The faceless men win.

[Matilda]

Bill Shorten, one of the so-called faceless men who engineered Julia Gillard's leadership coup last year, is the biggest winner in her ministerial reshuffle today.

Mr Shorten will move into Cabinet, shifting from Assistant Treasurer into the key Workplace Relations portfolio, with another "faceless man", Mark Arbib, becoming Assistant Treasurer and Small Business Minister.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-12/gillard-announces-cabinet-reshuffle/3726500


Bill Shorten is a very capable man, and very ambitious, but he's only been in Parliament for two minutes, and it looks very much a reward for engineering the assassination of Kevin Rudd. As for Arbib - next election, I'm going to tick every box in the Senate ballot and put Mark Arbib last - even behind the Shooters or any other nutters who are running. He does not deserve to be placed so high; there are many more capable people who've served longer than he. He is a treacherous scumbag.

[canetoad]

1. Shorten is no Hawke

But he's had dibs on Workplace relations for a few years. Hawke didn't do a long apprenticeship either.

Arbib - bastard. Too fucking cunning for his own good.

I don't mind a bit of treachery in politics. It ultimately plays out in public, mostly thanks to the ABC and a handful of extremely good journalists, to the detriment of the schemers.

[Matilda]

2. Shorten should do well in Workplace Relations; they're made for each other.

But with Arbib's promotion as the same time, it looks too much like rewards for helping Julia to power, and leaves a bad taste. Too soon, and she hasn't been forgiven by the public yet.

The word amongst the political reporters is that McClelland and Garrett both threatened to resign from the parliament and force byelections if they were dumped. Good for them if it's true, although I thought Garrett should really have joined the Greens, not Labor.

[Matilda]

3. McClelland makes his feelings known.

Dumped former attorney-general Robert McClelland has all but confirmed he refused to step down from Cabinet, despite being given a junior ministerial role of emergency management and housing.

Reports have indicated Prime Minister Julia Gillard was unable to force Mr McClelland out of Cabinet, after he was backed by the powerful NSW Right faction.

"Clearly I indicated that I thought the work I had done justified a Cabinet-level position," Mr McClelland told Sky News this morning.

"Without going into the details of the discussions, clearly I had made that opinion known."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-15/mcclelland-talks-about-reshuffle/3732488


And all this to reward Mark Arbib, who has shown no particular ability for anything other than political assassination. Gillard really is a poor judge of people - I think all she's done is alienate a few more people and perhaps pushed them into Rudd's camp.