Ms Gillard is running the country her way , no matter if someone writes to her about something it is passed onto someone else instead of her giving a reply back, i know when you write a complaint of something to her it gets passed to another part of the goverment, but some emails should be responded by the prime minister specially when they concern many of us living in this country, something the goverment has been hiding about still to this day is the forgotten australians, even though mr rudd gave a national apology , the goverments of australia still cover up about many of the childrens homes and orphanges in this country, their are unmarked graves of children who have died while in these childrens homes and the leader of the country can not even give them a proper burial cemertry and place head stones on all these graves of which the goverment have covered up about with the churches, these children never got to live and those of us alive today who had grown up in the childrens homes still suffer from the goverment coruption and cover up of us victims maybe ms gillard would like to answer this as if the goverment had nothing to hide why have many of the log books of the childrens homes and orphanages been destroyed by the goverment departments

It is merely a distraction, I think, to ascribe the antipathy towards Ms Gillard to her gender. Doing so debases any discussion before it can begin, and is therefore a form of special pleading that should be ignored, and deplored. As can the kneejerk insult, "colonial hangover".

The fact is, there are many cogent and totally reasonable arguments why she is out of favour, none of which involves her speaking voice. Which, incidentally, she should get fixed, as Thatcher did before her. It's not hard, and it's not an admission of weakness.

The manner of her accession to leadership of her Party was risky in itself. And where we were slightly mystified at first, given the Rudd
stories that we were fed, this quickly shifted to distaste. Strike one.

Strike two was probably a result of strike one. Her Party failed to gain an overall majority, and was forced to take aboard some bedfellows that normally you'd run a mile to avoid. This compromised every single political move that followed, and was in fact a home-made poisoned chalice. No Australian government has had to work with such a rag-bag of half-baked ideas, both super-global (Green) and super-parochial (Independents).

Strike three, of course. is her patent inability to show any form of leadership in this fundamentally treacherous environment. Unlike Campbell in the UK - who has many faults too - she does not have the innate ability to rise above it all, and take charge.

I suspect she is underneath it all a perfectly normal, decent person. But she is unable to perform the role she has chosen, one that is, after all, faced with unprecedented challenges in terms of the material she has to work with.

It isn't about being "tough". It is about simple, basic fitness for purpose.

Exactly what Shadow Minister said- down to the most minute detail.
She's simply an awful leader who shows very little knowledge and caves into (or bribes) interest groups.
So far she has done absolutely nothing but try to promote herself to exclusive groups to get their support.

Our PM has been " Tainted Goods" ever since becoming Prime Minister.Everything that she has said or done since, is viewed in this Light.

Female or Male , the Gender makes no difference, it was the method in becoming PM.

The sooner the Labor Party realize this and correct the situation the sooner things may improve for them.

Personally , I believe that they have left it too late to save themselves from the Voters' fury at the next Election

Tanel, thanks for your dispassionate article.

The web is full of bile, some commenters even pretending that they voted Labor because of Gillard's carbon tax promise. What nonsense! Abuse is no substitute for reasoned argument. Well, at least it used not be.

Huffnpuff, I know exactly where you are coming from and what you are saying is correct. I was also raised in institutions as a Ward of the State.
I am very SLEPTICAL when any of our governments refuse to listen to the will of the people.
All the Polls concerning the Carbon Tax indicate that the majority of the people are against it. Now not everyone voices their opinions in polls so we can never assume they are accurate.
Gillard/Brown led Labour Greens who are all for the Carbon Tax were provided with the opportunity to save face on the issue by putting it to the people in a REFERENDUM vote.
Had they did this the vote of the people would have proven that the people either supported or declined the proposal of a carbon tax,
This would have given Gillard some credibility.
Australia is a Democratic Country and in a Democracy the people rule, this means that the govenment must listen to the people.
The stance taken by Gillard and Labour to keep Bob Brown and the Greens on side made many of the people see her as a Dictator leading a Tyrannical Government, not a government for the people.
In the past since I was old enough to vote I always voted labour that is up until Bob Hawk was Prime Minister. I voted for him wrongly beleiving he would be a Peoples Prime Minister considering his back ground in the Union Ranks.
I changed after the Referendum of the people in 1986 whereas the people were asked to replace our Constitution 1900 with the Australia Act 1986. The result of the REFERENDUM was 67% voted to retain our Constitution. Bob Hawk disregarded the will of the PEOPLE and overruled the PEOPLE and enacted the Australia Act 1986.
If you are not clear of my age I am 62 and will be turning 63 in August.