Kevin Rudd has made a dramatic call for Labor Party reform on the 10th anniversary of his taking the ALP leadership - and delivered a thinly-veiled swipe at Bill Shorten in the process.
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And in an opinion piece written for Fairfax Media, the former prime minister warns Labor that the Coalition are not sentimentalists and will act to remove Malcolm Turnbull before the next election, if necessary.
Mr Rudd's second foray into domestic Australian politics in as many months follows Mr Turnbull's decision not to back him for the job of United Nations secretary-general, and after a long preceding silence.
The former leader's comments are quite clearly aimed at Mr Shorten, and other factional leaders of the ALP. Mr Rudd argues that "it's time for the formation of a new Labor reform movement". He outlines a series of key changes to ensure the defeat of the Coalition at the next election, and to ensure the party membership starts to broaden and grow again.
"Democratising the party should continue, including submitting the election of the party's national conference, national executive and national secretary as well as Senate preselections to a ballot of the entire party membership. This would further reduce union-based factional power and re-engage ordinary people in a broad-based, mass political party," he writes.
The party must also democratise its policy-making agenda, he writes, to ward off the threat of the populist Greens and One Nation parties and reduce the influence of factions.
"I am not anti-union, I am anti-faction.
"Australians are not dumb. They see the factions for what they are: a syndicate to organise the distribution of political power within the party, and within a government, with scant regard for merit and maximum regard for ensuring those in political office remember who's in control."
After becoming Opposition Leader, Mr Shorten promised to pursue Labor Party reform, but he has delivered on almost none of his promises.
His close factional ally, Kimberley Kitching, was recently chosen behind closed doors to fill a casual Senate vacancy in Victoria and Mr Rudd's comments can be seen in this context. The factional stitch-up that ensured Ms Kitching's elevation has infuriated allies and enemies of Mr Shorten in the caucus.
Mr Rudd argues his rule change in 2013, which gave party members a 50 per cent say in choosing the leader, in fact saved Mr Shorten in 2015 when Mr Turnbull was riding high in the opinion polls.
That popularity has now slumped, he notes, but "we cannot simply conclude that the party will win the next election by default," he writes, in another apparent reference to Mr Shorten's performance, "or that victory will be delivered off the back of the flailing efforts and rolling contradictions of the most ineffective conservative Prime Minister we have seen since Billy McMahon".
"The Liberal Party are not sentimentalists. They will not sail happily into the next election with a leader taking them steadfastly into political oblivion. They will act".
