Well, we’re approaching the end of the third week and — surprise, surprise — there was more cash for the marginals yesterday. Julia Gillard doled out some dough for a ring road and medical research centre in Townsville, while Tony Abbott made his key health announcement at a hospital on Sydney’s north shore. But all the focus was on the return of the former PMs, as John Howard and Kevin Rudd joined the campaign trail in support of their respective party leaders.

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So after 18 days of 4am wake-up calls, Labor’s Kevin Rudd Cabal has chalked up a Rocky-like 21,276km, while the Coalition’s John Howard Junta has notched up a Lazarus-esque 28,370km. Together that’s an exhausting total of 49,646km — the equivalent of more than 21 million hospital beds.

Gillard:

  • Julia Gillard was in Townsville, in the marginal seat of Herbert (0.03% ALP) yesterday, where she kicked in for a $160 million upgrade of the Townsville ring road. Gillard said the funding amounted to 80% of the project’s cost. “Without action, the traffic volumes that you’re going to see on Shaw Road and the Bruce Highway on the intersection there, you’re going to see 64,000 vehicles there a day by 2021,” she said.

Abbott:

  • Tony Abbott was in Crows Nest in Sydney’s north yesterday where he announced his $3.1 billion health policy. Under the policy every hospital would be run by its own community board and there would be 2800 new hospital beds over the next four years. “It’s a smarter spend than Labor’s, not a greater spend,” Abbott said.

Rudd/Howard:

  • Kevin Rudd reentered the campaign in triumphant — dare we say prime ministerial — style yesterday to declare he had agreed to a request from Julia Gillard to join the hustings. It was a day for former prime ministers, as John Howard also entered the campaign last night to mount a vigorous attack on the Labor government and its leader.

Baby Watch:

  • Tony Abbott is really taking it up to Julia Gillard on the baby-cuddling front. Here he is with five-day-old Sassika Jackson:

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Donation Watch:

  • Apparently LNP supporters are none-to-happy with their party’s campaign efforts up in Queensland. According to the Beaudesert Times, local supporters have expressed concern the party is not doing enough to counter claims made in ALP advertising. LNP supporter Barry Dittman raised the concerns with Nationals leader Warren Truss and LNP president Bruce McIver at a campaign function in Beaudesert on Monday. When challenged again about the need for the LNP to run more ads, McIver responded by telling supporters “if you want to see it stop, write us a cheque”.

Quotable:

  • “There is a saying that you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression, well they made a bad first impression and they want us to forget about it. What we have got to do is make sure they don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.” — Warren Truss makes a good impression on the Election Tracker, for the second day in a row.

Where are they today?

  • Julia Gillard was being grilled by John Faine in the ABC’s Southbank studios in Melbourne this morning. She’s due to catch a mid-morning flight … but the press pack hasn’t been told where yet.
  • From Sydney, Tony Abbott caught an early-morning flight to Devonport in Tasmania. He’s due to campaign in the seats of Bass and Braddon.
  • Bob Brown is in the nation’s capital but will return home to Tasmania later today.

What is the tracker?

Crikey tracks each leader’s amazing race across the country via our Election Tracker. Each day we’ll plot the leaders’ movements, feeding in the key policy announcements and spending commitments, the best media coverage and social media chat, plus the campaign stunts and bloopers. You can also use the tracker as a hub for the best Crikey coverage.

Click on the tabs across the top to watch how many kilometres Gillard and Abbott have clocked up, the movements of other key players and finally our bloopers and stunts bonanza on the right. You can click on each stop to see what they’re up to, with links to extended coverage and detailed electorate information.