And how electors voiced their opinion in the ballot box

Gabriela Perdomo - There is relief in seeing an 11-year-old government leave office, and anxiety to find out what a new era will bring. On Nov. 24, Australian voters elected the opposition Australian Labor Party (ALP) to lead Parliament, effectively ending the premiership of John Howard and his conservative Coalition of Liberals and Nationals. It is not a historical shift and, both politically and economically, things will likely not change much in Australia. But the electoral outcome is good news for the country as it shows a healthy degree of political maturity from voters.

According to preliminary results, Kevin Rudd’s ALP won 83 of the 150 seats in the House of Representatives, gaining 23 seats from the last election in 2004. The Coalition secured 58 seats, and so far two independents have been confirmed to have won seats. The outcome was widely expected, following a year of voting intention polls showing the ALP ahead.

Rudd’s win and his party’s rebirth were built in just over a year, in a campaign based on listening to Howard critics. A fiscal conservative and centrist politician, Rudd managed to lure voters from the right by promising to stay focused on the country’s remarkable economic performance, while he offered to be "more generous" and "compassionate" with poorer demographics and workers. In a campaign heavily focused on domestic affairs, but with significant international undertones, Rudd capitalized on every failure of the Howard administration—even when there were not many.

Perhaps the best example of this would be Rudd’s campaign against WorkChoices, a law enacted by Howard last year that saw the wage-setting powers of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) taken away. WorkChoices was widely controversial as it prevented organized unions from negotiating wages as a group, made it easier for employers to fire workers, and made it harder for the latter to go on strike.

Since his election as ALP leader last year, Rudd vowed to revoke WorkChoices if elected and won sympathy from numerous voters this way. Australians expressed dissatisfaction with Howard’s reforms to the country’s industrial relations legislation. Rudd made sure the reforms were alive in the minds of voters throughout the entire year. The promise to revoke WorkChoices helped identify the ALP with a cause clearly related to the party’s roots and at the same time helped keep party members together—many of whom were unsupportive of Rudd in the early stages of his leadership.

Besides other local topics, like education and a growing wealth gap, global issues such as climate change and the war in Iraq also gave Rudd ammunition to fire against Howard. Within hours of accepting his victory, the future prime minister announced he would sign the Kyoto Protocol to fight global warming and reiterated his vow to begin withdrawing Australian troops from Iraq. In an approach reminiscent of Gordon Brown in Britain, Rudd is calculating the two steps will please critics of Australia’s apparent lack of independence from the United States in global affairs.

As Rudd worked on differentiating himself from Howard—even though policy-wise the two leaders are not as far apart as they may seem—Howard underestimated his electorate: he counted on a sound economy to maintain his leadership, but miscalculated how much Australians care about labour laws, immigration, race relations, climate change, and foreign policy. For the past few years, Australians were outspoken about what they thought was negative in Howard’s policies. The prime minister failed to listen, and voters finally had their say at the ballot box.

The future of Australia looks stable and hopeful. Rudd will have the advantage of presiding over a strong economy that has grown non-stop for more than one decade, and a country that has become a consultant for numerous regional partners. Howard is leaving because it was time to renew the country’s leadership, but his legacy is more positive than negative by most accounts. Rudd has much to offer to the country, beginning with his diplomatic experience and his desire to be more practical than political both domestically and internationally.

As many other parties whose glory has been built in opposition, the ALP will have a major challenge in becoming an administrator of government instead of just a critic. If Rudd can demonstrate maturity in his leadership by acknowledging what Howard did right for Australia, and changing that he considers as negative, he will do well for himself and his voters.

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