SYDNEY - Australian far-right populist party Pauline Hanson’s One Nation won its first seat in the country’s House of Representatives in a by-election on May 9, a preliminary vote count showed.

The result is in line with a surge of electoral support for far-right populist parties globally. Britain’s ruling Labour party this week suffered a widespread loss of seats at council elections.

Mr David Farley, a former agribusiness executive, won the rural seat of Farrer, some 550km south of Sydney and 320km north of Melbourne, for the anti-immigration party with a projected vote of 59.1 per cent, defeating the incumbent centre-right Liberal Party, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corp.

“It’s very clear, the next member for Farrer is David Farley,” Australian Broadcasting Corp election analyst Casey Briggs said in a broadcast. “It’s not a close result.”

The result is significant in that it marks the first time One Nation has won a Lower House seat since Ms Hanson formed the party 30 years ago.

But it does not affect the parliamentary majority of the ruling Labor Party, which holds 94 of 150 Lower House seats.

The seat was left vacant when Liberals leader Sussan Ley resigned in February.

The Labor Party did not run a candidate in the contest for the seat that has been held by the opposition conservatives since it was formed more than half a century ago. REUTERS