Julia Gillard become chief of staff to John Brumby, the leader of the Labor Party in Victoria. This preceded her own entry into federal politics. Gillard was first elected to the House of Representatives at the 1998 federal election for the seat of Lalor. Following the 2001 election, she was elected to Shadow Cabinet. When Kevin Rudd was elected as party leader and Leader of the Opposition in December 2006, Gillard was elected unopposed as his deputy. Upon Labor's victory at the 2007 election, she became the first female Deputy Prime Minister of Australia, and was made Minister for Education, Minister for
Julia Gillard Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency would also be introduced early 2011. The Rudd Labor opposition promised to implement an emissions trading scheme (ETS) before the 2007 federal election which Labor won. Rudd, unable to secure support for his scheme in the Senate, dropped it. During his 2012 leadership challenge against Gillard's prime ministership, Rudd said that it was Gillard and Swan who convinced him to delay his Emissions Trading Scheme. In the 2010 election campaign, Gillard pledged to build a "national consensus" for a carbon price by creating a "citizens assembly", to examine "the evidence on climate change, the