News
13 April, 2026
Exclusive - Former Liberal MLC now singing One Nation’s praises
When Louis (Lou) Amato was elected to the NSW Legislative Council, he was full of praise for the Liberal Party and the people in it.
When Louis (Lou) Amato was elected to the NSW Legislative Council, he was full of praise for the Liberal Party and the people in it.
He used his inaugural speech on May 12, 2015 to thank a long list of Liberal party members and the volunteers from south-west Sydney who worked tirelessly to get him elected.
It was the Liberal Party, Mr Amato told Parliament, that had turned NSW around.
“This wonderful state, our home, has gone from being at the bottom of the Australian economy to emerge as the star achiever of the Australian states.
“This economic turnaround is not a miracle.
“It is the product of policies centred on employment infrastructure and growth,” he said.
“It has been the product of a government working in unison under the great leadership and foresight of our Premier, the Hon Mike Baird”.
How times have changed.
Mr Amato – a former Wollondilly councillor and deputy mayor – is part of a tide of people turning their backs on Australia’s major political parties in support of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.
“If anyone still supports the two major parties I don’t know how to help them,” he told a One Nation meeting in Bowral on Saturday.
Mr Amato – whose parents arrived in Australia as “penniless refugees” in 1956 – now speaks passionately in favour of the right-wing party formed in Ipswich almost 30 years ago and is happy to chant the One Nation mantra: ‘Life ain’t easy under Albasleezy’.
Polling now indicates that as many Australians would vote for One Nation as they would for Labor, the Liberals, the Nationals or the Greens.
That’s a big comeback from Hanson’s 2003 conviction for electoral fraud and her 11-week stint behind bars before the conviction was overturned.
She could still be described as one of the most polarising figures in Australian politics – but love her or loathe her, Hanson is attracting disillusioned voters in their droves.
Not surprisingly, given persistent allegations of racism and xenophobia levelled against Hanson over the years, Mr Amato’s talk on Saturday afternoon focused primarily on immigration.
He accused the Australian Government of “importing Labor voters”.
“We’re not getting the best - just taxi drivers and Uber drivers,” he told the audience.
He said his own parents had arrived with nothing and had worked hard to live a comfortable life but immigrants now relied on the government for ‘everything’.
Mr Amato said it was important to understand other cultures and religions but the current government’s immigration policy was allowing people from ‘questionable’ cultures to enter the nation.
“Only a fool would say it’s not,” he said.
Mr Amato’s parents were Italian expatriates living in Egypt when they made the decision to move to Australia but the former MLC considers himself a proud Australian.
“I’m bloody Australian. I’m more Australian than most people who call themselves Australian.”
He said it was important for people to understand other cultures and religions, but we should be embracing our own culture first and foremost, and politicians should be representing the nation “at all costs”.
Mr Amato also criticised the pressure on young people to remain in school until the end of Year 12 and said that many of them were “wasting two years of their lives”.
He said more young people should be encouraged to leave school at the end of Year 10 and to study at TAFE or “the working person’s university” as he referred to it.
He said there was a desperate need across the country for skilled tradespeople.
“Try to get a good tradesperson nowadays – it’s almost impossible,” he said.
Mr Amato also slammed the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) as a ‘scam’ and a waste of taxpayers’ money.
“That’s our money that could be going to other things,” he said.
Other speakers on the day said One Nation was sweeping the nation and was offering voters something different.
It could no longer be criticised as overly right wing because it represented the vast majority of everyday Australians.
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