We still need Newspoll to seal the deal, but it does seem that normality has returned to the opinion poll landscape: we are seeing Labor with slight to moderate leads plus a few per cent extra from Roy Morgan, just like old times. As it does each Friday, Morgan has published a telephone survey from 614 responses (slightly higher than usual), which shows Labor down from 46 per cent to 43.5 per cent on the primary vote – 3.5 per cent lower than any Morgan result since January. However, the Coalition haven’t budged from 40 per cent. The remainder has gone to minor parties and returned as preferences, leaving the two-party preferred result steady at 55-45.
and stephen regarding the so caled dirty tricks campaign i note you dont say anything about a major big business saying in there dirty tricks campaign about coercing labour to do their bidding or else? it goes both ways u know .libs are not squecky clean
Just saw AC Neilsen on ABC News. ALP 57, Coalition 43. Primary vote steady at 48-39.
Please, no personal attacks or rubbish like that here. I only just got into the other sites blog thing a week ago and all of a sudden the guy running it decided to close down the section where people can debate stuff. I would hate to lose another because of the yobs who think there is something to be gained by being an ass.
“But the smart stuff is being drowned out by a fierce, bullying, often witless tone of intolerance that has overtaken the left-wing sector of the blogosphere. Anyone who doesn’t move in lockstep with the most extreme voices is savaged and ridiculed—especially people like me who often agree with the liberal position but sometimes disagree and are therefore considered traitorously unreliable” (Joe Klein: Beware The Blogers Bile: Time Magazine”).
Well said STROP. This site is the best of its type anywhere and now the only one carrying a blog. Personal insults on other bloggers is not needed and we should all support William to keep this a number 1 site. If people have opinions or beliefs point to the errors in a constructive way rather than calling people names in some school yard tantrum.
Charlie Says:
June 16th, 2007 at 6:39 pm
Bill, if the Greens do not direct their preferences to Labor in all marginal seats they will lose my vote in the Senate. It’s all very well to maintain one’s ideological purity, but I feel you and your party are starting to lose sight of the bigger picture and this is something that comes across very clearly in my many discussions with people of all political colours.
Can you elaborate Charlie? As for my preferences the ALP candidate has not contacted me for a chat while the Lib MP has. The ALP should not assume that i will come along as a slave to them. I have not moved away from the bigger picture but i believe the ALP has. I mean come on negotiating with right wing FF?
57-43.
again. stagnation.
Gary Bruce Says:
June 16th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
I get the sense there is a bit of wishful thinking on the split thing Bill. You mentioned this some time ago. It would help you politically wouldn’t it? How much are you promoting it at these meetings?
It would be advantageous for the Greens if the ALP split but i do not promote it. I don’t need too its festering already
Yes, I can elaborate Bill. Howard is not the enemy, not the ALP. For all your dissatisfaction with its policies in recent years (and I share many of them no doubt) it is better than the alternative. Realistically, the Greens are not going to win any House of Reps seats. There are two reasons for you to run in the lower house – to maximise your Senate vote and to harvest preferences for the ALP to tip the Coalition out of power. The more that you and your party colleagues focus on Labor, the easier it is going to be for the Libs. Your obsession with Labor forgetting which side it’s supposed to be on runs the risk of leading you into the very same trap.
Further, as much as I can’t stand Family First, if dealing with them can win government for the ALP it simply has to be done. Any Green who is sincere about wanting to see change in this country would agree. As far as Labor – and the broader left, for that matter – is concerned, the Senate can wait. There’ll be a double dissolution next year if Labor wins and that will be the Greens’ biggest opportunity yet. In the meantime, if a couple of distasteful decisions have to be made we all need to suck it up.
You don’t need to take this advice, but you’d be sensible if you did. Both current polling (showing a booming Labor vote and stagnant Greens vote) and my own experiences support the argument.
57-43. I can’t read why, but from what I heard today, I am changing my previous position on the Kirribilli thing, and am figuring out that it could potentially do worse for Howard if he is a repeat offender. If anything, it will buy both Howard and Rudd some time.
From other polls:
Imagine locking Western Australians and Tasmanians in a room together.
My post above should read ‘Howard IS the enemy, not the ALP’.
howard is the enemy, ministers in the liberal party refer to their government as the howard government not the liberal party, an ex. of this is the offical letter of veteran affairs sent to the elderly regarding the $500 bonus, it states this bonus is from the howard government.
during the last 11 years the libs have become howards and i want howard to lose so that the liberal party can become the liberal party again
Thanks Charlie for your thoughts. Yes we run lower house candidates for Senate votes but myself personally am running to promote Green principles in Kingston and to give workers an alternative to the right wing ALP candidate or if my vote is high then it gives Rishworth the maneuverability to show that the original ALP promises on IR is important to the electorate. I do not see myself as an ALP preference candidate but rather a Green Union RANK & FILE candidate. If i thought i was being an ALP lackey or stooge i would be working for Rishworth rather than going through the stress of being a small party candidate.If voters put the ALP number 2 all the better but if i see the ALP back down on any issue that affects the electorate i will jump on it. I have been getting an extremely positive response everywhere i go and everyone i talk to. It does help to belong to some of the community groups in Kingston and believe in their goals rather that turning up to gain votes.
BTW charlie your post are always informative and some on here could take a leaf out of your book in how you conduct yourself. Personal attacks by some actually don’t bother me but it is nice to see many discuss topics beliefs and issues in a friendly way.
Michael,
Can you list the “socially conservative†ALP candidates who received Family First preferences for the House of Representatives in 2004? I thought that FF preferenced the coalition in almost 100 per cent of the seats.
All posters,
I am concerned, like others, that the demise of OzPolitics Blog will see the worst offenders on that site migrate here. There has already been a rise in the temperature of debate that bodes ill for the future of this site. I follow four rules in posting:
1. I never ascribe motives to fellow posters.
2. I never make assumptions about fellow posters.
3. I never abuse fellow posters.
4. I never respond to abuse.
I think the last rule is particularly helpful, because abuse by A at one level leads to an abusive response by B at a higher level, which leads to A hitting back at an even higher level – and then you don’t even have a discussion about politics, just childish name-calling that would have earnt a detention if it had continued in any of my classes, not that I have ever taught students who were as abusive as some of the posters on OzPolitics.
There is no point in partisan rants on this site. Most of us try to stand back and adopt at least some objectivity in putting our views about the state of politics rather than as advocates of particular causes, though the latter obviously colours the former. It is possible to state your case forcefully without descending into viciousness. If you are unable to do so, go away.
Bravo Chris
Yes, I believe they did in the 2004 election. The recent SA election was quite different though, and I believe that is the policy they now follow.
Nice to see some self-spanking here, before, like rowdy children, we get out of hand!
Well there are plenty of politics forums on the web now to take the heat from PB and soak up some of the craziness, just click on my name for an example.
I’m curious about the Nielsen results – does this mean the Galaxy was an outlier?
Newspoll is out
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21922704-601,00.html
“According to the latest Newspoll survey, conducted on the weekend exclusively for The Australian, Labor’s primary vote slumped six percentage points to 46 per cent and the Coalition’s rose from 35 to 39 per cent.
But the two-party-preferred support, based on distribution of preferences at the last election, still has Labor in a position to wipe out the Coalition at the next election, 56 to 44 per cent. ”
Shamaham is talking it up like anything
Arch Bevis got FF preferences in Brisbane.
Jacinta Collins got FF preferences in Vic.
In the recent Vic election, there were two seats where Family First preferenced Labor first – Monbulk and Pascoe
Vale.
In the seat of Mildura FFP preferenced the sitting independent member Russell
Savage first.
Where there were sitting Nationals members FFP preferenced the Nationals
ahead of the Liberals – Benalla, Shepparton, Rodney, Gippsland South, Murray
Valey, Swan Hill, and Lowan.
In seats where the Liberals and Nationals ran against each other but it was
NOT a Nationals held seat FFP preferenced the Liberals first, with the
exception of Morwell where we put Nationals first.
In the Qld State Election, FFP preferenced the ALP in:
• Burdekin
• Glasshouse – although FFPdid not field any HTV booth workers in this seat.
• Mudgeeraba
• Logan
• Ipswich West
This info is all on the web.
So, there is nothing unusual in the ALP preferencing the FFP. Makes sense, in fact — FFP voters follow How to Vote cards about 4-5x more closely than Greens voters. A Morgan poll before the last Vic election asked voters if they followed their HTV cards – 51% of FFP voters said they followed it down the line, while a pathetic 17% of Greens voters said they followed their HTV. Even with a slightly lower primary vote, FFP voter preferences are far more valuable & reliable to the ALP if we want to pick up a few more marginal seats.
This may be just my view, but I seem to think that public perception of the FFP has changed a fair bit in the last 2 years. Fielding has generally voted quite moderately and sensibly, and is far from being a ‘radical right wing nut’ the Green’s campaign originally warned.