Federal polling continues to come thick and fast, with a general pattern of improving results for Labor and Anthony Albanese:
• The Guardian reports the fortnightly Essential Research poll has the major parties unchanged on the primary vote, with Labor on 29% and the Coalition on 35%, and the Greens down one to 12%, with the remainder including an undecided component of 6%. The pollster’s 2PP+ measure has a 47-47 tie (the balance being undecided), after the Coalition led 48-47 last time. The stability on voting intention is in contrast to much improved personal ratings for Anthony Albanese, who records his first net positive result in this series since October 2023, the month of the Indigenous Voice referendum. Albanese is up five on approval to 46% (The Guardian report says up four, but the previous published result was 41%) and down four on disapproval to 45%. Peter Dutton is steady on 41% approval and up two on disapproval to 46%. The poll also finds 31% supporting and 39% opposing Peter Dutton’s proposal to reduce work-from-home arrangements for public servants (with women particularly opposed), which he has since dialled back. Albanese’s suggestion that Australia might send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine was supported by 33% and opposed by 40%. The poll had a sample of 2256 and was presumably conducted from Wednesday to Sunday. The full report will be along later today.
• Roy Morgan, which is notably more volatile than other Australian pollsters, has turned up an eyebrow-raiser with its regular weekly federal voting intention result, putting Labor 54.5-45.5 ahead on respondent-allocated preferences, out from 51.5-48.5 last week. Labor is up two-and-a-half on the primary vote to 32.5%, the Coalition is down three to 34%, and the Greens and One Nation are steady on 13.% and 5%. The result is also 54.5-45.5 on previous election preference flows, which usually favours Labor more than the other method, out from 52-48 last time. The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a larger than usual sample of 2097.
• The ABC has polling from Talbot Mills on attitudes to Donald Trump, finding approval down from 41% since February (well on the high side of such polling in Australia) to 37% and disapproval up from 49% to 51%, including a six-point increase for “strongly disapprove”. Twenty-two per cent of Australians somehow approve of steel and aluminium tariffs on Australian exports, with 65% disapproving. The survey was conducted between March 6 and 12, so before the tariffs were actually confirmed, from a sample of 1051.
Yesterday’s News Corp papers reported on polling of six seats of interest to the Greens, conducted for right-wing activist group Advance by Insightfully, whose principal is Leanne White, formerly of Crosby Textor. Reported under headlines promising a “federal election wipeout” for the party, it in fact suggests the party will gain a second seat in Victoria and retain one or two of their three seats in Brisbane. To deal first with the latter, for which the greater detail is provided:
• In Griffith, the poll has the LNP on 38.6% (30.7% at the 2022 election), the Greens on 31.3% (34.6%), Labor on 22.6% (28.9%), independents on 1.5% and others on 5.9%. No two-candidate preferred is provided, but a conservative estimate based on 2022 election flows would give the Greens a winning margin of between 2% and 3%, compared with 10.5% at the 2022 election.
• In Ryan, the primary votes are LNP 39.6% (38.5% in 2022), Greens 27.4% (30.2%), Labor 21.9% (22.3%), independent 7.1% and others 3.9%. A two-candidate result of 51.6-48.3 in favour of the LNP is presumably based on respondent-allocated preferences, with flows from the 2022 election suggesting a lineball result. The Greens’ winning margin over the LNP in 2022 was 2.6%.
• The results suggests Labor would gain Brisbane with 29.5% of the primary vote (27.3% in 2022) to the LNP’s 36.4% (37.3%), since they would receive most of the third-placed Greens’ 18.1% (27.2%) as preferences, with independents on 9.7% and others on 6.3%. A two-party result of 53-47 result in favour of the LNP (the basis of the “Brisbane to turn blue” table headline) appears to presume the Greens would come second, when the primary votes clearly suggest otherwise, and seems excessive in its LNP preference flow besides. The Greens won by 3.7% over the LNP in 2022, and Labor won the two-party preferred count over the LNP by 4.4%.
Sketchier detail is provided for the three Victorian seats canvassed:
• In Melbourne, Adam Bandt is on 50.1% (49.6% at the 2022 election, which reduces to 44.9% on my own determination of the redistribution), Labor is on 19.2% (25.0% and 25.6%) and the Liberals are on (I think) 21.6% (15.2% and 19.4%).
• In Wills, the only detail provided for the primary vote is that the Greens are up 4.8% on what seems to be the 2022 result without adjustment for the redistribution, suggesting 33.1%. Labor is said to have a 53.7-46.3 lead after preferences (54.2-45.8 based on my own post-redistribution determination), which is hard to assess in the absence of the other primary votes.
• In Macnamara, the Liberal are on 37.6% (29.0% on the 2022 election result, which will do because of the modest impact of the redistribution on this seat), the Greens are on 27.9% (29.6%) and Labor is on 25.9% (31.8%). No two-candidate preferred result is provided, but the Greens would certainly close that gap on any normal accounting of Labor preferences, which may hold true even if Labor put the Liberals ahead of them on their how-to-vote cards, as counselled by News Corp’s James Campbell.
The polls targeted “about 600 voters” in each seat, suggesting a margin of error of around 4% (effectively higher if the results were heavily weighted, as was presumably the case), with field work dates not disclosed.