A Year of frustration for Gillard as voters refuse to forgive and forget.

[Matilda]

After a year as Prime Minister, Julia Gillard has failed to establish any sort of positive relationship with the Australian people, according to the Labor Party's own research.

Gillard is seen as cold and untrustworthy, still haunted by the way she took the job by deposing the man to whom she had endlessly pledged loyalty, Kevin Rudd.

(snip)

Women voters generally welcome the fact the country has a female leader, but then qualify this by saying they wish it had not happened the way it did, or by wishing for a different woman.

Focus groups commissioned by the Labor Party had the opinion that Gillard had been put in place by factions or unions, while Kevin Rudd had been elected by the people.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/a-year-of-frustration-for-gillard-as-voters-refuse-to-forgive-and-forget-20110622-1gfky.html#comments


I'm one of the many who realised that Kevin Rudd was stuffing up, whatever the reasons, but didn't like the way he was forced from office - I thought mediation between Rudd and the movers and shakers would have been better for the party as the way to go. I also found having a female prime minister at last was very exciting, and knowing how well Gillard performs in parliament, I had high hopes. It didn't take long for the excitement to die, as we were forced to listen to her boring voice repeating tired old cliches over and over while the party went nowhere. I also find her cold and completely lacking in charm; I simply can't warm to her on any level, while still admiring her negotiating skills and her robust performances in parliamentary debate.

Rudd, on the other hand, has proved to be a very good Foreign Minister, and he still has that blokey kind of charm that people warm to. He certainly hasn't helped Gillard by playing up to the media and oh-so-casually letting little things drop - such as how he'd do things differently now. I suspect he probably would like his old job back, but it would likely be over the dead bodies of most of the parliamentary Labor party (and it may come to that, the way they're going).

The only thing that may save Gillard at this point is that so many people, including not a few Liberals, find Tony Abbott totally unappealing - a destructive bovver boy, hell-bent on seizing power for its own sake, with very little idea of what he'll do with it once he gets it.

You might say that Australian politics is a bit of a mess at the moment, and much of that is due to Julia Gillard's complete inability to sell her policies to the Australian people – part of that is because much of the policy is being made on the run, and part of it is because there seems to be a natural resistance to anything Gillard says.

We just don't like her.

[snagglepuss]

1. Interesting summary of what's happening way yonder. Thanks.

:hi:

[Chan790]

2. Any chance Labor holds on...

on the express understanding and compact with the people that won-or-lose, Gillard is getting the heave-ho, that she's done as PM? It'd likely be too much to hope for Rudd back but anything is better than a PM considered illegitimate by most of the public.

[Matilda]

3. I don't think that would happen.

The difficulty is that the right-wing of the party, who engineered the coup, will lose face if they then get rid of Gillard. They're already in trouble through losing NSW through their own corruption and incompetence, and to admit they made a mistake federally would be very bad for them. I think they'd rather lose the election than appear to lose their power base within Labor. And the left-wing isn't strong enough to field their own candidate.

And at this stage, there really isn't anyone who's quite ready to take over from Gillard – Bill Shorten,the former union leader who was one of the coup plotters, would love the job, but he's only been in parliament for two minutes. He'd never carry the public with him, and the same goes for Greg Combet, who's very intelligent and I think quite an honest broker, but again, not a high enough profile with the public.

Apart from the usual party hacks, that leaves Kevin Rudd ...