‘I can’t get down’: Moment Pauline Hanson’s Uluru dream crashed and burned

She’s been openly protesting the ban on the Uluru rock climb for months, before venturing out to Ayers Rock herself to make the steep and tough climb in protest this week. But even the best-laid plans don’t always work out.

And Pauline Hanson has been left fairly red-faced after her attempt at the controversial climb fell flat, as she became stranded halfway up and seemingly unable to get herself back down again. In footage aired in a teaser for Monday night’s episode of A Current Affair, the panicked pollie appears to let the stress get the better of her on the steep slope.

“I’m not going up any further… Seriously I cannot walk down here, my boots are that bloody old,” she tells her team while sat on the slope and appearing to refuse to go any further.

https://twitter.com/ACurrentAffair9/status/1164831623231111169

Forced to sit in one spot, cameras then capture the moment other walkers pass her by on their way up and the embarrassed politician is forced to shake their hand and greet each of them individually.

Once back on solid ground, the cameras follow her as she meets with staff at the bottom and Aboriginal workers, as she asks them: “Where’s my land, if it’s not Australia?” To which they reply: “Erm… England?” She later defiantly says: “This belongs to all Australians.”

The senator previously admitted to the ABC this week that attempting the climb had made her rethink why it had to be closed, insisting she now saw major safety issues with the tough venture.

“It’s quite scary, I was surprised, I’d never been out there before,” she told the news outlet. “I respect the decision that there is not enough safety with regards to the rock. I respect the decision that their people, their kids, are not getting jobs. They’re bringing in Aboriginals from outside to fill the positions that should belong to their own people.” 

Uluru is set to be closed off to all climbers in October following continued protests from Indigenous groups. Hanson has always opposed the ban and even previously compared closing the iconic rock to closing Bondi Beach in Sydney’s east.

“People have been climbing the rock all of these years and now all of a sudden they want to shut it down?” she previously told Deb Knight on Nine’s Today show.

“The Australian taxpayers put in millions, hundreds of millions of dollars into it and they’re wanting another $27.5 million to upgrade the airport there for the resort,” she added previously. “Now the resort has only returned $19 million to the taxpayers only just recently. It employs over 400 people there, 38 per cent are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.

“It’s money-making. It’s giving jobs to indigenous communities, and you’ve got thousands of tourists who go there every year and want to climb the rock.”