Vienna - Werner Faymann, expected to be chosen as Austrian Social Democratic leader later Friday, said he is focussing on social issues to win voters and alienated party members.

At his party's convention in Linz, Transport Minister Faymann sought to sharpen his social policy profile by announcing tax cuts in 2009 and by seeking support from trade unionists.

"The social democratic model of a just and fair society with equal opportunities is as valid as it has been in the past," he said.

As party chairman, Faymann would succeed Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer, who had alienated the strong trade union wing of the party by diminishing their influence in parliament and by making concessions to the coalition partner.

Gusenbauer threw in the towel in June as party chief amid low popularity ratings and installed Faymann as interim leader of the Social Democratic Party. The chancellor will not run in the next general elections on September 28.

Gusenbauer's coalition partners in government, the conservative People's Party led by Vice Chancellor Wilhelm Molterer, called for new elections in early July, ending 18 months of wrangling between the two parties.

In his convention speech, Faymann assured party members that he would not form a government with the right-wing Freedom Party led by Heinz-Christian Strache.

"We don't want to have anything to do with that," he vowed.

Faymann faced some criticism from his own party ahead of his election as some say he is pandering to the powerful conservative tabloid paper Die Krone.

According to a recent poll, the Social Democrats could cease to be Austria's strongest party after the elections. Conservatives and Social Democrats now both stand at 26 per cent, the newspaper Oesterreich wrote on Friday. Previous polls this summer had consistently put the conservatives ahead.

The governing parties are followed by the right-wing Freedom Party with 19 per cent and the Green party at 14 per cent, according to the survey. The Alliance for the Future of Austria, which again might be led by right-wing politician Joerg Haider, would reach six per cent, the poll predicts. dpa