Gillard ends year in positive territory

JULIA Gillard has ended the year the way she would like, at least as far as her net satisfaction rating with Newspoll is concerned.

In the final Newspoll of what has been a tumultuous 2010, the Prime Minister's net satisfaction rating is steady at +7 - a positive rating that suggests she is an asset rather than a liability for her party. Just as well, given that the commentary of late has increasingly focused on the pressure she is under to justify her decision to roll Kevin Rudd as prime minister.

While Tony Abbott has ended the year with a negative rating, it is only marginally in the red, at -1. And for the Opposition Leader, the rating is a comparative win, given that being opposition leader is regarded as the hardest job in politics.

How each of the major party leaders starts next year will be extremely important to their political fortunes. Never has a start to a year been so crucial.

The opposition is trying hard to delegitimise the government, claiming that it is incompetent, unfit to govern and unable to implement an agenda.

The government wants voters to believe the Coalition does not have an alternative agenda and is simply bitter at missing out on power.

Hence the aggressive way Gillard ended the parliamentary session.

While both attacks are more spin than reality, they each carry enough of a grain of truth, potentially, to sway the public. The issue therefore becomes which case is more convincing, and which wins over the thinking of a voting public tired of politics so soon after an election was held.

Gillard's danger is that, without a strong start to the year, the opposition attacks become accepted wisdom, with negativism trumping any message attached to a positive agenda.

Abbott's danger is that his negativity defines him over and above any message that he is the leader of a viable alternative government.

The summer months will matter - so long as the public is prepared to listen to what politicians working over the New Year period have to say.

A 50-50 split on the two-party-preferred vote could hardly have been a more appropriate way to end the tightest year in federal politics for a generation.