No Labor minister or leader has ever had an easy job. The urgency that rests behind the Labor movement, pushing it on to do things, to create new conditions, to reorganise the economy of the country, always means that the people who work within the Labor movement, people who lead, can never have an easy job. - 1949, Ben Chifley, ALP Prime Minister

As Julia Gillard wakes up on the first day of the rest of her life, I’m sure she would agree. Faced with scrutiny and criticism that didn’t just go over the line - it ripped the line up, then pretended no line ever even existed and whoever thought otherwise was just being unreasonable - it finally came down to this: a more engaging day in politics not witnessed in some time.

From the early morning announcements that key independents Robert Oakeshott and Tony Windsor would not recontest the federal poll, to the falling of a Prime Minister by day’s end, it is a political junkie’s twisted form of heaven. But at the same time, a reminder of the brutal world of modern day Labor politics. With corporate, vested and media interests largely stacked against you, the going is tough.

In the end, the third serious move on the Prime Ministership by Kevin Rudd would be a successful one. After two failed attempts and one non-attempt, the cat was once again in possession of the cream.

As a Prime Minister, Julia Gillard achieved much more than she was ever given credit for. In the face of cruel and absolutely unnecessary spiteful criticism, she delivered reforms that will serve us well for years, decades to come.

DisabilityCare is the Medicare of the modern era, and a reform whose impact cannot be understated. Much like we cannot imagine a world without Medicare, in time, Australians will view DisabilityCare similarly, and the impact on the more than 400,000 Australians with a disability is considerable. And they will have Gillard to thank. On education, the Gonski reforms will bring benefits to children that we can’t even fathom yet. Once in a generation reform - that actually passed through the parliament yesterday, but was, like many other achievements of this government, overlooked by a media seemingly focused elsewhere.

Putting a price on carbon was gutsy, and ultimately politically costly for Gillard; the ‘tax’ that never truly was a tax. While pricing carbon pollution remains the most efficient way of dealing with the global challenge of climate change, such sense was seemingly lost in the story of a ‘lie’. And such reforms were undertaken while keeping unemployment low (5-6% is the envy of the modern world), the economy growing (14% bigger than it was in 2007, despite the GFC), inflation low, interest rates low, as well as the third lowest rate of debt in the OECD meant that receiving a AAA credit rating from the three leading agencies was no fluke.

That many of these achievements occurred despite a hostile minority government, makes them all the more commendable. As Prime Minister, Gillard’s negotiation skills, intelligence and work ethic, could not be questioned. Matched almost, by a sheer resilience to stare her opponents down and beat them, time again.

She was not without fault though. Her approach to asylum seekers disappointing; to marriage equality, curious. Policy gaffes like the watered down MRRT (mining tax) and cuts to sole parent payments, and questions on judgement (read: Slipper) and her back-tracking on pokie machine reforms, did not help. Together with hostility from across the chamber and even within her own ranks (that includes the incoming PM Rudd and his backers), the message of a positive agenda was seemingly lost. Australians heard a different tune.

—

From menus, to her cleavage, to her shoes, to her knitting, to the size of her behind, ears or jacket, Ms Gillard put up with more than she would have ever thought she was signing up for. That so many people refused to show the Office of Prime Minister the respect it deserves is a blight on us as a society. That we are ridiculed overseas for this maltreatment, is testament to that.

Why? Why did so many resort to cheap name calling? In what country could you ask the PM whether they were in a marriage that was essentially a fraud? Ask yourself whether Messrs Rudd or Abbott would ever be asked such a question. If not, why not?

But Ms Gillard took it with the grace and aplomb that she was rarely given credit for. She stared the hate and vitriol in the face, and stood up to it. Her misogyny speech, which many will opine as being a highpoint of her tenure, put a fire into the belly of many women and girls across the country, and indeed, across the world.

Were Australians ready for a female PM? In the end, probably not. As the outgoing PM said herself though, ‘it will be easier for the next woman, and the woman after that and the woman after that. And I am proud of that,” she said.

As a media performer, Julia Gillard - while direct and on message - seemed to struggle to connect on a personal level through the barrel of a camera. In person though, the steely resolve that perhaps put some offside was lost, replaced with an engaging, articulate and delightful warmth.

—

It is most likely that the next twenty-four hours will determine how far away an election is. It will hinge on whether Rudd goes to the polls swiftly in the hope of riding on the back of any honeymoon period, or whether he stays the course previously decided by his predecessor and wait for September 14. Keen to make a break from the past, the former seems the likely bet. Either way, the next few weeks and months will test both Mr Rudd, and the Leader of the Opposition, Tony Abbott.

To date, Abbott has managed to escape considerable scrutiny during his tenure, campaigning on a simple platform of ‘government bad’, while providing little in the way of policies. Outside of a watered down and widely criticised national broadband offering, and a workplace relations policy that has little backing in Liberal party circles due to the claim that it doesn’t go far enough, Abbott has been a policy-lite zone.

In the interests of a democracy, with voters making informed decisions on polling day, this needs to change. As Rudd himself said last night, “Abbott shouldn’t be allowed to come to power by default.” In short, a glossy pamphlet does not a policy make. Abbott’s negativity and sloganeering in coming weeks will get old, quickly.

That we are potentially weeks away from an election and the Opposition has offered nothing in the way of policies relating to key areas such as education or health, is breathtaking in the Liberal Party’s confidence. Two key policy areas, both with significant impact to the budget bottom line, and there has been nothing.

There are differences elsewhere too, the key one being that for the first time, we will have in Kevin Rudd, a Prime Minister that supports marriage equality. While this is an issue that has generally had widespread public support, it will be interesting to see whether it translates into votes. If Mr Rudd is keen to reclaim the excitement and fervor of Kevin07, this may very well be a key plank of it. A fresh, progressive and positive pitch, compared with the more conservative and traditional views of the Leader of the Opposition.

If the polls are correct, Mr Rudd has a sizeable task ahead of him to even make the election a contest. While the difference in support is not as wide as some polls suggest, it nevertheless remains to be seen whether it can be overcome. He will also need to try and heal the party, bringing back into the fold those supporters - and they exist - angered by the treatment of our first female Prime Minister, who feel that Rudd’s undermining was in the end, rewarded.

While Rudd was unable to go quietly into the night in 2010, one thinks Gillard will do exactly that, and do it in style. While Rudd gathered with his family and spoke for thirty minutes, fighting back tears after being deposed in 2010, Gillard spoke for barely half that last night, her delivery efficient, resilient and disciplined. Even right to the end, she did not crack.

She will bother no-one, undermine no-one, and will leave politics with what it needs - some grace and class.

Outgoing Treasurer Wayne Swan said it best last night when in an impassioned resignation speech, showing a side that we probably didn’t see enough of, he referred to the outgoing PM as "one of the toughest warriors who have ever led the Australian Labor Party".

One only hopes that history is kinder to her than far too many Australians ever were.

A few weeks ago, I went along and watched ‘Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea’, a documentary produced by barrister and refugee advocate Jessie Taylor (@taylor_jessie). It looks at some of the circumstances that often lead individuals and families to make the decision to become what we in Australia loosely describe as ‘boat people’. Tucked away in the inner-city surrounds of The Standard in Sydney’s Surry Hills, we watched stories of people thousands of miles away, risking everything they had, in search of a better future for them and their loved ones. A decision that is not taken lightly, it ultimately leads them on a treacherous, dangerous and often fatal voyage, from Indonesia to Australia.

These are people who through no fault of their own, but often because of war, or persecution due to faith and race must flee their homeland. It is a situation that is truly unimaginable to most of us. They flee, looking for safer and more secure surrounds. For many, this sees them turn to Australia, in the hope of brighter days. (Here's the promo: http://vimeo.com/6328019)

My watching of the documentary was timely, coming days after the Shadow Minister for Immigration, Scott Morrison, aired his notion of ‘behavioral values’ for those seeking asylum in Australia and on community release. His comments almost beggar belief. In the dog-whistling world of modern day Australian politics, where xenophobia is not only alive and well, but seemingly actively campaigned on, his comments are hardly surprising. The manner in which the debate on asylum seekers is conducted in many parts of the mainstream media is so misleading and misinformed that it would be funny, were it not so hugely disappointing.

Scott Morrison - and it would seem the Liberal Party, the party that purports to believe in freedom and liberty - think people should know when asylum seekers move into your neighborhood. Why? Morrison feels that as they should be in detention centres, but as a result of increasing numbers, are instead on community release, then we should seemingly have tabs on them. 

But what of the countless people that arrive by plane to Australia, overstay their visas, and slide into Australian life? Why no concern about the backpackers that cram into the  hostel down the road from where I live? Is there no risk to us because they happen to be European? Or is it because they are white? Or is it because they arrived by plane? Or is it all of the above?

Morrison’s position, and that of the Liberal Party, overlooks an inconvenient truth: those seeking asylum in Australia have done nothing wrong. They have committed no crime, and seeking asylum is certainly not illegal, despite what the media might tell you. But on the back of an isolated incident at Sydney's Macquarie University, Morrison talked it up, radio commentators were drawn to it like moths to a flame, and there was outrage everywhere. 

In many respects, the asylum seeker debate has become a race to the bottom. Morrison’s comments do not struggle to find company in a debate laced with loads of hate, fear and falsehoods - and so little in the way of facts, sensitivity and at its most basic, class. In a world where radio shock jocks and tabloid journalists thrive on fear and negativity, his comments are an affront to sound and informed political and social discourse. Deep down, I’ve no doubt there are those in the Liberal Party who know that. But politics has become a win at all costs game. The price paid, including overlooking the truth, seems to matter little anymore.

That said, the government is hardly without fault in this debate. While its members may not stoop to the lows that Morrison regularly does, for a progressive party, it could do better. Much better. It is one of the things I find most disappointing about this, a Labor government. Rather than trying to rise above it though, in many respects, the government follows suit, even if it does trail some distance behind on the sheer outrageousness of its vitriol. 

Its messaging isn’t as offensive as that of Messrs Morrison, Brandis and Bernardi, but it does not do anything to fix this debate; rather, it just feeds into it. The more recent policy announcements by the PM on the clamping down of 457 visa usage, is but one example.

**

From a young age, my parents raised me to not judge people by how they looked, what they believed in, or from where in the world they’d come. While my Dad has always been hugely patriotic of his mother country, his ‘patrida’, always quick to share an anecdote of a Greek-Australian that made it big, it never got in the way of fundamental concepts of  opportunity and fairness for all. Concepts that, we were told, were part of the Australian way of life.

Mum and Dad migrated to Australia in the late 1960’s. My Armenian mum from Cairo, Egypt, my Dad from the island of Kos, Greece. Their parents brought them here so that they, and their children could have the opportunities they never had growing up. My parents met a few years later at work, got married, then built a life that provided my sister Maria and I with the opportunities they and their parents never had. Their sacrifices, their teachings, and their hard work have all contributed greatly and made me into the person that I am today. 

But here’s the rub: my parents today, understand that what these so-called ‘boat people’, these incorrectly and unfairly labelled ‘illegal arrivals’ are doing, is not much different from what they did more than forty years ago. This leads into what is, for me, one of the most disappointing aspects of this debate; namely, the number of immigrant Australians, and their children, that take the very different view, namely that these ‘boat people’ are in fact ‘illegals’ and ‘queue jumpers’. They believe the myths, peddled by a mainstream media that stopped doing its job properly, quite some time ago. Such myths feed into a narrative that makes Australians - including immigrant Australians - feel they’ve been hard done by on asylum seekers, that they are rorting the welfare system, costing millions in taxpayer dollars, while ordinary Australians continue to do it tough. This viewpoint of many immigrant Australians is disappointing, as one can’t help but think they’ve forgotten what it was that brought them, and their parents, to Australia in the first place.

I’ve no doubt that some families are doing it tough across the nation. But the media has managed to pit people against each other with an ‘us versus them’ mentality that is divisive and destructive, posing asylum seekers as some kind of threat to the fabric of Australian society. It’s garbage, especially when one need not look far to see the benefits of a multicultural Australia. 

The failure of so many media outlets and journalists to report the facts in this debate has become a huge blight on our modern day Australian society. It has left a stain - an indelible one, whose roots are xenophobic, if not racist. This is however beyond politics - the stain is far deeper than that - and will outlive not only this election campaign, but the one after that, and the one after that. 

Until those in the public spotlight - journalists, politicians, our so-called leaders, commentators, hell, even celebrities - begin replacing fiction with fact, then the end to this horrid and ill-informed debate, and the awful stench that comes with it, will never be in sight.

Solving the problems associated with people fleeing war torn nations will not be solved overnight. And it is not a problem unique to Australia. (By global comparison, the numbers of asylum seekers arriving in Australia are quite moderate. Pick up a tabloid Australian daily though, and you’d think we were being swamped by an armada, with people ready to steal our jobs and our women.) 

A Sunday afternoon spent listening to a group of politicians speak isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Truth be told, I don’t really drink tea, but as I don’t mind me a bit of politics, I headed out to Parramatta, to hear the Prime Minister speak at the University of Western Sydney.

The speech was to kick off what has become a much talked about week for the PM in western Sydney. The PM will be staying at the Novotel in downtown Rooty Hill. The fact that her choice of accommodation has even been newsworthy says a lot about how poor a service many in the Canberra press gallery are currently providing. One can’t help but think that they may have bigger issues to discuss. Ideas. Policies. Maybe a vision. Certainly not the trivial details of hotel choice? Some ‘commentators’ have poked fun at the PM’s decision to stay at a hotel, rather than staying at her official Sydney residence in Kirribilli. Mind you, if she’d chosen that option, she’d probably be criticised as being out of touch by the very same people.

Choosing to stay in Rooty Hill has also provided fodder to those who claim that the trip deserves to simply be written off as a stunt. Mind you, the Sunday evening news reportedly had footage of Margie Abbott, the Opposition Leader’s wife, riding a bike….but no talk of stunts. Given where current political discourse appears to be however, the PM can’t seem to do much right, and she rarely gets credit for it when she does. As I’ve openly quipped previously, she could cure cancer tomorrow - and she’d be criticised for putting oncologists out of work.

Nevertheless, the Sir Ian Turbott Auditorium was packed; inside, a who’s who of the NSW ALP. From state members, to federal Ministers, and everyone in between - including the much maligned faceless men, this time *with* faces. Acting as a nice foil to these dreadful faceless men however, loads of young women proudly wearing “Women for Julia” t-shirts. Overall, it was a good mix of people, with the 1000 seat venue packed with people across age, race, gender, and dress code.

Members of the press corp were there in force. ABC, Fairfax, and network TV stations. But no-one it would seem from News Limited. Guess those at the Daily Telegraph and The Australian have already made up their minds. Not sure how those outlets filed copy without being there though.

Chatting with a few of the locals before the speeches kicked off, the common theme that kept emerging was what many perceived to be an unfair portrayal of the PM by sections of the media. “She’s done plenty for us, but they [the media] write her off as being all bad. It’s not fair,” one said to me. “They’ve just got it in for her,” another said. Despite suggestions to the contrary, it seemed that here, in western Sydney, the PM would be amongst friends.

NSW ALP President, Michael Lee, took up MCing duties, introducing a local Dhurag elder for an Indigenous welcome to country and song. In a heartfelt and at times stirring performance, “more than 200 years ago, we were the ones to lead you to water”, she praised the importance of strong women in Indigenous culture, and reflected on her own pride in being able to perform before the nation’s first female PM. It was a nice moment. The rendition of the national anthem by a local schoolgirl that followed shortly after, was a belter, delivered with some serious gusto.

General Secretary of the NSW ALP Sam Dastyari was up next, talking of western Sydney being comprised of suburbs that “the ALP will never turn its back on”. Dastyari reminded the crowd of all that the ALP has done for western Sydney, “from sewers of the 1970’s to the broadband cables of 2013”. He reflected on effort and on values, and called for “respect and recognition for those that do the right thing by their community”, and that being from the west should never be considered second rate.

Whether it is treated as second rate is one thing, but the fact is that our media - and our politicians - do seem to treat western Sydney differently. The reaction to the PM’s visit is consistent with that. If she’d visited Darwin for a week, would it have been considered a stunt? If she spent 5 days working up and down far north Queensland, would that be a stunt? Arguably not. Politicians travel, it comes with the territory. But for western Sydney, it was almost like she wasn’t allowed to visit. Sheer nonsense.

Dastyari took aim at sections of the media for writing this week-long visit off before it had even begun. He said the constant negative portrayal of the government should be called for what it is: ‘A crude attempt at regime change’, and then criticized the ‘snobs and elitists of the Liberal Party [that] keep talking western Sydney down’. He urged the crowd to be hopeful: “don’t write us off, listen to your heart, don’t listen to the shock jocks.”

Next up was Jason Clare, the federal member for the western Sydney electorate of Blaxland, Minister for Justice and Home Affairs, and according to some on Twitter, also the Minister for Handsomeness. Listing many of western Sydney’s success stories, from the Waugh brothers to Michael Clarke, Harry Kewell and Betty Cuthbert, and of course, Paul Keating, Clare talked of Prime Minister Gillard being made of the same stuff as those in the west: toughness. Clare warmed the crowd up with absolute aplomb, and the PM in turn received a rockstar welcome. She was amongst friends, and it was obvious. For all the talk of western Sydney opposition towards the PM, at this point, it was nowhere to be seen. People can claim this wasn’t a campaign event all they like, but boy it felt like one.

The PM delivered a strong and passionate speech. She talked up the government’s economic credentials, and told us that ‘modern challenges require modern solutions’, including both pricing carbon and the rollout of the National Broadband Network, the latter being key to the region’s future prosperity, the former to the nation’s competitiveness. (How those on the Right continue to fail to recognise that, is beyond me, even if they are just playing politics.) One of the loudest cheers from the crowd however came when she mentioned that the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) would be kicking off in July. This is a momentous occasion for the history of our nation, and the biggest single social reform since Medicare - it too a Labor construct. Where’s the Liberal plan for NDIS? Is there one? The PM went on to say that western Sydney suburbs “should never be viewed as being second rate” and that, “for far too long the community I made my home, the communities I represent, have been the kind of places people hurried through, not places where you stopped to stay.” It was time, she said, for this to change.

It was a theme that continued through her speech:

We don’t accept that hospitals in other suburbs should be better class than the hospitals here. We don’t accept that you should feel less safe, or have less opportunity, or worse infrastructure than other parts of this city or our nation.”

In some respects, it was a pitch to the blue-collar heartland.

The speech was also heavy on anti-gang rhetoric, with the PM following up a launch earlier in the day of a new national anti-gang taskforce modelled on a similar body set up the US FBI. Misplaced or not, there’s a perception that crime, law and order are important politically out west, so her announcement out here was fitting at best, although arguably feeds into the hysteria that it matters more out here than anywhere else. Surely not. The taskforce will have $64 million in funding and be cross-collaborative between state and federal police forces. (On the other hand, the Liberal Party yesterday simply announced more CCTV.)

Overall, the speech went down a treat - although given it was delivered to Party members and supporters - that’s hardly surprising. The real test for the PM in western Sydney will be over the next five days, although she’s given herself a tremendous start. I have no doubt she’s brought her cheque book, a positive outlook and a steely resolve to interact with the people of western Sydney on as personal a basis as much as possible.

It is often reported on social media that everyone that meets the PM walks away from the experience liking her. As a politician, that’s handy - to say the least. And while I’m reluctant to discuss opinion polls, it would seem that at the very least, the PM has got a few people to win over.

*

(On a completely different topic, and only because you probably wont see it on TV or in the Daily Telegraph, here’s footage of Tony Abbott falling over yesterday. When the PM had a heel mishap while in India some months ago, it was BREAKING NEWS and received a frightening amount of coverage. This on the other hand, barely got a mention yesterday: