Senator was told to be controversial, says man that Sky News claims is former One Nation official in leaked audio

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Fraser Anning was urged to be controversial by a former One Nation official before he gave a racially inflammatory speech that has also triggered warnings the union movement will abandon Katter’s Australia party over the controversy.

On Thursday Sky News played a recording purported to be of the former Queensland One Nation president Jim Savage telling an unidentified person that he and others had told Anning months ago to “say something really controversial, really hit that nerve” to draw attention to his first speech.

“We told him to do that and that is exactly what he did,” Savage said, adding they urged Anning not to apologise afterwards but instead “hold your fucking nerve”.

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Savage told Guardian Australia he did not recall the conversation but it “sounds like the sort of thing I might have said” after Anning’s speech, adding he thought it was good and he did hope Anning held his nerve.

The tape calls into question Anning’s claims he was not intending to be controversial when he called for a popular vote on immigration as a “final solution” and to stop immigration by Muslims and non-English speaking people “from the third world”.

On Thursday Anning’s policy adviser, Richard McGilvray, quit in protest at the speech but the Katter’s Australian party leader, Bob Katter, continued to defend the remarks by claiming that Anning’s push for a vote to stop immigration as a “final solution” was taken out of context.

Troy Gray, the secretary of the Victorian branch of the Electrical Trades Union, which gave KAP $100,000 between 2011 and 2013, told Guardian Australia the union “totally disagrees” with Anning and Katter’s position on immigration.

He added he would be “staggered if anyone in the union movement would support the party after those comments”.

Gray said that both Anning’s speech and Katter’s response were “absolute dog-whistling, they are ridiculous comments and are not needed in this country”.

He said that unions had previously supported Katter because he was “very good” in his opposition to the Australian Building and Construction Commission and “sticks up for farmers and workers”.

“But I don’t think any unions would support that position.”

Gray said that “Donald Trump-type political theatre” was resonating in Queensland, with politicians keen to make “basic populist comments” like “make Australia great again” to capture voters who support parties including Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.

“Do they actually believe in it? I’d be staggered if Katter actually believes in what [Anning] said. He may pay a heavy political price. Time will tell.”

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Earlier in 2018 the ETU Victoria moved to re-affiliate to the Labor party after cutting ties in 2010. Gray explained that after donations to KAP between 2011 and 2013 the union “won’t be backing Bob – we made that decision a couple of years ago”.

In addition to donations from the ETU, Katter’s Australian party has received $200,000 from the Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union national office and construction branch since 2011, including $25,000 as recently as 2015-16.

The secretary of the Victorian Trades Hall Council, Luke Hilakari, said on Wednesday that union members must “fight back against the Fraser Annings of the world and their racist agenda”.

In a letter to unionists posted to Twitter, Hilakari said that everyone was welcome in the union movement “except Nazis”.

Without naming anyone, Hilakari warned about “Nazi hate speech in the Senate” and “Nazis on the news ... organising speaking tours [and] hiding in suburban gyms”. “You can fuck right off.”

Hilakari said the union movement would campaign against “every politician who pulls out the dog whistle to stir up racism, Islamophobia and hatred in our community”.

On Thursday Katter told Sky News he was “very strong for stopping the migration of people that have a very unpleasant track record in this country”.

Katter said that Australia should preference “persecuted minorities” such as Sikhs, Jews and Christians who will “fit in infinitely better in our society than the other people who you’re bringing in, who are the persecutors”.

“I’ve advocated that the immigration policy should encompass an integration factor – and an integration factor would lead, in my opinion, to people from Europe coming here on mass proportions.

“It would also lead to the Sikhs in India, or the Filipinos, or the Afrikaans people.”

Katter said he had discussed the themes before Anning delivered the speech but had not read it beforehand.

Katter said when he first read Anning’s speech he thought “I don’t know about that” but on a second reading Anning had only advocated an immigration intake that was “predominantly” made up of Europeans.

On the phrase “the final solution” Katter said Anning was “just using two words in the English language, he could’ve used ultimate solution or some other phrase”.

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In a post on LinkedIn McGilvray said he had not seen or heard the reference to the “final solution” before it was delivered and “as a consequence, within hours of Senator Anning’s speech, I resigned my position effective immediately”.

“I do not condone Fraser Anning’s speech.”

On Wednesday Pauline Hanson named Anning’s adviser Richard Howard in the Senate as the author of the speech which she said was “straight from Goebbels’ handbook from Nazi Germany”.

Guardian Australia contacted the CFMEU, Anning and Howard for comment.