By GREG ROBERTS BRISBANE
Thursday 18 November 1999
Ms Pauline Hanson has fallen out with one of her closest advisers as a fresh bout of infighting erupts within the ranks of One Nation's leadership.
Mr Scott Balson resigned last week as One Nation's Internet website master during an angry confrontation with Ms Hanson over a letter he published on the Internet which criticised party vice-president Mr David Oldfield.
In the letter, Mr Balson referred to Mr Oldfield as "abrasive and condescending" and questioned why the party spent $1.2 million in "securing" him a seat in the NSW Upper House but nothing on the Victorian election.
Mr Balson wrote that Mr Oldfield's "overriding goal" was to take over the party leadership from Ms Hanson.
Mr Balson has been one of Ms Hanson's closest lieutenants since the party's inception and a visible fixture at One Nation functions, videotaping proceedings for the party website he created.
Mr Balson said yesterday that the party executive was not sufficiently accountable and open with its membership.
"They convey the perception that they can do no wrong and when they do there is always an excuse," he said.
Mr Oldfield said the $1.2 million referred to by Mr Balson was the cost for the entire NSW election campaign, and it was not his intention to take over the party leadership from Ms Hanson.
The party's national director, Mr David Ettridge, went further, accusing Mr Balson of setting up a group of former One Nation members called the Independents' Alliance Forum who, he claimed, were working to undermine the party.
Mr Ettridge said Mr Balson would have been sacked if he had not resigned.
He said the NSW party executive resolved last week to deny Mr Balson access to branch meetings. "He was one of our inner circle but now he has shot himself in both feet and I think that is very disappointing."
Meanwhile, One Nation responded sharply to the revelation yesterday that police had established an investigation called Operation Tier into the role played by Ms Hanson, Mr Oldfield and Mr Ettridge in the party's Queensland registration.
One Nation's Queensland spokesman, Mr Ian Petersen, described the investigation as a "travesty of justice".
Mr Petersen said that if there had been any transgression, it was "purely a technicality".
Mr Oldfield said he was puzzled that neither he, Mr Ettridge nor Ms Hanson - who departed yesterday for a two-month visit to the United States - had been interviewed by police.