Burston wants to stay

ONE Nation member Brian Burston says he’ll remain in the party unless Pauline Hanson, who called him a traitor, decides otherwise.

Senator Burston is defying his leader to vote for proposed company tax cuts and has accused Senator Hanson of creating “policy on the run” by revealing the corporate tax cut backflip.

But he says he will remain in One Nation “unless Pauline decides otherwise”.

In an emotional interview on Thursday night, Senator Hanson said she was deeply hurt by Senator Burston’s decision to vote for the Government’s corporate tax cuts.

“For him to turn around and do this to me – it’s hard. But I’m going to keep going. And I’m going to get good people in that Parliament beside me,” she told Sky News.

Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm said Senator Burston “feels let down” and discussed his future at a dinner last week with himself and One Nation defector-turned-independent Fraser Anning.

“One of his ideas was to form some sort of alliance with me and a couple of the other senators,” he told ABC radio.

Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said it was not in the Government’s interest for One Nation to split. “It would be preferable if all three One Nation senators remained committed to the consensus that we reached,” he told Sky News.