THE AUSTRALIAN ELECTION

In my blog on Lene Espersen, I said that there was no such thing as a shoo-in in politics. Julia Gillard should have taken note.

Just over two months ago, Ms Gillard was deputy leader of Australia's ruling Labor Party, and a Government Minister. Worried by falling opinion polls caused by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's decision to abandon a proposed emissions trading scheme, she organised a palace coup that dumped Mr. Rudd and installed her as party leader. From that position she automatically became the country's first woman Prime Minister. Buoyed by the subsequent blip in the polls, she called a snap general election in order to give herself a proper mandate. Facing an opposition led by the unattractive Tony Abbott, and fortified by the knowledge that Australians had not rejected a first-term government since the 1930's, she looked a shoo-in for a second term.

She was not. Lacklustre campaigns by both major blocks, and a flight of voters to the Green Party, have led to a hung Parliament for the first time since 1940. Labor has 72 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives, the lower house of Parliament, the Liberal/National coalition has 73, the Green Party has one, and there are 4 independents. Since the independents are former opposition members from rural outback communities, you might think that the opposition has the upper hand. However, there are good reasons why they are "former opposition members", so nothing is certain. Negotiations and horse-trading look set to continue for some time.

The last thing Australia needs at the moment is a weak Government. So whoever comes out on top this time round, it is likely that there will be a fresh general election before too long. In the meantime, we should rejoice in the fact that this election produced the country's first ever Aboriginal M.P. in the lower - and more important - house (there have previously been two in the Senate). It was a long time coming, but an important milestone nevertheless.

Walter Blotscher