One Nation’s immigration policy is clear as mud – but that ambiguity could be a secret weapon for Pauline Hanson

One Nation has experienced a swell in popular support in the past year, and has primarily done so off the back of tough talk on immigration – a policy area almost synonymous with its leader, Pauline Hanson. But a series of blunders this week show a party unable, or unwilling, to clearly articulate what it would actually do about immigration levels. Does it want “net zero” immigration, as it boasted for many years?

Or does it want a small increase – a net gain of up to 130, 000 people per year – as Barnaby Joyce said emphatically this week? Let’s step through what key figures have said – and what the party’s policy says. Officially, the policy listed on the party’s website is a promise to cap visas at 130,000 per year.

Whether that would mean a net overseas migration (Nom) target or a permanent visa ceiling is unclear. Joyce has said this is the party’s Nom cap. On Thursday, Hanson reiterated this.

Nom is the overall gain or loss of population through long-term arrivals and departures. It measures people coming into or leaving the country for a period of at least 12 months over 16 months and thus excludes tourists. This week David Farley said One Nation’s Nom was 130,000 but that it wouldn’t include an additional 100,000 skilled workers, backpackers and Pacific and Timor-Leste labour through the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (Palm) scheme.

Joyce said that wasn’t right. The former Nationals MP, who defected to One Nation last December, said there were no additional visas hidden from the policy’s headline figure, ruling Farley’s comments out as a rookie mistake. The messaging was further muddied after the contribution of the Queensland senator Malcolm Roberts.

In a brief interview with the far-right influencer Andre Mamet, known as Ausmaxx, on Tuesday, Roberts appeared to say he supported “net negative migration” – when fewer people enter the country than leave – but he also supported a cap on net migration of 130,000, which implies more people coming than leaving. I didn’t realise it was so high. And what we’re saying is, we will cap the number of people, net people, [that] come in at 130,000,” Roberts said.