Australia's Labor votes to end leadership tension

CANBERRA, Dec 1 (Reuters) Australia's centre-left Labor Party today threw open its leadership in a bid to end infighting as the party struggles to make ground against Prime Minister John Howard ahead of an election year.

Labor leader Kim Beazley said he would re-contest a leadership ballot on Monday against his ambitious foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd to stop simmering leadership tensions.

''Spilling the frontbench gives my party the best opportunity to move forward together, in the interests of middle Australia,'' Beazley said today.

Conservative Howard, 67, in power for 10 years and victor in four straight elections, continues to command a strong personal rating in polls and has promised to contest the next election, due in the second half of 2007.

Beazley, who lost to Howard in 1998 and again in 2001, has clawed back support for his party with promises to withdraw Australian troops from Iraq and to scrap unpopular new workplace laws.

But Beazley's personal approval continues to lag well behind Howard, prompting some Labor Party lawmakers to worry about a fifth consecutive election loss.

A Newspoll published on Tuesday found Labor held a narrow two point lead, 51 per cent to 49 per cent, over Howard's conservatives in late November.

But the same poll found 58 per cent of respondents were dissatisfied with Beazley's performance, while only 25 per cent said he would make a better prime minister, compared to 55 per cent support for Howard staying in the job.

The poll said voters would overwhelmingly support Rudd to take over the leadership, with a Rudd-led team wining twice the support of Beazley's current leadership team.

Rudd, a former diplomat, has a knack for attracting media coverage and has led Labor's parliamentary attacks against the government over a scandal involving bribes paid to Saddam Hussein's Iraq by Australia's monopoly wheat exporter AWB Ltd.

REUTERS SBA BST0757