Newspoll: 55-45 to Labor

No Christmas cheer for the Coalition from the final Newspoll for 2018.

The Australian reports Newspoll has closed its 2018 account with another crushing 55-45 lead for Labor, from primary votes of Coalition 35% (up one), Labor 41% (up one), Greens 9% (steady) and One Nation 7% (down one). Scott Morrison edges to net negative territory on his personal ratings, being down one on approval to 42% and up three on disapproval to 45%. Bill Shorten is respectively down one to 36% and up one to 51%. Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister is 44-36, narrowing from 46-34. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1731.

BludgerTrack: 54.3-45.7 to Labor

Nothing much doing on the poll aggregate, but two ReachTEL seat polls provide further evidence of the Coalition’s low ebb in Victoria.

The BludgerTrack poll aggregate shifts negligibly in favour of the Coalition, who have picked up one on the seat aggregate in South Australia. I won’t be bothering with the leadership ratings until the new year recess, as some fairly heavy reupholstering is required to integrate Scott Morrison’s data into the code.

Two ReachTEL electorate polls have lately emerged from Victoria, recording swings approaching or exceeding double digits against the Liberals – with the caveat that both appear to have identified the names of the parties rather than the candidates.

• In Corangamite, held for the Liberals by Sarah Henderson on a post-redistribution margin of exactly nothing, a poll for the Geelong Advertiser gives Labor what I calculate to be a lead of 59-41, based on 2016 election preferences. The Advertiser’s report has it at 52.1-47.9, but this credits Labor with no preferences whatsoever from “other/independent”, when they in fact scored slightly over half of them in 2016. After excluding the 4.6% undecided from the poll, the primary votes are Labor 42.8%, Liberal 33.7% and Greens 11.7%. I don’t know exactly when the poll was conducted, but the sample was 856.

• The Herald Sun reported last week that a poll for the CFMEU found Kelly O’Dwyer, who holds Higgins on a post-redistribution margin of 10.3%, trailing Labor by 53-47. Primary votes of Liberal 38.6%, Labor 32.5% and Greens 18.8% are provided, which I presume does not exclude an undecided component.

Victorian election endgame

A week and a half on, the finishing touches are being applied to Victoria’s rather extraordinary election result.

Saturday morning

Late excitement in Ripon, where contested ballots during a recount appear to have worn away to nothing. The VEC’s communications on the recount have been a bit confusing, but the buzz on social media suggests the Liberals have achieved the tiniest of leads, with the result perhaps to be decided by a single digit margin. The recount is to resume this morning, and is proceeding slowly as every dubious ballot is scrutinised in minute detail.

Thursday morning

My results platform is now fully updated with the latest results, and hopefully more or less works. Many more preference counts have been conducted, but not in the one contest that remains of potential interest, namely Melton.

UPDATE: By latest results, I mean the latest VEC feed. Unfortunately, this hasn’t been reconciled with the preference counts yet.

Tuesday evening

The Victorian Electoral Commission is now a fair way through the preference distributions, and it seems the numbers in the new parliament will be Labor 56, Coalition 26 (Liberal 20 and Nationals six), Greens three and independents three. The one remaining chance for a boilover is Melton, which will presumably be retained by Labor, but they have only 34.9% of the primary vote with the remainder scattered among the field of eleven other candidates. Then is the upper house, which I’m afraid I haven’t been able to give its due over the last week and a bit, but do stay tuned.

Notable results from the resolution of the count:

• Sam Hibbins retained Prahran for the Greens by a 7.4% margin over the Liberals, which he was able to do because he again squeaked ahead of Labor at the last exclusion. At that point in the count, Liberal candidate Katie Allen was on 14,824 (36.7%), Hibbins was on 12,911 (32.0%) and Labor’s Neil Pharaoh was on 12,647 (31.3%). The 264 votes separating Hibbins and Pharaoh compares with 31 votes when the exact same candidates faced the exact same situation in 2014. The difference on that occasion was that Pharaoh landed only 277 votes clear of Liberal incumbent Clem Newton-Brown on the final count – here as in so many other places, the Liberals were not a feature this time.

• Labor won the western Victorian seat of Ripon by just 31 votes, Sarah De Santis finishing with 20,030 (50.04%) over Liberal incumbent Louise Staley on 19,999 (49.96%).

• The vague prospect of an independent win in Benambra did not eventuate, with Liberal incumbent Bill Tilley emerging with a winning margin of 2.4%. Independent Jacqui Hawkins reduced Labor to third place, at which point Tilley was on 19,517 (47.1%), Hawkins was on 11,778 (28.4%) and the Labor candidate was on 10,110 (24.4%). That left Hawkins needing 88% of preferences, and she managed 78%.

In the seats that were being followed closely on the earlier post, Liberal member David Southwick made it home in Caulfield by 205 votes (0.3%); Labor’s Jackson Taylor prevailed over Liberal incumbent Heidi Victoria in Bayswater by 296 votes (0.4%); Labor’s John Ormond Kennedy was a 329 vote (0.4%) winner over Liberal member John Pesutto in Hawthorn; Tim Read of the Greens won Brunswick from Labor by 504 votes (0.6%); and Labor’s Chris Brayne finished 767 votes clear (0.9%) of the Liberals in Nepean.

Essential Research: 54-46 to Labor

Reasonably good personal ratings are the only consolation Scott Morrison can take from another diabolical poll result.

The Guardian reports the Coalition’s recovery in Essential Research a fortnight ago has proved shortlived – Labor has gained two points on two-party preferred to lead 54-46, returning to where they were the poll before last. Both major parties are up on the primary vote, Labor by four points to 39% and the Coalition by one to 38%. We will have to wait on the full report later today for the minor parties. The monthly personal ratings have Scott Morrison up one on approval to 42% and down three on disapproval to 34%, while Bill Shorten is down three to 35% and down one to 43%. Morrison leads 40-29 as preferred prime minister, barely changed on 41-29 last time.

Also featured are questions on Labor’s dividend imputation policies and negative gearing policies. The former had the support of 39% and the opposition of 30%. On restricting negative gearing to new homes, 24% said it would reduce house prices; 21% said it would increase them; and 27% believed it would make no difference. Thirty-seven per cent believed it would lead to higher rents, 14% to lower rents and 24% make no difference. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1032.

UPDATE: Full report here. Greens down one to 10%, One Nation down one to 6%.

ReachTEL: 51-49 to Labor in New South Wales; YouGov Galaxy: 52-48

An encouraging first poll for Labor’s new leader, as the burden of federal politics weighs upon the Berejiklian government four months out from the election.

The first New South Wales state poll in a surprisingly long time (considering the imminence of the election in March) is a uComms/ReachTEL poll for the Sydney Morning Herald, which credits Labor with a lead of 51-49. After excluding the 3.1% undecided (there may have been orced-response follow-up results for these, but the Herald report doesn’t relate them), the primary votes are Coalition 37.7%, Labor 35.2%, Greens 9.9% and One Nation 7.7%.

The poll also has new Labor leader Michael Daley leading Gladys Berejiklian 54.2-45.8 on preferred premier, which is not bad for a newcomer non-incumbent, even allowing for the peculiarities that ReachTEL’s forced response preferred leader questions tend to produce. After a week of election-decided-on-state-issues malarkey from politicians with an interest in such matters, the poll finds 50.2% of respondents saying federal politics would indeed play a role in their decision, with only 36.4% saying it wouldn’t.

The poll was conducted Thursday night from a sample of 1557. Come back later today and you might find an updated state poll trend chart attached to this post.

UPDATE: And now a YouGov Galaxy poll from the Daily Telegraph, this one of 903 voters conducted Thursday and Friday, showing Labor leading 52-48. The primary votes are Coalition 37%, Labor 39%, Greens 9% and One Nation 8%, with Gladys Berejiklian holding an unconvincing 33-31 lead over Michael Daley as preferred premier. As per ReachTEL, they asked about the influence of federal factors, but specified “the Coalition’s federal performance”. This had 33% saying they had become less likely to vote for the Coalition, against 35% for no influence and 20% for more likely.

And now for that poll trend, the current reading of which is 51.3-48.7 to Labor, from primary votes of Coalition 37.2%, Labor 35.9% and Greens 10.0%.

Continue reading “ReachTEL: 51-49 to Labor in New South Wales; YouGov Galaxy: 52-48”

BludgerTrack: 54.5-45.5 to Labor

A devastating Newspoll strips the Coalition of almost all of its poll trend gains from two improved results last week.

In the week that brought them the Victorian election result, Newspoll has taken from the Coalition what Ipsos and Essential Research gave the week before in BludgerTrack, with Labor up 0.6% on two-party preferred and making seat projection gains in Victoria and South Australia. I’m afraid I’ve been too preoccupied/lazy to update the leadership trends, but Newspoll is unlikely to have changed them much. Other than that, full results from the link below.