Independents key in Australian election

THE Australian election was declared too close to call yesterday. Voters will decide whether to give their first female prime minister her own election mandate or return to a conservative government after just three years.

A record number of ballots cast for independents and Australian Greens candidates might decide the outcome, with the possibility growing that the mainstream parties will need to strike a deal with fringe groups to form a government, the first coalition in 70 years.

Deputy prime minister Wayne Swan said it would take days of counting before it was clear who could form a government. "It's very close. I think it's just too early to come to that conclusion," Swan said, referring to the possibility that his centre-left Labour party had lost power.

Prime minister Julia Gillard, 48, a charismatic former lawyer, came to power in a 24 June internal coup during the first term of her predecessor, Kevin Rudd, and almost immediately called elections to confirm her mandate.

She is vying against Tony Abbott, 52, a married former Catholic seminarian with three daughters who barely gained the endorsement eight months ago of his conservative Liberal party, which has led Australia for most of the past 60 years.

Australians have not dumped a first-term government since 1931, when a Labour administration paid the price for the Great Depression. However, this year's elections are coloured by Gillard's surprise seizure of the helm of her party from former prime minister Rudd after a series of poor opinion polls.

Gillard, a Welsh-born immigrant, acknowledged before polls closed that Labour could lose its entire eight-seat majority in the 150-seat House of Representatives. Labour won 83 seats in the 2007 elections.

Issues vary across the large and diverse country, but asylum seekers, healthcare and climate change are hot topics. Another issue brought to the forefront yesterday was Afghanistan, where two Australian soldiers were recently killed. The government and opposition support Australia's military commitment to Afghanistan, where 20 Australian troops have now died.

The decision by Labour power-brokers to support Gillard - widely regarded as a better communicator than Rudd - cost the party the traditional incumbent's advantage. However, one of those power-brokers, Paul Howse, said yesterday that the decision was correct, despite the loss of Labour votes. "Labour would have done worse under a different leadership," he said.

Abbott, whose socially conservative views alienate many female voters but whose supporters say he can better empathise with Australian families, is his party's third choice as leader since prime minister John Howard led it to defeat in 2007.Abbott beat his predecessor by a single vote last December in a party ballot.

He has long been seen as a gaffe-prone fitness enthusiast lampooned over the many images of him clad in Lycra cycling and swimming wear.

However, one voter, Jodie Waterhouse, 31, a longtime Liberal, said: "I do care about paid maternity leave, education and the environment. But I suppose I vote because I like the person and the balance they deliver, and think Tony Abbott is delivering that."