WA election 2017: Pilbara One Nation candidate says taxpayers should not fund 'lazy' single mums

By Joseph Dunstan

One Nation’s candidate for the seat of Pilbara in the West Australian election is standing by an article he wrote saying taxpayers should not support single mums who are “too lazy” to attract and hold a mate.

In the wake of former prime minister Tony Abbott’s 2015 comment suggesting living in remote Indigenous communities was a “lifestyle choice”, David Archibald wrote a Quadrant article nominating “lifestyle choices that could be defunded”.

“The first that springs to mind is single motherhood,” Mr Archibald wrote.

“These are women too lazy to attract and hold a mate, undoing the work of possibly 3 million years of evolutionary pressure.

“This will result in a rapid rise in the portion of the population that is lazy and ugly.

“We know what causes pregnancy these days, so everyone who gets pregnant outside of marriage is a volunteer. This is an easy one for defunding.”

Mr Archibald also used the article to suggest defunding the disability support pension and childcare.

“The 800,000 Australians on the disability pension. OK, not all of them. But a good proportion are able to drive cars, bash police and each other, go fishing and so on,” he said.

“Now comes federally funded childcare. This is a lifestyle choice. Looking after children is very labour-intensive.

“If society wishes to encourage childbearing, it should reward that with tax rebates to the childbearing pair and leave it at that.”

Stolen Generations a ‘myth’: Archibald

In another 2015 Quadrant article, Mr Archibald — who has described himself as “part-Aboriginal” — labelled the Stolen Generations a “myth”.

“Senator Payne swallowed the whole concocted Stolen Generations myth, hook, line and sinker,” he said in the article about Defence Minister Marise Payne’s appointment.

The Stolen Generations are recognised by Australian governments at the state and federal level as the forced removal of Indigenous children from their families and communities, a practice carried out by European-led Australian governments and missionaries well into the 1970s.

When contacted about the articles, Mr Archibald said he stood by them but declined to be interviewed.

The ABC has also approached One Nation leader Pauline Hanson for an interview.

Senator Hanson has recently disendorsed several Queensland state election candidates over controversial views.

Peter Rogers, who was contesting the seat of Mulgrave in far north Queensland, said he was dumped at the weekend over an article published on his website two weeks ago.

He said he did not write the article, which claimed images of a toddler’s body washed up on a Turkish beach in 2015 were fabricated, along with the Port Arthur massacre in 1996.

Former candidate Shan Ju Lin was sacked earlier this month for anti-gay comments, while Andy Semple withdrew his nomination after people within the party raised concerns about inappropriate comments he had made on Twitter.

Meanwhile, the party’s candidate for the WA seat of Dawesville, Lawrence Shave, advertised on Facebook in July 2015 for young women to work as bikini baristas, serving coffee while clad only in swimwear.

Senator Hanson said she was unaware of the advertisements, but retained confidence in Mr Shave.

Mr Archibald is running against the leader of the WA Nationals Brendon Grylls.

Polling has suggested Mr Grylls is under pressure from One Nation in the seat.

The polling was commissioned by the Chamber of Minerals and Energy of Western Australia and was carried out before Mr Archibald’s candidacy was announced.

This post originally appeared on ABC News.