Gillard takes a tumble as heels dig in .

THE Prime Minister took a spectacular tumble near the Gandhi Memorial yesterday when her shoe bogged in soft grass.

She ended flat on the ground after losing her footwear and her footing on her way to a news conference. Helped up by her hosts, she quickly recovered and laughed off the incident, providing a lengthy explanation when a male journalist questioned her.


''For men who get to wear flat shoes all day, every day, if you wear a heel it can get embedded in soft grass. And then when you pull your foot out, the shoe doesn't come, and then the rest of it is as you saw,'' she said.

Ms Gillard has a history of embarrassment with apparently loose shoes and difficult heels.

In August, she had a mishap at Sydney's Customs House. She slipped out of one of her shoes as she walked on stage to launch a cyber safety initiative. She later explained that she had been distracted admiring how well the host - in higher heels than the PM - had negotiated the stage.

Early this year she was separated from her shoe when she was being dragged to safety by security officers during a demonstration near the Aboriginal tent embassy in Canberra. That shoe was seized by protesters, who finally returned it after considering auctioning it on eBay.

During the 2010 election campaign, she lost another high-heeled shoe when she stepped off the back of a forklift while visiting a distribution centre in her electorate.

Her fall might have dominated last night's TV pictures, but Ms Gillard was basking in some positive feedback from her combative speech last week in which she accused Tony Abbott of being a misogynist.
She had been left in no doubt ''a lot of people have clicked on and watched that speech''.

''When I gave it, I didn't quite expect the kind of reaction that we've seen around the world, and the dissemination through all of the new technology,'' she said.

People had raised it with her ''approvingly'', she said.

Asked about the decision by Macquarie Dictionary to amend the definition of misogyny to include ''entrenched prejudice towards women'', Ms Gillard said: ''I will leave editing dictionaries to those whose special expertise is language.''

But she is not letting up on Mr Abbott. On Tuesday, she accused him of being cowardly in failing to raise his turn-the-boats-back policy with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. When a journalist suggested she might have been a bit hard on Mr Abbott, she said: ''Abbott has done two press conferences where he's had the opportunity to say the simple words - [that] he raised tow-backs with Indonesia.

''It seems to me Mr Abbott is now spinning like a top because he's embarrassed with his failure to raise with the President of Indonesia something that he beats his chest about when he's home in Australia.''