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"Senator Hanson has been parading prejudice as protest for decades."
That was Foreign Minister Penny Wong condemning a re-hashed stunt by Queensland Senator Pauline Hanson.
Following the rejection of her motion to ban the burqa, the One Nation leader wore the full black garment, with her legs visible, into the Senate chamber on Monday afternoon.
The burqa is a garment typically worn by Muslim women in Afghanistan.
Appearing around the broadcast networks, Ms Hanson says her stunt was about "protecting national security."
"It's not only just national security. If you cannot wear a helmet into the bank, or any other venues where they tell you to take it off. Why is the Burqa any different?"
The Senate erupted in protest, with some calling Hanson "old hat," and "been there, done that," referring to a similar stunt she pulled in the Senate in 2017.
Senate president Slade Brockman initially allowed Ms Hanson's motion to proceed to a vote.
This outraged many Senators.
Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi, who is Muslim, accused Hanson of racism.
"A dress code might be a choice of the senators, but racism should not be the choice of the Senate. This is a racist senator, displaying blatant racism and Islamophobia, and someone should pull her up on that and it is you in the chair you should be pulling her up on that."
Senator Fatima Payman who is also Muslim, was also quick to condemn the behaviour.
"If this is about the dress code, she is disrespecting of faith. She is disrespecting the Muslims out there, Muslim Australians. It's absolutely unconstitutional. This needs to be dealt with immediately before we proceed."
Followed closely by the leader of the Greens Party, Larissa Waters.
"Clearly what has happened today is not a genuine demonstration of faith. In fact, it is the middle finger to people of faith. It is extremely racist and unsafe and I would like you to reconsider your earlier ruling, that it is not appropriate in this Senate to draw attention to a religion that this person does not even subscribe to."
Senate President Sue Lines then came into the room and told Senator Hanson to leave because she was being disrespectful.
Ms Lines was referring to an earlier decision in the Senate that ruled using religious clothing as a prop was disrespectful to the parliament.
Ms Hanson still refused to remove her burqa.
Then Foreign Minister Penny Wong put forward a motion to suspend Ms Hanson from the Senate.
"In relation to a similar stunt by this senator in this place. And I would remind those who may not have been here of what the then leader of the government, Senator Brandis, said at the time. He said to Senator Henderson, Senator I'm not going to pretend to ignore the stunt you have tried to pull today by arriving in the chamber dressed in a burqa, when we all know you are not an adherent of the Islamic faith."
Senator Wong called Ms Hanson's behaviour unworthy of the Australian Senate.
"I will caution and counsel you with respect to be very, very careful of the offense you may do to the religious sensibilities of other Australians. What we should not do in this place, whatever views we may have on policy, is to be this disrespectful of the chamber and of people of faith, whatever our own beliefs may be, whatever our own beliefs may be the sort of disrespect that you are engaging in now is not worthy of a member of the Australian Senate and it should not be allowed to stand."
The stunt effectively shut down the Senate, as the majority of senators voted in favour of the motion to suspend Ms Hanson from the Senate.
Eventually, the Senate was suspended after another motion by Wong was agreed to.
Multicultural Minister Anne Aly told SBS that she condemned the attention-seeking move.
"On undertaking a stunt that effectively shut down the Senate. Shut down the Senate to attack a group of women, which is a very small group of women, by the way, who choose, choose to wear a religious item of clothing that for them is an expression of their faith. In a country where our expression of our faith, regardless of what faith you are is part of the freedoms that we enjoy."
Ms Aly responded to the surge in One Nation polling, which is now sitting between 15 - 18 percent by saying that Ms Hanson preys on genuine grievances in the community.
"Australia has a history of these kinds of attitudes intermittently erupting to the surface. It's when you have people like Pauline Hanson in the parliament who utilize and prey on the grievances, and some of them are genuine grievances that people have, whether it's around cost of living, whether it's around affordability, or availability of housing, whether it's about infrastructure, for example, who prey on those prey on those genuine grievances and utilize them for political purpose."
In response to the stunt, Race discrimination commissioner Giridharan Sivaraman says it gives a dangerous license for members of the community to do the same.
"I was very disappointed. I think that politicians should reflect the standards that we want our society to model, and this certainly didn't do that. And I'm also concerned about the implications when a politician engages in behaviour that demeans someone or demeans a group of people, gives license to the community to do the same."
Mr Sivaraman calls for a stronger endorsement of the national anti racism framework.
"We need support and endorsement of the national anti racism framework, and one of the specific recommendations in that framework is that politicians conduct anti racism training and be held to standards in terms of their behaviour, particularly where their behaviour is racist, I think that's what's necessary. We actually need solutions that will mean that all politicians are educated and can behave better."
Opposition leader Sussan Ley said in a statement that the action "weakens Senator Hanson’s case and cheapens our parliament".
As Ms. Hanson serves her seven-sitting-day suspension, Senator Wong encapsulated the mood in the Senate.
"And her daughter asked, mummy - do all Christians hate Muslims? That summarized where we find ourselves and that and we see it again, and we see it again."
