Australia PM defiant as popularity plunges

The country's first female prime minister, who wrested power a year ago by ousting Kevin Rudd, vowed not to back away from her controversial plan for a tax on carbon pollution, a move that has badly hurt her popularity.

"I'm determined to push on with the agenda because it's the right thing to do for the country's future," she told ABC television.

"We need to tackle climate change, we need to cut the amount of carbon we put in the atmosphere.

"I'm not going to put this country's future in the too-hard (to tackle) basket and just hope that it will go away."

Climate change has been a thorny issue in Australian politics, with former prime minister Rudd's shelving of his emissions trading scheme helping pave the way for Gillard to replace him in a backroom party coup.

Her defiant comments come after a Newspoll for The Australian newspaper, conducted last weekend, showed only 39 percent favoured her as prime minister against 41 percent for Abbott.

The telephone poll of 1,158 voters also showed just 28 percent were satisfied with the Welsh-born Gillard, her lowest level since taking office.

Dissatisfaction with her performance leapt to 62 percent, making Gillard the most unpopular modern leader since Paul Keating at his worst in the mid 1990s.

According to the poll, her government was faring no better with Labor's share of first preference votes crashing to a record low of 30 percent.

The conservative opposition's support was steady at 46 percent, with the Greens on 11 percent.

Gillard brokered her way into office with the support of minority lawmakers after last year's election ended in deadlock and Abbott said the carbon tax, Rudd, and her alliance with Greens leader Bob Brown were to blame for her dismal polling.

He told Fairfax Radio voters recognised it was a "bad government getting worse".

"I think it's about the carbon tax, it's about the fact that Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard don't talk to each other and the fact that Bob Brown seems to be setting the agenda... and the people are responding," he said.

Gillard's deputy Wayne Swan said governments always struggled in the polls when they introduced important changes.

"Big reforms are always tough," said Swan, who is also treasurer.

"They're always hard fought... but the prime minister's got more leadership in her little finger than Tony Abbott has in his entire body."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011