The Gold Coast Bulletin, which has a reasonable record with its local polling, has produced a survey showing a fairly modest swing to Labor in the safe Liberal seat of McPherson. After exclusion of the undecided, Liberal incumbent Margaret May leads Labor’s Eddy Sarroff 57 per cent to 36 per cent on the primary vote, compared with 58.9 per cent and 30.1 per cent at the 2004 election. No sample size is provided (“full results” will be published tomorrow), but if it’s like the paper’s polls in 2004 it will be around 450.
Most useless Poll ever??
Whats next, polling of Batman Victoria?
Why poll this seat. For heaven sake, talk about a waste of money.
Maybe if they poll every seat, we won’t need to have an election.
‘Hasta la vista, McPherson’… I guess not, Possum. 😉
To be fair to the paper, it’s not as if there’s a wealth of marginal seats on the Gold Coast to poll. McPherson is actually the closest of the three.
Cast your eye northward to Fadden. Libs will probably win it, but it is far more fascinating.
In 2004 the GCB polled Richmond – I gather their reach extends over the border.
The paper is spending money to poll its local seat. Good on it. It might not interest people on Poll Bludger, in a national context, but I’m sure the voters of MacPherson would be interested.
It does put a bit of a wet blanket on some of the hysteria about massive swings to Labor in Queensland. But it’s still a small sample.
They must be BORED at the Gold Coast Bulletin.
http://ozforums.com.au/viewtopic.php?id=1620
Apparently the latest tip is that there’s a big screw-up in the bulletin with this article.
We. Shall. See.
This poll is, er… interesting. Especially since internal party polling has it at about a 4 point split with 8 points of undecideds.
Is it also true that the Bulletin stuffed this up, they know it but wont rectify it as someone has already said here, and as someone warned me about earlier today?
If that’s true and anyone has any info – that’s a disgrace. Please feel free to mail me, it might be time to smack the seven shades if sh*t out of a regional rag.
different, not used to a poll with liberals leading
Of course, if they don’t change it, McPherson voters might be more inclined to lodge the famous “protest vote” with Labor, if they believe the Libs are going to win anyway.
Personally, if the numbers are wrong, I think they should correct it. Facts and all that…
Well with due respect, polling some safe seats helps to reduce the number of unknowns. Though, I was of the impression that in general safe seats were more likely to swing more than marginal seats. Bite me if I’m wrong 🙂
Possum,
I agree this poll has to be wrong..
but what sort of things can be stuffed up when reporting poll results?
Did they get the numbers the wrong way around?
Spell Labour wrong? Poll the wrong electorate?
Or even my speciality, Not get what Real Wages vs CPI means
Gee there’s some wacky numbers going around just now
Just to put the nigger in the wood pile here. Rumor has it this this poll is close to the mark, but the Gold Goast Bulletin has it ar*e up.
Peter @12 might be on to something because my info agrees with him.
PI.
I agree with you. My informed spy tells me that it is a possible screw up and since we do not know each other the possibility that it is true hangs in the air.
THe GCB crowd are barely literate. I wouldn’t hold out too much hope for a great deal of numeracy there.
Mr Squiggle, all sorts of things could have been done wrong. These guys are rank amateurs so you wouldnt expect any weighting of the results and that’s probably fair enough with these rags, but it could have been basic stats problems, it could have been really dodgy sampling (for instance, ringing during the day is a big no-no if you arent weighting your data.That alone can massively skew your results, and not just by a few percent). There’s a million and one possible problems.
You’re right though, there is some seriously whacky numbers flying around. There has been for quite a while in some places.The ALP had to do some polling twice a few months back in NSW because they didnt believe what they saw the first time round.
Could they really get poll numbers the wrong way round?
There’s been so much talk recently in the media about the crucial seats swinging back to the coalition – could it be correct?
Possum,
What is your E mail address.
Thanks Possum
I think you know I’d love to see a result like this, but even so, whoever managed this poll has been in the sun too long.
Maybe they are just keeping thier circulation numbers up
Does anyone else anticipate a Neilson for tomorrow? I need a reality check
Assume the results of this poll are correct and that the Newspoll state results are correct.
Then there must be swings of 15 per cent in other Queensland seats.
I’ve heard thru the vine as well that it’s not true,the question is how deliberate was the editor in doing what they have done.Disgraceful stuff here.
Spiros,yes there are swings in some seats here in Queensland that are big ,and boy,they’re really big!!!!!
Star at 20
possum_comitatus [at] yahoo dot com dot au
Mr Squiggle, ACN were doing one of their online polls this week that seemed to be around the day, maybe just before the day of the rate rise, so that surely should be out soon.
Do we have a verdict on the online polls yet?
Michael, the ACN ones seem to be pretty good, but they aren’t the usual online polls. The have 70 thousand or 90 thousand odd people on their books or some enormous figure like that, with full demographic data known about each registered person, so they can get a pretty accurate representation of reality out of it when they choose their sample.
Poss,
sounds like you’re saying the real ACN isn’t out till Monday, maybe put back to take account of the rate rise?
After Morgan’s 60+ screamer today and this Bulletin number, I need the real thing, not On-line results with their boatload of bias.
Maybe another galaxy will come through to sooth the nerves
Mr Squiggle,
Expect a Galaxy sometime this weekend (I’m guessing Sunday) on Wentworth.
What has happened to the Advertiser polling? Have they shut up shop?
Swing,
SA aint a big place, they probably ran out of seats 😉
Possum, you have the cred, could you send a note to the GCB and threaten them with Christ knows what if they publish a poll that is knowingly wrong.
So its basically a slow night on the pseph front
anyone heard who will be on lateline?
Did anyone ever actually poll Grey? Wasn’t that the seat where the Libs were fearing a 20% swing in rural SA?
From the link to that rag:
Numbers don’t seem the same -have the changes them? Or have I gone mad?
Stan S,
That’s not a bad idea, Does the Freedom of Information bill allow us to demand access to bodgy poll results?
I’m up for it, just as a pet project, you know?
This poll has as much credibility as my f2f poll at work that produced 80/20 to Labor. But if even partly true, I know which electorate never to live in.
I’ve heard that Dawson in central queensland is in play and that is 10% Nationals territory.
Skunkrat, if you’re wondering why my figures are different from the ones in the article, it’s because I’ve excluded the 12.9 per cent undecided. The GCB article has not changed.
Stan S, I’m not one to stand in between an editor and his need to print twaddle – a free press is a free press is a free press.
But if they do, and I can get evidence that its twaddle, then it deserves to be pointed out in the most brutal way possible.
LET me tell readers a few things about the Gold Coast where I live (I am in Moncreiff, which went Liberal over 19% last election). This place remains the corruption capital of Australia. The poll could well be a fraud, or just a sad reflection on the state of this area.
Ex-councillor Eddie Sarroff is campaigning in McPherson because he has a good reputation as a bloke who stood up to the big property developers who have been running the council for years (the former Deputy Mayor set up a bank account where developers could put deposits “if they felt like it”: he somehow avoided jail time).
Nobody up here even hears about the non-Liberal candidates, because the media is totally controlled by Murdoch and he just doesn’t give them oxygen.
The only way I even knew who my Labor candidate WAS is because I googled it. The Labor Party doesn’t bother spending money on the seats up here, which makes things even worse. IMHO every single seat in Australia should be considered “in play” this year. But actually the local Greens here make more effort than Labor.
Sure, we get all the blue rinse set up, retirees from Sydney and Melbourne. And the old dears will just vote Liberal till they die. But there is a lot of anti-Howard anger around here too. If Labor bothered contesting these Gold Coast seats, you never know what might happen.
PC #40 Publish and be damned hey…..trouble is I bet my lefite that the GCB would not print a retraction ever or until after 24 Nov.
Preview of galaxy on lateline, Mr Moneybags looks secure to me
Hmmm, regional newspaper polling – I remember it well. It was usually the journo or cadet journos wot done it, and while we were always taught to ask for the youngest adult male in the house, and even taking into account we were ringing after six o’clock, we invariably got middle-aged or elderly women. And these were the type who just lived to be polled – you couldn’t get the feckers off the fecking phone.
I well remember one suspiciously high-pitched voice insisting s/he/it was a 30-year-old male – I still noted s/he/its responses accordingly and they probably made up one of the 50 or so responses we actually did manage to note correctly.
Younger women often told us what to do with our survey in no uncertain terms, particularly if there was the sound of a crying baby or the theme tune to Neighbours in the background. Young males do not answer phone calls from strangers. It makes the beer go flat.
I would hope that contemporary polling is done a little more scientifically, but if the Advertiser polls are to be believed, which many here do, why not the fine publication that is the White Shoe Bullsh#tin?
a pisstake of that photo with JWH and teh fallen woman at the shopping centre:
John @ 38 – Don’t taunt me. I live in Dawson, and while I’ve got nothing against the Nationals per se, De-Anne’s…. well, she’s De-Anne. An electrical engineering degree and still not the brightest spark around.
Has anyone read the article?
It says
There is no mention of McPherson.
Did they poll Moncrieff, like they say? Or, did they poll McPherson which is held by Maggie May?
I love Laura Tingle
Peter @46 – Agreed but then James doesn’t appear to be foreman material either, perhaps we can just hope for a better local member.
Crikey, I hadn’t noticed that, Barry.