Rudd hints he was the Labor leaker
Kevin Rudd admits it is “entirely possible” he was the source for a devastating leak that almost lost Labor the 2010 election and condemned his successor Julia Gillard to a hung Parliament.
The leak to veteran journalist Laurie Oakes during the 2010 election campaign detailed Ms Gillard’s acceptance of Mr Rudd’s demand for more time, shortly before deposing him as prime minister.
Asked in tonight’s episode of ABC TV’s program The Killing Season whether he was Oakes’ source, Mr Rudd says: “It’s entirely possible.”
“But just as it’s possible that I spoke to a whole bunch of other journalists about it. Julia Gillard marches in and launches a leadership coup and then suddenly there’s supposed to be some veil of total secrecy surrounding a conversation with me?”
Mr Rudd denies in the program being the source of a second damaging leak to Oakes — that Ms Gillard opposed a pension increase and paid parental leave — but Labor frontbenchers Jenny Macklin and Wayne Swan say they are convinced it was him.
Ms Gillard indicates she too believes Mr Rudd was responsible, saying nothing could have led her to expect “bastardry of that magnitude”.
The leaks stopped when Mr Rudd was assured he would be made foreign minister.
One of Ms Gillard’s key lieutenants, former minister Craig Emerson, gets emotional recalling the anti-carbon tax rallies outside Parliament.
“I felt like vomiting when I saw the signs,” Dr Emerson says.
“‘Ditch the Witch’ is bad enough, but ‘Ju-liar, Bob Brown’s bitch’ is so deeply and utterly offensive ... to any woman in this country let alone the prime minister of Australia.”
Ms Gillard rounds on her then Liberal opponent for attending the rally. “I really don’t know why this wasn’t a career-ending moment for Tony Abbott — sexism is no better than racism,” she says.
