On Wednesday, 28 October 1996, just after 2 p.m., the Prime Minister, John Howard, rose to his feet in Parliament to answer a question. There was nothing unusual in this per se – after all this Prime Minister has boasted that he spends more time in the House answering questions, and allows for a much longer Question Time, than did his predecessor, Paul Keating. But on this occasion the questioner was none other than the MP who had become the latest object of fascination to the Canberra press gallery – which is continually searching for the ‘new, new thing’ (to use the US writer Michael Lewis' observation about business writers covering the ‘dot-com’ era). That person was Pauline Hanson – the independent MP for the Ipswich-based seat of Oxley.

Hanson had been disendorsed by the Liberal Party prior to the 1996 federal election as a result of racist comments she had allegedly made. She had won the seat nonetheless – with a 20 percent swing – from the ALP. This Queensland seat had been a Labor stronghold for many years; the former Opposition Leader and Foreign Minister, Bill Hayden, had held it for Labor for two decades.

Hanson used her rare opportunity to ask questions in the House of Representatives to drive home her core messages, and these included the fact that, as she saw it, ‘mainstream’ Australia wanted to stop Australian governments shelling out so many taxpayers' dollars in foreign aid.