Thanks to their campaign chief, Lynton Crosby, plain speaking on controversial issues has lifted the Tories. Now the battle could get even dirtier

In Australia he's called ruthless and grubby but he helped to win four elections. Can he win one for Michael Howard?

In the farming community of Kadina, where Lynton Crosby grew up, there is some confusion about his high-profile role in the forthcoming British general election. "He was up there with John Howard, now he's got some role with Tony Blair. It's not bad for a country kid from Kadina," said Jeff Crosby, a second cousin to Australia's most famous election strategist.

But thousands of miles away from the small community on the Yorke peninsula of South Australia, where Lynton Crosby, the son of a cereal farmer, was born 48 years ago, those within Australia's political establishment are very clear about what Mr Crosby will be doing in the crucial weeks before Britain goes to the polls.

Nine years on from the victory of the Australian Liberal leader John Howard over an apparently invincible Labor prime minister, Paul Keating, Mr Crosby is attempting a repeat performance, steering another Howard to a seemingly impossible election win in Britain.

Those who experienced the campaign techniques of Mr Crosby as he shepherded John Howard to four consecutive election victories warn that Labour should not underestimate his willingness to go negative or his desire to win.

"It is likely to get dirtier. What will drive his campaign will be a commitment to drive a clear distinction between the parties on an issue that will shift votes," said an Australian political source.

"Grubby", "brilliant" and "ruthless" are some of the words used to describe Mr Crosby. Last weekend's appearance by Michael Howard with his whole family, including his grandchildren, bore his stamp, according to former colleagues.

"John Howard does it at every election," said Ronald Walker, former treasurer of the Liberal party. "It is seen as a sign of faith with people's families, a way of relating to people."

The mark of Mr Crosby is increasingly evident in the issues headlining the Tory agenda: immigration, asylum seekers and, most recently, abortion, all familiar to veterans of political campaigning in Australia.

The apparent gusto with which he tackles such issues has laid Mr Crosby and his business partner - the pollster Mark Textor, who is also advising the Tories - open to accusations that they pander to the lowest common denominator. "They will play to the basest of opinions in the coming weeks," said Bob Hogg, a former campaigner for the Australian Labor party. "There's a dark underside to any human being and they pander to people's fears."

Others, however, see this tactic as an ability to tap into the public mood, no matter how unsavoury the views uncovered. According to Mr Walker, Mr Crosby's success in the upcoming election will be down to the meticulous research he undertakes through Mr Textor, who flies into London in the next few days.

Whether it is fears of asylum seekers, high taxation or unemployment, Mr Crosby, according to Mr Walker, finely tunes his research to pinpoint the issues that can turn votes. Typically, media teams will work 24 hours a day analysing the results of polling and voters will be addressed the same day with direct mailshots on the issues raised.

"There's no doubt that he is behind the immigration/asylum issue being addressed by Michael Howard, because that was a John Howard issue, border protection," Mr Walker said. "No one wants their jobs to be taken away by foreigners and border protection is a major concern in most of the western world."

This detailed research has attracted controversy in Australia over allegations that the Textor telephone pollsters are engaged in push-polling. The claim is they do not merely gather voter preference but feed negative and sometimes defamatory propaganda about other candidates to voters. Speaking at a joint senate committee inquiry into the 2001 Australian elections, Mr Crosby denied such tactics, as has Mr Textor.

"Whenever we make such calls we release the script to the media so that no one can say there is push-polling on our part," Mr Crosby told the committee.

But there are instances of the Liberal party using push-polling at the time Messrs Textor and Crosby were involved in campaigning.

Sue Robinson, the losing Labor candidate in the Canberra federal byelection in 1995, won an apology and an out of court settlement from the Liberal party after householders were asked whether they would be more or less likely to vote for her knowing she had publicly stated she supported the right to abortion up to the ninth month of pregnancy.

She warns that the tactic will surface again. "The technique has been refined and finely tuned, but it still works to inject the negative, whether the information is correct or not," she told the Guardian.

"It is tawdry politics. Modern campaigns are short so if you can get maximum impact with simple, sometimes simplistic messages you are going to have the ability to swing the votes."

Those who have worked against Mr Crosby believe he will take on any issue. As director of John Howard's 2001 campaign, he was part of the team involved in the exploitation of the row over the Tampa, a Norwegian vessel carrying 438 refugees, which the prime minister turned away from Australian shores. At the same time newspaper advertisements showed Mr Howard with clenched fist stating: "We decide who comes into this country," amid claims that refugees were throwing their children overboard to blackmail their way in.

Mr Howard was accused of playing the race card, but many believe the issue swung the election in his favour. "You didn't have to have unique insight into the Australian psyche to know that blocking the arrival of refugees would be extremely popular," said David Marr, co-author of Dark Victory, an examination of Mr Howard's 2001 victory.

"Crosby and others were daring enough to exploit this for electoral purposes and pander directly to the innate fear in the Australian psyche that slanty-eyed people from the east are going to invade."

Such "daring" is also involved in the exploitation of local community divisions, a tactic employed by Mr Crosby to take the debate away from the national agenda.

"The kind of stuff he seems to be really interested in is the grubby low-level stuff of tapping into a community's prejudices and exploiting them," Mr Marr said. "The fact, for example, that what poor white Australian communities are irritated by is the fact that Aboriginals in Australia are getting secondary school scholarships."

Mike Kaiser, who as Labor campaign manager was at the receiving end of Mr Crosby's technique in 1992 state elections in Queensland, believes the British Labour party should be warned that his tactics will not change despite the different culture he is operating within.

"In 2001 he ruthlessly exploited sentiment against boat people and immigration in general and Labor found itself very much on the wrong side of public opinion. He seems to be using the same tactics in the UK."

But Mr Walker condemned those who criticise him. "Success is the only thing that counts. Lynton does not leave anything to chance, he checks every detail and the Labour party ignores him at their peril."

Watching from her farm in Kadina, Mr Crosby's older sister, Robin Hewitt, knows over the next few weeks that her brother's much-praised focus and professionalism will be driven by a steely belief in the politics he promotes.

"He is a strong character with strong views," she said. "He believes what he campaigns about, he always has."