When the Federal Government chose the northern NSW centre of Armidale as the site for the first switch-on of its National Broadband Network (NBN), in the electorate of independent Tony Windsor, it was instantly accused of pork barrelling.

It did seem like a golden if cynical gift for Windsor, a key government supporter. But Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, was able to comfortably refute the charge.

"Well we actually chose Armidale over 18 months ago... long before the last federal election and nobody batted an eyelid."

So there! A good answer, but it is also a sharp reminder of just how far Labor's fortunes have plummeted since those heady days near the end of 2009.

Eighteen months ago Labor had no idea that it would, after the next election, be hanging onto power by a gossamer thread, reliant on the goodwill of the Greens and independents.

Go back that far and Kevin Rudd is still in the polling stratosphere, although sharp observers might have noticed that the Rudd dirigible was already leaking hot air. It had been punctured by boat arrivals, but it had no idea of the cataclysmic storm it was drifting towards.

"Carbon tax" was a chant heard from Barnaby Joyce and a few other voices in the wilderness. Tony Abbott thought the science behind climate change was crap, but that the politics were too tough to make the battle worthwhile: "the politics of this are tough for us - 80 per cent of people believe climate change is a real and present danger," he said in October 2009. That was just two months before he surprised everyone, including himself, by surfing a wave of climate change scepticism into the leadership.

And all the political graphs have been running for the Opposition and against the Government with little interruption ever since Tony Abbott emerged as leader at the expense of Joe Hockey and Malcolm Turnbull.

It is a general pattern of Australian politics that when a party gets the right opposition leader into harness, the leader then hauls them towards success. That happened with Whitlam, Fraser, Hayden and (at the last minute) Hawke, Howard and Rudd. There are a number factors in all changes of government, but in a presidential age the leader has been the key to victory.

Now Abbott has broken that mould. His personal support has been lagging far behind the standing of the Coalition parties, in fact he may be the reason the opposition failed to win the last election.

The Abbott paradox is that he has simultaneously made victory possible and prevented it. Mike Steketee in The Australian has reported on an academic study of the 2010 election, the Australian Election Study, which conducted a survey just over 2,000 voters.

It found that both Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott were unpopular compared with previous leaders, behind even the now-reviled Mark Latham. Tony Abbott had a particular problem with women, the survey found, with 44 per cent of women voting Labor compared with 36 per cent of men - men preferred the Coalition by 50 per cent to 41 per cent.

The public seems to be buying the attack but not the attacker. I have found the same thing anecdotally with conservative voters saying they don't like Abbott as leader. Mind you, they dislike Julia Gillard more and I have found not one person who has a higher opinion of Julia Gillard now than when she took the top job. Disappointment in her seems to be general.

Tony Abbott's personal polling numbers have varied between bad and very bad through recent months, a time when the Coalition has held a crushing lead over Labor on the party votes.

This contradicts the received wisdom of the age of presidential politics. On current trends Tony Abbott could be that rarest of things in modern politics, a leader who leads his party to victory, from behind.

Marius Benson can be heard covering federal politics on ABC NewsRadio's breakfast program each week day morning.