Pauline Hanson Defends Child Autism Views As ‘Misrepresentation’

Image: Seven News

Pauline Hanson has deflected calls to apologise for her divisive comments on separating autistic children in Australian classrooms, saying her critics are looking for "political point-scoring".

The One Nation leader told reporters this afternoon her comments were geared towards providing the best education outcomes for intellectually disadvantaged students, and were not intended to be discriminatory.

"These children should go into a special classroom, and be looked after and given special attention," she said.

"If it were one of my children I would love all the time given to them, to give them those opportunities.

"I think we have more autistic children yet we are not providing the special classrooms or the schools.

"For the Greens or anyone else to come out and say I do not believe they [children with austistic disabilities] should be in our classrooms is a lie," she told reporters.

"It is misrepresentation, and it is for political pointscoring."

It comes as Western Sydney MP Emma Husar - who has an autistic son - has joined a chorus of voices hitting back at Senator Hanson for suggesting kids with autism should be removed from mainstream classrooms.

"I have come out here today because I am angry and I am upset but most of all I am disappointed," she said.

"I am disappointed that in 2017 we have got people like Senator Hanson sitting over there in the Senate making ill-informed comments about kids that are autistic that they don't belong in a mainstream class and calling for them to be segregated."