Oz Election Thread #4 - Gillard's Labor

Bitter aftertaste ruins Abbott toast to future
November 26, 2011/the AGE

Opinion


'The pressure is squarely on Abbott to come up with a new strategy.' Photo: Stefan Postles

IT WAS a throwaway line, but it summed up the end-game of a political strategy that was all about blasting Julia Gillard out of office, as quickly as possible. ''See you next year at The Lodge for drinks,'' a cheerful Abbott told reporters who attended the Opposition Leader's Christmas drinks at this time last year.

Whether it was achieved by wooing one of the independents who helped Gillard form minority government, or blasting out a Labor MP accused of behaving badly, or fuelling speculation of an imminent challenge to Gillard by Kevin Rudd, didn't matter.

Abbott was one vote away from the prime ministership and - courtesy of his relentless assault on Gillard's integrity and Labor's ineptness - a country mile ahead in the polls. His was a ''government-in-waiting'', and it all made for a very disciplined party room.

A year on, Abbott's Coalition is still mightily ascendant in the polls, but the game has changed. The coup that delivered the speakership to the disaffected Peter Slipper has transformed this contest, giving Gillard a two-seat buffer and dramatically increasing the odds that the Parliament will run full term.

That means Gillard has a better chance of building a recovery from the foundations of recent weeks. It certainly means the pressure is squarely on Abbott to come up with a new strategy in the months ahead. No wonder he is crying foul.

As Abbott describes it, the departure of the much-respected Harry Jenkins, and his replacement by Slipper, is just another ''squalid manoeuvre'' from Gillard's Machiavellian playbook. The PM deployed the ''Sussex Street death squads'' of Labor's Sydney machine to dispatch a good, decent and loyal man for the sole purpose of shoring up her own position. ....<cont>

I still say she can't afford to be for it. She's an unmarried atheist already, not to mention (gasp) female. An open attack on the churches she has gone out of her way to avoid. She needs for others to make it happen I think. Which of course it must eventually. Shame though. Can't imagine she really is personally against it.

Asylum seekers to be released from detention
Updated November 25, 2011 20:49:59/ABC news

The Federal Government will start using bridging visas to process asylum seekers in the community in the coming days.

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen says those granted the visas have undergone initial checks and security clearances and will live with family or friends while their requests for asylum are processed.

The new rules will not allow asylum seekers to access Centrelink services but they will be allowed to work. ...<cont>

Rats in all ranks

TONY Abbott's hysterical reaction to the Peter Slipper deal must make people wonder what sort of Liberal Party he thinks he's in. It was the Liberals who induced Mal Colston to rat on Labor, by making him deputy president of the Senate, so they could get their sale of Telstra legalised. Abbott was a minister in that government - yet he never uttered a word of disapproval.

We can expect a stream of anti-Slipper stories to be fed to the media. Back when he was a Liberal, we'll be told, he rorted his travel allowances, he drank and he did something embarrassing in his office that was recorded on a videotape.

Yet when he was a Liberal, the party was quite comfortable about these things. Indeed, the Liberals were glad to welcome Slipper into their ranks when he ratted on the Nationals.

Grant Agnew, Coopers Plains, Queensland

Usual stunts

TONY Abbott asks us to believe he wouldn't have done what the government has done - electing a Speaker to suit the Coalition. This is pure humbug. He has said he would have done anything to get the support of the independents after the election, and asked us not to believe anything he said ''unless it was written down''. We also have the spectacle of his ''blood oath'' pledge to reverse the carbon tax. The government can now focus on managing the economy while he indulges in his usual stunts.

Jeanne Hart, Maryborough

The Labor Party is broken. Here's how to start fixing it
Kevin Rudd
November 28, 2011

Opinion

Factional powerplays are a turn-off. It's time the rank and file reclaimed the ALP.

A genuine public contest of ideas is fundamental to the continuing viability of the Labor Party — its capacity to adapt to the challenges of the future. Open debate allows the sunshine in. Closed doors, driven by factional self-interest, do not. ...<cont>


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