One Nation Senator, Pauline Hansonfailed to declare another flight it received from the company of billionaire Gina Rinehart, who was traveling on her private jet between Melbourne and Sydney last October.
Guardian Australia revealed Senator Hanson was gifted the plane after an event at a private agricultural college in Geelong last year, where she attended the official opening of a new building partly funded by Rinehart.
Hanson failed to declare the flight accordingly Parliamentary Rules for the benefit of Senatorsrequires a declaration of any sponsored travel or hospitality where the value of the sponsorship or hospitality exceeds $300.
Asked at a press conference in Adelaide on Tuesday if she had received any flights or transfers from Hancock Prospecting to or from the October 19 event, Hanson initially said: “No … if you try to say you’re funding me. Gina Rinehartthe answer is no.”
Asked again if she had any flights or transfers to or from the event, Ms Hanson replied “I don’t remember”.
On Monday, the Guardian sent questions to One Nation and Hancock Prospecting about Senator Hanson’s approach to and from the event.
Hancock referred questions to Prospecting One Nation. One Nation initially said they would return with a response but did not do so until Tuesday afternoon.
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The Queensland senator attended the opening of Nicholas Hancock House at Marcus Oldham College in Victoria at the invitation of Australia’s richest man.
Hancock Agriculture chief executive Adam Giles told the Guardian he believed Hanson flew to Avalon Airport on a Jetstar flight to attend the event, but it is understood the senator left Melbourne later that day on Rinehart’s Gulfstream 700.
According to publicly available flight tracking information, Rinehart’s jet traveled from Perth to Sydney on October 19, making a brief stopover in Essendon, more than 3,000km away, on the same day. It’s unclear if Rinehart was on the plane at the time.
Rinehart did not attend the Geelong event, which marked the official opening of an $11m student accommodation building for the agricultural business college named “in honor of Mrs Rinehart’s family”. Rinehart donated $2m for the project.
Giles attended and spoke on behalf of the mining magnate, apologizing for not being able to be there in person.
At the event, Senator Hanson was introduced as Rinehart’s “dear friend” along with Tony Seabrook, then head of the WA Pastoralists and Graziers Association. Hanson thanked Rinehart for the “kind invitation” to attend the inauguration and spoke of her love of the land and her support of the agricultural sector.
“My job as a politician is to make sure that we have what this country is built on – not just agriculture but the mining sector – because it brings a lot of money into the country to provide the services we need, to keep our country viable and profitable,” she said.
The panel discussion focused largely on the need to repeal policies aimed at achieving net zero carbon emissions, but Senator Hanson also spoke about the need for lower taxes.
“My God we are overtaxed in this country and if this was a country, we would get rid of the payroll tax [and] There are a lot of these other taxes that we have,” she said.
On the night Hanson arrived in Sydney, she spoke to Rinehart’s long-time friend – former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce – about defections to One Nation.
“I said: Barnaby, it’s your decision, there’s an offer, it’s up to you now what you do about it, that’s how I left it,” Hanson told Sky News on 20 October of the phone call the night before.
Guardian Australia Reported in December Hanson failed to properly announce that Rinehart had flown the Queensland senator and her chief of staff, James Ashby, to Florida to attend the Conservative Political Action Conference, where she also stayed at the mining magnate’s $66m Palm Beach mansion.
The rules state that any change in a senator’s interests must be notified to the Registrar within 35 days of the change occurring.
The party claimed to have mistakenly updated the register on December 16, the day of the Guardian report. It resubmitted the forms to properly declare return flights and hospitality on December 30.
By noon on Tuesday, October 19 by air No announcement has been published regarding
