The leaders’ debate last night was very polite as each tried to exhibit their best manners as worms tend to punish rudeness or aggression. It was therefore not in any way interesting in either content or style. There was a strange set of nuances at the beginning of Tony Abbott’s speech when he talked about marriage, parenting and his familiarity therefore with the family budget in a way that could suggest this was alien territory for his opponent. But otherwise it was a bland, clean exchange of well-trodden views. Nothing new, but a lot of repetition, particularly Abbott on his mantra of stop the taxes, stop the boats.

The great non-debate indicated why gender could be a standalone factor in the election. If policies are dull and bribes are somewhat tacky, the personal aspects of the leaders may gain some traction. One worm, the Channel Seven Polliegraph, is a representative sample of voters and offered two clearly intersecting lines with women liking Gillard and men liking Abbott.

The worm on Nine was run by claimed undecided voters and was less clearly gender driven, with the pink and blue lines often intertwined but there were clear points when women rose. Interestingly, Nine scored Julia more strongly, voting for her 66% to 34% versus men at 62% to 39%.

The overall scores on Seven were Gillard 53% and Abbott 47%m with women being more strongly pro-Julia. So generally, while women liked Abbott on paid parental leave, women did respond more to Julia overall. Tony Abbott’s question at the end on “whether Prime Ministers are to be chosen on the basis of the job they’ve done, or gender” can be answered by asking what differences the candidates are offering in the future job they will do.

Currently, the range of issues on offer are obviously not engaging voters as they avoid anything that may raise passions in the focus groups.

Voting for or against someone on gender grounds alone is not something I’d support as I’d rather women made it on their recognised merits. However, when there are no other issues to excite the voters’ interest and imagination, some may well decide to act on the first woman PM factor. Even if this were not a major shift, with many marginal seats, it only needs a few disaffected voters to focus on this factor to make a difference to outcomes.

Maybe if the major parties offered some policies that engage more vision and excitement about the future, gender change alone may not seem so exciting. They should try appealing to our better angels as voters are not all scared, greedy or bored.