Breaking News: Prime Minister calls a leadership ballot.
Your thoughts?
PM says his electoral win and performance means he should stay. He will not move to the right over policy differences.
British Prime Minister John Major did the same thing in the 1990s. Didn’t solve his problems. The party continued to snipe at him.
It seems that Julia Gillard (the Deputy PM) called for the spill, and that she might have the numbers to be the leader – she’s on the left of the party, but seems to have significant support from parts of the Right. If so, she’ll be Australia’s first woman Prime Minister.
Currently, she is the first woman Deputy Prime Minister, and the first foreign-born Deputy Prime Minister (she was born in Wales). However, she wouldn’t be the first foreign-born Prime Minister – Chris Watson was born in Chile.
I don’t really know enough about politics to know whether this is a good thing overall, but I’m tentatively pleased with this news as it means there might be a major party with a leader I actually agree with on at least some things. I’m not even that much of a lefty, but both major parties have been very socially conservative, of late. Plus if there’s any chance that this will somehow upset the internet filter thing, that’s a big plus. I have heard people saying, though, that this will screw up Labor’s chance of winning because Gillard’s too far left, which for all I know is a totally valid point. I’ll watch this thread with interest to see what the people who know more about Australian politics have to say, though.
Why is it called a ‘spill’? I have only ever heard this usage in Australian Federal politics…
In this context, a “spill” means that all the offices are vacated and will be voted on. That means, in this case, if Gillard doesn’t get elected as leader (and as PM-designate), then the next item of business for the Federal Caucus is a ballot for her position as deputy leader (and Deputy PM-designate). So you only call for these things if you’re pretty sure about the numbers, because if you lose you might finish off much worse off than when you started. And that in itself is a good indication that the powerbrokers and numbers counters – on the left and right of the ALP – have done their sums, and decided that Gillard will get more votes than Rudd.
I want Rudd gone. He’s pro-censorship and just gave a big middle finger to the West Australian economy by proposing a new 40% tax on the mining industry, on top of the existing company income tax and royalties.
Very interesting. As I posted in the other thread, I’m surprised this has come to pass - last I heard, Rudd was doing well and was likely to remain PM for the foreseeable future. But I admit I don’t follow Aussie politics all that closely.
What’s the earliest use of the term “spill,” and/or who coined it? I hadn’t heard of it before today.
The earliest quote in The Australian National Dictionary is from Jack Lang in 1956.
(Jack Lang was Premier of New South Wales 1925–27 and 1930–32, and is notable for having been dismissed from office by the state Governor, even though he controlled a majority in the Legislative Assembly. I once heard Mr Lang speak in the 1960s, and he’d lost none of his fire, even though he was about 90 years old then.)
Gillard is very well liked, there are even jokes that the leader of the opposition has a bit of a crush on her.
The media has been pretty brutal with Rudd, he’s just not very charismatic and he’s gone from being the highest percentage to the lowest in an amazingly short period of time.
When you look at Obama and similar woes you have to wonder how much this is about the speed of communication these days, peaks and lows seem to be much quicker. Its not so much clear mistakes havent occurred, as how quickly they seem to translate into disillusion compared to the past.
Otara
So Gillard has triumphed and Rudd has stepped down. I doubt too many people will be weeping at his departure.
And Australia will have a female PM.
ABC (the Aussie one) has called it. Congradulations Ms Gillard. It only took a 108 years of female suffrage to put a women in Australia’s third highest office (& the highest one that actually comes with real power).
Tosh and nonsense.
He was a media darling from when he came to lead Labor until not much more than 2 months ago.
Rudd’s popularity shaded the Silver Budgie (Hawke) for years.
A darling of the sound bite, Kevin 24/7, micromanagement of the media message, and excruciating interest in the detail. Plus a very short fuse, incendinary temper and a curious ability to apologise fullsomely for big mistakes made by others and a total inability to admit little ones of his own.
The factional leaders who gave him the gig (only because none of their own was up to the task) hated that he didn’t consider himself beholden to them, and largely governed with a “kitchen Cabinet” of four, by-passing the notional national power forum of the Cabinet, committing such heresy as selecting his cabinet without reference to them, so when the polls turned they took the gig off him.
As described by one to Chris Uhlman:
“This crypto-fascist made no effort to build a base in the party. Now that his only faction, Newspoll, has deserted him he is gone.”
Except that suffrage didn’t really put her as PM. She has not been elected by the public. Only time will tell on that one.
Ricky Ponting doesn’t have real power? :eek:
Psst- Prediction. Ponting will also go shortly.
Except that communications haven’t changed very much at all in the last 3 years, and neither Bush nor Howard saw any such rapid changes in popularity despite making what I consider some monumentally wrong decisions, such as children overboard, the entire Iraq War/WMD fiasco and so forth. Even the atrocious WorkChoices proposal only saw a slight increase in Howards already downward popularity trend, rather than the massive reversal seen by Rudd.
Obama and Rudd are suffering, not because of the communication on the decisions they have made, but because of the decisions they haven’t made. Both of them swept to power in a climate of overwhelming dissatisfaction with a right wing government. Both of them spruiked long and loud about the need for changes, not juts in policy but changes in national direction and outlook. And both of them chose to cage their policies in terms of moral battles, Rudd much more explicitly than Obama.
And in both cases they have been unable or unwilling to deliver on their moral promises. When I say that the shenanigans at Guantanamo or the response to climate change are major moral issues facing the nation, I cannot walk away form them just because they are difficult or will cause the loss of votes. Of course the electorate becomes dissilusioned when I do that. I have just proved that I will sell out your own principles to retain power.
Obama has suffered the same problem for the same reasons as Rudd. He has suffered less than Rudd for two main reaosns that I can see reasons.
Firstly he was less explicit in stating that he was fighting a moral battle. Rudd repeatedly stated that he was fighting moral battles over illegal entrants, climate change and whaling. When he failed to act on or actually walked away form those issues he proved beyond any doubt that he was immoral. His own words condemned him as being an immoral man. Obama was cagey enough to pick fights that the public perceived as issues of morality (gays in the military, Guntanamo, health care) without ever actually saying that *he *thought thy were moral issues.
Secondly, most voters aren’t suffering buyer’s remorse because they still think that McCain would have been no better. While large numbers ofpeople who voted for him now think that Obma stinks, the same people mostly think that McCain would have stunk just as bad. So while they are disappointed with Obama, they feel no regrets at voting for him. In contrast many people think that Howard/ Costello would have actually been better than Rudd. There is genuine remorse. Howard lost because the electorate were voting against Workchoices, the “Pacific Solution” and inaction on climate change. they were actively voting *against *specific government policies, and they voted for someone who promised to rectify those problem areas. The person they voted for has proven abysmal at doing anything to even address those problems, with exception of IR reform, and a complete disaster at initiating any new new policies (Supertax, insulation scheme, schools building fund, national broadband).
The third area where Rudd has a handicap cv Obama is the he is personally responsible for his inability to act. Obama blames an obstructionist Senate/Congress at every opportunity, and it’s a plausible claim. In contrast, Rudd controls the lower house personally and has, for all intents and purposes, handpicked cabinet of three members. The Senate opposes him, but he has the option of going to a double dissolution election at any time he wants. He is entirely, totally and personally responsible for any action he chooses to take or not to take. Like no PM before him he has taken personal control of both the party room and the cabinet. He chose to have things that way, and it left him with no excuses at all when it came time to act.
So no, I don’t see Rudd’s or Obama’s problems as being in any way related to change sin communication. The problems are caused because they both chose to fight moral battles and draw in voters for their moral crusades. That’s a noble thing to do, but you can’t expect people to stand by you when you sell out on a moral issue, the way they do when you sell out on an economic or diplomatic issue. Bush and Howard also stood on moral issues, the difference is that they didn’t back down on theirs. It is the standing on moral issues and then being revealed as impotent that has buggered both Howard and Obama, not the change on communications.
The next step is to wait and see how Gillard performs at the next election. Historically Australians have reacted badly to leaders foisted upon them by the party. Hewson put Keating into ofice with his GST proposal, beyond, that history hasn’t been kind to unelected leaders. Gillard has the advantage of never have made any declarative statements about moral battles herself, but that means she also has no real grounds upon which to fight her battles. Just another politician. Still if the old axiom is true, that the government loses elections the opposition never winds them, then she should be all right for the next poll.
Assuming she wins the election, there is a big question mark over how she actually performs in office. While she’s likeable, insider opinion seems to be that she is a fairly average performer, a product of the Labor “jobs for girls” system. The pundits are already saying that she is being pushed far to the right of Rudd by her factional supporters. With the backdown on Climate Change and the re-opening of Woomera, Rudd is already indistinguishable from Abbot for practical purposes. So a Gillard to the right of Rudd seems like she will be slightly to the right of Abbot. As in the 80s, Australia seems likely to end up with a Labor party to the right of the Liberals. So after 10 years of Howard, you have 18 months of incompetence and then another strongly conservative government.
Ave bossa nova, similis bossa senecio.
Agreed about the censorship comment, but your take on the mining tax is way off, or at best misleading. By no means is it a “40% tax in the mining industry”. It changes the resources royalty regime from being based on volume mined to being on company profits - it is NOT on top of existing imposts.
Specifically, where a mine earns a greater rate of return than a nominated amount (around 6% has been posited) then the new tax is 40% of the excess. It only applies to companies larger than a certain size, and any money already paid in royalties is reclaimable. Furthermore a mine that made a loss would be entitled to a credit of 40% of extraction costs.
Far from a big finger for the WA economy, it’s a vote of confidence in it. All it does is bring mining into line with oil and gas extraction which work just this way already, and we’re not exactly seeing those industries die in WA, are we?
Blake: at least she’s not religious. And I agree with some of what you say about Rudd; for me his defining moment was late last year when he had the chance to call a double dissolution election over several issues, when his and Labor’s popularity were still high, and squibbed it. It’s been downhill all the way. I do dispute that people wish they’d stayed with Howard though.