They squeezed in beside Medicin sans frontiere who had grabbed the front spot at the crack of dawn and were already well established when we arrived, as the sun cleared the trees. The sun was high in the sky now, and hot, so most of the locals had done their shopping. We had been talking to tourists since Larissa arrived and sending them off with membership forms to join their local groups.
Kev came over, shook everyone’s hand – registering names and roles, then focused on Senator Waters and life in Canberra. He wowed us all with tales of Beijing, being in Tien an Min Square on June 3 1989 and life as the Prime Minister. He insisted “Say, Yes!” that someone agree our conversation was off-the-record so he could discuss the Greens frustration with Labor’s environmental policy in a manner that he is bound not to do publicly.
He then turned his considerable charm on the crowd, beaming bon-homie down the barrel of a dozen cameras with smooth, well-practised schtick.
What the face-book video confessing his “daggy” status with a Canadian youth, or the arms-around-the-shoulder shots to be sent home by local Indian traders do not show, though, are the things he missed.
Larissa did three media interviews just before he showed. The ABC TV cameras were leaving as he pulled up. His minders had seen them come and go and sat po-faced and melting in the heat – Medicin sans frontiere and we had co-opted the shade – waiting for him to rush from another event. Kev was too late. Senator Waters gets on state television, Kev features on some Canadian kid’s youTube account.
All the arrogance that lost him the top job is still there in spades. He practically barked the command, “Say Yes” at senate candidate, Adam Stone, in an attempt to cover his arse before apologising for Labor’s environmental policies. This is not the behaviour of a leader in waiting, or even a man who knows where he is going, this is political survival by an experienced operator who is schmoozing the Greens because he needs there preferences to survive.
He plays the ex-Prime Minister card, front and centre. In pinching a key plank from the Greens Qld election campaign, he announces that “ex-prime minister Kevin Rudd, challenges the Premier to keep the promises he made during the state election campaign.”
Labor has ridden on The Greens environmental policies as long as we have existed as a party, allowing us to do the hard work of educating the public, knocking the warts of the policy and testing the public’s taste for them, then taking the finished product and selling it as their own.
That’s fine, The Greens are pleased to make a difference and green voters understand that this is the role of a party in its growth phase: Shift the agenda onto our ground.
The hugging Mumbai business men, mouthing “I’m a dag” into Android devices and “when I was PM” speeches all serve to bouy the man up by keeping the myth alive but they beg the most important question.
Where is all this going? What is next for Kevin Rudd?
The party does not want him as leader. His leader does not want him as minister. His party needs him on the back bench but his personal ambition will not allow him to sit there much longer. Therese needs him to have a job, but international lobbying is a better paying and more glamorous job than sitting on the back-bench, so how long is he going to keep up this farce?
The numbers indicate that he is going to need every preference he can get to scrape over the line in this election. A nine percent swing could defeat him and The Greens currently hold just over 15% of the vote. As a good party man he is most likely to fight for the seat to keep the government in power and then resign gracefully some time into the next parliamentary term.
Everyone who points a camera at him this election campaign should be asking him to tell the camera what he plans to do next. It might make for interesting viewing.