Newspoll: 56-44

We’re apparently back to the routine of fortnightly Tuesday Newspoll surveys. Tomorrow’s effort shows Labor’s two-party lead steady on 56-44 and their primary vote up from 46 per cent to 48 per cent. The increase comes at the expense of minor parties and the Greens, with the Coalition vote unchanged at 39 per cent. Also featured are questions on the government’s intervention into Aboriginal communities (strong thumbs up) and whether troops should be returned from Iraq (two bob each way). The Prime Minister has at least narrowed the preferred leader deficit to 42-43, his best result since February.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

275 comments on “Newspoll: 56-44”

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  1. Yes, funny how the Australian for 2 days running has ignored that 56-44 2PP poll figure – a case of cherry picking particular bits to suit one’s argument.
    You wonder what Howard has promised Murdoch – a further relaxation of media ownership laws after the election?

  2. Dennis’ latest ramble is unnecessary and immature. William, Peter, Chris and all the other fine bloggers out there, keep up the good work. It’s you guys who make this site (and others like it) so enjoyable for the rest of us!

  3. Re: the preferred prime minister business:

    Wouldn’t such polls be useless in a country with the Westminster system? Seems to me like such polls are an American import to make the prime ministerial contest seem more “presidential” in a U.S. sense.

  4. Just done a a comment moderation cleanout, so a warm welcome for new comments from Richard Jones, Martin B, Haiku, Marky Mark Says, Nhullubuy and Mr Squiggle. Apologies for the delay.

  6. I just wish the PM would call the election.
    The Lowest poll I have seen for the ALP has been 53-47(Galaxy)
    The Highest is 61-39 (Morgan)
    From talking to friends and work colleagues 56-44 to the ALP seems about right and I do not think that the polls will differ too much until the election is called.
    The Internet is going to play a bigger part in this campaign than ever before.The days of the MSM ruling the roost are over.More power to blogs like these,crikey,mumble,oz politics etc.At least it (the web) provides more of a forum for real debate.Not just something that is spun to suit the owners(editors) point of view or interest.

  7. William, could you establish a separate thread for people who want to bitch endlessly about The Australian, and keep this thread for discussion of the election?

  8. In politics they say keep your enemies close- hence I keep reading The Australian newsapaper, its politics is funnier than the cartoons section and I can do my bit for the environment (save toilet paper) at the same time.

  10. While your there Adam, can I ask for your opinion on the prospects of having to wait for WA results to get an election outcome. History says no, but what do I know (be kind, I have an outragous hangover).

  12. haha too funny.. I think scrutinising other political analysts’ work is all part of the blogging experience. I for one would freely criticise any commentator who spins a poll result Labor’s way when the polls are clearly against Labor… But that hasn’t happened in about a year now, at either state or federal level.

  13. Has a Rudd supporter can I susgest that if the left is going to have people standing on City street corners attacking Howard please make sure you know what you are talking about for not being willing or able to discuss what you are on about could damage the ALP’s changes.

    I asked a Lefty a simple question and the silly boy couldn’t answer the question, now if I was a swing voter tonight I would be voting for the Liberals.

    At least he was polite.

  14. Thanks William. The comments threads here are always interesting, and mostly civil and on-topic. Thinking about low polls and election dates, and APEC: what about a Howard retirement just after APEC?

    He enjoys the world media spotlight, gets to stand next to W wearing a driza-bone, akubra, RMs and a Ken Done shirt, then retires, possibly due to Janette’s health. His only election loss is 1987, and that was Joh’s fault. Dennis et al (sorry Adam) write the history of the Master (who still might have won, had he stayed on) – with a bit of work, they might even start to use the words “undefeated”. Costello tries to get whatever traction he can before calling an election one month later, which he loses to Rudd.

    Upside: schmoozing with world leaders, and retirement in time for the Rugby World Cup final, summer, cricket season, more time with the family and kids etc. Costello’s loss further enhances the legend. Lots of people on this site and elsewhere p*ssed off that they didn’t get to vote him out.

    Downside: gets called a coward, but Dennis and co will fight that one hard. Costello loses (see upside above). Haunted by thought that maybe he might have won.

    But come September, if the primary vote is still low, surely it’s a tempting option?

  15. # Karma Policeman Says:
    July 11th, 2007 at 6:11 pm

    Re: the preferred prime minister business:

    Wouldn’t such polls be useless in a country with the Westminster system?

    Not completely. If the rating would seem to indicate the alternative Prime Minister is less popular than herpes, I think it’s fair to assume that that would limit the chances of the Opposition gaining government.

    However, less than a 10% difference doesn’t really seem to effect the primary vote much, if at all.

    And as it happens, Rudd is currently very far indeed from being political herpes.

    Seems to me like such polls are an American import to make the prime ministerial contest seem more “presidential” in a U.S. sense.

    Possibly. But I tend to think it’s more a natural product of the electronic media, for better or worse. They like to quickly boil things down to simple choices. Example: instead of asking the question “Which party bests represents your interests”, the ask “Who do u prefer? Howard or Rudd?”

  17. STROP, it is perfectly possible that we will be waiting for the results from WA to see who has won the election. If Labor wins (say) 17 seats east of the rabbit-proof fence, but then loses Swan and Cowan, then Bob Katter will have the balance of power.

  18. It would serve you lot right in the East if WA kept you waiting for a result, cause we usually know the result from having a looksy at Tasmania even before how booths close!

  19. I’d say Howard is quittiing is unlikely more likely a Francis Urqhart – The Final Cut scenario given the particular cunning of the Rodent.

  21. Got to mention the Australian again (sorry, Adam).

    Did anyone else notice the juxtaposition of the webpage headlines “Protestant Faith not a Proper Church”- Vatican- followed immediately by “Catholics find Faith in Rudd”?

    Am I being paranoid (and some say I am), and is this a pathetic attempt to raise the implication that Protestant=Howard, Catholic=Rudd?

    If so, this is the most disgusting and contemptible action by any Australian newspaper in the last 70 years. You would have to go back to the days of Mannix to see any similar religion/party divide.

    I have no truck with any religion per se, but the last thing we need in this country is a division along secterian lines.

    What have we (or more particularly the Australian) learnt from the experiences of travelling along that path in Ireland and Iraq?

    Are there no limits?

    OK, I’m paranoid.

  22. Hi Black Jack,

    The change is to the assets test taper rate. Without going into too much detail, the level of assets a pensioner can have before losing the gov-t pension completely is effectively doubled after 20 Sept. There are going to be two areas of impact:

    1) any pensioner currently getting the pension at a level somewhere below the maximum due to the assets they hold won’t have to do a thing, nix, nada etc. Just sit tight and more money will come through when the taper rate change re-values thier pension entitlement.

    2) any retiree getting zero dollars from the gov-t currently because of the amount of thier assets should be doing thier sums right now and thinking about applying. Basically if they were exlcuded before, they may be eligible now, and alot of them will be.

    Overall, I think this is something entirely different from the once off $500 payment mentioned in an earlier post. This is a major structural change to governemnt pension and its potential is being ignored, maybe because it came from the 06 budget, not the 07. My guess is that Lib pollsters will be watching this group of voters like a mad scientists with too much coffee on board.

  23. Hi Strop, Hi Garry Bruce,

    Thanks for the notes. Wasn’t aware of the single parent thing. Still wondering what puts a voter segment into a party’s back pocket? Is it 56-44?

    By the way , read over my post last night and I promise to learn how to sepll proper nect time
    🙂

  24. Dennis Shanahan has cut off comments on his blog site after only 16 comments. He has had some sneering comments about PhDs. Apparently The Australian have contacted Mumble.com and told Peter Brent that they will be going after him.

    The Australian and Shanahan are just a pathetic bunch of creeps. For Christ sake how biased does The Australian have to get before it disappears up its own arse-hole?

    There are times when I just despair for Australia.

  25. “Am I being paranoid (and some say I am), and is this a pathetic attempt to raise the implication that Protestant=Howard, Catholic=Rudd?”

    Even if it were, I doubt highly it would take, for the reasons you mentioned.

  26. STROP,

    I’ve never been a smoker of anything. I’ve never understood it. Indeed, in my university days, I was so naive that I did not realise that the smokers around campus were not all smoking tobacco.

    My editorials of he future are not predictions. I do not know exactly how long Kevin Rudd will be PM. I am just having some fun with the way The Australian would undoubtedly deal with him if he were.

    Adam,

    I have to read The Australian. We all need something to annoy us. Besides, it is a really informative newspaper, as well as being entertaining.

    Drop by,

    I am not by nature conspiratorially inclined. But if you think in guerrilla warfare terms, a Liberal platoon on The Australian blogs manages to engage a whole battalion of Labor supporters who would otherwise have to leave their desktops and engage with potentially winnable voters in the real world.

  28. Shanahan’s blog post is the most honest he has ever made. He said that he doesn’t have the time to study the figures and explain what claims they actually support. Instead he just presents whatever stands out to him, irrespective of statistical validity. This is what satirist Stephen Colbert calls “truthiness”; things someone knows to be true because their gut instinct says they are true.

  30. With apologies to Adam, I doubt the Australian pores over Mumble.com (more’s the pity). But they are at loggerheads with crikey.com, and Peter Brent’s witty little contributions there would be noticed.

    Eg: ‘Great News for Howard: Newspoll Shows Landslide to Labor’
    http://www.crikey.com.au/Politics/20070710-Great-news-for-Howard-Newspoll-shows-Labor-landslide-.html

    That they’d also target Charles Richardson is revealing. Why not Christian Kerr? Might be that Kerr is a neo-liberal.

  32. The 2004 Coalition 2PP vote in WA increased 3.78 percent to 55.40%, the second highest Coalition State 2PP result (the highest was in Qld: 57.09), almost 3.0% higher than the Coalitions national 2PP result (52.47). Labor’s 2PP result (44.60) in WA was the second lowest behind Qld (42.91) and not much better than in SA (45.64) compared to Labors National 2PP result (47.26).
    The Coalition 2004 First preferences vote in WA increased 6.74 % (48.76), well above the National Coalition First preference increase of 3.67% (46.36). In QLD the Coalition First preference result improved 3.56% (49.16) and in SA it improved 2.50% (48.42).
    Labors First Preference result (34.75) in WA was the lowest ahead of QLD (34.78) and things were not much better in SA (36.75) where Labors First preference result improved in 2004.
    Labors 2004 national First preference result (37.64) compared to the Coalition (46.36) is a big margin to deal with. The national 2PP margin (52.74-47.26) looks better for Labor, mathematically at least.
    It is clear, as most here have already accepted/stated, that the critical State results will be in SA, QLD and WA, notwithstanding the popular view that you must win in NSW to win Government. SA and QLD are looking very good for Labor if the polls are any guide, so the big question may well be, what of WA ? And worse, how much nail biting can we expect whilst Labor election strategists wait for those bloody WA booths to close and sent results across the ‘rabbit fence’.? If, as Adam stated, “it is perfectly possible that we will be waiting for the results from WA to see who has won the election” in the context of my specific question, images of the grey haired maverick (Bob Katter) are going to plague me for the next three months. Ewww !!!

  33. Chris Curtis Says:

    July 11th, 2007 at 8:49 pm
    STROP,

    I’ve never been a smoker of anything. I’ve never understood it. Indeed, in my university days, I was so naive that I did not realise that the smokers around campus were not all smoking tobacco.

    Yeah I realise your postings can be very tongue in cheeky, very funny at times. Keep it up, your a much better read than that newspaper were not sposed to say much more about for awhile, lol.

  37. Half Senate Election

    Re the Senate, could Rudd call a half senate election if bills are blocked.
    I understand Gough was going to Kerr to put this to him when Kerr got in first. So could Rudd call one before the new senators take up there positions in July.

    Fulvio

    Interesting re the religion angle, during Hawkes time the papers made much of Hawke being agnostic and Hayden being atheist. I would say you are not paranoid, just the conservatives getting desperate as they have been lately.

    I think you will see a sign of real desperation when Abbott starts talking about restricting the advertising of junk food targeted at children.

    Strop

    Recent Westpoll showed at a state government level labor 56.3 to libs 43.7, I think some of this will translate federally and stick by labor picking up 4 and holding their own

  38. If we see Abbott saying anything resembling sensible, we’ll know the Coalition has reached the bottom of its list of stratagems 🙂

  40. STROP, if the ALP comes close to winning – but WA stops this from happening – I can not describe to you how much pain I’d feel about such a prospect. I’d take an irrational disliking of WA for the next year or so just to make the pain feel a bit better. Sort of like a “compensation drug for the next 3 more regressive years”.

    But I’m traditionally a pessimist anyway. Queensland is driven so strongly by the conservatives that I can’t really imagine it shifting from this. Queensland is basically Australia’s version of Texas – one of the strongest conservative states in the federation.

    I never actually knew about WA’s conservativeness until this year. This actually gives me more pessimism though. What’s the likelihood that these strong conservative states could swing to the Labor party? As mentioned somewhere, there are the swing voters, and then there are the voters that, no matter how bad a party’s policies are, will always support them. I just get an impression that Queensland is one of those states.

    16 seats has never felt so hard. The polls are going well for Labor, but there is always the likelihood that they’ll do a 1998 where they came to almost a smidgen of becoming government, but losing out because of it.

    56-44 however is a very good figure though and the fact that it’s been consistent might be a sign that the country really does want a change. I’m almost excited about election day as I am about Harry Potter coming out next Saturday! Okay, maybe I’m more excited about the latter! 😉

  42. Sean, if there’s one thing Queenslanders do well it’s getting behind a fellow Queenslander. For that reason I think they are looking past their conservative tendancies and have moved their votes to Rudd (although for an ALP leader he is pretty conservative).

    Howard tried to be pretend he was more of a Queenslander than Kevin (I still can’t believe he did that!), and just ended up looking like a total idiot. He won’t win them back up there now unless he brings back the death penalty or something truly drastic.

  46. This was the best bit:

    As a newspaper we don’t know who we will support at the federal election.

    That line immediately caused me to burst out laughing. I only stopped for fear I may have awoken the rest of the household.

  47. Well, I’m still waiting. That editorial still didn’t explain how Howard won the election in 1996 with a lower prefered P.M. rating than Keating. Opinion peices in the previous two editions argued that there is a direct correlation between the two, when 1996 suggests that this isn’t always so.

    I think it is funny that The Australian put blogs on their website in an attempt to be all hip and trendy, but now they are complaining about some of the feedback they are getting on those blogs.

  48. this is extrodinary stuff

    an Editorial is a national newspaper devoted to humiliated a very small clique of online ‘psephologist’s’ with a very limited, if any at all, impact on public sentiment.

    good grief. What are they scared of ?

    and they use the term Bias!!!!

    and they mean the PMs 12th man Mitchell and Shanahanahan.

  50. Arbie Jay,
    The Senate normally has a fixed term. In normal circumstances, the term of the senators starts on the 1 July after their election and lasts 6 years. The election can only be held within 12 months before the start of the term. The next senate election after this one will be for senators elected in 2004 who started their term on 1/7/05. Therefore the next half senate election can not be held until some time after 1/7/10 and those senators will not take their places until 1/7/11.
    Whitlam’s situation was extraordinary as the election of 18/5/74 was a double dissolution. Under the constitution, after a DD, the junior senators (those with a 3 year term) start their terms on the 1 July before the election. In this case their term was deemed to have started on 1/7/73. A half senate election could therefore be held anytime after 1/7/75 and the senators would have taken their seats on 1/7/76.
    In any case Whitlam’s popularity was so low by 11/75 that it was highly unlikely that a half senate election would have given him a majority – it just wasn’t going to work.

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