HONG KONG (AFP) – 0850 GMT: Not forgetting some of the other parties in the election, exit polls are giving billionaire Clive Palmer’s ?Palmer United Party’ 9.5 percent of the primary vote in Queensland, which could give the party a spot in the Senate.
0834 GMT: Retiring Defence Minister Stephen Smith tells ABC News 24 he fears the defeat for Labor could be worse than the 1996 landslide which saw Paul Keating lose power.
0829 GMT: Bob Hawke, one of the Labor Party’s most successful leaders from the past, tells Sky News the party’s prospective defeat is their own fault.
“I really believe that this is an election that was lost by the government, not won by the opposition,” says Hawke, noting that polls as late as Saturday morning had shown “the electorate is not madly keen about Tony.”
0820 GMT: If Rudd loses the election and decides to stand down, or is toppled in Griffith and has no choice, Bill Shorten, the Employment and Workplace Relations Minister, is seen by the Australian media as favourite to take over as Labor leader.
Others in the running could be deputy leader Anthony Albanese, Treasurer Chris Bowen and Immigration Minister Tony Burke.
Asked earlier in the day what his future held, Rudd said: “This is politics. You take things one step at a time.”
08:17 GMT: While voting stations in the crucial states of Queensland and New South Wales shut at 6:00 pm (0800 GMT), along with Victoria, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory, those on the west coast are still open and due to close in just under two hours.
08:10 GMT: The contrast between the two isn’t just in the way they spent the day.
Rudd, the charismatic prime minister once deposed by his own party, has never given up hope of capping an extraordinary political comeback with a second election victory, and has campaigned hard.
Cut down mid-term in 2010 — a fate that reduced him to tears and stunned the nation — he re-emerged as the man who could potentially save Labor from a crushing electoral defeat and was sworn in as prime minister a second time.
The Mandarin-speaking ex-diplomat has refused to whitewash his unusual history, telling voters: “You’ve seen me at my highest highs and some of my lowest lows.”
Abbott has ditched his “Mad Monk” tag and softened his macho image to turn around his conservative party’s fortunes and steer them towards likely victory.
A former trainee Catholic priest, boxing enthusiast and monarchist, Abbott has in the past been known as a political hard man of the Liberal Party, unafraid of speaking his mind and occasionally tripping up on a gaffe.
His election campaign has not been immune to verbal stumbles — with his comments about one of his female candidate’s “sex appeal” causing concern, along with his description of the conflict in Syria as “baddies versus baddies”.
“I’ve certainly said some things which I wouldn’t say now,” Abbott told the 60 Minutes television programme earlier this year.
But the 55-year-old has rebuilt his image and it appears to have paid dividends.
08:06 GMT: The Sky exit poll also had bad news for Rudd personally, with the sitting prime minister in danger of losing his seat of Griffith in his home state of Queensland to Liberal/National Bill Glasson.
“It’s 50-50,” Newspoll chief Martin O’Shannessey said, reporting a seven percentage point swing away from Rudd.
08:05 GMT: The expected outcome has largely been reflected in how the two main candidates have spent the day.
A relaxed Abbott spent Saturday morning campaigning in Sydney while a subdued Rudd kept a lower profile in his home town of Brisbane, voting in the early afternoon.
Abbott hit the hustings early on a beautiful spring morning, casting his vote at the Freshwater surf club in his Sydney constituency of Warringah, a Liberal heartland.
With him was wife Margie and his three grown-up daughters Louise, Bridget and Frances, who have frequently been seen on the campaign trail with their dad.
“The rhythm of life is always better on the beach, isn’t it,” Abbott, in suit and tie, told supporters.
In contrast a subdued Rudd was strangely low profile, cancelling plans to vote early and instead conducting a handful of short television interviews from Brisbane.
He didn’t mix with the electorate or attempt to convince people face-to-face that they should vote for him, perhaps resigned to the fact that he’s facing a hiding.
When he finally turned up to vote, it was chaotic with no one at St Paul’s Anglican Church in East Brisbane seeming to know he was coming with a huge media pack in tow. There was a crush and the press were thrown out before being let back in.
“Another colourful day in Australian democracy at my local polling both,” Rudd later tweeted.
WELCOME TO AFP’S LIVE REPORT as millions of Australians vote in national elections where early exit polls show the Tony Abbott-led conservative opposition romping to victory over Kevin Rudd’s Labor Party.
A Sky News exit poll released before voting was to end at 6:00 pm (0800 GMT) predicted that the Liberal/Nationals would gain a massive 25 seats to sweep 97 of the 150 seats in the lower House of Representatives.
The survey, carried out by Newspoll, forecast Labor would lose 21 to be left with just 51. The independents would have two seats.
On a two-party basis, the coalition would take 53 percent of the vote to Labour’s 47 percent.
A separate Morgan-Channel Ten exit poll predicted Abbott’s coalition would sweep to victory with 52 percent of the vote to 48 percent for Labor on a two-party basis.
Rudd has struggled for traction after toppling Julia Gillard, Australia’s first female prime minister, as Labor leader just weeks before calling the election and his party looks set for a period in opposition.
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