Pauline Hanson wears burqa in Senate chamber in repeat of earlier stunt

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Pauline Hanson has appeared in the Senate wearing a burqa, repeating a stunt she pulled in the chamber in 2017.

The One Nation leader wore the head covering minutes after she was denied leave by the government to table a bill to have burqas and full face coverings banned in Australia.

Hanson has campaigned for the policy for decades.

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Senator Pauline Hanson wears a burqa in the Senate at Parliament House in Canberra on November 24, 2025. fedpol Photo: Dominic Lorrimer

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The stunt prompted uproar in the chamber, with condemnation coming from from Labor's Senate leader Penny Wong, Coalition Senate leader Anne Rushton and other members of the crossbench.

The Senate session was then temporarily suspended.

Hanson's stunt was slammed by Australia's Islamophobia envoy Aftab Malik, who told the Sydney Morning Herald the move could worsen harassment, threats of rape, and violence against Muslim women in Australia.

"It is frustrating to see Australian Muslim women's choice of clothing continually tied to national security concerns," Malik said.

"Islamophobia is at record levels in Australia, described as 'unprecedented' by the Islamophobia Register Australia. Muslim women, in particular, face the brunt.

"Senator Pauline Hanson, eight years after her last call to ban the burqa, is again proposing it.

"This will deepen existing safety risks for Australian Muslim women who choose to wear the headscarf, the hijab, or the full face and body covering, the burqa."

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Senator Pauline Hanson wears a burqa in the Senate at Parliament House in Canberra on November 24, 2025. fedpol Photo: Dominic Lorrimer

Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi told the newspaper One Nation "has nothing to offer Australians apart from tired culture wars and hollow publicity stunts".

"Nearly 10 years on from Hanson's pathetic burqa stunt in the Senate, One Nation has flipped through its racist, Islamophobic policy generator and landed on the burqa ban once more," Faruqi said.

"The idea that the government should be regulating what a woman can and cannot wear should never be up for debate. Parliament should outright reject this."

Hanson first wore a burqa in the Senate chamber in 2017.

"Today, the Senate stopped the introduction of my bill to ban the burqa and other full face coverings in public places," Hanson said on social media this afternoon.

"Despite the ban in 24 countries across the world (including Islamic countries), the hypocrites in our parliament have rejected my bill.

"So if the parliament won't ban it, I will display this oppressive, radical, non-religious head garb that risk our national security and the ill treatment of women on the floor of our parliament so that every Australian knows what's at stake.

"If they don't want me wearing it – ban the burqa."

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