Channel Nine's worm, the live tracking device operated by a sample of swing voters, awarded the debate to Ms Gillard emphatically, while Channel Seven's polliegraph gave it to the Prime Minister by a nose.

The view among the punditry was of a close result, if not tilted in Mr Abbott's favour. The odds on a Coalition election victory were shortened after they awarded the debate to Mr Abbott, although Labor remains the favourite.

This was backed by a poll in the key seat of Eden-Monaro.

A poll for the Canberra Times, the Herald's sister publication, found if an election were held today the Labor incumbent, Mike Kelly, would win in a canter over the Liberal candidate, David Gazard, by 61 per cent to 39 per cent on a two-party-preferred basis.

Both leaders stuck to the carefully rehearsed scripts they have followed since the election was called just over a week ago.Conscious that he is struggling with women voters, Mr Abbott made a play for female voters by empathising with the struggles of raising a family and spruiking his $2.7 billion paid parental leave scheme that would be funded by a 1.7 per cent increase in the company tax rate.

''I'm happy to stake my political future on this visionary social change,'' he said.Labor has legislated for a taxpayer-funded scheme to start in January. Ms Gillard said Mr Abbott's scheme made a mockery of his concern for the cost of living because the tax rise would be passed on to consumers.

''I can't imagine putting up the company tax rate and having that flow through to prices that families pay,'' she said.Labor is expected to concentrate more on this line of attack as the campaign progresses.

Mr Abbott said he was making no promises about helping with the cost of living but reducing debt and deficit would help.Immigration and asylum seekers were the most debated issues.

Before the debate, Mr Abbott sought to seize the policy initiative by promising to cut net annual migration to 170,000 a year. He claimed this would constitute a cut of more than 100,000 people by comparing it to the 2008-09 level of 300,000 people.

But the immigration intake has already been reduced under Labor.

The Immigration Department has estimated the number to be 230,000 for last financial year, while the economic forecaster BIS Shrapnel predicts the level - based on current policy - will reach 175,000 this financial year and 145,000 the year after.

Ms Gillard said last night that Mr Abbott had been caught out trying to con people and that the 300,000 level inherited by Labor was a result of the immigration rorts allowed under Howard government programs.

''The trick here is that Tony today has promised the Australian people what I am already delivering,'' she said. ''It's pretty clever but it's a trick.''

Ms Gillard struggled on asylum seekers. One of the biggest shows of disapproval by the worm came when she could not say when, or if, her proposed refugee processing centre on East Timor would be established. ''We've started a dialogue with East Timor,'' she said.

Mr Abbott said ''there will never be a centre in East Timor'', Ms Gillard's policy idea was ''nothing but a pre-election fudge'' and she should ring the President of Nauru to reactivate the mothballed detention centre there.

Ms Gillard said Mr Abbott's pledge to turn the boats around showed he was ''a little naive about this problem''.Ms Gillard's other negative worm moment came when she tried to defend the ''citizens' assembly'' on climate change she announced last week to help build a consensus for a carbon price.

She said it was needed if Australia is to meet its 2020 target of a 5 per cent reduction in greenhouse gases.Mr Abbott said if Labor won the election and the Greens controlled the Senate ''we will get a carbon tax from this government … as sure as night follows day''.

Labor strategists had feared the debate. In March, an ill-prepared Mr Abbott was trounced by Kevin Rudd in a leaders' debate on health. He was coming off a low base so a reasonable performance would be viewed as a victory.