NSW:Gillard should 'call Rudd's bluff': Latham

AAP General News (Australia)
04-05-2011
NSW:Gillard should 'call Rudd's bluff': Latham

SYDNEY, April 5 AAP - Former Labor leader Mark Latham has accused Foreign Minister
Kevin Rudd of trying to sabotage the government and says Prime Minister Julia Gillard
should "call his bluff".

The former prime minister could not be allowed to act like a "teflon-coated minister",
Mr Latham told Sky News on Tuesday.

Mr Rudd caused a stir on Monday when he told a television audience about the division
in Cabinet over his emissions trading scheme plans, saying he was urged by some to abandon
it but would not say who.

He went on to say his party was fundamentally failing because factional leaders intimidated
a lot of the party from being politically effective.

When asked how he would handle Mr Rudd, Mr Latham replied, "call his bluff. Will he walk?

"If you put him out of the ministry for breaches of cabinet solidarity, and all the
other mischief that is well and truly on the public record, maybe his agenda is to think,
well, Gillard will lose the next election.

"A desperate Labor party will turn back to him, the grateful public will re-embrace
him at the election after that and he can bounce back as prime minister, do a Menzies."

Mr Rudd's behaviour should not go unpunished, Mr Latham said.

"Call it sabotage, call it whatever you like, you can't allow that to happen. It's
no way to govern a country," he said.

"You're better off calling the bluff of troublemakers than allowing them to be immune
to any form of discipline."

AAP ih/ajw

KEYWORD: CLIMATE LATHAM

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