Pauline Hanson and One Nation have lost ground following her contentious National Press Club address, with new polling indicating some support has moved back to the Coalition.
One Nation’s primary vote fell three points in July to 26 per cent, while Coalition support climbed to 23 per cent, according to a Resolve Political Monitor survey published on Sunday night.
Labor held steady on 28 per cent, while the Greens also remained unchanged at 12 per cent.
The poll of 2,252 voters, conducted for Nine newspapers between July 6 and 11, found support for Hanson as preferred prime minister had dropped sharply, falling eight points from 33 per cent in June to 25 per cent.
Anthony Albanese regained the lead as preferred prime minister, rising from 29 per cent in June to 33 per cent, while Angus Taylor lifted two points to 21 per cent.
The latest figures follow Newspoll and Redbridge surveys released two weeks earlier, which also suggested Hanson’s standing had weakened in the wake of her National Press Club appearance.
Among the groups turning away from Hanson in recent weeks are overseas-born voters, Australians aged 18 to 34, and people in full-time work.
Resolve pollster Jim Reed told Nine newspapers the biggest declines for Hanson had come among immigrants and women, saying her remarks on issues such as multiculturalism and abortion appeared to have reinforced perceptions of One Nation as an older-style party. “Mutton dressed as mutton, in policy terms,” he said.
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson’s popularity as preferred prime minister dropped by eight points from 33 per cent in June to 25 per cent
A third of voters listed Anthony Albanese (pictured on Sunday) as preferred prime minister
‘All are signs the varnish has come off a little.’
Before the controversial address, the One Nation leader had overtaken Albanese as preferred prime minister in a June Resolve poll that had Senator Hanson at 33 per cent over the prime minister’s 29 per cent.
Hanson suggested Australia should reject what she described as a failed policy of multiculturalism and instead become a ‘monoculture’ during the speech on June 17.
She also said employees should not be paid to take time off work, even if on maternity leave, which she later argued had been taken out of context.
One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce has since played down the poll.
‘The polls are an indicator that they’re not a vote, and you always expect there to be fluctuations in polls as you go through a process,’ he told Sunrise on Monday.
‘I think what this indicates is that Pauline Hanson is direct. She doesn’t try and gild the lily.
‘She’s straight down the barrel with what she says.’
Joyce’s does not believe Hanson’s recent comments have affected her popularity.
One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce (pictured with Pauline Hanson) played down the party’s popularity drop in the latest poll
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‘I think that people understand that one of the big things about One Nation, and one of the big things about Pauline is social cohesion and making sure that the issues, especially what we saw tragically at Bondi (the terrorist attack), are not repeated,’ he said.
‘It requires a substantive statement and you’ve got to be brave enough to make it.
‘If you don’t want to make it, then I suppose you accept that it’ll happen again and again and again.’
It comes after Joyce defended One Nation’s uncosted policies, saying it did not have adequate resources for independent costing.
‘I’m not going to give a sort of guarantee like that, because that means I have the resources to do it,’ he told Sky News on Sunday.
‘If I get the promise that we’re going to have the resources to do it, it certainly makes it a lot easier.’
