Polls turn against Australian PM Gillard

SYDNEY, July 31 AFP - Australia's conservative opposition has taken an election-winning lead over Prime Minister Julia Gillard's embattled party just weeks ahead of an election, a poll showed Saturday.

According to a Nielsen survey, the Labor's party's popularity has sunk to levels that prompted Gillard's shock axing of her predecessor, Kevin Rudd, to become the country's first woman leader just five weeks ago.

Gillard's plunging popularity came after she suffered a spectacular reversal of fortunes in the campaign's second week, with damaging leaks and the ghost of a hospitalised Rudd dogging her bid to return the ruling Labor party to office. Labor's vote slumped to 48 percent against the conservative Liberal/National coalition's 52 percent, the latest Nielsen poll showed, a six percentage point shift away from Gillard's centre-left party.

Labor's primary vote bled six percentage points in the week to 36 percent while the coalition, led by Tony Abbott, gained four points to a commanding 45 percent.