The Leadership Ballot

Today, at Parliament House in Canberra,  102 Member’s of the Caucus voted in favour of Julia Gillard (71 votes) to Kevin Rudd’s (31 votes), meaning that Julia Gillard remains as Australia’s Prime Minister. Most people expected Julia Gillard to win the leadership ballot which she did comfortably, while Kevin Rudd never did stand a chance of winning this ballot.

 If the leadership ballot was a public vote, Kevin Rudd would have won because he has the popularity vote with the people as they see him as the better leader over Julia Gillard. The people forget that Kevin had his chance to be the PM, he made mistakes and he was stubborn over many issues while he was in office, that was why he was ousted back in 2010. People lost confidence in him as a leader of the country, his party lost confidence in him as the leader of the Australian Labour Party. He was doing more damage than good the longer he remained in the role of PM. There was a lot of talk at the time within his own party about having Kevin removed as PM in a no confidence vote. People were tiring of the way he was leading both the Australian Labour Party and the country.

Many people have also forgotten that while Kevin Rudd was Prime Minister, while he was feeding his ego and going on a lot of overseas trips, Julia Gillard spent a lot of time running the country during his absence in the role of Acting Prime Minister.

There are those people who hate Julia Gillard because they see her as the one who “knifed Kevin Rudd in the back” because her motive was that she wanted desperately to be PM. She was left with no other choice but to tell Kevin, during a late night meeting, that she was taking over as the PM whether he liked it or not. She was the Deputy Prime Minister at the time and there was many people in the factions of the Australian Labour Party – many of them self serving Independent MP’s who are only looking after their own interests, who feel they are the ones who are really running the country because they get a big say in how the country is run after the last Federal election when many Independents won seats on the Frontbench – people who never did support Kevin or no longer supported him, that wanted him gone. They were the ones who put the pressure on Julia because if she didn’t ask Kevin to step down as Prime Minister, they would have, if they had no other option left, placed that no confidence vote. However, most of them lacked the balls to do the dirty work themselves, as they were looking out after their own careers, and egos. So they got Julia to do their dirty work. Either way, Kevin Rudd’s time as Prime Minister was well and truly up.

When Julia took over from Kevin as Prime Minister, she was up against the wall from day one. She’s had to deal with the factions, the supporters of Kevin Rudd in parliament, as well as the all the people of this country who saw her as the “bad guy”, the failed policies under Kevin Rudd. She also had to deal with the man himself who would undermine her at every opportunity he got and didn’t really give her his support.

The Party have now spoken and have told Kevin Rudd they do not want him to be PM. Hopefully, he stays true to his word and goes quietly to the backbench and not bring up the question of leadership again.

Now that Julia received the majority of the votes in today’s leadership ballot, may the matter now rest so that she can lead the country and the people the best way she can.

I think Julia will be a great PM now after the question of leadership of the country, not just the ALP has been finally settled. She can make changes to the people she wants in the Member’s of the Caucus with a reshuffle of the Cabinet, where some of the Frontbenchers will be removed to the Backbench and vice versa, the new Member’s in the Frontbench will be given new portfolio’s, while those who move to the Backbench will lose their portfolio’s.

Hopefully in the time that there is left before the next Federal election is called, Julia Gillard has the time to gain the trust of the people. I think that now she no longer has the issues of leadership over her head, not to mention the continual in-fighting within the party, she will finally have the time to prove herself as a leader of the country.

K

I wish I could be a fly on the wall

Tomorrow, in the world of Australian politics, it will be an interesting day. In fact, it will  be a very interesting day for the whole of Australia whether you care about  tomorrow’s decision or not.

At 10am, Australian Eastern Daylight Savings Time, the Federal Members of  Parliament from the Australian Labour Party along with the Independant’s, (these are the people who help make decisions regarding the running of the country within the walls of Parliament House in Canberra), will tomorrow be a part of a “secret” leadership ballot will be deciding who their leader will be.

I don’t know how they can call this leadership vote a “secret” vote, considering that both Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd would have a fair idea who their supporters are among those who will be casting their votes tomorrow.

By my count, out of the main players, so far 5 MP’s will be backing Kevin Rudd, 6 MP’s will be backing Julia and that leaves about 9 MP’s who are still undecided as to who they will vote for.

Many political “experts” and commentators have stated that Julia Gillard could win tomorrow’s leadership vote because she has the support of many who will be voting tomorrow and Kevin Rudd, if the vote was a public vote, would win because he has the popularity vote with the people.

Personally, I hope Julia Gillard wins tomorrow. Not because I’m a Julia supporter, I’m not. I’m not a Kevin Rudd supporter either and I definitely can’t stand Tony Abbott, (for all his continual bitching about the ALP but he never states how he would fix the issues he has a problem with). I hope Julia wins because I think she has been doing a good job with what she’s got to work with. She has to deal with many of Independant’s or “faceless men” who currently have a seat on the frontbench, many of them are looking out for their own egos and their own interests and not the interests of the people, the citizens of Australia, the people who pay them to be there.

Kevin Rudd, I feel has a hidden agenda. He’s made it no secret that he wants to be back in his “rightful” place as Prime Minister of Australia but if he is re-elected as Prime Minister in tomorrow’s ballot, he will be most certainly be unbearable and he’ll make those who weren’t his supporters pay with the cabinet reshuffle and the handing out of the Minister’s portfolios that will follow if he is to be re-elected.

I also think that Julia Gillard is true to her word, that if she should lose tomorrow’s leadership vote, she will indeed go to the backbench and not bring up the topic of leadership again, that she will accept the decision if the vote doesn’t go her way.

Kevin Rudd, on the other hand, I think that if the decision doesn’t go in his favour, and he is not “reinstated” as the Prime Minister of Australia, I bet he’ll be acting like a spoilt child who doesn’t get his way and he’ll throw one great, big tantrum as he will be most certainly ungracious in defeat. I have a feeling that he will certainly not go quietly to the backbench or accept the decision if it doesn’t go his way.

Whatever the decision is tomorrow, whether Julia Gillard is still our Prime Minister, or Kevin Rudd is re-elected as the Prime Minister of Australia, I just hope that whoever is in charge of the country puts the people first.

Tomorrow will be very interesting indeed.

K

Politically speaking…

I think Kevin Rudd is losing the plot… he was ousted as the Prime Minister of Australia in 2010 for his very unpopular and failing policies which lost him favour with some factions within the Australian Labour Party. Rather than compromising on those unpopular and failing policies, he dug his heels in and carried on regardless, stepping on as many toes as he could along the way.  That was his undoing. The factions within the ALP grew tired quickly of him being consistently egotistical, his unwillingness to listen and his arrogance. The factions wanted him out, so late one night in 2010, the wheels were set in motion by those factions to have his then deputy, Julia Gillard, replace him as the Prime Minister in an attempt to go into damage control and settle some seriously ruffled feathers among the party and the voters.

Julia Gillard has made mistakes while she’s been the Prime Minister but she hasn’t let her ego get in the way of doing what is right for the people of the country. She may have lied about not bringing in the Carbon Tax and now guess what, we now have a Carbon Tax along with any other tax our politicians can think up but she IS a politician after all and as we all know, they are famous for changing their minds or they suffer from an acute case of selective amnesia from time to time.

Many people don’t like Julia for many reasons such as, she is a strong woman, she doesn’t speak in a manner that has been elocutioned (if that’s a word) to within an inch of it’s life, she doesn’t show her emotions at all, her leadership style and her popularity is in the toilet (someone please push the button to flush, thanks) and many other reasons but I do believe she’s doing the best job she can do considering the people within the Australian Labor Party and the Independents, she has got to work with.

Kevin and Julia could have been a great team together if they were on the same page working together but they weren’t. Kevin Rudd always saw his “rightful” place as being the Prime Minister Australia and nothing else less than that. He certainly doesn’t want Julia Gillard as the Prime Minister and makes frequent jibes stating that fact.

Now things between Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard have gotten to breaking point, that while Kevin Rudd was in Washington DC as the Foreign Minister of Australia, he resigned, effective immediately.

He’s back in Australia now and he’s accepted Julia Gillard’s offer of having a leadership vote with the Federal Members of Parliament currently sitting in the ALP casting their votes effectively deciding who they would prefer as the Prime Minister of Australia on Monday at 10am Australian Eastern Daylight Savings time. Whoever loses the leadership vote has agreed that they will go to the backbench and will not contest the postion of Prime Minister and the matter will be dropped, the Party have decided and they will accept that decision.

Now back to my first few words… I do think that Kevin Rudd has lost the plot. If anyone has heard his carefully prepared speeches during the press conferences over the last couple of days, he’s certainly milking for all it’s worth the “poor me, I was unfortunate scapegoat that was stabbed in the back by his own party” when they ousted him as Prime Minister (give Kevin Rudd the TV Week Logie Award (Australia’s equivalent to the Emmy’s in the US) for acting, or should that be, over acting? His arrogance is also well and truly on display during the press conferences when he makes references such as “My rightful place is as the Prime Minister of Australia”, “I should still be the Prime Minister of Australia” and “no one should be the Prime Minister of Australia but me”, and behaving like a spoilt little child who wants it all his way. He is a man who has an agenda and he’ll be certainly doing everything he can to get what he wants. His ego has definitely gotten in the way of him doing what’s right for the people of Australia.

Not that it’s a great surprise but Kevin Rudd is still seriously miffed off with those who forced him to end his term as Prime Minister sooner than he expected, he was still, however, a major contributor to his downfall. If Kevin does win the leadership vote on Monday, he will be totally unbearable…

Kevin Rudd may come out as the winner in the upcoming leadership vote for he is still popular with the people, the voters. Julia Gillard may win the leadership vote because she has the backing of those who will be doing the voting within the Party. Monday will be the tell all day when the leadership has been decided after all the votes have been counted and the winner of the leadership vote announced.

As for me, I’m hoping that Julia wins, if I’m honest, as a gloating Kevin Rudd… I don’t even want to go there…

K