Australian prime minister Julia Gillard's hopes of forming a minority government received a boost today with "kingmaker" independents criticising her conservative rival for refusing to meet a key demand.
Ms Gillard's Labour party seems to be ahead in early negotiations to form government, having agreed to all seven of the initial requests by the crossbench MPs, and with three of them backing Labor's plans for a new resource tax.
Labour also firmed as favourite overnight with bookmakers after conservative leader Tony Abbott refused an independent request to have his election policies costed by treasury.
Independent Tony Windsor said Mr Abbott's refusal to cooperate was like "a bucket of concrete around one foot" in the race to form a minority government.
"It's not a good start at all, because when we go to this issue of stability [of government] . . . what we're trying to establish here is a degree of trust," Mr Windsor said.
One of the few positive signs for Mr Abbott today was a Daily Telegraph newspaper opinion poll showing a majority of voters in the rural electorates of the three independents wanted them to back conservative leader Mr Abbott into power. Australia's rural population traditionally belong to the socially conservative end of politics.
Ms Gillard has also offered to surrender her right to decide the next election date, a political ace for a prime minister, and agree with the three independent and Green MPs on the date.
Both Ms Gillard and Mr Abbott have agreed to serve a full three year term and not have an election before August 2013.
Reuters