By Tim Walgers and Chris Dawson
Around 200 people attended a rally to protest the launching of Pauline Hanson's One Nation party in Toowoomba on July 27.
The lively demonstration, organised by the Brisbane and Toowoomba Anti-Racist Campaigns, was addressed by a variety of speakers on Hanson and the Coalition's racist attacks.
Hannah Durack, a student at the University of Southern Queensland, commented that, "It is encouraging to see the diversity of the anti-racist crowd, with both older and young people present, unlike the mostly older, white people inside the Hanson meeting", she said.
Gracelyn Smallwood, an Aboriginal activist and associate professor at the USQ, told the protesters it was important that peaceful demonstrations outside all Hanson meetings continue. She added that Howard's racist attacks must not be ignored while fighting Hanson's racist movement.
Smallwood, whose father was one of the stolen generation, criticised federal and state governments' responses to the mistreatment of Aboriginal children. "Much more than an apology is required", she said. "If white lives were involved, surely this would be a cause for compensation", she said.
On July 24, 60 protesters rallied outside a One Nation support group meeting in Bulimba. It was the first attempt by One Nation to establish a presence within Brisbane.
Around 40 police arrived after some protesters attempted to occupy the hall before the meeting started. Emboldened by the police presence, One Nation organisers proceeded to push and shove protesters on the steps of the building, and one woman waded into the crowd swinging her handbag around her head. Another woman scuffled with a freelance photographer and tried to snatch his camera. This violence was not included in television news reports, but police filmed the protesters all evening.
At the speak-out that accompanied the protest, one Bulimba resident told the demonstrators that the fact that "this racist organisation and its neo-Nazi friends of the Australian League of Rights and National Action are trying to create a safe harbour for themselves in this community is offensive. We need to campaign around the real issues of racism in order to offer maximum resistance to them."