{"id":90177,"date":"2026-09-07T11:43:23","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T11:43:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/90177\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T11:43:23","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T11:43:23","slug":"pauline-hanson-stands-by-victorian-one-nation-leader-warren-pickering-amid-heavy-drug-use-allegations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/90177\/","title":{"rendered":"Pauline Hanson stands by Victorian One Nation leader Warren Pickering amid heavy drug use allegations"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Patrick<\/p>\n

September 7, 2026 \u2014 5:31pm<\/p>\n

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One Nation founder Pauline Hanson has said claims about Victorian leader Warren Pickering having an alleged history of heavy drug use is \u201ca personal situation\u201d and not a matter for the party.<\/p>\n

In an interview with The Australian on Monday, Pickering\u2019s former partner of almost two decades, Jo Scott, claimed the pair had used marijuana and amphetamines \u2013 including the highly addictive drug crystal meth, or ice \u2013 in the home they shared with their daughter and her three sons from a previous marriage.<\/p>\n

\"HansonHanson with One Nation\u2019s Victorian leader, Warren Pickering, at a press conference in Melbourne in August. Eamon Gallagher<\/p>\n

The article was accompanied by handwritten notes purportedly written by Pickering to Scott, apologising for his behaviour while \u201con the shit\u201d and acknowledging \u201cusing substances\u201d.<\/p>\n

A former bricklayer who also served in the army as a combat engineer, Pickering is a self-described conspiracy theorist who has claimed Australian government policy is controlled by a cabal of foreign \u201cglobalists\u201d, and endorsed the idea that the world economy was deliberately crashed to trigger a \u201cgreat reset\u201d.<\/p>\n

Hanson said on Monday during a press conference she was comfortable with the 43-year-old leading the party at a state level despite the claims.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Darren<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m happy [with him],\u201d she said. \u201cThese are allegations that have been put to Warren Pickering, and he\u2019s denied those allegations. I will not be saying any more about it. It is a personal situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

One Nation senator Barnaby Joyce said Pickering was accepted into and served the Australian Army following the period of alleged drug use, which included security vetting.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe managed to serve our nation. And the other thing \u2026 we\u2019re talking about something 20 years ago,\u201d Joyce said.<\/p>\n

Pickering was named as One Nation\u2019s Victorian leader early last month<\/a> and is standing for the marginal lower house seat of Pakenham in the November state election. He previously ran unsuccessfully as a candidate in the 2022 state election and for the Senate in 2025.<\/p>\n

In Victoria, One Nation has been polling with primary support of 23 per cent, which suggests it could be a major presence in the next state parliament.<\/p>\n

\"BarnabyBarnaby Joyce and Pauline Hanson addressed allegations against Warren Pickering during a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra on Monday.Alex Ellinghausen<\/p>\n

One handwritten note purportedly written by Pickering reads: \u201cI\u2019v [sic] been talking to people about my own sexual deviance when on the shit & it turns out its all fairly common like all 70s Rock Stars who got off everything & went on to lead normal lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pickering said in a statement on Monday that his former partner had made \u201cfalse and salacious allegations\u201d against him since 2010.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"One<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe [Family] Court has dismissed these allegations and has consistently given me sole custody of our daughter,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese allegations are false. They\u2019re extremely hurtful, and I just hope the public can see through them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scott and Pickering were in a relationship between 2000 and 2018. The allegations relate to a period between 2005 and 2014.<\/p>\n

Scott was contacted for comment.<\/p>\n

Cut through the noise of federal politics with news, views and expert analysis. Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"PatrickPatrick Hatch<\/a> is state politics reporter at The Age. Contact him at patrick.hatch@theage.com.au, or via Signal at @pwhatch.61Connect via X<\/a> or email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 7, 2026 \u2014 5:31pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":90178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21],"class_list":["post-90177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}