Abbott eases back on boat people vow

On election eve, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott eased back on his pledge to stop the
refugee boats within three months.
But he says Australia can judge him harshly if he's not up to the job.
The asylum seeker issue dogged Mr Abbott in the final hours of the campaign that
ended with his marathon 36-hour blitz of marginal seats.
Mr Abbott had promised to stop the boats within three months of coming into office,
although on Friday he said reducing the numbers of arrivals should be good enough.
"If we can get the number of boats down from three a week to three a year ... I will
regard myself as having very substantially succeeded," he told reporters in Sydney.
Though he declined to put his job or that of his immigration spokesman Scott
Morrison on the line, he said the coalition would deserve to be "very harshly
judged".
"Elections are an opportunity for the people to pass judgment on the competence or
otherwise of the government," he said, "just as I expect the current government to
be judged."
Mr Abbott's final plea to voters was not to give Labor a second chance.
Nevertheless, he believes the coalition is still the underdog, despite the latest
breakdowns which suggest a 50/50 split between the major parties.
He likened it to a football grand final where the scores are level with only minutes
to go.
He vowed to campaign to the last - although technically his 36-hour non-stop
campaign blitz ends on Friday night.
Mr Abbott spent the early part of election eve talking to punters at the flower and
fish markets in Sydney, before pledging $10 million to redevelop Brookvale Oval,
which is home to the Manly Sea Eagles.
While Mr Abbott continued to duck criticism about the hushed release of his
superannuation and workplace policies, he also found it hard to get away from sport.
Running onto the training field with the Manly team, frontrower Brent Kite burst
through the media scrum to flash the budgie smugglers one last time on Mr Abbott's
campaign trail.
Stripped to just his briefs, Kite yelled: "Tone, hit me short!" before dashing off
to the change rooms.
Judging by the smile on his face, Mr Abbott didn't mind the interruption at all.
It was to be the last on-the-road stop for Mr Abbott on his 36-hour blitz, which
began in Brisbane on Thursday morning, covering 10 electorates.
Mr Abbott looked slightly the worse for wear by Friday and has been battling a sore
throat for much of the past week.
"I would much rather feel exhausted ... than to finish this election campaign like a
spring chicken," he said.
"They are a test of political parties."
In the first 30 hours, he'd completed - by his count - some six television
interviews, 14 on radio and visited 10 seats.
More interviews were expected through the night, ahead of a Saturday morning likely
to be spent visiting polling booths in his home electorate of Warringah.