Australian Labor Party Takes Newspoll Lead; PM Kevin Rudd Scores as He Dropped Bomb to ALP
The Australian Labor Party was once again the more preferred party by 50 per cent according to a recent Newspoll published in The Australian.
Labor Party's primary vote moved notches higher by 50 per cent while the Coalition's plummeted to 42 per cent.
PM Kevin Rudd was still the preferred PM over his rival Tony Abbott, with 53 per cent to 31 per cent.
Newspoll's margin of error is three percentage points.
The party's increase in Poll and Mr Rudd's consistency as preferred PM can be attributed by the announcement that Mr Rudd is giving Labor Party members their right to decide for the party's leadership.
The announced changed was that in time that the party will choose its leader again, 50 per cent of the votes will come from the party members and the other 50 comes from the elected Labor Caucus.
Essentially, the change means that there will be no leader to be ousted again the way Julia Gillard was replaced or Mr Rudd himself back in 2010. Currently, only 30 per cent of the vote from Caucus is required to replace the party leader. With Mr Rudd's announcement, the party will need 75 per cent votes in order to oust a current leader. The elected leader will then need 20 per cent of the support from caucus to run for election and ballot will seat up to 30 days
In an interview with ABC news, Mr Rudd explained that, "rule change is clear: if a leader of the Australian Labor Party takes the party to the election and they are returned to form the government of the nation, that person remains as leader of the party in the government for the duration of that term."
"The reforms I announced today will give more power to everyday members of the Labor Party. They will ensure that power will never again rest in the hands of a factional few. Make no mistake, this is the most significant reform to the Australian Labor Party in recent history."
"It is one that should be welcomed by all members of the ALP across the nation, whether you are a long-serving member of the Parliament, a loyal hardworking volunteer, a union activist active in our local branches or a student who has joined Young Labor."
Deputy Prime Minister Anthony Albanese expressed agreement with Mr Rudd's announcement, "This is an opportunity to re-engage in Australian politics for all those who are Labor-true believers but have, up to this point, questioned the value of party membership... we want people to be part of Labor party... and in return for that you will get a say in who is the leader of the federal parliamentary Labor Party."
Meanwhile, NSW State secretary Sam Dastyari was "flabberghasted" by the announcement.
In an interview with The Age, Mr Dastyari said, "I don't know what to make of this yet. This was tightly kept within the parliamentary leadership. The organization was not in the loop on this."
Opposition Leader Tony Abbot called the announcement a "fake change".
In his interview with 7.30 he said that the labor Party should rather call an election and allow the nation to choose party leader. "The first three years of this Government were so bad they sacked the prime minister; the second three years were so bad they sacked the prime minister - now they want another three years. What's more, the bloke who's there now wants to change the rules so that he can't be sacked no matter how bad he is."
Dennis Shanahan, a political editor from The Australian expressed a different take on Labor's lead on the poll. In his article today, he said that the party's rise in polls was exactly as predicted by those people who ousted Ms Gillard BUT "all this positive polling is about Rudd not being Gillard or Abbott, two leaders who have damaged each other severely in the past three years..."
"This is personality politics pure and simple: NSW state Labor got a rise out of Kristina Keneally's bright new personality but still got smashed at the election. This is a lesson Rudd has noted as he moves to reform the Labor party and hand the Leadership to the general membership."
"Rudd has performed a miracle but there's still a long way to go before Labor is resurrected."