New Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says opposition leader Tony Abbott should face him in a moderated debate. Courtesy: 7.30 Report, ABC
Tony Abbott and Kevin Rudd will be at each other right through to the election, but will the Opposition Leader accept the PM's challenge of a moderated debate? Picture: Stefan Postles/Getty Images Source: Getty Images
PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd suspects Tony Abbott lacks the "ticker'' to debate him on key policy areas.
Mr Abbott has been "lying'' to the Australian people about the state of the economy, his ability to turn back asylum seeker boats and the impact of carbon pricing, Mr Rudd says in his first major television interview since retaking the leadership from Julia Gillard.
"So what I would say to Mr Abbott, you've been doing this for a long time, it's time we had a properly moderated debate ... on his chosen subjects,'' Mr Rudd said on the ABC's 7.30 program.
"Mr Abbott, I think it is time you demonstrated to the country you have a bit of ticker on this.
"He's the boxing blue. I'm the glasses-wearing kid in the library.
"Come on, let's have the Australian people form a view about whether his policies actually have substance, whether they actually work, or whether they are just slogans.''
Later the PM took to Twitter to further goad his opponent into a one-on-one challenge, naming a time and a place.
His tweet reads: @KRuddMP: Hi @TonyAbbottMHR we need a debate on the national economy. National Press Club next Thursday? I'll be there. Over to you... KRudd
A spokesman for Mr Abbott said Opposition Leader would debate Mr Rudd once the PM "ends the uncertainty and names the election date".
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New Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says opposition leader Tony Abbott should face him in a moderated debate. Courtesy: 7.30 Report, ABC
On his broken pledge never to return to the Labor leadership, Mr Rudd said Ms Gillard had vacated the spot and brought on the caucus ballot.
He said a second reason was the prospect of defeat at the 2013 election.
"The Australian Labor Party and the government was on track towards a catastrophic defeat and I wasn't about to stand idly by and see everything we worked for for the last five or six years go down the gurgler as Mr Abbott set about ripping it apart.''
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He said he was not motivated by revenge, but taking up the fight to Mr Abbott and coming up with a positive plan for the future.
Mr Rudd said he was working through policy changes but it would be an "orderly process''.
He said he wanted to take the time to "think and take the best advice''.
Asked whether Labor would be punished for its long leadership turmoil, Mr Rudd said he had faced four Liberal leaders over a period of four years after he took on the Labor leadership.
"In political parties these things happen from time to time,'' he said.
On the issue of asylum seekers, Mr Rudd conceded he may have been slow to act in 2009 when the number of boat arrivals increased dramatically.
Mr Rudd defended his decision to dismantle the Howard government's Pacific Solution in 2008.
More than 45,000 asylum seekers have arrived by boat since those policies were scrapped.
The prime minister, in his first major interview since taking Labor leadership last week, said more people had arrived by boat in 2009 and 2010 due to wars in Sri Lanka and Afghanistan.
He admitted his government may have been too slow to change its policies in light of overseas conflicts.
Seven boats arrived in 2008 and 61 arrived in 2009.
"If we made a mistake, it was in perhaps not being quick enough to respond to the new change in external circumstances,'' Mr Rudd said.
Australian governments had always made changes to asylum seeker policies in response to global events, he said.
"There is nothing set in stone with immigration policy or asylum seeker policy,'' Mr Rudd said.
"I'm open to adjustments in the future.''
He backed Foreign Minister Bob Carr's comments that more economic migrants were coming by boat from Iran.
"I can understand why people want to leave Iran,'' Mr Rudd said.
"But the bottom line is, it's not all about seeking freedom from persecution.''
He dismissed Mr Abbott's plan to reinstate the Howard era policy of towing asylum seeker boats back to Indonesia as just a slogan.
"Mr Abbott, how will you turn the boats back?
"If it sinks, what will you do? Let people drown?
"If you turn the boat back to Indonesia and the Indonesian navy says no ... what do you do then?''
Earlier, Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare said Australia should consider expanding to other nationalities its policy of returning failed Sri Lankan refugees back to their homelands.
"The fear of death has not stopped people getting on leaky boats,'' Mr Clare told reporters in Sydney.
"The fear of going to Nauru or Manus Island has not stopped people getting on to boats.
"But I tell you what has, the fear of being flown home in a week. That's what works.''
Australia could send Iranians ``halfway'' to Malaysia instead of Iran, considering Tehran won't accept people who don't want to go back, he said.
Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said Mr Rudd dismantled coalition policies that worked.
He said the coalition would bring back temporary protection visas, give no benefit of the doubt to people arriving without documentation, open "genuine'' offshore processing and turn back boats where it was safe to do so.
"If Kevin Rudd is elected, the people smugglers would not just have won the battle but won the war,'' Mr Morrison told reporters in Perth.
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