KEY POINTS:
Canberra - The political dawn of Homer Simpson has broken, illuminating what is likely to be one of the most divisive issues in this year's Australian election - nuclear power.
Homer, star of the television cartoon show The Simpsons and an almost homicidally incompetent worker at the Springfield nuclear plant, has been drafted into Labor's nascent campaign as a weapon against Prime Minister John Howard's plans to fight climate change with a chain of 25 reactors across the continent.
"That's his solution," Labor Leader Kevin Rudd told the party's national conference. "It's the Montgomery Burns [Homer's boss] solution for Australia's future climate challenge.
"And if you think of the nuclear safety record out there in Springfield with Homer Simpson in charge - be afraid, be very afraid."
For his part, Howard has nothing but contempt for Labor's new nuclear policy, which allows the unlimited mining and export of uranium - overturning 25 years of a three-mine cap on production - but refuses to countenance electricity from atomic reactors.
"You have this ridiculous situation where [Labor] have hailed themselves as apostles of the 21st century by ending their three mines policy on uranium," he said.
"Yet in the same breath they're saying, 'But of course, we can't convert the uranium for nuclear power in Australia although we can sell it to countries overseas and they can use it for civilian nuclear purposes'.
"What a hypocritical, contradictory position to have."
In the background is the broad span of climate politics. This includes Howard's refusal to ratify the Kyoto protocol on climate change despite his initial willingness to sign up to it, tough new emission-reduction targets from Labor, and the desire of both parties to promote new clean-burning coal technology so Australia's vast resources sector will not be hammered.
Dissent lurks in both major parties, with concerns on the political and practical impacts on Liberal backbenches, and anger within Labor at the narrow, 15-vote, victory Rudd engineered to end restrictions on uranium mining, largely to shore up the party's economic credentials.
Many party faithful went along with the proposal reluctantly, aware that a defeat for Rudd at this stage of the electoral cycle would seriously damage Labor's present, glowing, prospects of ending Howard's 11-year run in power.
The nuclear debate has been years in gestation.
It has been pushed by miners and economists who see huge potential for Australia in exploiting the 36 per cent of known global reserves buried in the Outback. There have been proposals to construct a chain of electricity-producing generators going back more than 30 years.
In the event, only one was built, at Lucas Heights in southern Sydney, whose existence and recent replacement has been a constant source of controversy: for decades, the majority of Australians opposed nuclear power, linked as it was to Cold War brinkmanship.
But nuclear advocates, supported by some prominent environmentalists, have pushed reactors back into consideration through growing international alarm at climate change and the role played by fossil fuels.
While 1000 opponents marched through Melbourne to protest against atomic energy in March, a Newspoll in the Australian newspaper only a few weeks previously showed for the first time that more people now supported nuclear power than opposed it.
The poll said that while the overwhelming majority rejected a reactor in their neighbourhood, support for nuclear power in the previous four months had risen from 35 per cent to 45 per cent, while opposition had plunged from 50 per cent to 40 per cent.
Significantly, backing was strong among people aged 18 to 34.
But political support was muted to some degree by the potential implications for the massive coal industry and the votes represented by its workforce.
Howard, especially, has been adamant than any climate change policies must not damage the Australian economy and place it at a disadvantage to other, less conscientious, countries - a key reason for his refusal to ratify the Kyoto protocol.
All sides of Australian politics now promote the development of clean-coal technology and, to a lesser extent, other renewable sources of energy.
Howard, slow to acknowledge the threat of climate change, now accepts the disputed argument that nuclear power could be less damaging than other forms of energy production, and that uranium, with proper safeguards, is a potential goldmine for Australia.
Proposed new export customers include China, Russia and India.
And if Australia is to mine uranium, Howard argues, it makes sense to develop its own nuclear industry, outlined in a Government-commissioned report by former Telstra chief and nuclear scientist Ziggy Switkowski, and in other studies by a Government-industry group and Parliament's industry and resources standing committee.
Despite predictions of much higher electricity costs - even Treasurer Peter Costello could see no economic point in nuclear power for at least a decade - Howard has now launched Australia firmly on the atomic trail.
His timing was pure politics: the policy was announced on Saturday, as Labor began its divisive debate into the expansion of uranium mining. Although passed, Labor contrasted firmly with Howard by refusing to consider nuclear generation in Australia.
It was, politically, a declaration of nuclear war.
