(7 Sep 2013)
Outgoing PM Rudd accepts responsibility for Labor Party defeat as Conservatives sweep to election victory
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POOL
Brisbane - 7 Sept 2013
1. Wide of former Australian Prime Minister Kevin on stage waving amid cheers
2. Wide of Rudd and family
3. Rudd kissing his family members then waving at the end of his speech
Tony Abbott gives victory speech after being swept to power
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POOL
Sydney - 7 Sept 2013
4. New Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott entering and greeting family members
5. Wide of Abbott and family on stage, a man stands beside them who is then chased away by security
STORYLINE:
On September 7th 2013 Australia's conservative opposition swept to power, ending six years of Labor Party rule and winning over a disenchanted public by promising to end a hated tax on carbon emissions, boost a flagging economy and bring about political stability after years of Labor infighting.
"I know that Labor hearts are heavy across the nation tonight, and as your prime minister and as your parliamentary leader of the great Australian Labor Party, I accept responsibility," Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said in a speech to supporters in Brisbane, after calling opposition leader Tony Abbott to concede defeat.
"I gave it my all, but it was not enough for us to win."
A victory for the conservative Liberal Party-led coalition comes despite the relative unpopularity of Abbott, a 55-year-old former Roman Catholic seminarian and Rhodes scholar who has struggled to connect with women voters and was once dubbed "unelectable" by opponents and even some supporters.
But voters were largely fed up with Labor and Rudd, after a years-long power struggle between him and his former deputy, Julia Gillard.
Gillard, who became the nation's first female prime minister after ousting Rudd in a party vote in 2010, ended up losing her job to Rudd three years later in a similar internal party coup.
The drama, combined with Labor reneging on an election promise by imposing a deeply unpopular tax on the nation's biggest carbon polluters, proved deadly for Labor's re-election chances.
In his concession speech, Rudd said he would be stepping down as party leader.
"The Australian people, I believe, deserve a fresh start with our leadership," he said. "I know this will not be welcome news to some of you. But my responsibility has been to maintain Labor as a fighting force for the future so that we can unite behind the next leader of our party."
Abbott, who becomes Australia's third prime minister in three months, will aim to end a period of extraordinary political instability in Australia.
Abbott has vowed to scrap the carbon from July 2014, two years after it was implemented, and instead introduce taxpayer-funded incentives for polluters to operate cleaner.
It is unclear whether Abbott will be able to pass the necessary law changes through Parliament, but he has threatened to hold early elections if the Senate thwarts him.
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