10.00am – Kevin Rudd has been sworn in as Prime Minister by the Governor-General, Michael Jeffery, in a ceremony at Government House, in Canberra. Governor-General Michael Jeffery with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Therese Rein Rudd becomes the nation’s 26th prime minister and the head of the first Labor administration since 1996. He replaces John Howard, the second-longest serving prime minister in the nation’s history. At the ceremony, the Governor-General asked Rudd for an assurance “that you have been elected leader of the party holding a majority in the House of Representatives, that you can form a government and that you will have the confidence of the House of Representatives.” Rudd gave this assurance and on that basis the Governor-General accepted the resignation of John Howard, which had been tendered last Friday. Accepting Howard’s resignation also terminated the commissions of all the previous government’s ministers. Rudd was first sworn as…