However dubious the exercise might be, let it be noted that Roy Morgan has aggregated its polling from the supposed bellwether electorate of Eden-Monaro since Kevin Rudd became Labor leader last December, producing a result of 62-38 in Labor’s favour. As observed in the previous post, Liberal internal polling from this electorate was used by the Prime Minister to calm the party room’s nerves during its anti-climactic meeting on Tuesday morning.
Yes Adam, it was Craig Thomas. Obviously I was only half listening. Apologies.
41
Adam Says:
September 13th, 2007 at 6:48 pm
And here he is
http://www.qld.liberal.org.au/Members.aspx?MemID=116
The Qld Libs’ website is 200% better than any other Lib website.
The “local problems” flavour seems to be all they have to run with. How hooning and local traffic jams should influence things is mystifying….. all in all, the site is dreary but clean.
I think this blog is deteriorating into “Group think”.
It is becoming more and more a reinforcement of each others views. The ad was far from devastating, it was boring, it was not particularly negative and certainly wasn’t positive…..it definitely wasn’t devastating!
I think the Stairway to Kevin will be far more devastating (as I am sure a similar one about Howard will be). It was viewed by 2.2 million people and summarised with humour
-strip club
-stupid T-shirts
-ANZAC sunrise
-etc
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/chaser/war/video/default.htm
What the hell is that guy running for, the town council?
Ifonly, the term “Group think†is an oxymoron, when you think about it.
My view is that it’s okay to include that ad in between other positive messages for the future like early childhood education, health, IR etc. But Labor should not run that ad over and over and over again.
Re (15),
Seats with no Coalition candidate: Banks, Barton, Batman, Blaxland, Charlton, Cunningham, Fowler, Grayndler, Griffith (!), Lowe, Newcastle, Prospect, Rankin (Labor margin 2%), Reid, Scullin, Shortland, Watson, Werriwa.
Seats with no Labor candidate: Warringah
1. Werriwa is my seat ;-). Hey, I wasn’t going to vote for the Libs anyways so no worries there :). Seriously, though, this electorate is the safest Labor electorate in the state of NSW and probably one of the safest federally as well. As some might already know, this was Whitlam’s and Latham’s electorate. The only time is has ever had Liberals representing it was 1913-1914.
2. In the Victorian byelections this weekend, the Libs aren’t running candidates (saving resources for the Federal election). Seems that there isn’t a requirement that I am aware of that a party MUST run a candidate in any given seat if they don’t want to or can’t find someone.
[ I think this blog is deteriorating into “Group thinkâ€. ]
Ifonly,
Very few members of the “group” reacted to the comment about the ad so I don’t know why a few posts about an ad would seem to you to be a “group” who dominate this site. I also saw the ad but didn’t think much of it so I didn’t bother talking about it. I think you’re just miffed because the Stairway to Kevin skit is a non-event. The Chaser team made fun of both sides of politics. It’s hardly devastating.
Ifonly, I think you might be overstating the negative impact of Stairway to Kevin. It was funny, though a bit lame in parts, and yes, it does highlight those things you mention. But the thing is, no one actually cares about those things – if anything they make people like him more. At the moment, we’re all in love in with Kevin (whether or not you or I might like that), so for him any publicity like that (in front of 2 million people) is gold. It just further cements the growing consensus that Kevin Rudd will be PM.
This acclaim will turn sour eventually, of course, but it’s looking quite likely that Rudd will be a highly popular PM for his first few years, at least.
Hi Adam: I repeat my earlier comment on another thread for you…
There is some evidence about that the WA Liberals have a 3rd senate candidate in Michaelia Cash.
Eg see
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:st9bjkxxrWIJ:www.wabusinessnews.com.au/en-story/1/53145/Testing-times-call-for-diplomacy-in-View-from-the-Arch%26printstory%3Dy+%22Michaelia+Cash%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=au
Obviously they are hiding her along with Howard’s rabbits for the time being.
Ifonly i thought the advert was dull, however it was targeted at some demographic. These boys don’t throw money away.
Back to the matter at hand, I’m not that much can be read into this poll, but then I guess one shouldn’t read too much into any one poll. The thing is this poll, like pretty much every other one all year, puts us in landslide territory, and it’s the sheer mass of this kind of polling that gives this one some credence. There’s hardly been a bright spot for the Libs all year. They are holding up relatively well in the West (though still likely to lose Stirling & Hasluck on the back of a 4-5% swing), and there have been a few rumours about good polling in marginal seats and so on, but I haven’t seen any of it. It sounds suspiciously like leaks designed to rally the troops.
I am normally pessimistic about Labor’s chances, but I’m really running out of reasons to be so this time.
Hugo #59
You are right, i probably overstated the negative. It is tricky on what will work. I remember the phrase “a vote for John Howard is a vote for Peter Costello” and the response was “a vote for Simon Crean is a vote for Simon Crean”.
The Stairway to Keven managed to not labour any point, was funny but compressed a lot of concepts into 2 minutes.
Once policy details start coming, the trick will be to emphasis the negatives. In QT today Howard was asking in taking over hospitals would Rudd increase taxes to pay for it or take money from the states. He of course didn’t respond but once Kerry O starts asking he will have to have the right spin.
Gary at 45
“A Current Affair held a poll. 27,000 responses. 80% said changing to Costello would make them more likely to vote coalition. This poll wouldn’t have been hi jacked would it? Just a wild guess.”
That’s funny – the Skynews poll today, same question, was the exact opposite.About 80/20 the other way.
Guess the kindy comrades got Channel 9 and the tiny tories rogered Sky.
Ifonly at 53 – if it made some of the punters smile, it served the purpose for which it was made.
i dont believe Howard would lie about Eden Monaro to cling onto the leadership…surely not…Morgan must be mistaken
Ooops, ignore the last to Gary – Skynews actually asked “would it change the way you vote” and it was 20% yes, 80% no.
The Chaser hasn’t been funny all year. In any case I doubt it’ll have any impact on the election either way, most of the people who watch it will be decided already.
I’m still tipping a Coalition win. I don’t expect enough seats will fall at this election to change anything. We’ll all have to endure 3 more years of this arrogant, smarmy ‘team’.
I remain to be convinced that Morgan will have got anything like a representative sample in a seat as large and diverse as Eden-Monaro, but Labor would presumably still rather be 62-38 than 38-62.
Not hugely surprised that the Liberals are having trouble filling spots in safe Labor seats, but a Labor candidate for Warringah isn’t totally without a chance if the swing’s really on, even with zero local campaigning – Labor almost won Doncaster under similar circumstances on a similar swing in Victoria in 2002.
Of course, the main purpose of running in unwinnable seats is to maximise the Senate vote. Uncontested seats weren’t unheard of in the long-distant days of House-only elections (last seen in the 1960s, before governing parties realised that a standalone half-Senate election was an open invitation to a national protest vote).
OK, forgive my ignorance but if you have a private phone number can you still be called by polling ppl. is it only ppl with non-private numbers that get called?.. I have NFI.
[ They are holding up relatively well in the West (though still likely to lose Stirling & Hasluck on the back of a 4-5% swing) ].
Canning. Should fall.
Blair,
The last stand-alone House election was in 1972.
Just to add a quick note to some above points:
1) I was actually shocked to learn Rankin, my old electorate, was held by the ALP by only 2%. The area is very much ‘Labor heartland’ and Craig Emerson is a very good MP. I wouldn’t be surprised if seats like this account for a lot of the poll swing, I’d tip a swing of 15% there, just on gut feeling.
2) The Lib candidate for Griffith, my new electorate, seems to have a message of ‘Rudd isn’t interested in you now he’s leader, also he hasn’t done enough to fix local (read State and Local Govt.) issues’. I’m not well enough informed to know how much he actually has gotten done, but my impression of him before he assumed the leadership was that he was a solid, approachable local member.
No no no Andrew, John Howard wouldn’t lie about anything……
Hugo said
“I am normally pessimistic about Labor’s chances, but I’m really running out of reasons to be so this time.”
Let me help you out.
1) Very cashed up govt.
2) No morals so everything is possible (Maybe people in marginal seats should put their vote on ebay and see what it gets)
3) Some geo-political event that changes the landscape
4) Howard gets the boot next week and Costello has a freakishly good honeymoon
5) Rudd could get the flu mid campain
6) Newspoll 54/46 next monday night
Don’t give up – plenty to worry about between now and the election 🙂
Possum Comitatus I’ve seen a couple of these polls now and they say the same. I think the other was 17% would change vote. But which way?
There was a poll in which two thirds of voters said they wouldn’t vote for Peter Costello. It’s possible this confusing double-headed campaign could put voters off even more.
“Ooops, ignore the last to Gary – Skynews actually asked “would it change the way you vote†and it was 20% yes, 80% no.”
That would be 20% of Coalition supporters changing sides? In which case thats pretty nasty.
I doubt that 20% Labor voters will now jump to the Coalition because…they have half Howard half Costello, maybe at sometime. I doubt that the leadership affair and result is going to win them extra votes – it was simply an emergency fix.
————————————————————-
“A Current Affair held a poll. 27,000 responses. 80% said changing to Costello would make them more likely to vote coalition. This poll wouldn’t have been hi jacked would it? Just a wild guess.â€
They got 27,000 responses? hahahahahahaahahhahaha
AND it is simply not credible that Costello would increase the govts popularity by 80% if at all. The people sticking to the govt are mostly Howard supporters or Labor haters. Howards approval level at 50% can hardly mean that people would vote for Costello if he stepped down.
——————————————————–
Is the Friday Morgan a phone poll? If so an outlier of say 62/38 within MOE would send Howard scampering to the GG before the Cabinet could get their knives in. AND imagine the backbencher hand wringing, facing the green mile. Then again something like 55 would give them some hope.
Richard – I think the pollsters will answer this very question for us over the next few weeks, either through their headline results or dedicated polling questions.And lets face it, these online and phone in polls have more hijacks than your average episode of North Korean Idol
Very little movement in Portland seat by seat since midday. except that Maxine has racked up another 1.8% implied prob. since midday — she’s now a 48.9% chance in Bennelong. Ryan went the other way, but that’s probably a rection to a fairly strong plunge on Lab yesterday.
I think the national market is being influenced by the Bookies trying to balance their books after a strong surge yo LAB in the past few days caused some of them to close their books for a while. Portland ratched the Coalition price quite a lot, to be more in line with the others, while Centrebet eased them.
I suppose the money is waiting for the Morgan poll.
BTW, i don’t think the Lib insiders can be punters. Eden Monaro, Bendigo and Kingston have got to be terrific value, if their polling leaks are to be believed
In case you missed today’s Bill Leake: “United I Stand”.
Simply a must for Dolly watchers.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/opinion/cartoons/
Speaking of shonky online/phone polls Ninemsn had a doozy yesterday.
The question was “Would you vote for the coalition under Peter Costello”.
I first noticed at 8pm at which time the figures were Yes 87,000 and No 60,000. This surprised me greatly in terms of both the size of the response and the fact that Yes was the more popular. But that was nothing to what came next. I kept refreshing every few minutes in which time the Yes vote went up by 4-5,000 while the No vote went up by 70 – 80. By 9:30pm the figures were Yes 219,000 No 62,000. So in the ninety minutes from 8pm – 9.30pm the “votes” were Yes 132,000 No 2,000. Couldn’t they have have made it slightly more realistic.
Then they turned the robot off because in the following 90 minutes to 11pm the votes were Yes 1,085 No 1,683 which was probably about right.
By 7am though Yes had garnered a further 66,000 compared with 2000 No votes so the hijackers were busy again during the night.
Why do they insist on making fools of themselves by having “polls” like this.
Unicorn in all the times I looked at it I never saw the yes outnumber the noes. It was always no well in front.
CTEP
It’s a pity I can’t attach the screen dump that I have, taken at 10:52pm that shows Yes 219695 No 63810
I think the Morgan Eden-Monaro poll is a publicity stunt by Morgan, to get a media run after Howard mentioned the seat in the party room. That’s not to question the accuracy of the figures – if they’re true, it would convert EM from a marginal Liberal to a safe Labor seat in one hit. That would surprise me, particularly as regional seats tend to swing less dramatically than outer metro seats.
But I think by far the most interesting aspect of the poll is that 40 per cent of voters thought health was the most important issue, and they overwhelming thought Labor could handle health best. This electorate does have a lot of retirees on the south coast, and the hospitals there haven’t kept up with population growth. But one could argue that that’s the state Labor government’s fault.
So there are reasons why health is such a big issue in EM, but I suspect it’s big everywhere, that Labor “owns” health, and that all the coalition can do to counter that is bag state governments.
Twice as many people in EM are concerned about health than WorkChoices. There are very interesting implications here for all those other marginal seats, in Qld and northern NSW, which have a lot of retirees.
Well done, Dr Good. I can further reveal that Ms Cash is an employment and industrial relations lawyer and the daughter of state upper house MP George Cash, and that she won preselection ahead of another lawyer, Michael Mischin. Financial journalist Nick Bruining, who was mentioned in earlier discussion, was a late withdrawal after it became clear he wouldn’t win. Also in the field was Matt Brown, thwarted nominee for Tangney.
Boll at 340
“Is there any truth to the rumour that the great Angels classic, with full crowd participation, will be played on the last day parliament sits this year?”
What, Dolly’s going to play ‘Love Takes Care’ to Johnny?
Remind me not to eat
Thank you Albert F (72) for those words of discouragement. I feel much less sanguine about the election now, which is as it sould be.
Ooops – wrong thread.
Mea Culpa Muma Mia!
EC
Great link. I shouldn’t be, but I am still surprised that Howard forced the party to keep him or have a bloody leadership battle. I would have thought the after been told over half the cabnet wanted him to step down he would have realised this was his last chance to go with good grace.
Its gone now – all exits from here are undignified.
Thankyou Dr Good! 🙂
The Cashes are an old WA Liberal family. She’s probably George Cash’s daughter and Earl Cash’s granddaughter. Or maybe’s George’s wife?
The new ALP ad about the liberal party leadership transition is a waste of money. The people already know that eventually Costello will replace Howard presuming the coalition wins the election. It didn’t bother anyone the last time when they ran similar ads stating a vote for Howard is a vote for Costello.
They would have been better off spending the money on something related to workchoices, education, health, climate change or interest rates.
People might not like Costello but they are used to him. The possibilty of him being Prime Minister someday has been staring us in the face for 11 years. Every other day the Howard says he will make a great PM and that he is the obvious person to replace him.
The people who are flooding the switchboard to vote that they’d rather Costello than Howard as PM are probably the same folk who flooded the switchboard years ago to say they wanted Joh for PM over Howard, viz Labor staffers.
They have access to free phones (well, taxpayer-funded phones), and the word probably went out to put in the calls to the poll. You can set the phone on “redial” and do it for an hour. That’s the only way to explain the huge numbers.
It’s in Labor’s interest to undermine Howard in every possible way.
No doubt Liberal staffers would do the same to undermine a poll on Rudd.
These phone-in polls mean nothing, no matter who conducts them or what the question is. The only way you’ll get a flood of calls all in one direction is if it’s a plan to rort the polls, and the only people who can afford to make the calls, and are sufficiently motivated, are those using government-funded phones (and that includes the ALP).
Hardly anyone actually wanted Joh as Prime Minister, and the only real support for him ever showed up in phone-in polls.
She’s a partner at Freehills, another smarmy Liberal corporate lawyer no doubt. Give me Kevin Reynolds any day. (Ooops bias 🙁 )
She is indeed George Cash’s daughter, Adam – see my previous comment.
Where did you glean this fact, Wm?
I think Labor’s ad is a good move. It’s nothing flash, but it capitalises on the news of the day, and capitalises on the confusion which many voters must feel about what’s going on in the Liberal Party. It’s cheap, it’s topical, and will probably only run for a short time.
The best thing the Libs have going for them is Howard’s tenacity in leadership, so it’s in Labor’s interest to undermine it. I would expect some positive Labor ads soon, probably on housing issues. But, as I mentioned in my earlier post, some health ads could be advantageous. Putting dental treatment under Medicare would be expensive, but a huge vote-winner…just floating ths one…I certainly would expect Labor has something or other planned in the region of the tooth.
Adam, from various articles in The West Australian at the time of the preselection in late May, unearthed on Factiva (which doesn’t seem as responsive to searches as it used to be).
Always treat internal party polling for individual seats with a lot of caution – I speak from painful experience.
Daughter of George Cash – that’d be the former Stirling City Councillor who fingered former Premier (and jailbird) Ray O’Connor for being the alleged bag man for Bond Corp…hmmm but Cash wasn’t that bad in the Leg Council – had SOME integrity…
IMHO I thought the Chaser were very good – everybody where I was last night (Coogee Legions Club) sat and watched and laughed their heads off, ESPECIALLY at the APEC stunt. The point about the show was that the APEC stunts made fun of the whole “fear is the key” election strategy employed by Howard over the years. I’m not suggesting that terrorsts don’t exist, but lets remember they’ve been around for a fair old time, and most people just get on with their lives (think London in the 80’s – I remember, I was there). The fact that $160m was spent and these guys got through when they didn’t expect to showed the fallacy of placing your faith in “expenditure=success”. And I thought “Stairway to Kevin” was kinda cute (if you’re a fan of 70’s rock…showing my age…).
My point is, if a bunch of people (some political, some not) thought Chaser last night was funny, pointed and a talking point, then it had an impact – while it spoofed Rudd, it essentially mocked Howard and what he stands for.
Other than Youtube, has the ALP’s new ad based on yesterday’s leadership news appeared anywhere in the MSM? I don’t watch much network TV, but others may have.
So the preselection (or endorsement as I think the Libs prefer to say) was in May, and it’s taken until September for this to become known, and there is nothing at the WA Lib website about it. Bizarre.