RedBridge Group: Coalition 30, Labor 23, One Nation 22 in Victoria

A poll conducted in the immediate aftermath of last week’s leadership change finds Victorian Labor still headed for defeat, with One Nation losing ground.

The Financial Review has the first Victorian state poll since last week’s leadership change, courtesy of RedBridge/Accent Research. The results are not encouraging for Labor, who are down three on the same pollster’s result a month ago to 23%. The Coalition is up four on a soft primary vote result last month to 30%, but One Nation is down five to 22% while the Greens gain one to 14%. Labor trails the Coalition 57-43 on two-party preferred; the Financial Review’s graphic confusingly has One Nation with a 54-43 lead over the Coalition. Ben Carroll records a minus 15% on net favourability, though 57% said they had no strong impression of him. Jess Wilson is unchanged at plus 13% net favourability. Nineteen per cent said the leadership change made them more likely to vote Labor compared with 14% for less likely and 56% for no difference. The poll was conducted Tuesday to Saturday from a sample of 1014.

UPDATE: I missed another poll out overnight, from Freshwater Strategy in the Herald Sun, although its field work period of July 21 to August 3 began well before the leadership change on July 28. It has the Coalition at 30%, up three on the last such poll in June; Labor at 25%, up two; One Nation at 22%, down three; and the Greens steady at 14%. The Coalition’s two-party lead is in from 53-47 to 52-48. Ben Carroll records 21% favourable, 31% neutral and 29% unfavourable; Jess Wilson 39% favourable, 25% neutral and 21% unfavourable. The sample for the poll was 1020.

Further Victorian election news:

• The government’s legislation to abolish group voting tickets is now before the upper house, having been introduced to the lower house on the same day Jacinta Allan was deposed and passed the following day. Reflecting the practice for the Senate, above-the-line voters will be directed to fill a number of boxes above the line equal to the number of vacancies (so five rather than six for the Senate), though a savings provision will in fact mean that a single number one will suffice for a formal vote. Since the legislation leaves intact the state’s eight five-member regions with their quota for election of 16.7% (abolishing them would require a referendum), Labor, the Coalition, One Nation and the Greens seem likely to dominate.

• One Nation finally announced a slate of eight candidates yesterday, and designated state party president Warren Pickering as its prospective parliamentary leader, and candidate for the lower house seat of Pakenham. The others named were lead upper house candidates: high-profile Liberal Party defector Colleen Harkin in South-Eastern Metropolitan; Mark Nicholson, the animator behind the party’s cartoon web series and Super Progressive Movie feature, in Northern Metropolitan; Chris Burson, Geelong councillor and former police officer and Angry Victorians candidate, in Western Victoria; criminal lawyer Aaron Sandford in Southern Metropolitan; Fiona Lopez in Western Metropolitan; Natalie Adams in Eastern Metropolitan; and the party’s sole incumbent, Rikki-Lee Tyrrell, who will seek re-election in Northern Victoria.

• As well as Jacinta Allan announcing she will not contest the next election, creating a vacancy in her seat of Bendigo East (margin 10.8%), two further senior ministers announced their impending retirements in the wake of last week’s leadership change: Climate Change Minister Lily D’Ambrosio, who holds Mill Park on a margin of 11.6%; and Health Minister Harriet Shing, who was second on Labor’s Eastern Victoria upper house ticket in 2022.

• Kim O’Keeffe announced last fortnight she will not recontest Shepparton, which she gained for the Nationals from independent Suzanna Sheed in 2022. Chip Le Grand of The Age reports Steve Threlfall, a Shepparton councillor and shooting and sports store owner, has confirmed he is seeking One Nation preselection, and there are suggestions the mayor, Shane Sali, could ran for One Nation or either of the Coalition parties.

• Will Fowles, who became Labor’s member for Ringwood in 2022 and resigned from the parliamentary party in August 2023, has announced he will not stand at the election.

RedBridge Group: Labor 29, One Nation 31, Coalition 22 (open thread)

One Nation records its best poll result in six weeks, as Labor slumps on various two-party preferred measures.

The Financial Review has its monthly poll from RedBridge Group/Accent Research, which is somewhat at odds with recent trends in recording a two-point rise for One Nation to 31%, equalling their best-ever result the month before last, and the Greens slumping four points to 10%. Less unusual is a four-point rise for the Coalition to 22%, but it’s typically been accompanied by softer results for One Nation. Labor meanwhile is down a point to 29%.

Labor’s respondent-allocated two-party lead over One Nation narrows from 56-44 to 53-47, and it records what may be its worst result of the term in trailing the Coalition 52-48, after leading 54-46 last month. Using preference flows from the previous election (which involves extrapolating the 6.4% who voted One Nation to the 31% recorded in the current poll), a Labor lead of 55-45 last month becomes a 50-50 tie.

For leadership ratings, only net favourability is provided – I will hopefully be able to break this out into favourable and unfavourable later today. Anthony Albanese is down a point to minus 19; Angus Taylor is up three to minus six and Pauline Hanson is steady on minus 10. The three-way preferred prime minister result has Anthony Albanese down a point to 32%, Pauline Hanson up one to 24% and Angus Taylor up four to 15%. The poll was conducted last Monday to Thursday from a sample of 1001.

UPDATE: Leadership ratings have Anthony Albanese down a point on favourable to 30%, up three on neutral to 19% and steady on 49% unfavourable; Angus Taylor is up three to 20%, up three to 31% and steady on 26%; and Pauline Hanson down one to 36%, up four to 15% and down one to 46%. Also featured in the poll are one off personal ratings for Gina Rinehart (27% favourable, 27% neutral, 36% unfavourable) and John Howard (43%, 28% and 21%).

UK Greater Manchester mayoral by-election live

Labour should hold this mayoralty, but how much will their vote drop from Burnham’s 63.4% in 2024? Also, Trump’s US ratings have dropped to a new low.

Live Commentary

12:27pm While Labour won easily, there was a large swing to the right since 2024. Adding the swings for Reform, Restore and the Conservatives has the combined right up 19.5%. Doing the same for Labour, the Greens and the Lib Dems has the combined left down 12.4%.

11:57am It took far too long to get a result in this election. In Australia, it would have been clear within a couple of hours of polls closing that Labour had won easily, based on just the primary votes. In this election, it took more than 24 hours after polls closed to get a result. I have no idea why Greater Manchester didn’t release primary vote results after it was known they would be distributing preferences between Labour and Reform.

Of the total 31.9% that were not Labour or Reform primary votes, 34.2% went to Labour in preferences, 26.6% to Reform and 39.2% exhausted. Pre-election polls understated Labour and overstated the Greens and Conservatives.

8:57am Finally a result! Labour wins the Greater Manchester mayoralty by 66.3-33.7 over Reform, from primary votes of 47.1% Labour (down 16.3 points since the 2024 election), 21.0% Reform (up 13.5), 12.2% Greens (up 5.3), 8.7% Restore (new), 7.7% Conservatives (down 2.7) and 2.8% Lib Dems (down 1.4).

6:56am Saturday Labour and Reform candidates have both qualified for the supplementary vote distribution of preferences, meaning they both had under 50%, and all other candidates have been eliminated. We still don’t know first round vote shares and won’t know anything more until we have a final result! It’s now nearly 10pm UK time; counting will continue until the bitter end.

11:53pm Turnout was 25.1%, down from 32.1% in 2024.

11 pm Four hours since counting began in Greater Manchester, there’s still no results from any of the ten boroughs. There doesn’t seem to even be any reporting of the likely result based on party sources, unlike for Westminster by-elections. This has been frustrating.

7:16pm Here’s the BBC’s live blog on the Greater Manchester count. It appears that counting didn’t start until 7pm AEST (10am UK time).

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here.

Polls closed at 7am AEST today for the Greater Manchester mayoral by-election to replace Andy Burnham after his June 18 election to the UK parliament. It will be the biggest UK by-election. Counting will start at about 6pm AEST (9am UK time). There are ten districts within Greater Manchester where votes will be counted.

This by-election will be held using the “supplementary vote” system, where voters get two preferences. Mayoral elections prior to 2024 used this system, but the Conservatives regressed to first-past-the-post for 2024-26 mayoral elections. Labour reverted to the supplementary vote.

In the 2024 mayoral election, Burnham won 63.4%, with the Conservatives a very distant second with 10.4%, followed by 7.6% for an independent, 7.5% the populist right Reform, 6.9% Greens and 4.2% Liberal Democrats. Three early to mid-July polls had Labour at 38-39%, Reform 19-24%, the Greens 14-22%, the Conservatives 8-12%, Restore 7-9% (another populist right party) and the Lib Dems 3-8%. After preferences, Labour defeats Reform by between 62-38 and 66-34.

The Election Maps UK aggregate of national polls has Reform leading with 24.5% (down 1.5 points since my July 16 article before Burnham became PM), followed by Labour at 23.4% (up 2.6), the Conservatives 20.2% (up 0.4), the Greens 11.7% (down 1.3), the Lib Dems 11.1% (down one) and Restore 2.7% (down 0.5). Seat projections give Reform 217 of the 650 seats, with Labour on 135, the Conservatives 102 and the Lib Dems 76. Reform, the Conservatives and right-wing Northern Ireland parties would probably have enough for a majority.

There will be a by-election on August 13 in Clacton after Reform leader Nigel Farage resigned to recontest. No other well-known party will contest this by-election. It’s likely Farage’s main opponent will be joke candidate Count Binface. A total of 34 candidates are standing, breaking the previous record of 26 for a by-election in 2008. In 2024, Farage defeated the Conservatives in Clacton by 46.2-27.9 with 16.2% for Labour.

US: Trump’s ratings drop to new record low

With the resumption of the Iran war, Donald Trump’s ratings have dropped again. In Nate Silver’s aggregate of national polls, there had been a recovery in Trump’s net approval to -16.4 on July 14 from -20.2 in late May. But now his net approval has fallen to -20.6, a new record low, with 58.8% disapproving and 38.2% approving.

Democrats are winning the generic ballot by 48.3-41.9 over Republicans, a 6.4-point margin. From a peak lead of 7.1 points in late May, Democrats had dropped to a 5.9-point lead on July 22. The current lead should give Democrats control of the House of Representatives but not the Senate at midterm elections this November.

Troy Jackson was nominated by Democrats to replace Graham Platner as their Maine Senate candidate last Saturday after Platner withdrew owing to sexual assault allegations. On paper, Maine should be the easiest Senate gain for Democrats as Harris defeated Trump there by 6.9 points in 2024.

A jungle primary occurred Tuesday in Georgia’s 13th federal House seat. This special election occurred owing to the death of the incumbent Democrat in late April. At the 2024 presidential election, Kamala Harris defeated Trump in Georgia 13 by 70.6-28.5, a 42.1-point margin.

At a jungle primary all candidates run on the same ballot paper and the top two, regardless of party, go to a runoff if nobody gets over 50%. Two Democrats, Scott and Blair, advanced to the August 25 runoff with 46.0% and 37.4% respectively, and Democrats overall beat Republicans by 86.5-13.5, a 73.0-point margin. But turnout was pathetic, with just over 20,000 votes compared with over 360,000 in 2024.

Armenian election

Armenia elects its MPs using proportional representation with a 4% threshold for single parties and 8% for coalitions. At the June 7 election, the governing centrist Civil Contract won 64 of the 105 seats (down seven since 2021), the pro-Russia Strong Armenia 29 (new) and the pro-Russia Armenia Alliance 12 (down 17). Civil Contract has governed since 2018.

Federal polls: YouGov, Spectre Strategy, Essential Research (open thread)

Three new federal polls tell a similar story on voting intention, with two showing a marked deterioration in Angus Taylor’s standing.

The fortnightly result from the YouGov poll series now known as News24 Pulse has Labor steady on 28%, One Nation down one to 25%, the Coalition up two to 22% and the Greens up one to 13%. Respondent-allocated two-party measures give Labor unchanged leads of 53-47 over the Coalition and 56-44 over One Nation. Anthony Albanese is down a point on both approval and disapproval, to 37% and 55% respectively, while Angus Taylor is unchanged at 33% approval and 49% disapproval. Albanese’s leads on preferred prime minister narrow from 45-34 to 43-37 against Taylor and from 54-35 to 52-37 against Hanson. The poll also finds only 10% rate that multiculturalism has “not served Australia well”, with 37% rating it an unalloyed good and 46% good but “becoming a problem”. The poll was conducted last Tuesday to this Tuesday from a sample of 1519.

Also out is the fourth poll for the term from Spectre Strategy, whose primary votes of Labor 28%, One Nation 26%, Coalition 23% and Greens 12% differ from their April result only in being a point lower for the Coalition. Labor has a steady respondent-allocated two-party lead over the Coalition of 51-49, while that over One Nation widens from 52-48 to 54-46. Quite a few of the poll’s other indicators were improved for Labor after bad results in April, including Anthony Albanese’s personal ratings, which are up two on favourable to 33%, up four on neutral to 19% and down five on unfavourable to 47%. Angus Taylor is down two to 26%, up two to 34% and up eight to 33%, while Pauline Hanson is down two to 41%, up two to 16% and up two to 42%.

The Essential Research has updated its website with its monthly voting intention result, which has Labor up one to 31%, One Nation down one to 25%, the Coalition down one to 22% and the Greens up two to 12%, with the undecided component down a point to 4%. The pollster’s 2PP+ measure, which has been particularly sticky for Labor, now has Labor leading 48-47 after trailing 48-46 last time. Angus Taylor takes a hit on his personal ratings, down three on approval to 33% and up seven on disapproval to 44%, while Anthony Albanese is steady on 38% and up one to 52%. The poll had a sample of 1060 and I assume was conducted last Wednesday through to Monday. The Guardian reports further results on the salience of various issues and how the government has handled them, which should shortly be published along with other attitudinal results on the pollster’s website.

Victorian Newspoll and Labor leadership spill

On the eve of a Labor spill motion, Newspoll records disastrous personal ratings for Jacinta Allan.

The Australian brings an adroitly timed state Newspoll result for Victoria, which has Labor on 28%, the Coalition on 31%, One Nation on 19% and the Greens on 13%, with the Coalition leading Labor 52-48 on two-party preferred. This is distinctly weaker for One Nation than other recent polling, and suggests Labor to be more competitive than recent conventional wisdom has allowed. Any notion that this might boost Jacinta Allan ahead of today’s party room vote is torpedoed by her personal ratings of 25% approval and 71% disapproval, which Kevin Bonham informs us is the “worst net satisfaction recorded by a state Premier in the history of Newspoll”. Jess Wilson is on 47% approval and 39% disapproval and leads 51-32 on preferred premier.

Respondents were asked who they would favour to form government out of Labor, the Coalition and One Nation, with respective results of 41%, 35% and 18%, and who they would prefer out of “Jess Wilson and the Liberal-Nationals in alliance with One Nation” and “Jacinta Allan and Labor”, which respectively scored 48% and 42%. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1035.

As for today’s spill motion, the Herald Sun quotes sources close to Ben Carroll saying they expect 40 to 45 votes in favour with 25 against and four undecided, which supporters of a “confident” Jacinta Allan describe as “inflated”. Should it pass, the question will arise as to whether Jacinta Allan will attempt to pursue the matter unto a ballot of the party membership, as she indicated she would in a letter to the party’s state secretary. This would require 14 party room members to support her nomination, which they might hesitate to do given it would involve a four-to-six week process during which an interim leader would need to be appointed who was not contesting the ballot. The Australian reports “disagreement within Labor” as to whether caucus has the power to prevent this by changing back to the more traditional method of choosing a leader.

The Herald Sun also published results on Saturday of polling conducted by JWS Research for Australian Energy Producers targeting 1000 respondents across “28 marginal and significant seats between June 26 and July 3” that shows a 9% swing from Labor to the Coalition in two-party preferred terms, compared with the 7% recorded by Newspoll. The primary votes were Coalition 29%, One Nation 24%, Labor 23% and Greens 14%, which offers only so much insight in the absence of detail on which seats were polled, though we are told the equivalent results in 2022 were Labor 44%, Coalition 44% and Greens 9% (One Nation is credited with 1%, but presumably only ran in a handful of the seats).

Federal polls: DemosAU MRP poll and Roy Morgan (open thread)

The latest endeavour to project seat outcomes from a large-sample poll points to a hung parliament and a decimated Coalition.

DemosAU has published its quarterly MRP poll for Capital Brief, which combines demographic modelling with a large-sample survey of 9343. This has produced its most radical result yet with respect to One Nation, showing a median projection of 68 seats for Labor (down 15 on the first quarter MRP and 26 on the 2025 election), from a primary vote that drops three points to 26%; 60 for One Nation (up eight on the first quarter), who gain three to 30%; 13 for the Coalition (up four on the first quarter and down 30 on the 2025 election), who are steady on 21%; three for the Greens (up two on both the first quarter and the 2025 election result), who are up one to 13%; and six others (up one on the first quarter, but down six on 2025).

Compared with the first quarter result, One Nation is now rated the more likely winner in Labor-held Paterson, Eden-Monaro, Ballarat, McEwen, Petrie, Dickson, Moore, Pearce, Bass, Lyons and Lingiari, together with Liberal-held Cook; the Coalition has recovered front-runner position from One Nation in Casey, Flinders and Moncrieff, as has Rebekha Sharkie in Mayo; Liberal are now rated favourites over Labor in Chisholm; and the Greens are rated favourites in Labor-held Richmond and Brisbane. The survey period was May 27 to July 11; plentiful further detail is available from the pollster’s full report.

Also out yesterday was the weekly Roy Morgan result, which has Labor steady on 27.5%, One Nation up three to 25.5%, the Coalition down one to 22% and the Greens steady on 14%. Labor’s respondent-allocated two-party lead over One Nation narrows from 55-45 to 53.5-46.5, and its leads over the Coalition narrow from 56-44 to 54-46 on respondent-allocated preferences and from 53-47 to 52.5-47.5 on 2025 election preference flows. The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of 1643.

Secret Harbour by-election: August 29

The resurgent One Nation gets its first chance to flex its new muscles at a by-election for an historically safe Labor state seat in Western Australia.

I have a guide up for the Western Australian state by-election for Secret Harbour, where events have moved quickly since Paul Papalia announced his retirement on July 6. The by-election will be held on August 29, and candidates are already in place following the ballot paper draw on Tuesday. A remarkable field of 16 candidates has emerged, with six independents joining candidates from 10 of the state’s 13 registered parties. This is unlikely to dent perceptions of the by-election as a contest between Labor and One Nation, in an area whose low ethnic diversity and large trades workforce reflects that of the South Australian seats where One Nation emerged as a threat to Labor in March.

Labor’s candidate is Georgia Tree, a former staffer to local federal MP Madeleine King and government relations employee at Woodside. One Nation has endorsed Luke Herdegen, a gymnasium franchisee and former national weightlifting champion. Basil Zempilas’s contention that any defeat for Labor would a win for the Liberals said much about his party’s prospects, though it has a seemingly strong candidate in Ryan Robertson, a Rockingham councillor, real estate agent and former submariner, the latter a particular asset in a seat located near the HMAS Stirling naval base.

Non-federal polls: Resolve Strategic NSW and DemosAU ACT

New polls find the One Nation disruption at full force in New South Wales, but largely only a problem for the Liberals in the ACT.

I am late in noticing the Resolve Strategic poll of New South Wales state voting intention for Nine Newspapers, which follows the pollster’s usual pattern in combining responses from the state from the last two monthly national polls. One Nation is up three points to a new peak of 25%, while Labor returns to 29% after a three-point spike in March-April, the Coalition drops three to a new low of 23%, and the Greens gain one to 11%. Chris Minns’ lead over Kellie Sloane as preferred premier shifts from 38-18 to 36-16. The sample for the poll was 1100.

Also out this week was a rare Australian Capital Territory poll conducted by DemosAU, with results providing little indication that Labor’s 26-year hegemony is about to come to an end. Labor was on 32%, compared with 34.1% at the October 2024 election; the Liberals were on 21%, compared with 33.5%; and the Greens were on 11%, compared with 12.2%. One Nation, who did not contest the 2024 election, were on 14%. A generic independent category accounted for 19%, with 3% designated as others. When non-major party voters were asked who they were favoured to form government, 42% of the independent voters opted for Labor compared with only 18% for the Liberals. Chief Minister Andrew Barr was viewed positively by 33%, neutrally by 29% and negatively by 38%, while Liberal leader Mark Parton respectively scored 26%, 48% and 28%. The poll was conducted July 2 to 16 from a sample of 979.

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