February, 2012

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Repercussions of the Rudd coup: how the right wing got it wrong

Thursday, February 23rd, 2012

Mosaic law contends that the sins of the father shall be visited upon the son. In the travelling circus known as the Australian Labor Party it seems that the sins of the Right faction, ironically known as Labor Unity, have been visited a thousand times on Julia Gillard. It doesn’t matter if the Prime Minster wins the leadership spill on Monday, she is now an official sitting duck. If not Kevin Rudd, someone else, anyone else, will lead the ALP to the next election. Why has this all happened?

Julia Gillard’s Prime Ministership should have been a feather in the ALP’s cap. It should have been a landmark occasion for all Australians as we celebrate our first female national leader. Gillard had all the right qualities to be Australia’s answer to Elisabeth Kopp, Mary Robinson, Chandrika Kumaratunga or Megawati Sukarnoputri. Cool under pressure, committed to education and the working class, endorsed by Emily’s List, all the ingredients were there to create a cult hero for progressive politics in Australia.

Her achievements in office are numerous. Her masterful ability to negotiate has seen her hold together the most fragmented Australian parliament since World War II. Despite governing with the tenuous support of a Greens MP, two nominally conservative independents and a Liberal in the Speaker’s Chair, under Gillard’s leadership the ALP has been extremely productive, often succeeding in policy areas where Rudd failed. None of these achievements have made any headway with a disillusioned and impatient electorate. The toxic way in which Gillard gained the leadership has neither been forgotten nor forgiven.

There is a long standing tradition in both major parties that you can never challenge a new MP for their seat before their second term and you cannot touch a minister. Even the ambitious young head-kickers in the far-right of the Liberal Party adhere to this and won’t seek pre-selection against a back-bencher in their first term. It is beyond scandalous that an election winning Prime Minister was rolled in his first term after ending nearly 12 years of conservative rule. The factional war lords in Labor Unity committed an act of hubris and it has followed poor Julia every second of every day. In particular, Mark Arbib and Bill Shorten flexed the Right’s muscles and both were rewarded with cabinet positions.

Conventional wisdom says do not cut your nose to spite your face and yet the ‘faceless men’ of the ALP have somehow managed to do this (remarkable for people who have no face). Labor Unity achieved their short term goal but they have poisoned Gillard’s Prime Ministership. The Socialist Left faction have sniffed blood and are preparing for the return of Rudd. Doug Cameron, a powerbroker for the Left has come out for Rudd, as has Robert McClelland and Kim Carr. The undecided back-benchers will likely follow suit. Corangamite MP Darran Cheeseman has already called for Gillard’s resignation. Many of the back-benchers rode to office on the back of Rudd’s popularity. Now desperate to keep their jobs, they will look again to the most popular Labor MP.

The facts remain stubbornly clear in the public’s mind. What happened to Kevin Rudd was wrong. Of course, we do not have a US style presidential system and we pride ourselves in Australia on voting for party and policy not personality. Be that as it may, the Kevin 07 campaign saw a landmark victory against a four-term winning Liberal leader. The people rightly expected Rudd to serve his first term. The Australian people have never even denied a new Prime Minister a second term. In that sense, we really do believe in a fair go.

Gillard is, rightly or wrongly, facing the consequences of low politics from Labor Unity. The resurrection of Rudd just goes to show, the public do have a long memory  on certain things and you cannot simply hope the passage of time will sweep political dirt under the rug. Kevin Rudd is the only Labor leader in the past 17 years to win government for the ALP in its own right. He is the only person who can stop the Australian people reluctantly voting for the dismally unqualified Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott.  Rudd never should have been dumped and it is now painfully clear that the Labor Right got it horribly wrong.

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The Young and the Ruddless: The ALP’s leadership soap opera

Thursday, February 23rd, 2012

The soap opera that is the federal ALP leadership looks set to come to a dramatic climax with Prime Minister Gillard expected to call a leadership spill today. Like a bitter couple in a loveless marriage, Gillard and Rudd have been trying, and failing, to keep up appearances for weeks and there is a sense of relief inside the frustrated government that divorce proceedings have finally been initiated. Gillard and Rudd had been engaged in an awkward Mexican standoff with both sides unconvincingly maintaining they supported the other. In an extraordinary move Rudd announced from Washington that he was resigning as Foreign Minister.

If this is a divorce, Rudd is certainly playing the part of the abused victim. In his resignation speech he claimed, ‘The truth is I can only serve as foreign minister if I have the confidence of Prime Minister Gillard and her senior ministers’. Gillard had not defended Rudd following attacks and charges of disloyalty from leading Labor figures including Simon Crean. Rudd commented, ‘When challenged today on these attacks Prime Minister Gillard chose not to repudiate them. I can only reluctantly conclude that she therefore shares these views’. The former Prime Minister certainly gave the impression that for the second time, the ‘faceless men’ of the ALP have driven him from a high office. The question, of course, is how caucus will respond.

Kevin Rudd is unpopular inside his own party. Treasurer Wayne Swan released a scathing statement claiming that Rudd was an egotist who did not share real Labor values. His government colleagues were, ‘sick of Kevin Rudd driving the vote down by sabotaging policy announcements and undermining our substantial economic successes’. Yet however unpopular Rudd is with the ALP, he is by far the most popular Labor politician with the public. Polls have repeatedly confirmed him as preferred Prime Minister. Despite every effort, Gillard has failed to put the government in an election winning position. Far from it, federal Labor is facing annihilation along the lines of the Keneally NSW government in 2011. A poll from June last year suggested Labor would gain a 13 point first preference increase – an election winning improvement – if Rudd replaces Gillard.

These statistics must be playing on the mind of nervous Labor back-benchers in marginal seats. Two days ago Corangamite MP Darren Cheeseman broke ranks and called for the Prime Minister to stand down insisting, ‘there’s no doubt about it: Julia Gillard can’t take the party forward’. In his resignation speech as Foreign Minister, Rudd trumpeted this theme claiming, ‘There is one overriding question for my colleagues and that is who is best placed to defeat Tony Abbott’. For his part, the Opposition Leader stated, ‘Kevin Rudd has confirmed two things – that the faceless men are running the Labor Party and that the instability at the top of this government is damaging our country’.

It is notoriously difficult to gage the numbers in Labor’s divided caucus. Of the 103 members, it seems neither Rudd nor Gillard have a clear majority. The Prime Minister appears to have more supporters but the undecided MPs could see either camp over the line. Sportsbet.com.au is giving Ms Gillard short odds at $1.33 with twice as much money currently placed on her. It is possible that Rudd will simply retire to the back bench or even quit politics, however, being so close to regaining the top job it is hard to believe he won’t challenge. Provided he receives a fair shake of the sauce bottle in caucus, there is every likelihood he could win back the leadership of the ALP and the country. We have had Prime Ministers serve two separate terms before, but never in circumstances quite like this. A truly unique story in the history of Australian politics will unfold over the next few days.

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