The election of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard as the new Labor leadership team represents a sea change in Australian politics. It is a bold move by the Federal Parliamentary Labor Party as it steps up its efforts to pitch to Australian voters in the 2007 election.
Prime Minister Howard will not be able to take any comfort from the change. Kim Beazley, who served the Labor Party with honour, departed with grace and dignity, having lost two loves in his life—his younger brother David, and the Labor leadership. Opinion polls and psephologists alike have been sounding an insistent drumbeat: Kim Beazley’s legacy is a party that is within striking distance of government.
The vote for a leadership change reflected the pressure that Labor members are getting in their electorates from an increasingly embittered constituency. It is clear in the groundswell of opinion in communities across the country that the Coalition government is not on the side of working Australians.
Kevin Rudd’s leadership needs to be sophisticated and incisive. He needs to identify the weaknesses that can be used to defeat the Howard government. He is not afraid to articulate his vision for Australia, a vision that recognises how life in this country has changed, and one that gives back to people the hope that this government has dashed.
The Report of the Iraq Study Group, released in the US this week, has revealed that current strategies in Iraq are failing and the situation is deteriorating. Tony Blair is big enough to acknowledge this and has put in place a withdrawal strategy. John Howard stubbornly refuses to accept the validity of the report, or to act on its findings.
Australians are also disturbed by the government’s abandonment of David Hicks, left to languish for five years in Guantanamo Bay. The Immigration Ombudsman this week revealed that ten Australian citizens have been locked up illegally in Australia , some of them traumatised children. As Kevin has stated, "compassion is not a dirty word … not a sign of weakness." It’s part and parcel of the Australian belief in a 'fair go', and without it we’re in a bad way.
For working families, two interest rate rises in close succession have had a crippling effect on their struggle to maintain their mortgage payments. The dream of owning the family home is becoming less and less achievable. For many Australian workers, since the Workchoices legislation