Pauline Hanson pictured poolside with Gina Rinehart at luxury Sicilian hotel

Pauline Hanson says she is “grateful for the support” of Gina Rinehart after she was spotted with the Australian billionaire at a luxury Italian hotel as the One Nation leader faces criticism back home.

Photos posted on Instagram and first reported by the Australian Financial Review show Hanson and Rinehart together poolside at the Sicilian Grand Hotel San Pietro – where part of the show White Lotus was filmed.

Hanson’s office on Thursday responded to questions about her relationship with Rinehart, saying the pair are friends.

“For a long time now, it’s been a matter of record that Senator Hanson and Mrs Rinehart are friends and that Mrs Rinehart is a strong supporter of One Nation,” a spokesperson for her office said.

“Senator Hanson is grateful for the support from Mrs Rinehart, a successful Australian businesswoman and generous philanthropist.”

Opposition Leader Angus Taylor told reporters on Thursday morning it appeared that Hanson was “living it up” in Italy as he criticised her for not dealing with issues within her own party, like Malcolm Roberts praising Russian President Vladimir Putin for his invasion of Ukraine.

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Greens Senator David Shoebridge told nine.com.au the latest meeting between Hanson and Rinehart proves that the longtime politician serves the ultra-wealthy.

“Gina Rinehart is playing Hanson’s main donor and policy adviser and in that role she has summoned her to a meeting in her $2000-a-night luxury Italian hotel,” he said.

“This tells you all you need to know about the dynamics at play here.”

Liberal MP Garth Hamilton, whose seat is in danger from One Nation, said the photos would do little to help Hanson’s declining popularity in the polls.

“They say pride comes before a fall, but the polling numbers are already giving way on her,” he told nine.com.au.

“A Sicilian rendezvous is unlikely to turn that around.”

Rinehart donated a $2.1 million light plane and $2 million in cash to Hanson ahead of the Farrer by-election earlier this year and has loaned Hanson her own plane to use.

Hanson jetted off to London early this month to spend her parliamentary winter break on a “fact-finding mission” and attend the Conservative Political Action Conference.

She has used the time to meet with convicted criminal and Islamophobic agitator Tommy Robinson, who took her around his hometown to confront migrants and question how they entered the country.

Hanson’s own right-hand man, One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce, failed to support Robinson.

“I don’t support so much of what Tommy Robinson does, but I think it’s incredibly important we understand the social dynamic and how that came about,” he told the ABC on Thursday.

“If I had the opportunity to talk to him, I would to work out exactly what was going on in their head.”

Hanson’s meeting with Robinson, who recently made headlines in Australia after his controversial appearance on former Today host Karl Stefanovic’s independent podcast led to his departure from Nine, has similarly been criticised.

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“Hanson travelling halfway around the world to meet a neo-Nazi racist, when she barely rocks up to vote for her job in the Senate, doesn’t pass the pub test,” Shoebridge said.

“Pauline defended rehiring a convicted rapist in her party and now she’s doing podcasts with a cop basher,” Hamilton said.

“Why does she surround herself with these people? What sort of government would she form?”

Hanson also sat down with the shortest-serving British prime minister Liz Truss for an interview and said she wanted to “round up” the Greens and independents and move them to an island.

She is set to meet Reform UK Leader Nigel Farage, who is being investigated over a million-dollar donation scandal, and exchange notes.