PM passes on a chance to muster some more votes

Seventeen days to go and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has finally "regretfully confirmed" to The Goanna that he will pass up the opportunity to catch up with his famous old ute, his mate the Brisbane car dealer John Grant and thousands of young folk from the bush.

He has a prior engagement, apparently, which means he won't be able to travel early next month to the drought-struck Riverina town of Deniliquin, home of all that is loveable about the great Aussie ute.

Unfortunate, really, because he may have been given the honour of officially consigning the celebrated "Utegate" ute to a permanent home atop a pole outside the nation's newest ute museum.

Yep, it's the Deni Ute Muster and among all the hotted up Holden, Falcon and (insert your favourite brand name here) utes gathering and roaring and spinning their tyres on October 2 and 3 will be the little old Mazda that started the unholy political mess that became known as Utegate.

The aforementioned car dealer, John Grant, who famously lent Rudd the old Mazda to help him electioneer, is having the modest vehicle trucked all the way from Brisbane to Deniliquin, where the ute muster is by far the biggest show in town, and indeed, the whole Riverina.

The cheeky Muster organisers invited Rudd a couple of months ago to attend the big festival, claiming they wanted the PM to defend the reputation of the great Aussie ute.

Festival director John Harvie said at the time "we are worried Mr Rudd will lose the love of the ute due to the 'utegate' controversy".

Since then, the only word from the PM's office had been that a response would be forthcoming "closer to the event".

The Goanna's inquiry yesterday ended the dream. "The Prime Minister has to regretfully confirm that he will be unable to attend," a spokesman told us.

The Ute Muster folk, having learnt this week that the Australian National Museum in Canberra has knocked back the chance to grab the old Mazda and preserve it for posterity, are keen to give the politically famous machine a new home in their town.

"Deni is the Ute Capital of the World! Where else would you retire a ute," Mr Harvie demanded of The Goanna yesterday.

"Deni is a hospitable town. We are more than happy to accommodate the ute in our new Festival HQ, which will incorporate a ute museum. It could even end up on a pole – you never know!"

Malcolm Turnbull's head very nearly ended up on a pole, of course, after his attempt to skewer Rudd and Treasurer Wayne Swan with an email that suggested they wanted special treatment for Mr Grant, the ute lender. The email, revealed by the wonderfully named Godwin Gretch, turned out to be a fake and all hell broke loose on Turnbull, who has not been invited to the ute muster.

The muster, by the way, is no tinpot affair, and any PM worth his salt could construct a fine argument that it represents the sort of self-help stimulus that can save rural regions.

It's very nearly the saviour of Deniliquin, whose big rice mill is hardly operating and whose pastoral industries are struggling for want of rain.

Last year's muster weekend brought $13 million into the area, according to an audit carried out by the organisers.

And lest you imagine it is no more than the doughnut-burning stomping ground of big-hatted station hands swilling Bundy and Coke, the audit discovered a fast-changing demographic among ute lovers.

Last year, 52 per cent of those attending were aged between 18 and 35, another 31 per cent were between 36-60-year-olds, 5.5 per cent were over 60 and 11.5 per cent were between the ages of 13 and 17.

Prime territory, you might have thought, for a Prime Minister to dust off his rural credentials. He would have had an audience of 20,000 or so.

Ah, well, back to the chauffeur-driven limo and the VIP jet.