Abbott Set for Big Win in Australia Polls
Conservative challenger Tony Abbott was headed for a sweeping victory over Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in Australian elections on Saturday, as voters punished Labor after years of internal party warfare.
With polling booths in the mandatory ballot closed across the country, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation called a clear win for the Liberal/National coalition while several senior Labor ministers conceded the divided party was beaten.
"The government will be defeated tonight," Defense Minister Stephen Smith told ABC television.
"Pessimistically, I'm looking at a result which will be a 1996-type result, a heavy defeat for the government," he added, referring to the election which brought Liberal leader John Howard to power.
Health Minister Tanya Plibersek also admitted Labor had lost.
"The clear take-out from this definitely is that disunity is death and we are not disciplined enough," she said.
"I don't think the division or the pain was justified at any stage."
With 54 percent of the vote counted, the Australian Electoral Commission had Abbott's party leading in 76 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives and Labor in 55.
A majority of 76 is needed to form government once all the votes have been tallied.
The ABC forecast the Liberals would end up with 89 seats, Labor 59 and independents two.
Early poll numbers suggested big swings against the government in the key states of New South Wales and Queensland, with the ABC's respected election analyst Antony Green saying Labor had no chance of winning.
"At this stage I'm seeing consistently Labor behind and losing seats," he said, adding: "I think we can say the government has been defeated".
Former Labor prime minister Bob Hawke, who won four successive elections in the 1980s and 90s, said personality politics had been allowed to overtake the party's message and policies.
"The personal manipulations and pursuits of interest have dominated more than they should and in the process the concentration on values has slipped," he told Sky.
"I really believe this was an election that was lost by the government rather than one that was won by the opposition."
Rudd struggled for traction after toppling Julia Gillard, Australia's first female prime minister, in a bitter party room coup just weeks before calling the election.
He at first appeared to heading for defeat in his Queensland seat of Griffith to Liberal/National Bill Glasson as the polls closed, but he recovered ground and looked likely to hold on.
The prime minister remained upbeat ahead of casting his ballot in a Brisbane church, where he was met by a group of noisy refugee advocates who yelled at him about Labor's mandatory detention of asylum-seekers who arrive by boat.
"I believe we have put our best foot forward. I'm very confident in people's judgment because they will assess what is best for our country's future, their community's future and their family's future," he said.
Asked if he would step down if he lost, Rudd said: "This is politics. You take things one step at a time."
A relaxed Abbott, 55, running as opposition leader in his second election, said he was ready to assume the leadership.
"Inevitably, all candidates are nervous but I am confident I am ready and my team is ready," he told reporters at Freshwater Surf Club in Sydney, where he voted with wife Margie and three adult daughters.
Abbott has made a paid parental leave scheme his "signature" policy, while pledging to scrap the carbon tax and make billions of dollars of savings to bring debt down.
Rudd, also 55, campaigned on his administration's success in keeping Australia out of a recession during the global financial crisis.
He also promised to scrap the carbon tax brought in by Labor after the 2010 election and move to a carbon emissions trading scheme by July 2014.
Other key policies included a plan to introduce a bill in parliament to legalize gay marriage and the adoption of tough measures to halt asylum-seeker boats.
Despite the logistical difficulties of holding a poll in such a large country, Australians overwhelmingly abide by their obligation to vote, turnout never falling below 90 percent since it became compulsory in 1924.
Source: Agence France Presse
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