‘Really shady place’: Top adviser claims One Nation sacked him when he raised rapist, underworld concerns

November 8, 2026 — 7:06pmA former senior One Nation staffer claims he was unlawfully sacked for raising concerns about the party’s ongoing ties to an ex-senior staff member with a rape conviction and for calling out links between a high-ranking One Nation official and a strip club promoted by a man linked to an underworld figure.Charles Swindon, who led the campaign for One Nation’s first lower house MP elected under the party’s banner, has broken his silence to claim high-ranking One Nation official Kelvin Morton downplayed the rape conviction of former party campaign director Sean Black by jokingly describing it as “surprise sex”.Charles Swindon (left) says he has concerns about the conduct of Bianca Colecchia (top), Kelvin Morton (right) and Sean Black (bottom).Illustration: Stephen KiprillisMorton, who strongly denied ever joking about rape, did last week admit to making inflated claims about his military past and previous political work for the US Democrats.Swindon has also alleged One Nation buried his concerns about a commercial deal between the party and Black’s company for fundraising in the Victorian election campaign ahead of this month’s state election.Black claimed, on a recording obtained by this masthead and 60 Minutes, that he continued to provide consulting and fundraising services to One Nation after he was sacked from his director’s position in April amid ongoing controversy about his 2018 jailing for raping and assaulting an ex-partner.Contacted by this masthead, Black denied any involvement in One Nation fundraising or consulting roles after his removal in April.Former One Nation staffer-turned-whistleblower Charles Swindon.Glenn HuntSwindon also criticised One Nation for failing to adequately investigate his concerns that its Victorian state secretary and federal candidate for the seat of Bruce, Bianca Colecchia, had spent eight years managing a strip club while its chief promoter had previously been accused by police of being a Comanchero bikie gang financier.In an interview with this masthead and 60 Minutes, Swindon said his almost five months in the inner sanctum of the One Nation party machine revealed it to be “weirdly incompetent, chaotic”.“Without exaggeration, it’s a really shady place,” he said.Among a litany of appalling behaviour he claims he witnessed, Swindon said that during party leader Pauline Hanson’s press club address in June, a senior staffer watching it inside party HQ with One Nation personnel shouted out that an Indigenous journalist who had quizzed Hanson was a “black c–-t”.“If you give them [One Nation] government as they currently are, you will get fly-by-night operators constantly flip-flopping on policy, not sticking to anything they promised, and just in general, causing chaos and economic damage, basically,” Swindon said.Swindon also believes that billionaire Gina Rinehart wields far too much power over One Nation, echoing Black’s concerns about Rinehart’s influence that were heard on the secret recording of Black this masthead revealed on Saturday.“Gina Rinehart is on top of both of them [Hanson and her chief adviser James Ashby]. Gina tells both of them what to do, but she’s not actually formally in the party. ‘We’ll check with Gina’, was a common response to questions of strategy or optics,” Swindon claimed in his interview.Rinehart has denied any inappropriate involvement and instead pointed to financial backing for the Greens, teal and Labor movements from other wealthy Australians.Swindon also alleged that One Nation was so concerned that David Farley – the first candidate to win a federal lower house seat under the party’s banner – would quit One Nation that it threatened to make a claim to recoup the party’s financial campaign support if he ever jumped ship.One Nation’s David Farley on the campaign trail with Pauline Hanson.Janie Barrett“It would have been embarrassing for them if it came out that they were this worried about their first candidate with the chance of winning leaving the party,” he said.Swindon managed Farley’s byelection campaign in the NSW seat of Farrer and was lauded by Farley as the “future of One Nation and the future of Australia” in the new MP’s victory speech in May.Since Farley’s byelection victory, his tenure has been marked by his mixed public messaging on migration and speculation about whether he would quit One Nation.In his interview, Swindon claimed Farley told him privately he was considering quitting the party because of conflict with Hanson and Ashby.“He definitely did make it sound to me in private like he was considering leaving One Nation or at least getting elected and then becoming independent,” Swindon said.“He confided in me twice that it wasn’t going to work if it continues like this. And he was referring specifically to Pauline and James Ashby calling him and badgering him about his position on immigration and also abortion.”During the Farrer campaign, Ashby and Hanson were aggrieved to learn via a report in this masthead that Farley had years ago tried to enter parliament with Labor. The story sparked fiery conversations between the trio, this masthead reported at the time.“The statistic that really gets under their skin whenever the media mentions it is that the vast majority of One Nation elected representatives defect. So if you’re a One Nation representative, in all likelihood, you won’t be by the end of your term,” Swindon said.He alleged Farley also confided to him on the campaign trail that he was deeply opposed to core parts of One Nation’s anti-migration policy – including any significant cuts to net immigration that would impact farming businesses – and that he had heard Farley privately vow to a wealthy farmer and political donor he would keep the free flow of overseas migrant labour to the agriculture sector.“It was basically: ‘If you put money behind me, if you have confidence in me, I can promise that you will always have easy access to migrant workers for your agricultural interest,’” Swindon claimed.“He’s to the left of Labor on immigration. But every single time he says something about immigration ends up altering One Nation policy.”Farley described Swindon’s claims as “nonsense” and “speculation”. He insisted One Nation’s migration policy was “aligned with the workforce demands of Farrer” and that “Farrer is highly dependent upon the skilled and non-skilled migrant workforce”.One Nation has said it intends to cut net migration by 750,000 over three years – albeit with select measures to protect some temporary farm work sources — as part of a policy the National Farmers’ Federation has warned could hurt farming communities.Garner Smith is standing for One Nation in the Victorian election.Jason SouthFurthering confusion about One Nation’s migration policy, a candidate for the party in this month’s Victorian state election, Garner Smith, said he would fight to ensure regional communities had ready access to as many migrant workers as needed.“I can assure you that if there are people that wish to come to this country, that wish to assist in rural areas with things like harvest, picking of fruit, that every effort will be made to assist those people. Not just allow them to come here, but assist them,” Smith said.The claims about Black, Farley and Rinehart are among several allegations made by Swindon during his interview with this masthead and 60 Minutes, in which Swindon said One Nation voters deserved to know about the party’s dysfunctional and suspect practices as it becomes the third force in Australian politics.The former Coalition staffer worked for the LNP for six years before quitting because he believed the federal Coalition was weak on immigration. Swindon was hired by One Nation in late February.He was sacked in late June and has flagged he intends to sue the party for his alleged unlawful dismissal, a claim One Nation has privately denied.Swindon’s allegations of dysfunction inside One Nation echo those of Black on leaked recordings in which Black also claimed Ashby appeared to be using the party to enrich himself.In particular, Black pointed to a controversial deal involving a shed funded by One Nation that was built on Ashby’s privately owned property.While Black expressed concern about use of One Nation members’ money to build the shed – there is no suggestion Ashby, who declined to comment, has ever acted corruptly.In an email to members, Morton described the shed arrangement as “unconventional” but approved by One Nation.Secret dealAmong Swindon’s concerns about One Nation’s operations was an alleged secret deal involving the party and Black struck shortly after Pauline Hanson claimed publicly she had overseen Black’s removal from One Nation – including a Sky News interview in which Hanson said Black had been “shot” and was “gone, finished”.On Saturday, this masthead revealed Black had been caught on a secret recording claiming that after the public claim he had been removed from One Nation, One Nation’s Victorian branch was involved in a commercial deal with his family firm Front Door Services.On the recording, Black claimed the deal allowed his firm to keep a cut of every donation it raised for One Nation’s state election campaign.“It was a written contractual agreement ... on behalf of the Victorian executive, operating as its own legal entity, and my wife,” Black said of the deal in the covert tape recording. They [Victoria’s One Nation office] were calling me like daily for assistance.”Black also reveals on the recording that after word of the arrangement spread inside One Nation, the party HQ panicked and sent him a letter demanding he hand back sensitive personal data on One Nation supporters it accused Black of using to target donors.In May, One Nation’s “office of the general manager” sent an “urgent communication” that appears to warn that unnamed persons were offering their services to One Nation branches around Australia in a manner that could involve “potential breaches of” electoral law and campaign finance and disclosure arrangements.If that communication were about continued dealings with Black, Swindon said he believed One Nation should have come clean to its supporters about them.Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson and government minister Murray Watt on Saturday also called for One Nation to explain the claims made on the recordings.Swindon said he believed one of the reasons he was sacked was because he had queried Morton, the high-ranking One Nation official, over the party’s handling of the Black deal. He claimed Morton also made light of Black’s rape conviction.“When the topic came up about three or four times on the phone or at HQ, Kelvin made the joke that: ‘Hey, mate, remember, it’s not rape, it’s surprise sex.’ And it’s very difficult when your direct boss makes a joke like that to sort of speak up, and I regret not speaking up.”On Saturday, Morton denied ever joking about or downplaying Black’s rape conviction,“Rape is a serious crime and not a subject for humour,” he said in a statement.Hanson denied any arrangement with Black or his family business and described this masthead’s investigation as “absolutely garbage”. She declined an interview request and has not answered written questions about the arrangement with Black.The allegations concerning Black’s continued involvement in the party and the allegations against One Nation’s senior personnel, which this masthead is not suggesting are proved, come as the party is surging in the polls and favoured to win seats in the looming Victorian and NSW state elections.Swindon also claimed Morton had brushed off his concerns about links between a strip club One Nation’s Victorian secretary, Bianca Colecchia, managed and the underworld.Bianca Colecchia (centre) at Dreams strip club. On Sunday, this masthead reported that during the eight years Colecchia managed the Dreams strip club, its key promoter, hirer of women and supplier of wholesale alcohol was a brothel boss previously accused by police of involvement in “serious criminal activity” and of having deep links to the Comanchero bikie gang.This masthead has also confirmed the central concern Swindon flagged with Morton prior to his sacking: that “there was a promoter for the club that Bianca was chummy with that was still employed at the club … who had been credibly accused of being involved with the Victorian criminal underworld”.The promoter, who has never been convicted of a crime, had his money laundering charges dropped. A subsequent civil proceeds-of-crime case, in which he was also accused of underworld behaviour, was settled by making a confidential payment with no admission.Text exchanges confirm Morton characterised Swindon’s concerns as “rumours” before he suddenly sacked Swindon “because of Bianca Colecchia”.Colecchia has not responded to questions.On Sunday, this masthead also revealed that Morton, who is in charge of vetting candidates and staff for One Nation, had inflated his military career by falsely claiming to have been an army officer.Morton conceded he also made inflated claims about his role working on the 2008 election of a US Democratic politician, Dina Titus.Questioned by this masthead, Morton said he had overstated “what I did, and I am not going to defend it”.From our partners