Australia

Why can't Gillard sell the government's record?

And the answer to that is that she is completely lacking in communication skills. In parliament, she's an excellent debater: feisty, quick-thinking, concise, and extremely effective. But put her in front of a camera, and she's wooden, robotic, monotonous, and frankly, boring. Add to it her truly dreadful accent, and people simply turn off. I know she's been having coaching from an actor, but it's made no difference - it's a psychological problem, and could take years, if ever, to resolve. She simply freezes, and her personality dissipates.

And the other thing, which many on the left won't admit, is that she is not trusted by the electorate because of the way she took power. Rudd had many faults, but the way he was dealt with was because he owed no allegiance to either Right or Left, in particular to the right-wing trade union movement. That was the one thing they couldn't forgive, and Julia allowed herself to be used by them. Had she just waited until part-way through Rudd's second term, it was going to come to her, but she will always be tainted by the coup in which she was a major player.

It is very telling that currently, Rudd has 30 engagements to campaign for Labor MPs in their electorates, because of his extraordinary skill in communicating with people. Gillard has none.

I looked forward to our first female PM, but I so wish she hadn't taken power the way she did. It has tainted her, and her poor performance in communicating has done nothing to make the electorate forgive her. And sadly, there is currently no woman in Labor, or in the Coalition either, who has the ability to lead their party, and it's going to be a long time before another woman gets the nod to lead the country.

It could have been so different.