To say he shopped around is an understatement.

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He was a member of the NSW Nationals from 2015 to 2020. Rejected after putting his hand up to fill a Legislative Council vacancy in 2019, he applied to join the Labor Party in 2020 but was rejected again. In 2025, he backed an independent, then stood against her in a byelection a year later as a One Nation candidate and won.

His name is David Farley, the first One Nation candidate to win a seat in the House of Representatives. Now, the new Member for Farrer might be shopping around again.

Last Wednesday he accidentally walked into a meeting of Liberal Party backbenchers and on the way out quipped, "I could see myself sitting here."

Farley insisted it was a joke but given his past flirtations across the political spectrum, it naturally reignited speculation of yet another defection from One Nation. His deviation from the Pauline/party line on immigration, telling Insiders host David Speers his party's target wasn't that different from Labor's, only intensified suspicion he was eyeing off the exit.

It wasn't the first time Farley's views on immigration haven't squared with One Nation's. When he was CEO of the Australian Agriculture Company in 2012 he pushed vigorously for 457 visas for hundreds of Indian workers to address a skills shortage at a Darwin abattoir.

At the same time, he accused Barnaby Joyce of using xenophobic rhetoric to oppose Chinese investment in Australian agricultural land. Farley and Joyce now sit side by side in the House of Representatives but one can't wondering if there's an underlying tension between the two.

Joyce might have dismissed his colleague's deviation from the party line on immigration as a rookie error but it's handed Labor and the Liberals a crate of ammunition. They're now dismissing One Nation as all over the shop on immigration and not fit to govern.

Not that the major parties have their immigration ducks properly lined up either. Labor had to abandon plans by Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke to launch his toughened policy. And the Liberals' Andrew Bragg recently went rogue, infuriating........

© Canberra Times