Colleen Harkin
One Nation Candidate (South-East Metro, VIC)
- 🎓 Qualifications: Master of Education. (Uses it to argue against teaching kids about the environment).
- 🏢 Day Job: Director of Education Programs at the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA). (A very unbiased think-tank).
- 🚪 Hobby: Leaving the Liberal Party because they are too "insipid."
- ⚖️ Legal Acumen: Filing "half-baked" Supreme Court injunctions.
Ideology-O-Meter
🌡️ The Climate "Abuse" Incident
Ah, 2022. A simpler time. Colleen was running as the Liberal candidate for Macnamara. During a debate, a young first-time voter asked if the government had a duty of care to protect young people from climate change.
- Colleen Harkin (paraphrased from the Macnamara debate)
Yes, you read that right. Teaching kids science is "almost abuse." She later clarified that her language was "clumsy" and we should teach kids "hope, not fear." Because nothing says "hope" like ignoring literal fires and floods.
Through her work at the IPA, she frequently bemoans "climate anxiety" in children, suggesting that being worried about the collapse of the ecosystem is actually worse than the collapse itself.
📚 The IPA Education "Expert"
Colleen isn't just a politician; she's an intellectual. As the Director of Education Programs at the Institute of Public Affairs, she has written extensively on why the modern education system is ruining everything.
- Anti-Open Plan: She hates open-plan classrooms (fair enough, they are loud).
- Anti-Curriculum: She believes the curriculum is infested with "woke" ideology, climate catastrophism, and too much focus on Indigenous issues.
- Anti-Teacher Pay Rises (Sort of): While claiming to support teachers, she argued against a proposed 35% pay rise for Victorian teachers, stating that "throwing more money at it is not going to solve the problem" of their "impossible tasks."
Her solution? Get government out of the way, introduce a voucher system, and ensure children are taught "facts" (presumably the ones approved by the IPA).
🏃♀️ The Great Defection
In mid-2026, Colleen looked at the Victorian Liberal Party, decided they were entirely too "insipid," and jumped ship to Pauline Hanson's One Nation.
But she didn't leave quietly. Harkin was a vocal supporter of Moira Deeming (the former Liberal MP who was expelled from the parliamentary party). When the Liberal Party administrative committee decided to loan former leader John Pesutto $1.5 million to avoid bankruptcy after he lost a defamation case to Deeming, Colleen (still on the admin committee at the time) was having none of it.
The "Half-Baked" Injunction
Harkin's lawyers launched an urgent Supreme Court injunction to stop the $1.5m loan from being transferred. Unfortunately, they lodged it after the money had already been sent. A Supreme Court judge strongly criticised the move as a "half-baked" application with "a remarkable oversight" that wasted the court's time.
Now, she fights for "freedom, equality, mateship" and other buzzwords under the One Nation banner for the South-East Metro seat.
Pop Quiz!
According to Colleen, teaching kids about a climate emergency is: