by CRYSTAL-ROSE JONES – LATEST polling reveals the conservative-leaning One Nation Party has drawn level with the traditional centre-Right Liberal Party, while support for Labor has taken a dive.
This has occurred amid a broader debate about immigration.
- First time a non-Labor/Liberal Party has surged to this level in a national poll.
- One Nation claims it’s the “end of the two-Party stranglehold”.
- Australia is fertile ground for an anti-immigration voice.
The DemosAU snap poll obtained by The Epoch Times and conducted between January 5-6 with 1027 voters on behalf of business website Capital Brief, showed an almost 17 per cent swing to One Nation since last year’s May election.
This surge in support has come at the expense of the Liberal-National Coalition, which recorded an 8.8 per cent swing against it, while Labor saw a 5.9 per cent loss.
MODELLING
On a two-Party preferred basis between Labor and the Coalition, Labor leads 52 per cent to 48 per cent.
Tentative modelling by DemosAU, however, suggests a two-party preferred contest between Labor and One Nation could yield a 50-50 outcome.
The polling also shows 31 per cent of Coalition voters have switched to One Nation.
If the polling is an accurate reflection of voter sentiment, it would be the first time in decades that a minor Party has managed to draw level with Australia’s two major Parties.
If it continues, it will be the biggest shake-up to the system since the 1940s when Sir Robert Menzies founded the Liberal Party.
DemosAU research head George Hasanakos said the result of the first poll of 2026 was hardly surprising given certain societal shifts both globally and closer to home.
“It’s not that shocking when you see other polls, for example, in the United Kingdom, showing a Reform Party lead over a first-term Labour Government,” he said.
He said domestic factors had also contributed to One Nation’s rise.
“The recent terrorist attack in Bondi has shocked the nation and put issues such as national security, anti-Semitism, immigration and community cohesion firmly in the spotlight,” Mr Hasanakos said.
“With the rising support of One Nation before this event, it makes this fertile ground for a long-standing anti-immigration voice to gain further support.”
Following the Bondi Beach terror attacks that claimed 15 lives, each Party has emphasised different responses.
Labor initially ordered a national gun buyback and review of intelligence and security agencies, before finally relenting on a broad Royal Commission to examine migration and social cohesion.
Coalition leaders have largely criticised Labor’s response to anti-Semitism in Australia since October 7, 2023, while One Nation has argued against mass migration.
One Nation hailed the historic poll results saying it would be the “end of the two-Party stranglehold”.
SURGED
“It is the first time a Party outside Labor and the Liberals has surged to this level in a national poll, and it comes at the direct expense of both sides of the tired old duopoly,” a Party spokesman said.
Polling analyst Kevin Bonham, meanwhile, said the results had value but noted the sample size of 1027 people was a bit on the smaller end.
He noted that the projected Labor-One Nation two-Party preferred outcome relied on preference flows drawn from the Hunter electorate, which may not be “nationally accurate”.
“I advise to not immediately dismiss this just because it’s an outlier,” Mr Bonham said
“Polling has been sparse lately and there has been only one other poll post-Bondi. Wait to see what other polls come out with.”
The DemosAU poll confirms existing swings towards One Nation across several other polls since the May election.
In the Resolve Strategic poll in December 2025, One Nation’s primary vote was 14 per cent, while a RedBridge Group/Accent Research poll conducted a month earlier recorded support at 18 per cent, alongside gains for Labor at 38 per cent.
An October 2025 Newspoll put One Nation’s primary vote at 15 per cent.
One Nation polled 6.4 per cent in May.
A Resolve opinion poll also found, post-Bondi, that Labor’s vote diminished in the 18-34 younger demographic, and 35-54 demographic – likely a response to Anthony Albanese’s poor handling of the fallout.PC
MAIN PHOTOGRAPH: Pauline Hanson. (courtesy YouTube/Sky News Australia) Images in this article are used under Fair Use guidelines.
RE-PUBLISHED: This article was originally published by The Epoch Times on January 9, 2026. Re-used with permission.
Finally a straw of hope on which to cling! Good on Pauline and Barnaby! The woke, moderate and partly pedophile NSW liberal left is a cancer which has robbed Australia of hope, substance and prosperity, so here is a new force to excise this tumour and afford us all a future. Provided that enough competent lib conservatives, Nats and competent community leaders migrate across to this new body to bolster its governmental expertise then we might recognise our potential as a nation after all.
We are a potentially rich country so we really don’t need to lose our standard of living, and there are signs of hope. There’s a great resurgence of 18-24 year olds who want to celebrate Australia Day, and who want our country back. Youthful church attendance is interestingly increasing, as christianity is perceived as a much better offering than the collective of Albo, Penny Wong, Katie Gallagher, anti semitism, and their general dreadful dross.
Should the new body smash the ridiculous Albo and co to smithereens at a future election then Labor will be forced to abandon its terrible policies and revert to a Hawke/Keating type model, just as British Labor did under Blair post Thatcher (just for a while) so that either party could become a functional steward. Meanwhile patriots should put their shoulders to the wheel to afford Pauline and Barnaby the requisite support needed.
How lucky we are to have our Pauline! She was incarcerated by a fake brief of evidence and imprisoned, but she was never crushed by that experience, or a series of fake lawsuits, as she rose above her criminal assailants and kept going. She is so long overdue for recognition in the New Years Honours List. Barnaby saved us from the carbon tax, he is a force majeure in his own right, and he’ll be a star on One Nation’s hustings.
Sadly the people who used to run the highly respected Liberal Party, no longer do; or perhaps they are just too stupid to understand why many thousands of good decent honest branch members have been leaving in droves, over the last 15 years or so. Nobody seems to take notice that the Party has been taken over by this handful of morally and ethically bankrupt scumbags left right or center; known incredibly as bloody Factional Warlords :(( I left before the 2012 year by not renewing my 2 branch memberships. The thought of that ego driven lobbyist, drunk driving womaniser taking complete control was too much for many of us normal citizens. Now we have others who think they have some satan like authority to control every aspect of who says what does what or can run for preselection. How sad the party bows and scrapes to this worthless brain dead pack of treacherous wankers. For the record; at the last State election; for the first time in 60 years of voting Liberal; I did not vote Liberal in the Lower house because of my total loathing of the then member for Hornsby; in his seat over 40 KMs away. Now he is happily being paid an astronomical wage by his socialist mates.
To put it crudely; this once great party is completely F***ED!! Either get rid of this factional scourge or watch it rapidly die. The voters are too smart to vote these tosspots into Government.
Traditional Liberal voters are feeling alienated from that Party not just over immigration. Pauline Hanson is very strong when it comes to the scam of climate change, DEI and the division Labor is creating by insisting we have three National flags. I personally don’t feel Pauline has the infrastructure behind her and she is not exactly Prime Minister material. However, I DO like her policies and the Liberal Party is slowly but surely heading Left and leaving me behind. Even though he is a moderate, I feel Josh Frydenberg is the only hope for the Liberal Party. Angus Taylor is too dull and Andrew Hastie is too inexperienced when it comes to the media. They could not compete with the aggressive Labor machine. Josh Frydenberg, unlike Albanese, is articulate, has charisma and is highly intelligent. He has worked outside of Parliament and he has been Treasurer. He could easily win Kooyong back from Ryan. If they replace Ley with Taylor or Hastie, they will lose yet another election and how sad that would be for our country to be saddled with the socialists for another term.
A quick look at history shows us yet again: How long does it take and how serious do issues have to be for people to reform or reject existing political parties that simply are not able to take on the problems of the times? If only voters could think things through sooner rather than later, and reform or inject some reason into political thinking. Both Liberal and Labor are clearly losing primary votes. Whether One Nation has the answers or the capabilities is debatable, but what other alternatives are there to get solutions to urgent political problems before us today? Joining a Party in the hope of turning it around will be met with a wall of dogmatic incumbents averse to any change. Direct democracy in the form of Citizens’ Initiated Referendums would be one indicator to political parties of the mood of the electorate to massage Governments and Oppositions into community-acceptable policies.
Most punters are electorally lazy and consider their options 2 minutes before they vote. The other problem is for a long time the SF libs have barely distinguished themselves from the alp: the so called uni-party. The capitulation by the libs to Minn’s new gun laws is a case in point. The libs believe in global boiling and ruinables. Generally the libs are gutless.
Pauline is a great patriot but has a major problem: her candidate selection has been appalling. If PHON can get decent candidates they should start to move into the House of Reps. But that will create another problem: with house of rep members it will be natural for leadership of PHON to move to one of the reps. Pauline’s ego will have to deal with that.
I would like to see PHON unite with other minor parties and even the Nats, God forbid. Anything to get rid of the vile alp and albo’s louts and commies.