Independents meet would-be Aussie prime ministers

The two political leaders vying to become Australia's next prime minister meet Wednesday with three key independent lawmakers to discuss who best can provide stable leadership after weekend elections that failed to deliver a winner.

Neither Prime Minister Julia Gillard nor opposition leader Tony Abbott can form a government without the support of independents because no major party won an outright majority of 76 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives.

The kingmaker independents - Bob Katter, Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott - held a strategy meeting in Parliament House on Wednesday morning before they were to meet Gillard then Abbott for confidential negotiations.

The independents have promised to support whoever best offers stable government, but say a final deal cannot be struck until after the election's final vote count, which is not expected for several days.

The election results have ignited bitter recriminations within the ruling Labor Party over how they could become Australia's first government in almost 70 years to be thrown out of power after a single three-year-term.

At the same time, tensions have become apparent between two of the independents and members of Abbott's conservative Liberal Party-led coalition. The independents are all former members of the Nationals party, the Liberals' junior coalition partner, and have become scathing critics of the party.

Windsor - who since the election has described the Nationals as a "cancer-causing agent" and the party's Senate leader a "fool" and "an embarrassment" - said Wednesday he had good relations with both Labor and the coalition.

He was confident that a deal could be struck to create a government and avoid the need for another election.

"This thing will work out. It will take time. It might be a week or 10 days but we're developing a process that will resolve it," he told Nine Network television.

Newspapers reported Wednesday that Katter had branded the Liberals "slimy dogs" in May when he allegedly threatened to kill Liberal lawmaker Peter Lindsay during an argument at an airport.

Lindsay wrote to police alleging Katter "said he would have me killed and I better believe it because he could make it happen," News Ltd. newspapers reported.

Katter on Wednesday laughed off the reports as "absolute rubbish." Lindsay, who retired at the election, declined to comment on Wednesday.

A police spokeswoman, who declined to be named for policy reasons, said Lindsay contacted police on May 30 but did not make a formal complaint.

Katter has fueled unrest within Labor by telling a newspaper in a report published Wednesday that Labor lawmakers made a mistake by dumping their former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd two months before the election.

"If Rudd was still in the seat, it would be very hard to go against Kevin," Katter told Sydney's The Daily Telegraph newspaper.

The Australian Electoral Commission said Wednesday that the ruling Labor Party had likely won 70 seats in the House of Representatives and the Liberal-led coalition 72 seats, with more 79 percent of the vote counted.