Help:come back Kev!

The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that the Labor party has asked its deposed Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, to campaign for it, outside his own electorate of Griffith.

This follows a poll, in the same paper, which showed that Labor could lose up to 10 seats in Queensland, where anger over Mr Rudd’s removal is running high.

The paper says there has been a private, as well as a public approach to Mr Rudd.

The paper said, too, that  the ALP is understood to have approached Mr Rudd early in the campaign to ask him to work for the re-election of other Labor candidates in Queensland, according to Labor figures familiar with the contacts.

It also recalled that Simon Crean, the Minister for Education, and an ally of Julia Gillard, on Sunday publicly called on Mr Rudd to play his part in the team.

Mr Rudd is believed to have asked for more time to consider the request, which would  involve breaking plans he had made to campaign in Griffith.