Just days into her exciting new life, Pauline Hanson tells Glen Williams about her embarrassing travel saga, and her fears for the Australian flag.
She wanted to see the world, but Pauline Hanson’s time in jail is proving a stumbling block. The fiery redhead got as far as New Zealand, only to be halted by an immigration officer at the airport.
Despite Pauline’s criminal conviction being completely quashed, red-tape has seen the former One Nation leader tarred with the same brush as a convicted criminal.
“I don’t like it,” she says, using one of her trademark phrases. “I need to have this cleared up. I am not a criminal.”
Pauline was on her way to join two friends and a guide for a three-day hike through the South Island’s spectacular Hump Ridge Track, when she was stopped at New Zealand’s immigration.
“They have a card that asks if you’ve had a criminal conviction of more than 12 months, so of course I had to tick yes. It didn’t ask whether the conviction had been quashed. I was then asked what I had been in prison for.
“I explained I was Australia’s first political prisoner,” she laughs. “The poor man called for his supervisor, who called me over to the side.”
Pauline, 55, says her ordeal was carried out in front of other Australian travellers. “I felt terribly embarrassed. I basically felt like a criminal. I was taken to another room and asked to ‘please explain’ about my time in jail.
“Immigration said they had no record of my conviction and asked me if I had ticked the same box when I last visited New Zealand
in 2004. I honestly couldn’t remember if I had or not.
But you’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Had I not ticked the box this time, and they had a record of my conviction, then I would have been put straight back on the plane and that would have caused me more problems.”
Thankfully Pauline was permitted to enter the country, and despite her ordeal, says she had the most amazing time on the trek.
For the story see this week’s Woman’s Day, on sale April 26, 2010.
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