By George Christensen
https://cairnsnews.org/2026/10/20/helen-haines-mhr-in-critical-condition-after-being-hit-by-a-car/
Indi MHR Helen Haines hit by car in front of her electorate office in alleged targeted attack
Political violence must be condemned. It must also be understood. Asking why people threaten politicians does not excuse the threats, any more than investigating the causes of crime excuses criminals.
The latest reported total number of threats against public office holders rose from 951 to 1,067, an increase of 116, or 12.2 percent. These figures encompass reports of harassment, nuisance, offensive behaviour and threats. They are not just a tally of physical attacks. Nonetheless, the longer-term increase is substantial: the AFP reported 555 incidents in 2021–22, compared with 1,067 in 2025–26. That is an increase of 512, a near doubling, in just four years.
That demands a serious explanation. What has happened to the relationship between Australians and their political representatives and government officials?
The AFP’s own threat assessment identifies economic pressures, including inflation, interest rates and living costs, among factors capable of driving threatening behaviour. Are Australians becoming increasingly hostile because they believe politicians ignore their problems? Has trust deteriorated because people feel that decisions affecting their homes, livelihoods and communities are imposed without meaningful consent?
One X commentator identifying as an Indi local described the alleged attack on Haines as horrifying, but outlined how local farmers confronting solar, wind, battery and transmission developments felt abandoned by their representative. That comment doesn’t establish the driver’s motive, but it does raise a legitimate question: do affected Australians believe their representatives are listening and delivering results?
People can condemn violence while demanding answers about land, livelihoods and government decisions. Peaceful grievances do not become illegitimate because somebody commits a dreadful act.
Nor should conservatives accept collective blame for the alleged Haines attack, as left-wing agitators online and commentators in the mainstream media have already begun to ascribe. Even Albanese and other politicians are dog-whistling this line when they talk about lowering the temperature of political debate and the like.
Anyone proposing to blame One Nation or ardent conservatives in general for this incident is engaging in dangerous rhetoric themselves: they are trying to criminalise an entire political movement. The voting patterns and concerns of the alleged attacker do not make any political party or movement guilty of any offence, otherwise, by the same standards, all Muslims would stand condemned by the actions of one Islamist terrorist.
What of heated political rhetoric, though?
Well, at Queensland Labor’s conference on 30 August, Albanese described hard-right populists as peddling politics that was “dangerous, divisive, and downright dishonest”, before discussing One Nation. The following day, Attorney-General Michelle Rowland associated elements of One Nation with extremist and neo-Nazi views. As a proponent of free speech, I have no qualms with politicians using tough language to criticise their opponents, but their own language must also be examined when they demand that everyone else lower the temperature.
And the insinuation that right-wingers are the sole purveyors of violence in Australia is demonstrably false. I have personal experience of political intimidation from the Left.
On the Sunday after the 2022 federal election, I went to Brisbane’s Breakfast Creek Hotel with then One Nation state MP Stephen Andrew. A horde of unionists were there celebrating Albanese’s victory. While we were peacefully enjoying XXXX Bitter off the wood keg in the front bar, an angry unionist confronted me and wanted a fight. The harassment became serious enough that security had to be called.
Stephen and I moved to the restaurant area at the back. Several more angry unionists confronted us there, also wanting a fight. And why? Because of our conservative politics. Eventually, I left the pub earlier than I had planned in order to avoid an altercation.
Years earlier, at a town hall meeting in Bowen, I recall a Greens supporter laying hands on my wife and telling her our children would suffer because of me. My office also received a steady stream of threats of violence, including death threats, pretty much entirely from people outside my electorate.
Those experiences are why I reject any suggestion that intimidation belongs exclusively to one political camp. No politician’s wife deserves to be harassed. A One Nation representative deserves to enjoy dinner without being threatened. Helen Haines deserves to go about her work in safety.
Political leaders must condemn violence consistently, police must establish the facts of the alleged Haines attack, and elected representatives must take peaceful grievances seriously. Australians should never have to choose between their safety and their right to participate in politics.
Police investigating the attack this morning advised the alleged driver had undergone a mental health check but no results have been released.
No motive has yet been given however Helen Haines supports Teals voting mainly along Greens agenda and is a climate cataclysm cultist hence she could have been targeted because of widespread environmental destruction of valuable farmland and native forests in Victoria caused by reckless renewables. – Ed
22nd October 2026
This was posted this morning by Morgan Begg of the Institute of Public Affairs in Canberra:
“There is no obvious link between (Brendan Nugent’s beliefs) and what took place. ” “There is no actual evidence that the attack was motivated by politics or ideology.”
Response” What is obvious to me is that a person who does not want to find evidence will not find evidence. And looking for personal links will not necessarily help detect idological links.
Comment from W.Hall at the Cairns News.org site:
.
Readers of “Cairns News.org” seem to be more adept at linking what is linkable than frequenters of the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) in Canberra.
What is the IPA “view”? Reactive mode, implicitly defending through mentioning (and then “opposing”).
“The horrific attack on Helen Haines this week shocked many because violence has thankfully never been a feature of Australia’s political tradition.
A range of theories have been put forward to explain why Brendan Nugent allegedly repeatedly drove into Haines, with the most credible explanation (at the time of writing) suggesting a combination of mental illness and drug use, with a personal connection between the alleged assailant and the victim possibly providing the motive.
But there is no actual evidence that the attack was motivated by politics or ideology. According to this social media posts, Nugent has apparently held a grab bag of eclectic left of centre beliefs, and there is no obvious link between them and what took place.”
Request to Morgan Begg
Begging you, Morgan, broaden your terms of reference.
W.H.
Comment from “Who says NO to MRNA?”
Dandy, thanks, you saved me a chunk of time in expressing a similar train of thoughts.
In regard to what former Health Minister Greg Hunt called ‘the worlds biggest experiment’ ie, the covid vax roll-out, and its downstream effect, the best MSM can do is gaslight. But then, what to expect given their involvement in arguably the biggest crime in history?
Comment from “Dandy”
One wonders if the otherwise once bright, active male driver of the vehicle who out of nowhere has been diagnosed with transverse myelitis, an inflammatory injury to his spinal cord which affects important involuntary functions of the heart, bladder, digestive, sexual function and so on, was in fact a VICTIM of an experimental injection because transverse myelitis is a recorded SIDE EFFECT of it. And he would certainly not be the only one whose life has been destroyed by it if that was the case. One also wonders if the ex Nurse, now Politician ‘friend’ of the family for many years, was in fact the one with her ‘nurse hat’ who encouraged him to participate in the experimental injection. There are reports he had admired her and her leadership. One also wonders if he worked out that it was a bad idea after all and his life was now ruined. Of course the public will continue to be gaslit. Nothing to see there or here or anywhere. However if INJURED victims are starting to get desperate, one wonders what their mental health, their ‘screaming’ (pain related), their misrepresentation, their stonewalling might cause them to do. Obviously not condoning what occurs because we don’t know what occurred exactly. He was ‘tackled’ ? enough to give him concussion. We don’t know his state of mind, we don’t know anything. All we can know for sure is that transverse myelitis is DEBILITATING and is supposed to be rare. Not anymore. Of course, they won’t go there, and the public will continue to be gaslit and this incident will be played like a fiddle.