September 13, 2011
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop. Photo: Andrew Meares
THE federal opposition has been advised to prepare for a snap election should Labor replace Julia Gillard with Kevin Rudd.
Following the Herald/Nielsen poll yesterday that showed Mr Rudd at the helm would restore Labor to an election-winning lead, the Deputy Opposition Leader, Julie Bishop, told a meeting of the shadow ministry that the Coalition must be ready for such a move.
As senior Labor figures stressed Ms Gillard should be given at least until February or March to try to reverse Labor's fortunes, there was a consensus in the shadow ministry that Ms Gillard could not recover and would be replaced.
Ms Bishop, who forecast Mr Rudd's dumping before others in the Coalition, and Ms Gillard's own decline, told colleagues she did not believe the poll boost that Labor would receive from changing to Mr Rudd would be sustainable and Labor would rush to an election to capitalise on it.
The Herald poll showed Labor trailing the Coalition by 27 per cent to 48 per cent on the primary vote and by 42 per cent to 58 per cent on a two-party-preferred basis.
When voters were asked how they would vote if Ms Gillard were replaced by Mr Rudd, Labor's primary vote rose 15 percentage points to 42 per cent and the Coalition's fell 5 points to 43 per cent. Labor led the Coalition on a two-party-preferred basis by 52 per cent to 48 per cent.
Mr Rudd, the Foreign Minister, has returned to work after six weeks recuperating from heart surgery. He is due to fly to the US tomorrow for ministerial meetings in San Francisco and could stay on for another week for the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
Despite his public popularity, Mr Rudd remains a polarising figure within the ALP and there are doubts about the sincerity of his pledge - as communicated by supporters - that he would change his style if brought back and would not exact vengeance.
There was grumbling in some Labor quarters yesterday that Mr Rudd did not attend an early-morning cabinet meeting to try to find a solution on asylum-seeker policy but managed the day before to make a public appearance with the French Foreign Minister, Alain Juppe.
''It was the Kevin of old, able to make a self-serving photo op but nowhere to be seen when there was a hard decision to be made,'' one ALP figure said. Mr Rudd had a doctor's appointment yesterday afternoon to seek the all-clear for his overseas trip.
The NSW Labor general-secretary, Sam Dastyari, a leading figure in the NSW Right, wrote a newspaper article yesterday urging the party to hold its nerve during this tough period and see through its controversial reform agenda.
''Australian politics is hard and competitive and, when certain pressures prevail, political parties of all persuasions examine the issue of leadership,'' Mr Dastyari says in the article, which does not mention Ms Gillard.
But he says leadership changes must be a ''last resort when a party has lost its way'' and ''can never be allowed to transform into a prevailing culture''.
One source said Mr Dastyari's article was a sign to the Right to give Ms Gillard more time.
