Institute to warn Australians about risks of a potential One Nation government.
Mr Taylor doubled down on these comments on Friday morning with Sky News host Peter Stefanovic, asserting One Nation “doesn’t have the answers” to Australia’s problems, and described the party’s policies as “incoherent”.
Soon after, One Nation leader Pauline Hanson released a video in which she told the Coalition to stop attacking her party and focus its attention on the Labor Party.
Mr Antic agreed with Ms Hanson, saying both parties needed to make a “concerted effort to remove this Albanese Labor government.”
The Liberal senator said the path forward for the Liberal Party was demonstrating it was in tune with its voters.
“The reality here is it’s got to be a process of showing the public of Australia what it looks like with a Liberal Party that is actually going to deliver policies,” he said.
“Now Angus is going to do that. He’s in the process of doing that.”
Unity between the two parties is important, said Mr Antic, because both parties are “actually trying to save this country.”
“We now have a country that has had the greatest dip in living standards in the Western world over the last three or four years,” he said.
“The time has come for the conservative side of politics to give (the infighting) up.
“I do think that it is important that we don’t spend time talking about each other and that we focus on the issues, which is putting Australia first.”