Gillard Election Gloss Fades

August 01, 2010

By Anthony Fensom

In a statement released Friday, Rudd said he was prepared to join the Labor campaign outside his own electorate ‘as appropriate’ in support of Gillard’s campaign. The offer came after Rudd’s previous refusal to comment on national issues as he campaigned in his local south Brisbane electorate.

Ironically, accepting support from the man she dumped may be key to Gillard’s election, but it will be a bitter pill to swallow. The current Labor leader has stated that Rudd will be offered a senior position if Labor is re-elected, and he will be making an appearance at Labor’s official campaign launch in Brisbane on August 16.

However, any move to remind voters of Rudd risks also reminding them why he was removed from office by his own party, confusing Gillard’s message of ‘moving forward’ and not dwelling on past mistakes.

Rudd has been accused of being the source of recent damaging leaks against Gillard, with former Labor leader Mark Latham describing him as a ‘snake’ and ‘unmanly’ for allegedly throwing dirt against his own party.

Yet another Labor leak broke Saturday, this time in the Weekend Australian newspaper, with Gillard accused of sending a former bodyguard to attend sensitive security meetings on her behalf.

The leak – now the seventh in recent weeks – came after ABC TV’s earlier report that Rudd had sent his chief of staff to the same meetings held by cabinet’s National Security Committee, and will likely further raise antagonism between the Gillard and Rudd camps.

Meanwhile, August 1 will see the launch of new attack ads by the Coalition in Queensland, seeking to link the unpopularity of the Queensland state Labor government led by Premier Anna Bligh with the Gillard campaign.

‘Don’t let Gillard do to Australia what Bligh has done to Queensland,’ the ad says, warning of ‘more waste, more debt, more taxes.’

In a ‘reds under the beds’ theme more attuned to the 1960s, the ad shows pictures of Bligh and Gillard’s faces over a black map of Australia with a red background, similar to the classic image of revolutionary Che Guevara.

Don’t go back to the future is the ad’s main message, and it’s one the Gillard team will be pondering closely in the next few days as they prepare for Rudd’s release from hospital and return to the campaign trail.

Can Gillard get her mojo back in week three? Time, at least is on her side, and as observers point out, the only poll that matters is the one on election day.