Campaign Lesson from Abroad  

Having recently retired as a Labour politician after 25 years in public life and escaped the horrors of a hung parliament in Britain to enjoy a sabbatical in sunny Sydney, I have had plenty of time to observe this great Australian contest at close quarters. What a drab, joyless, uninspiring spectacle it turned out to be. Australians are a great people and I can’t help feeling that they deserve better than most of the politics and some of the politicians who were on offer last week. Julia Gillard is a pretty impressive politician, a good (if slightly monotonous) communicator and, apparently, an excellent minister always on top of her brief. It seemed to me Australia, by and large, liked the lady. They may have voted for her in greater numbers if she had spent longer in the top job spelling out a vision and allowing memories of the defenestration of Kevin Rudd to fade a little more. On...