The cartoon refers to a jibe by Liberal senator Bill Heffernan about the fitness for office of a childless Julia Gillard, the Deputy Leader of the ALP, was unfit because she was "deliberately barren", and that Ms Gillard could not understand the community because she had chosen to remain childless.

Leunig

The Liberal senator, who is well known for his attack on gay High Court judge Michael Kirby under parliamentary privilege, eventually backed off and apologized under pressure from the PM As he had previously done with Justice Kirby.

Gillard challenges the socially conservative values of the Prime Minister and Senator Heffernan. "Family", for them mean a man, his wife and a couple of kids. The father is the breadwinner whilst the mother stays at home dealing with Heffernan's "buckets of nappies". They are defenders of traditional family values and see the diversity in family life----divorced parents, single-parent families, blended-families, de facto marriages, homosexual couples with adopted children, foster parents----as undermining the moral fabric of society.

Of course, Howard's position is a contradictory one. As a neo-liberal he needs women in the workforce and many of his policy choices are deeply anti-family and anti-women, not least WorkChoices. The two positions, social conservatism and economic rationalism, are fundamentally irreconcilable. Women are both expected to stay at home raising babies and entering the workforce for the good of the economy.