Julia Gillard said she felt the Labor Party had been losing its way.
Julia Gillard said she felt the Labor Party had been losing its way.

Julia Gillard, Australia's first female prime minister



SYDNEY // After a political ambush, Australia has a female prime minister for the first time. Welsh-born Julia Gillard has replaced the fallen leader Kevin Rudd, who has been punished by his colleagues for a sharp fall in public support with a general election just a few months away.

Ms Gillard, 48, was Rudd's deputy in the left-of-centre government until he was ousted by party heavyweights who saw him as an electoral liability because of indecision over climate change and the mishandling of a controversial mining tax. The new prime minister, an uncompromising lawyer and feminist trailblazer, has fought her way through the male-dominated ranks of the governing Labor Party and defended her decision to take on the top job because she felt "a good government was losing its way".

"I did also form the view that the best way of making sure that this government was back on track, providing to the Australian people the leadership they deserved ... was to take the course that I took last night and this morning," Ms Gillard said. "I love this country and I was not going to sit idly by and watch an incoming opposition cut education, cut health and smash rights at work. My values and my beliefs have driven me to step forward to take this position as prime minister," she added during a televised address.

Ms Gillard inherits an administration that has been spooked by a resurgence in the conservative opposition, led by Tony Abbott, a committed Catholic and monarchist, who has flagged a return to more hard-line policies on immigration, including sending asylum seekers to camps in neighbouring countries, should his right-wing coalition win power. Ms Gillard's task is to reassure a jittery party that a fall in public confidence can be quickly reversed.

Support for her predecessor began to wane when Mr Rudd scrapped the centrepiece of his environmental policy, an emissions trading system, earlier this year. The decision led to accusations of political weakness and many voters started to wonder exactly what Mr Rudd stood for, while plans for a contentious resources levy heaped further pressure on his government. Despite mounting problems, Mr Rudd's demise was swift and unexpected.

Rodney Smith, a political scientist at the University of Sydney, said: "I don't think there has been anything like this in Australian politics for many decades. "This has been a huge gamble to install a new leader so close to an election. I'm not sure that there was any need for such desperation. The polls weren't so terrible. Labor was in with a very good chance of winning the next election, so it is a slightly puzzling move," Mr Smith said.

With time so short before the nation goes to the polls, the new Gillard administration is not expected to introduce widespread policy shifts, although some analysts believe she might push for an early exit for Australia's 1,550 troops fighting in Afghanistan. Prof John Wanna from the Australian National University, said: "She may want to signal that Australia withdraws from Afghanistan because Labor's been beset by a drift of votes to the left. Prof Wanna said Ms Gillard would be "less obsessed" with foreign policy than Mr Rudd.

The defence minister, John Faulkner, said earlier this week that Canberra could start bringing the troops home within "a two to four-year timeframe" if their mission to train local soldiers continued as planned, while public support in Australia for a distant and increasingly bloody conflict in Afghanistan appears to be waning. Last weekend three Australian commandos were killed in a helicopter crash, bringing the nation's number of fatalities in the Afghan campaign to 16 - the most casualties suffered by the country since the Vietnam war.

Anti-war campaigners have delivered a blunt message to the new prime minister. Ewen Saunders, a Socialist Alliance candidate for the federal seat of Brisbane in Queensland, said: "This is an unwinnable war and it is an absolute quagmire that the US and Australia can have no hope of getting out of other than withdrawing troops. "There are shades of Vietnam here. There is still a whole generation or two in this country who remember Vietnam and how long it took for our leaders to figure out what a futile and unjust war it was. There is talk on the streets that Afghanistan could be the next Vietnam."

foreign.desk@thenational.ae

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding
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Drishyam 2

Directed by: Jeethu Joseph

Starring: Mohanlal, Meena, Ansiba, Murali Gopy

Rating: 4 stars

Cryopreservation: A timeline
  1. Keyhole surgery under general anaesthetic
  2. Ovarian tissue surgically removed
  3. Tissue processed in a high-tech facility
  4. Tissue re-implanted at a time of the patient’s choosing
  5. Full hormone production regained within 4-6 months
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
 
Started: 2020
 
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
 
Based: Dubai, UAE
 
Sector: Entertainment 
 
Number of staff: 210 
 
Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners
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FIGHT CARD

Welterweight Mostafa Radi (PAL) v Tohir Zhuraev (TJK)

Catchweight 75kg Leandro Martins (BRA) v Anas Siraj Mounir (MAR)

Flyweight Corinne Laframboise (CAN) v Manon Fiorot (FRA)

Featherweight Ahmed Al Darmaki (UAE) v Bogdan Kirilenko (UZB)

Lightweight Izzedine Al Derabani (JOR) v Atabek Abdimitalipov (KYG)

Featherweight Yousef Al Housani (UAE) v Mohamed Arsharq Ali (SLA)

Catchweight 69kg Jung Han-gook (KOR) v Elias Boudegzdame (ALG)

Catchweight 71kg Usman Nurmagomedov (RUS) v Jerry Kvarnstrom (FIN)

Featherweight title Lee Do-gyeom (KOR) v Alexandru Chitoran (ROU)

Lightweight title Bruno Machado (BRA) v Mike Santiago (USA)

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: ARDH Collective
Based: Dubai
Founders: Alhaan Ahmed, Alyina Ahmed and Maximo Tettamanzi
Sector: Sustainability
Total funding: Self funded
Number of employees: 4
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%20name%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAlmouneer%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202017%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounders%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Dr%20Noha%20Khater%20and%20Rania%20Kadry%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EEgypt%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20staff%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E120%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestment%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EBootstrapped%2C%20with%20support%20from%20Insead%20and%20Egyptian%20government%2C%20seed%20round%20of%20%3Cbr%3E%243.6%20million%20led%20by%20Global%20Ventures%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Emergency

Director: Kangana Ranaut

Stars: Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahima Chaudhry 

Rating: 2/5

How to protect yourself when air quality drops

Install an air filter in your home.

Close your windows and turn on the AC.

Shower or bath after being outside.

Wear a face mask.

Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.

If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.

COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi

Director: Kangana Ranaut, Krish Jagarlamudi

Producer: Zee Studios, Kamal Jain

Cast: Kangana Ranaut, Ankita Lokhande, Danny Denzongpa, Atul Kulkarni

Rating: 2.5/5

WHEN TO GO:

September to November or March to May; this is when visitors are most likely to see what they’ve come for.

WHERE TO STAY:

Meghauli Serai, A Taj Safari - Chitwan National Park resort (tajhotels.com) is a one-hour drive from Bharatpur Airport with stays costing from Dh1,396 per night, including taxes and breakfast. Return airport transfers cost from Dh661.

HOW TO GET THERE:

Etihad Airways regularly flies from Abu Dhabi to Kathmandu from around Dh1,500 per person return, including taxes. Buddha Air (buddhaair.com) and Yeti Airlines (yetiairlines.com) fly from Kathmandu to Bharatpur several times a day from about Dh660 return and the flight takes just 20 minutes. Driving is possible but the roads are hilly which means it will take you five or six hours to travel 148 kilometres.

Gully Boy

Director: Zoya Akhtar
Producer: Excel Entertainment & Tiger Baby
Cast: Ranveer Singh, Alia Bhatt, Kalki Koechlin, Siddhant Chaturvedi​​​​​​​
Rating: 4/5 stars

Babumoshai Bandookbaaz

Director: Kushan Nandy

Starring: Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Bidita Bag, Jatin Goswami

Three stars

The biog

Year of birth: 1988

Place of birth: Baghdad

Education: PhD student and co-researcher at Greifswald University, Germany

Hobbies: Ping Pong, swimming, reading

 

 

Brief scores

Barcelona 2

Pique 36', Alena 87'

Villarreal 0

Vidaamuyarchi

Director: Magizh Thirumeni

Stars: Ajith Kumar, Arjun Sarja, Trisha Krishnan, Regina Cassandra

Rating: 4/5

 

Naga
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The specs

Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel

Power: 579hp

Torque: 859Nm

Transmission: Single-speed automatic

Price: From Dh825,900

On sale: Now

Other workplace saving schemes
  • The UAE government announced a retirement savings plan for private and free zone sector employees in 2023.
  • Dubai’s savings retirement scheme for foreign employees working in the emirate’s government and public sector came into effect in 2022.
  • National Bonds unveiled a Golden Pension Scheme in 2022 to help private-sector foreign employees with their financial planning.
  • In April 2021, Hayah Insurance unveiled a workplace savings plan to help UAE employees save for their retirement.
  • Lunate, an Abu Dhabi-based investment manager, has launched a fund that will allow UAE private companies to offer employees investment returns on end-of-service benefits.