2011/06/01 by David Hundt · 1 citation
Social Sciences · #Commonwealth, Australian Politics and Federalism
paper · doi:10.1111/j.1467-8497.2011.01597.x
openalex publication_date 2011/06/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
The second half of 2010 began with the shock of Kevin Rudd's dismissal at the hands of his caucus colleagues still hanging thick in the air.The Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the former prime minister suffered rapid declines in support during the first six months of the year, but Rudd's loss of support among his colleagues was even more precipitous; with 80 per cent of the Labor caucus backing Julia Gillard, the leadership did not even go to a vote. 1 The change of leadership also shocked key allies such as the United States.President Barack Obama reportedly called Rudd and asked if there had been a coup, but one of the administration's senior foreign policy experts, Kurt Campbell, expressed confidence in Gillard's leadership qualities and her commitment to the alliance.In late July Australia joined the US and other allies in imposing sanctions on Iran in the form of restrictions on the development of the oil and gas industries, and Australia's status as a close American ally was confirmed when the US Senate ratified a defense cooperation treaty that granted Australia access to sensitive American military technology. 2 Despite the unedifying spectacle of a first-term prime minister being dismissed by his own party, the change in leadership revived Labor's fortunes.Three issues were blamed for the slide in the ALP's polling: the shelving of an emissions trading scheme (ETS), the announcement of a new mining tax, and the arrival of asylum-seekers from Australia's north.Gillard promptly offered solutions to all three issues, announcing for instance that the mining tax would be recast as a Minerals Resource Rents Tax (MRRT) that was broadly acceptable to the big miners.Newspoll gave the government 55 per cent of the two-party vote in early July, and Gillard had a strong lead as preferred prime minister.An election was not due until November, but the government succumbed to temptation and named 21 August as the date for the federal poll. 3 The campaign, however, was a disaster for Labor.According to one commentator, both major parties were guilty of avoiding the difficult but necessary task of convincing voters of the importance of reform, and relied on polls and focus groups 1 Barrie Cassidy, "The killing of Tyrannosaurus Rudd", ABC News, 18 October 2010.