CANBERRA, Australia — Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who called elections Saturday just three weeks after taking power, was once considered too far left to win a national vote. But polls and analysts say she has as good a chance of wooing the Australian public as her opponent: He was long thought too conservative to appeal to the mainstream.
Buoyed by strong support for her new leadership — she grabbed power in a surprise ruling Labor Party coup — Gillard scheduled elections for Aug. 21.
Gillard has hit the ground running, attempting to steer a new course in key policy areas, saying the government had “lost its way” under her predecessor, Kevin Rudd.
“We would go into our second term with some lessons learnt,” Gillard told reporters at Parliament House. “We would be able to implement and deliver programs differently than we have in the past.”
ap polls give Labor a slight advantage but predict a tight race against a resurgent conservative opposition Liberal Party led by Tony Abbott.
“They’re coming from backgrounds where Tony Abbott probably worries that people think he’s a bit too conservative, and Julia Gillard worries that people think she is too left wing, and they’re both heading for the middle ground,” said John Warhurst, an Australian National University political scientist. “I think at the extremes you’ll get a little bit of support drifting to both of them and it might cancel each other out.”
Analysts say Gillard’s decision to capitalize on her early positive opinion polls and opposition disarray rather than take more time to establish herself in the job is a risky strategy.
The opponents
Julia Gillard, Australia’s first female premier, is a Welsh-born atheist with a common-law partner. She said she chose career over children — a decision for which she has been criticized by political opponents as unfit for leadership — and repeatedly denies that the left-wing politics of her 20s had ever been communist.
Tony Abbott, leader of the conservative Liberal Party, is a staunch Roman Catholic social conservative, married with three daughters. He was rebuked by Gillard for cautioning young women against having sex before marriage. Gillard advised him to mind his own business.
