Pressure mounts on PM to end tax debate

Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard has downplayed fresh calls for Labor to dump
Kevin Rudd ahead of the election as fallout continues over the proposed resource
super profits tax.
Pressure is mounting on Mr Rudd to give ground on his tax reform plans following
another damaging poll and calls from within Labor ranks for him to stand aside
before the election later this year.
Mr Rudd's brother, Greg Rudd, has also criticised the prime minister's performance,
questioning his honesty as a politician.
With the election just months away the government has suffered another poor poll as
fallout over the super profits tax intensifies.
The Westpoll, published in The West Australian newspaper on Saturday, shows Labor's
primary vote in the state has slumped to 26 per cent, its lowest level on record.
On a two-party preferred basis, the coalition holds a 68 per cent to 32 per cent
lead on Labor.
The damaging result came as former Queensland Labor treasurer Keith De Lacy, now a
coal mining executive, warned the government faced electoral oblivion unless Mr Rudd
was dumped as prime minister.
"Labor now runs the risk of being out of power for a generation. I regret to say
there is no alternative, but to change the leader," Mr De Lacy said.
But Ms Gillard again rejected calls for Mr Rudd to step aside.
"I don't agree with the view that is being expressed by Mr De Lacy," Ms Gillard told
reporters in Brisbane.
"I've read the newspapers and the thing that matters is not what's in the pages of
the daily newspapers, but a focus on making a difference to working families."
Ms Gillard also brushed off criticism of Mr Rudd from his brother, who wrote in an
article published on Saturday that it was hard to say whether the prime minister had
made the country a better place because of the "smoky haze of self-lit spot fires of
distraction".
"Can you trust a politician? No. Self-interest rules. Can you trust a politician who
is your brother? Yes as a brother, no as a politician," Greg Rudd wrote in The
Weekend Australian.
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott said the prime minister should simply abandon his tax
plan.
"Mr Rudd can't explain the tax, he can't defend the tax. It's no good changing the
tax," Mr Abbott said while campaigning in Cairns.
"Prejudicing the future of our country with a great big new tax on our most
productive sector demonstrates that Mr Rudd is not fit to govern, and that's why
this is a message that will be reverberating right around our country."
The comments came as questions were also raised about the mining industry's campaign
against the tax.
Mining giant Xstrata has been accused of misleading Australians over the impact of
the tax after signing a contract for work at a mine where the company said a project
had been shelved.
The $3.4 million mining services contract was signed last week on the same day the
Anglo-Swiss company said it was suspending operations at the Ernest Henry copper
mine in Queensland because of the super profits tax.
Federal Small Business Minister Craig Emerson said the company had misled Australians.
"This is simply more evidence that Xstrata is engaging in a campaign of
misinformation designed to scare the local communities around the Ernest Henry
mine," Dr Emerson said.
But Xstrata said it was the minister who was misleading people.
The tailings dam was still required as part of a smaller underground mine
development, the company said in a statement.
"Xstrata made clear at the time that this smaller project was not affected by the
June 3 announcement," the statement said.