Newspoll has been sprung on us a day early, showing Labor’s two-party lead widening to 56-44 from 55-45 a fortnight ago. Labor’s primary vote is up from 47 per cent to 48 per cent, and the Coalition’s is down from 41 per cent to 39 per cent. Kevin Rudd has taken a slight hit on his satisfaction rating, down from 65 per cent to 62 per cent.
Helen Coonan was a shambles on 7.30 report, Solar Thermal providing base load power.
Oh dear, things are not getting any better for the Libs.
Re Mercurius @ 398
Let’s not get nasty. There’s no reason that relying on political experience to suggest that blue ribbon seats will not fall at this election is out-of-the-world stuff. I always value the input of people that have political experience. Of course I might not always agree, but as Julia Gillard would say “it’s just another voice”.
I’m actually surprised people are entertaining the notion at all. Of course it’s possible that the seats will fall, just so unlikely to make discussing it a bit of a waste of time. I’d imagine we’d react the same way if the Liberal Party started talking about the possibility of ultra-safe Labor seats moving to the Coalition.
As to any suggestion that we should praise Howard for WorkChoices I’m still to hear a good reason why we should forgive Howard for introducing a scheme that he knew would put Australians at risk of greater exploitation. He was warned what would happen and didn’t listen. When Joe Hockey says “It was never the intention that [bad agreements] would become the norm” he is accepting that under their scheme it did become the norm. Yet we should forgive them now? We should trust them to listen when they’re warned in the future? Why?
GG once again you prove to be a complete hypocrite…so its wrong for Howard to use taxpayers money for television ads but its ok for State Labor Governments to do it and for Paul Keating to spend $100 million in his last year in office cmon give us a break…oh and Rudd’s proposal is just a non-core promise…
Getting Warringah GG is like the Libs winning the seat of Batman get real it aint gonna happen mate no matter your hubris or the polls…anybody who thinks Labor will get not only a primary vote more than 10% higher than in 2004 and a 2PP of more 9% has got to be kidding themselves….
“the swing is coming from liberal voters, the more liberal voters in the electorate the bigger the swing.”
Well, yes, this often happens when there’s a swing to Labor…the alternative is for Labor voters to swing more strenuously towards themselves.
Julie. I find that a pretty poor response since you went public with your allegations, I believe you should publically defend them.
I am still highly offended!
By the way Glen, I’m in the seat of Batman. No sign of a swing against Marn Fergs’n yet, but I’ll let you know if I detect one.
Glen, to turn your argument on its head, so it’s wrong for the state governments to use taxpayers money to advertise but not for the Howard Government?
Of course, to an objective viewer both are wrong. I somehow doubt anyone will be making their vote at this election or any based on the use of political advertising paid by taxpayers. However I’d say we should all be unanimous in calling for an end to any blatantly political advertising that serves only political parties.
I assume you’ll be fine with the political advertising when a Labor Government is in power federally? No? Then make a stand on it now.
Also in the words of Lenin “Shoot more professors!”
Glen,
My point about the advertising blitz is that it is a complete and utter waste of money because it has not changed opinion one iota.
The morality of spending shit loads of money on party based advertising is one for everybody to consider.
As for hypocrisy, I think we all have it. What do you do to deal with your hypocrisy in your life Glen?
As for Warringah, well Possum’s never lie.
Re the booing at last night’s Grand Final, it pays to remember that if there is a team that “supports” the Liberals, it would be Manly. Of course, the real poster child for the Liberals in the NRL would be those continual failures from the Shire, the Cronulla Gummy Sharks. So a resounding boo-fest from Manly fans would not have given JWH a good feeling. Still, it would have been a good deal worse had the GF involved South Sytdney and Newcastle. Then it would have been ugly beyond belief.
Antonio im not holding my breath for a swing in Batman in fact you’d have to pay a Liberal to stand as a candidate in that seat…
Not im saying that you cannot just bag Howard for doing this either its within the rules or it isnt you cant just pick on Howard because you arent a Liberal supporter…if by your logic its ok for State labor Governments to do this then i dont see why its not for Howard to.
CTEP its something you have to expect Governments to do its called incumbency and you have to deal with the consequences you may not like it but you’ve got to accept it as a hard reality.
i do not have a problem with most of the work choices advertising as it can be seen to be advertising a service and changes to the law, but where it is wrong is where they do not present information but propoganda – such as the “my brother just got one of those AWA’s” or “higher wages – everyone wants that”. Those parts of the ads are purely party political and go to the policy and ideology. The ads that say “ring in if you have a problem” etc are fine.
The climate change ads fit somewhere in that as well, except why advertise on television to turn your computer off?
Glen,
My point about the advertising blitz is that it is a complete and utter waste of money because it has not changed opinion one iota.
The morality of spending loads of money on party based advertising is one for everybody to consider.
As for hypocrisy, I think we all have it. What do you do to deal with your hypocrisy in your life Glen?
As for Warringah, well Possum’s never lie.
GG there is a difference between advertising changes to laws like the fairness test and advertising in which State Premiers like Steve Bracks and Mike Rann appear centre stage i think there is a difference.
Warringah is a rock CTEP sure there may be a swing against Abbott but you’d have to have rocks in your head to think its on the ALP’s hit list.
Once again we have Labor’s invisible front bench has anybody heard anything from them in the past weeks zip! Not even Roxon who stood next to Rudd hardly said boo and she could be a Minister in a month or two…i dont see the value in hiding the ALP front bench but mind you with airheads like Swan and Garrett and Albanese et al running the show no wonder Labor wants them invisible.
Glen, I can’t say there’s much sign of Marn campaigning in Batman. Yet there’s not much sign of him campaigning elsewhere either. He’s shadow minister for transport, Roads and Tourism, which one would think would be pretty important in this election. I suspect Labor has hidden him under a rock because he loves nukes.
Mercurius, polls are conducted in order to provide an indication as to the possible outcome of an event. Possum has dissected and examined the the polling statistics further to provide more information. Information which may ultimately assist in the prediction of an event. FACT.
Yushchenko and Tymoshenko from the Orange Alliance and pro westerners have won the Ukraine Election. Keeping the pro Russian Yanukovych and communists out. This is very good for democracy.
I think the swing in Victoria is in seats like Deakin, Aston, La Trobe, Casey, McMillian, McEwan and Corrangamitte.
Adam is right in saying Costello is well liked in Higgins, Goldstein and Kooyong could swing towards the ALP, before I go on these two seats are very different.
Goldstein is the more likely to go ALP for there are several booths that vote ALP, mainly around Bentleigh, the ALP have a good candidate.
Kooyong, look if this seat changes it will be the story of the Election for based on 2002 state poll only 6 booths voted ALP, not one on primaries, the problem for the ALP in Kooyong is while in 2002 the state seats of Hawthorn and Kew recorded big swings towards the ALP, the Liberal primary was still around 49% and this doesn’t take into account the ultra safe Liberal booths east of Burke Rd which all record Liberal majorities.
In writing all these in 1996 Keating suffered a 5% yet in several western suburb seats the swing against the ALP was between 10-15%, if the polls are right and we see a 7-10% swing towards the ALP then there will be seats that swing by greater margins.
A few months ago I pulled out the 2002 state result for the Kooyong area and while it can’t be taking as gospel the the Liberal TPP was still over 4,000 votes ahead.
Scorpio,
405
Scorpio Says:
October 1st, 2007 at 8:01 pm
Julie. I find that a pretty poor response since you went public with your allegations, I believe you should publically defend them.
I am still highly offended!
I do not, like some folks on this group, take the discussion off topic. The original comment was made in the atmosphere of comparing how I would vote if the Mormons were a political party in Australia. That makes it loosely on topic for an election based thread. William would prefer to keep this group on topic and I am not going there with you to take it off topic. If you care to read the book that gave me my opinion about Mormons, I repeat ask William to get my email and I will give you the details to be able to source the book yourself. Taking it any further in public makes it off topic for election based conversation. I won’t go there with you. However, I will answer one email from you to give you the book details.
Seats like mine (that have a buffer of 10%) are in play because the sitting member is retiring and there isn’t the personal support to be commanded by the replacement candidate. Despite many people believing that Leichardt is a safe Liberal seat, I am getting the impression from many people that Work Choices is making a huge detrimental impact on Liberal support. There are many people in the tourist and hospitaity industry that have had overtime stripped away by AWA’s. It is a pity that the Labor candidate comes across as a complete dork in TV ads. He looks like a casting extra in Revenge Of The Nerds.
EStJ
2 points:
1) If you think converting from a casual to a permanent position is “mere window dressing” you have obviously not had to pay a mortgage while on a casual wage.
2) Did you pay a public holiday surcharge at lunch today? – for all the propoganda about workchoices leading to reform of service industries it is still impossible to get a meal in Sydney after 11pm and most restaurants are still imposing service surcharges. Workchoices is not helping workers or consumers.
For more information on the Ukrainian election.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7020378.stm
312
The Happy Revolutionary Says:
“I don’t think the ’small l’ liberal vote is what’s causing the Coalition’s imminent defeat. ” etc.
I think it is an additive thing.
-Small l liberals are still upset.
-Rudd is right enough for left liberals to feel comfortable, and the labor party is going after their vote.
-Work Choices.
-Nuclear.
Pick the one that rocks your boat.
Oracle
Father was delighted with that translation. He is now on to other things, thank God, and has not noticed the quiet removal of the modem in the shed. Just hope he gets back to olive trees and curries.
Is it at all possible that the large swing in ‘safe government seats’ is merely down to the definition of what makes a seat ‘safe’? It’s probably a lot of technically safe seats (but not ‘blue-ribbon’ seats) are safe due to the Latham factor (again I just shake my head at the stupidity of the Labor Party for Latham in the first place).
If we look at it in that way I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to imagine these ‘safe’ seats will record large swings back to the ALP.
#
404
Antonio Says:
Or for the swing to come from the greens, independents, other and don’t know. But I take you point.
lay off the sharks!!
Not everyone who grew up in the shire is a redneck
Thanks bmwofoz (417), that is the first proper political comment I have seen on this question of safe seats rather than just blank assertions. I think it is right that Possum shows what the polls are saying, it does suggest we are in new waters and that seems reasonable to me although I don’t agree with many of the reasons Possum gives for it happening. I think the interview with Katter and Tony Windsor on Insiders also indicated why traditional coalition rural voters are voting Labor for the first time this election, especially the way rural matters are being now seen through the prism of climate change.
420 Oakeshott
You can convert from casual to permanent employment after 6 months under NSW Law only if you are a permanent casual (which is what Labor is proposiing federally). It sounds nice but in reality many many casuals prefer to stay casual because of the casual loading or do not work regular/permanent hours so do not have the right to convert anyway. Therefore its mostly window dressing and something an employer could avoid anyway.
I paid an extra $1 for corkage which was reasonable for my champagne.
I think the Liberals blunder was that they wanted to do over the unions with WorkChoices but if they wanted to do it properly they should have bent over backwards to make it fair without unions – something they belatedly recognised with the fairness test.
Adam, a pendulum is just that.
We dont move Wentworth further up the pendulum on the basis that we know Peter King artificially reduced the swing appearing to be needed for the ALP to take the seat – for to do so, the pendulum ceases to be a pendulum and becomes a personalised guess.
The Newspoll breakdown is just that – the results of the national pendulum as determined by the Newspoll data, made under the assumption that the ratio between the three seat types measured is consistent across the country.Not an assumption without foundation mind you, according to the history of the newspoll quarterly series.
If you want to argue the variance within the swing in those seat types – knock yourself out.Part of the point of producing the Newspoll list was to encourage that very discussion.
But to treat the list literally, rather than the pendulum it is, is missing the point and projecting onto it qualities it does not have.Why you continue to do it after your gross misunderstanding of the breakdown has been repeatedly pointed out to you is a question only you can answer.
Unless people were telling newspoll lies over a three month period, nay, a 9 month period, there is an 11% swing on in government seats held by more than a 6% margin.For every Wannon, Kooyong and and Warringah that swings less than 11%, some other safe seat in the country would have to have been swinging more than that at the time the polls were taken, unless you are suggesting that literally thousands of people have been telling lies to pollsters since February.
That is how pendulums work.
As for the psephology of it, I am treating Newspoll for exactly what it is, polling.If you wish it were treated as something other than polling, to be treated as something which it clearly is not, well…. good luck with that.
The list that was produced is simply a reflection of what the newspoll data stated, to the best that its seat type and state based resolution permitted using the national pendulum.I produced it to show exactly those results, to show what Newspoll stated.
You treat psephology as something other than science… good for you.
I treat elections as science and statistics using the observable reality as delivered by the data.
Adam (218),
You are more right-wing than I am, no tthta I have ever thought of myself as right-wing – only other ill-informed people have. I knew they would stuff up the Iraq war beforehand. The ALP certainly is a broad church.
It would strike me as odd as to why people in the Bush would vote for a political party that virtually ignored them for the 13 years they were in Government from 1983-1996…climate change is just a complete media beat up it sprung up only last year when the media started reporting it before then nobody gave a toss.
The inexperience of the ALP frontbench has been a constant canard of the Coalition during this phoney war (Don’t Trust Rudd etc”). What a crock. Let’s turn back the clock to 1996 and look at the post-election Coalition frontbench. There were only two members of the Cabinet that had ministerial experience in 1996 – JWH and John Moore, who both had ministerial positions in Fraser governments. That’s it. Admittedly John Fahey had been Premier of NSW for nearly three years.
Of the current ALP frontbench, both Bob McMullan and Simon Crean served as Ministers under Keating (Crean under Hawke as well).
This is a non-issue. Someone in the MSM or ALP should pick it up and put it to bed.
CTEP I don’t tend to see the Latham effect being as much an aberration. I think some of those that swung hard to Latham last time, such as in the mortgage belt may not swing back as much as the average this time. The main thing in this election is less Howard’s battlers coming back to Labor than the Liberals finding their core starts to melt away and I believe this election will redefine what is meant by swinging voters. In my view this largely comes from the profound vacuum in the Liberals’ agenda becoming obvious for the first time.
Glen whatever you think of climate change, rural people are increasingly seeing the drought in terms of it (ceratinly in SA, and by the sounds of the independents and the reaction to recent government hand-outs in the eastern states as well).
Possum would you agree or disagree (if so why?) with my comments at 390 & 415.
Hannibal, Laurie Oakes dealt with the inexperience issue pretty well in the Bulletin.
Another point about Kooyong, in 2004 the ALP primary vote was about 7% lower then in 1983, while the Liberals recorded their lowest primary vote since 1974
There are lots of seats with inflated margins…. Canning, Kalgoorlie,
Bowman, Leichhardt, Flynn,Herbert, Maccarthur, Hinkler, Aston, Dunkley, Gippsland to name just a few maybe others can think of more
If there is a large swing to Labor (say 6%) & these seats revert to a more normal vote then any thing is possible
Re ,
Post 417…. maybe It would be useful to look @ VIC 2002 upper
house votes esp for “safe Liberal” seats
Thanks Shrike #435. Must have missed it.
But Glen, Labor did a hell of a lot for the bush in the 1890s.
[ …climate change is just a complete media beat up ]
Another reason why the Libs are completely out of touch with the electorate.
Dunkley is a good example at every election between 1984 til 2001 the swing was never more than 1.9% yet in 2004 the swing was 4%
Source: Frankston Standard around time of the 2001 Election.
EStJ
An example of the problems of casuals. A medical receptionist is a permanent casual and depends on her wage to pay the mortgage. After a 6 month trial period she wishes to become permanent. Her Dr boss refuses and says he will employ someone else so she must stay as a casual.
At a whim the Dr decides at short notice to have a 6 week break – so the secretary is told to come back in 6 weeks – no holiday or any other compensation for her.
This is a true case and is apparently considered entirely legal underwork workchoices. Perhaps there is something I am missing but do you see this as fair or for the greater good of society?
432 Hannibal,
I very much doubt Simon Crean will make it back into the Ministry if they win. He may however be the Speaker – balances up finding a place for Shorten and being seen to give Crean dignity in his final term.
zedder @419
In the scheme of things, Zed, it does not matter too much if the labor candidate looks like a dork. Most candidates – Liberal and Labor – start off as dorks. They have to learn. It’s a hard call standing for Federal Parliament. Important thing is to see what he stands for – if it’s against WorkChoices, he’s your man.
Julie i’d be interested in that data as well if you wouldnt mind, Coonan was an embarrassment to herself on 7 30 report, but then she, along with Andrews are complete failures at their portfolios, hmm add Hockey to that, Abbott looked beaten and deflated in his broacast– didnt stop the bile coming from him though, has anyone noticed that after one of the coalition comes on air, just how logical and precise Rudd sounds when he follows them?
…climate change is just a complete media beat up it sprung up only last year when the media started reporting it before then nobody gave a toss.
Glen
Glen, that sort of ignorant rhetorical nonsense does you no credit.
Climate Change has not been definitively proven Paul K it stands to reason that when a hotly debated topic is hijacked by one side of politics one cannot remove the possibility of it being a false theory…Nevertheless i dont see the harm in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases with say Nuclear Power.
I actually am referring to the theory of Global Warming instead of Climate Change…
Oh no Glen… please… sometimes it’d be better to stop yourself from hitting send!
So you don’t believe in climate change… yet think nuclear is the way to solve the non-existant problem? Just goes to show the Liberal Party’s way of thinking… if you can see an opportunistic way to introduce something you want disguised as something else do it.
You know, I’m not 100% sure on climate change either, but I’d rather be safe than sorry. It’s a big gamble to take to risk the planet.