SYDNEY (AFP) — Australian Prime Minister John Howard defied mounting pressure to name an election date Monday as a new opinion poll showed him heading for a landslide defeat.
The opposition Labor Party accuses Howard of delaying the vote while the government pumps millions of dollars into an advertising blitz in a last-ditch bid to turn public opinion -- a charge he denies.
Howard's conservative Liberal-National coalition trailed centre-left Labor by 12 points in an ACNielsen poll published in the Sydney Morning Herald -- a margin large enough to rout the government if repeated on election day.
The poll of 1,405 voters put support for the coalition at 44 percent against 56 percent for Labor on a two-party basis, which strips out the influence of minor parties.
The result was in line with a series of polls this year since Labor was taken over by Kevin Rudd, 50, who consistently beats Howard, 68, as preferred prime minister.
In the latest poll he won 52 percent of the vote to 39 percent for Howard, with the rest undecided.
Rudd was regarded as more trustworthy and having a better vision for Australia's future, while the prime minister was seen as a better economic manager.
ACNielsen poll director John Stirton said the last opposition to poll so well was the coalition under Howard shortly before he won power in 1996.
"While this does not make Labor a certainty to win, it entitles (them) to clear favouritism going into the campaign," Stirton said.
Howard must seek a fifth term in office before mid-January next year. He has pledged that a vote will be held by early December at the latest, but has refused to name the date.
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