There’s been a change at the top, we somehow managed to change Prime Ministers mid-stream. It has been a very impressive handover of power.
Krudd gave a speech that told us all how proud he was about his achievements while in power. He was clearly deeply emotional and took long pauses as he gathered himself together and ploughed on through. He spoke fondly of his family, wife and children and thanked his staff. He gave thanks to god – that would be the same god that he has clearly fallen out of favour with. He had a cry and then with the world ‘zip’ he was gone, back in the doors and away.
Krudd said he’ll be sticking around, it’ll be interesting to see where he goes next. Back bench? Front bench? Ambassador to the Holy See?
Julia Gillard then appeared, quite unrepentant about what has been unfolding, took responsibility for the change and clearly is already in charge. She acknowledged the great job that Krudd did, took responsibility for some of the questionable decisions of the previous administration and then told us all what she was thinking about in the future. She was unemotional and pretty matter of fact about the transition. Very forthright.
The head of government in Australia is not directly elected by it’s citizens, despite the words that tumble out of their mouths. We don’t get to vote directly for them, we have to elect members of the same party so that that party has a majority. This means, as has clearly been demonstrated over the last 24 hours, that we don’t get to pick our PM. In fact, the PM is only PM while he (or she)enjoys the majority support of the parliamentary party. I don’t like that idea. There really has been no public outcry for the PM to step down, and let’s face it, the real reason why Krudd has been ousted is because the Labor Party really thinks that they’ll loose the next election with Krudd at the top. So, this really isn’t about what’s best for Australia, it is about what’s best for the Labor Party to stay in power. Of course they believe that in the long run they are doing this for the best interest of Australia, but I think they show a certain about of disrespect to the Australian electorate for not allowing us to make the decision about who leads us. It’s time for some reform, we need to directly elect our leaders and we need to directly sack our leaders.
Oh, she’s a woman, a red head, not married and childless, probably an atheist. So?