Paul Kelly writes on Labor's pain.

PAUL KELLY:

Labor's choice is Rudd or oblivion

Illustration by Igor Saktor. Source: The Australian

 

EVENTS of the past 10 days affirm that public destabilisation of Julia Gillard's leadership is institutionalised, which has two results: it further guarantees Gillard cannot recover in the polls, but it cannot alone meet Kevin Rudd's core requirement for his return to power.

Labor risks being torn apart. Emotions and animosities are getting hotter. Briefings on the leadership are rife. The Labor tragedy is that Gillard's prime ministership is being cancelled from within by a mood of anger and despair, yet the mechanism that permits a successful Rudd return does not exist. Not yet.

In Washington last week at the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue, Rudd was serene and his usual hyperactive self. As delegates moved in and out of formal sessions taking calls from Australia, Rudd seemed the calmest man in the room.

What is Rudd waiting for? For the Labor Party to sink into the depths of despair. In truth, it is only when Labor is absolutely desperate that it can form a collective view on the historic crisis it confronts. That may or may not happen.

Despite relentless media talk, Rudd is not doing deals. There is no Rudd-Bill Shorten deal. The unions remain with Gillard.
It is obvious Rudd feels the tide is with him and his momentum is building. Gillard's failure to build upon her 71-31 caucus defeat of Rudd in February is an abject lost opportunity.
For Rudd, the nation's mood is vital: might significant figures and institutions issue appeals for a change of leadership?

Rudd won't be accepting a poisoned chalice leadership. He won't be returning to lead a lost cause to certain election defeat. Why would he? Why would Rudd allow himself to be conscripted by people who have hated him merely to allow some of them to save their seats while his reputation is trashed as he loses the prime ministership for a second time, this time at an election? How mad would that be?

A survey of his career reveals that Rudd likes to have a viable gameplan for any big decision. And this is his biggest decision. The conclusion is obvious: Rudd could only return to the leadership if he felt the election was a winnable proposition. That is the pivotal point.
Labor has two choices in response to its crisis. It can stick by Gillard in a fatalistic assertion that the logic of June 2010 cannot be successfully undone or a majority of cabinet, caucus and organisation can commit to yet another recasting of the party to give Labor a fighting chance at the next election.

It requires party elders of immense status to lead the second option. Who might they be? Is there another John Button-type figure to persuade Gillard to resign the way Button, in early 1983, brought huge pressure upon his friend Bill Hayden to quit? No, there is not.
Button said that Hawke was a "bastard", but whether MPs loved or hated Hawke wasn't the point. The only point was Labor's long-run self-interest and its responsibility to its supporters. As long as the present contest is mired in emotions about Rudd, Labor falls between two stools - it cannot revive under Gillard and cannot move successfully to Rudd.
Rudd, of course, is not a Hawke. He is damaged goods. He lost the party's confidence in 2010 because of combined failures on climate change, boats and the mining tax - an inheritance that has plagued Gillard from the start.

The Rudd camp makes a lethal accusation - its opponents are willing to destroy the government and ruin the party for many years merely to deny Rudd.
Yet the Gillard camp has a lethal reply - Rudd had his chance, he failed and now insists upon putting his thirst for vindication before the cause of a unified, coherent government.
The shadow of the February contest looms large. Led by Wayne Swan, minister after minister slammed Rudd. Witness Stephen Conroy, Simon Crean, Nicola Roxon, Tony Burke, Peter Garrett. And there are others like Craig Emerson totally pledged to Gillard. Many ministers refused to serve under Rudd. Can they change their minds? Not Swan. Some others can, but most cannot. They would look fools.

Senior sections of the party are immovable - Rudd may be popular, they say, but he cannot run a successful ALP government.
Their message is there is no going back to the "revolving door" leadership syndrome that invites such public contempt.

The clinching case against Rudd's return is that it would totally convulse, even destroy, the government. In truth, this argument is exaggerated. The reverse logic can be applied. If ministers quit, that is their decision, not Rudd's. He wants a united party.
But Rudd needs, above all, to send a public message that he is leading a new and different government. Rudd must return as a circuit-breaker. He must return to end, symbolically yet substantially, the Gillard era.

Rudd's supporters say that constituting a "new look" government with lots of fresh senior appointments would only help this message. A ministry pruning could be a positive when Labor looks terminal.

The pro-Gillard spear-carriers from 2010 confront some hard decisions. Shorten knows that having knifed Rudd for Gillard in 2010 he cannot knife Gillard for Rudd now. That would be cynicism and trust-breaking on a scale to stain his integrity for years. Shorten is with Gillard. If the end comes, how much he is with Gillard is a separate question.

In February, Shorten avoided public assaults on Rudd, and that is significant. As a realist, he won't sacrifice himself if Rudd returns to the leadership.

The recent eruption over the Greens is a boost to Rudd. It is belated recognition that Gillard's 2010 deal with the Greens was one of the worst strategic decisions in the past 50 years of Labor history.
And that will probably prove an understatement. Gillard cannot escape from her alliance with the Greens despite party acceptance of its fatal impact. On this point, she is trapped. Only a new leader can redefine the Labor-Green relationship and start the big job of sharply separating Labor from the Greens forever.

Rudd's policy of moving to an emissions trading scheme as fast as feasible is known. It means killing Gillard's carbon tax - her three-year fixed-price scheme. It means terminating her broken promise. And it means a confrontation with the Greens.

As prime minister, Rudd would sponsor a bill to this effect. After it was defeated by the Greens and the Coalition (and maybe independents too) he would be positioned to take this policy to an election, a policy different from the Greens and Tony Abbott.
On boats Rudd has a serious problem. He positioned himself to the left of Gillard, yet this position doesn't work now. Somehow Rudd must become a hardliner on boats, a tricky transition. His dealings with the trade unions are easier. The unions like and trust Gillard, but dislike and distrust Rudd. That won't change, but any perception that union power is sustaining Gillard and denying Rudd would be disastrous for the party. With Gillard's primary vote at 28 per cent, Labor must choose between oblivion and making Rudd's return a viable project.