The Australian reports Newspoll has Labor ahead 63-37 on two-party preferred, with Brendan Nelson’s preferred Prime Minister rating down a further 2 per cent from last fortnight’s headline-grabbing 9 per cent. More to follow.
UPDATE: Two-party records on the Newspoll site only go back to January 1996 (the company goes back to 1985); before tonight the best result was Labor’s 61-39 from 16-18 March 2007, the top six all coming from Rudd’s killer run from March to October last year. The Coalition’s best result was 56.5-43.5 from 5-7 October 2001.
UPDATE 2: Graphic here. Kevin Rudd’s approval rating is at 69 per cent, up 1 per cent to beat the record he set a fortnight ago. John Howard’s best ratings were 67 per cent from 10-12 May 1996, and 65 per cent recorded in the aftermath of the Bali bombing on 1-3 November 2002. Pollsters other than Newspoll had Bob Hawke over 70 per cent in 1983-84. I have derived two-party figures for Newspoll from 1985 to 1995 using preference distributions from the preceding election, and none comes close to 63-37. The Coalition’s best result was 59.9-40.1 from 20-22 August 1993, immediately following John Dawkins’ horror post-election budget. Labor’s was 58.0-42.0 from 12-14 June 1987, at the onset of the campaign for the July 11 election.
UPDATE 3: Rather embarrassingly, this post originally claimed Brendan Nelson’s approval rating was 7 per cent. This figure is in fact his preferred prime minister rating. Nelson’s approval rating is 29 per cent, which is not much to write home about but nowhere near the record-setting level of his preferred PM rating.
I hope Shanahan reads Possum’s blog which thoroughly dismantles any paltry shreds of credibility that he may have had previously.
Two things!
The important poll numbers will be in six months time when the budget has been handed down and the full impact of the rate rises impact along with the continuing situation with the US Economy.
Glen #93
The trouble with your “always stated desire …. of a single conservative.. party” is that its a chimaera. My observation is that many of the Nats are much more “socialist”than the ALP, and might even be comfortable in the Greens, if the Greens were smart enough to court them… believe me, no one is more climate conscious than your farmer.
The demise of Kennett in Victoria (and the rise of the “Country boys” Bracks and Brumby) is evidence enough of the distaste Country voters have for the big end of town… Non Victorians can probably make their own examples.
I have attempted, without success, to imagine what a re-elected Howard Government, would have spun the incredible mess in which this country is mired.
Housing. Rentals. Interest Rates. Water. Infrastructure. Sub Prime. Inflation. Skills.
Education. Health. Inspiration.
Would the whole damn thing have been swept under the carpet. Probably.
And Kev has not cleaned it up, in his 100 days.
Gee.
MB Two things that won’t help Nelson for the simple reason that he will not be there to see either event happen.
William, I think it’s important we make the distinction between “approval rating” and the rating for “preferred prime minister”.
At the start of this thread you say that Brendan Nelson’s approval rating has fallen to 7 per cent. But that’s not the case. His approval rating in Newspoll is actually 29 per cent.
The 7 per cent figure is the amount of people who prefer him as prime minister over Kevin Rudd.
Nelson’s polling woes are bad enough without us compounding them by using the wrong terminology.
Glen Says: @ 93,
[But i hardly think this is Nelson’s fault he’s been leader for a couple of months give the man a break! ]
Glen, I can’t remember making any comment regarding Nelson’s suitability or otherwise for the Liberal leadership.
That to me is a decision that the Liberal Party have made themselves and is not something that I feel qualified to comment on, coming from, as I do, the other side of the political fence.
But I will say this, he was a bad choice for leader coming on the heels of Howard who was clearly determined by the electorate to be untrustworthy and tricky as well as dishonest.
Nelson’s background as an ALP member and the manner in which he tried to explain his road to Damascus conversion to the Liberal Party didn’t wash with the greater Australian electorate.
It also caused him to be viewed with suspicion by Liberal supporters including no doubt some of his parliamentary colleagues. Turnbull also is in the unfortunate position of coming on board the Liberal bus with a Labor background although in Nelson’s case, his honesty has been put under question and people will unfortunately, make comparisons with that of Howard.
They can’t put Howard and what he stood for behind them with a leader who reminds them of that which they desperately need to put behind them. IE, people need to regain trust in the Libs. They currently trust Rudd and Labor. They do not trust the Libs.
Spotlight on Liberal leader, Brendan Nelson. From Lateline upon his election as leader. Featuring commentary by John Hewson. Notice the disparaging remark from Hewson on Turnbull: “he is divisive”)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0fhk1jmgUw
Water Matters.
I organised it years ago that I could uncouple the downpipe from the roof so that the water flowed into the ground, when rain happened. One is not supposed to do that. Regulations. And as would be the case, my small back yard was flooded. But the water drained away. As anticipated. My idea was that the water would somehow remain in the ground, to help the trees, the vine, the plants.
It occurs to me that my little contribution has been utilised, by the bore waterer.
I did wonder why the trees on the footpath, died. I now wonder if my backyard tree and vine will make it.
Mexican Beemer Says: @ 99
[I’m not convinced that what he said was the problem, but the way the Liberal Party seemed unable to reach a position]
That was the problem. Nelson was only the messenger and the message was the wrong one at the wrong time. He should have just endorsed Rudd’s.
[I don’t think the voters care that Howard did not show}
I believe they did. Check the polling figures on the apology. It would have been a gesture thing. Showing the electorate, especially Liberal supporters that Howard was not below supporting the party position and making the gesture more meaningful by joining the other ex-PM’s and making it a royal flush.
[Workchoices will haunt the Liberals regardless of what they say or do,]
But now it will haunt them even more because they can now, “never” convince the electorate that at some future date, it will not be resurrected as Liberal policy, especially now that people know that they wanted to go even further with it and didn’t care about the consequent damage that it caused to so many people.
As Mumble points out every government enjoys a jump in the polls after an election and Rudds looks good because he has had high polls for over a year now, though these did not translate into the expected landslide at election time.
Howard enjoyed very high ratings after 96 but he almost lost in 98 with less than 49% of the vote.
Hawke enjoyed very high ratings in 83 but his vote went backwards by about 1.4% despite inheriting a mess of an economy left behind by Howard and Fraser.
Whitlam almost lost in 74 and got slammed in 75 despite having to deal with an obstructive senate and despite the big improvements he made in health, education, urban renewal, transport and other issues such as withdrawing from Vietnam and giving the aboriginals land. The Opec oil shocks that hit all economies world wide did not get him any sympathy.
Rudd will most likely face the polls in three years and he is not gauranteed re-election no matter what the polls of today say. If the problems including housing affordability, health and inflation are not contained the electorate may well give the other mob a go. It won’t take much of a swing,3 years is a long time, Howard is goen and a lot can happen.
While ever there is a Liberal Party there will be a WorkChoices (or differently-named) policy simmering on the backburner: either in the kitchen where it is visible to all in the electorate .. or bubbling away quietly in the murky depths of Liberals’ ideological “heart”.
Most house here don’t have gutters or downpipes which would be hopelessly inadequate during our usual rains. Water is plentiful, so are cane toads now. I have been thinking of replacing the lawns with natural trees and shrubs as a water conservation measure during the ‘dry’ season. ‘They’ say the north will get less and less rain with global warming as the monsoons won’t reach down as far though that I guess will be years down the track.
The Liberals might be in considerable strife with the Australian electorate at present, but something struck me when I read this article in the Oz.
[Interviewed for this paper on the weekend, Rudd outlined an essentially empirical approach to public policy.
On this view, social problems are identified according to familiar social democratic political principles. But solutions are sought on the basis of proven effectiveness, and fittingness to the national disposition. As opposed to the supposed ideological affiliations of the service providers.
This is the overwhelming trend of social democratic governance across the Western world. It’s bound to be the governing philosophy of the Government in areas as diverse as indigenous affairs, schooling, job placement, the environment and family policy. ]
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23307667-7583,00.html
With Rudd’s emphasis on “working families” and a good portion of Labor policy focused on economically responsible “social democratic principles”, the rug is being pulled totally from under Family First. They don’t really have any substantive platform left now.
Next election will see the total elimination of FF from the Australian political landscape.
Oh not, the cane toads. How dreadful. That beast is not yet here.
I don’t understand about houses not having gutters or downpipes. How does that work?
I am not doing lawn myself, just a bit of overhead shelter, the lost trees, oxygen and breezes, protection from the blazing sun.
Why would Costello feel any need to display loyalty after the way he was shafted both by Howard and others in the party. I suspect that he will announce his departure at a time of his own choosing, irrespective of any damage it will do to the Libs. As much as I didn’t like some of his policies, I also think he will be a loss to the Parliament. He could be forensic in debate, and was generally a fairly good treasurer. Unfortunately so many areas of policy in the Treasury were dominated by Howard (Mr Bottom of the Harbour, remember), and wasteful and pork-barrelling expenditure resulted.
Had to laugh watching 4 Corners on Joh last night, seeing Howard describing Joh for PM, he could almost have been describing himself, divisive, destructive etc.
Poor Nelson. One expects a bit of a honeymoon with any new Government, but he’ turned into the Incredible Shrinking Man. And his party seems to be shrinking right along with him.
What happens to parties when they do this? Maybe they’re like collapsing stars: If large enough, they explode and then collapse up their own a***holes into black holes; If not, they just waste away and turn into brown drarves, barely visible at a distance.
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens to the Libs, but whatever happens, it should make good viewing on the Discovery Channel.
My tip is the black hole scenario. After all, the only thing sustaining them for the last 11 years was Howard’s ego. And that was super massive.
onimod back at 54. I couldn’t figure out what you were wanting to know about, and just had a couple of random stabs at things I might be able to find out for you. Then had to crash, got to work today. If building regs or Serfchoices are not what you were inquiring about, forget it.
The Magnificent Seven of Brendan Nelson:
1. He cannot even do better Mr. MOE.
2. When May budget is handed down, the PPM will be negative, meaning more people preferred Mickey Mouse to be alternate PM than Nelson.
3. He tried to resign but nobody will allow him, as nobody wants a poison chalice.
4. He secretly rejoins the ALP as he got no issues left to oppose. Labor already owns all the major issues.
5. He decided to start a new Beatles covered band called The Beaten with “Nowhere Man” as its signature song.
6. He made a complaint to the “Fair Pay Commission” because he said the Australian people has not been fair to him. As his honeymoon period with the Australian people has been stripped away by Workchoice.
7. He decided to become an TS Eliot expert by reciting and explaining “The Waste Land” to his remaining troopers of Costello, Downer, Vaile, McGauran, Andrews and Ruddock, with JWH on the Sitar providing background music.
Dennis Shanahan…
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23315143-2702,00.html
A straight report of Newspoll – no spin, no bluster, no gibes.
It was, of course, all very bad news for him and after Possum’s demolition job I suspect he just wanted to get it out of the way and forget about polls for a while.
Here is a classic from Nicholson:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/opinion/animations/0,25199,10,00.html
How about “The Golden Girls” Sophie Mirabella and Bronwyn Bishop coming to the leadership rescue.
The Liberal party is still trying to pretend it is one nation, we know what that type of policy position is worth ( about 10%, no seats in the lower house and a couple of senators). They still have the -this mod can be the alternative government- vote, they have some way to go before the find the floor.
When the two party preferred vote is 80%+ to labor the right winger nutters may be dispatched, or perhaps they will get a leader that takes the Menzies solution, nutters dispatched by ditching the party. Who knows.
They will be broke after the next election if the right wing nutters still have control. In my view, as things stand, there is no future for the Liberal party.
A Galaxy poll on Queensland situation in the Curious Snail today.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,23314146-3102,00.html
122 [How about “The Golden Girls” Sophie Mirabella and Bronwyn Bishop coming to the leadership rescue.]
They all know,BK, that they could not put a dent in the chosen leader, the Nightwatchman. He is just too strong and popular for them to try and roll at present. Like the gutless performance we saw from Costello against Howard, we will see the Liberals wait until after today, after the next sitting of parliament, after the budget, after the Olympic Games, after Xmas, after the next election…
Well I don’t think Nelson has any chance of catching up in the polls now – “Uncommitted” has a comanding lead over him, 20% to 7%! Of course, even a coaliton of the Uncommitted and Nelson supporters could not catch Rudd 🙂
Seriously, as I said on a previous thread, the bad economic news has come too soon for anyone to fall for the line that it is Rudd’s fault. Nor does the “not fixed yet” attack wash, when Labour haven’t even had the chance to bring down their first budget. The coalition is the only place that responsibility for this mess can be placed. and clearly, 93% of voters are placing the blame precisely there. Nelson would be better off admitting that mistakes had been made and that the coalition was committed to forging a new set of policies.
On these numbers, you won’t see a byelection this year. Anyone who goes now coudl find a lot of dirt being dumped on them in a hurry. As Lord D would say, the backroom boys would be “tewwibly, tewwibly cwoss”.
I thought “Brendan 07” was a pretty snappy moniker.
The historical allusions abound: shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic, the “Admiral Doenitz” of the Liberal Party and so on.
Shanahan manages to pull some optimism out of the fire (although I think he’s having a joke, really I do) in his “the bigger they are the harder they fall…” article referring to Rudd’s soaring popularity. Even Dennis says it’s B07’s only hope that Rudd crashes and burns… somehow.
So, I suppose the Libs, led by Joe Hockey, that marvellous parliamentary performer, will be arranging for cardboard cutouts this Friday in Parliament? Perhaps a little bit of defiance of the Speaker might get those numbers back up? Maybe a few dozen disruptive points of order will re-establish their credibility? After all, the Libs “know” about these things, don’t they? Turnbull’s still on about Rudd and Swan “talking up inflation”. That worked, didn’t it? Yessiree. Political geniuses, those Libs.
Tossers.
At last, Dennis Shanahan presents an analysis I can agree with!
How you feeling Glen, eh? eh? Reckon the poll is bullbutter, eh? eh?
Where’s your messiah NOW?
Oh yeah… where’s Tabitha got to these days?
We can dispense with: We’re coming back! We’re coming back!
Because… we’re BACK baby! And loving every second of it.
One thing with the last few polls – I haven’t seen any “by the issues” results. I’d love to see economic management, where the coalition has surely crashed.
Bill – Brendan07 – love it! ROTFL
Seriously though, this presents an opportunity to Labour in another, more constructive way. Rudd shoudl not kid himself that he is getting 73% because peopel think he’s great. People are clearly worried about the economy now. This actually gives Rudd a mandate to act decisively in the budget to fix some of the deeper problems. If he does he may lose 10% of popularity to those who will face bad news. But there is a great opportunity to lock in the support of a substantial proportion of the swinging voters here. If Rudd can seize that, his second term majority will be much bigger than his first.
The only real danger Rudd faces at present is spill-over effcts from the debacle that is NSW State labour. His coming from Qld is probably quite an asset at present.
Socrates #130,
Can’t take the credit for “Brendan 07” Soc, try Classified at #4.
Meanwhile, Gerard is prattling on about “soft” interviews of “leftist” Academy Award-winning filmmakers on ABC radio.
Jesus H. Christ on a stick!
I am waiting with bated breath for someone to come in here with an envelope tucked under his hairy armpit addressed as follows:
Attention: For your eyes only.
The Chief Troll at Poll Bludger
As he breaks the seal from Liberal Party Headquarters, beads of sweat pour from his forehead as he devourers the latest secret message containing the Leadership solution.
It’s a done deal. Brendon Nelson will hand over the Leadership of the Liberal Party to Malcolm Turnbull on the day that Brendan turns sixty four.
Love
The faceless Men.
118 Harry
NCA – National Capital Authority (i’m sure you knew)
Anyway, for anyone else, the NCA is/used to be a little Liberal Party hotbed, just around the corner from the HQ of the LP, who found half of themselves sacked in the last few weeks thanks to Lindsay Tanner. They’re the remnants of the NCDC – the planning Authority that basically built Canberra as it it. We have two planning authorities in Canberra and the general opinion is that both of them are pretty inept.
The story I’ve been fed is that basically none of them were up to the tasks required to project ‘Nation building’ that they will be required to undertake in the near future. Along with the staff cuts a large chunk of public works has also been shelved, but that’s really chicken and egg type stuff.
From my insiders/outsiders perspective the politics around the NCA had become so thick and stifling of progress that the broom might have been the only answer.
I am interested in the BCA – what’s your connection? Garrett mentioned it the other night. I’d love to see the GBCA written out of the equation through the introduction of an AS, removing the whole marketing crap that goes with being ‘green’.
The underlying problem is that both the community and a large chunk of the industry professionals lag 20 years or more behind Japan or Northern Europe, and yet we seem to want to reinvent the wheel instead of emmulating ones that have already been pretty well refined.
116
Basil, That old proverb;
“Evil does what evil thinks”
sprung to mind when i heard his description of the mongrel Joh.
Arbie Jay is right – these polls, good as they are, do not guarantee Rudd will be re-elected.
What they show is that the voters are happy that they changed government, happy that Labor is implementing what it promised, happy with Rudd’s style, and still generally comfortable with their personal social and economic circumstances.
But they’ll expect Labor to “fix” the problems of rising inflation and interest rates, without anyone losing their jobs or existing home-owners seeing a fall in the value of their homes or rents rising further. One wonders whether any government has the power to fix these problems.
Voters will also start to question the implementation of some of Labor’s policies as time goes on…eg where are the shortened surgery waiting lists? Where is the school computer for my kid? Where are the extra child care places? It happens to every government.
The Opposition is still in the dressing room working out what jersey fits, while Labor has been out on the field for 100 days. This is hardly a surprise. The Opposition will make no impact until the Budget is delivered. Then it will have some specific issues to get stuck into, that weren’t mentioned in Labor’s election
manifesto.
What I’m hearing from people is that they’re impressed that Labor has just gone straight into government knowing what it’s doing, moving straight to implementing its policies quickly, calmly and rationally, with no much bullshit rhetoric. They do not blame Labor for the problems in the economy, but do expect they’ll be resolved.
But I really can’t see how you can bring interest rates and inflation down, when there’s a massive skills shortage, a need to bring in more skilled labour, and thus more upward pressure on house prices and rents. The only quick answer to the skills shortage, without increased immigration, is to reduce dmand for the products produced by those skills. That means recession.
Quick question and probably Politics 101. To all of the people saying that Costello, Downer et al. won’t be *allowed* to retire from Parliament on the current figures – how can anyone actually stop them if they choose to go?
Antonio,
Quite right. Rudd has made an impressive start but if there’s a recession then politics will get much more competitive.
I am more pessimistic about the Australian economic outlook with each passing week, people are just waking up to how ingrained is our addiction to cheap debt and “easy” returns on investment. This company results season has been an eye-opener.
135 Antonio
I generally agree, but it’s discounting the posibility that there are means and measures that haven’t been used before that might deliver results outside the commonly accepted box of solutions. If we look at other countries solutions, Canada, for example, has provincial sales tax – basically a variable GST that deals with a variable speed economy (old east slow vs new west quick in their case). It sounds terribly socialist of me but surely the mining boom has to be spread a little more equitably? The big miners and Banks are so beholden to the stock market bottom lines that I fear the solutions have to be legislative, and therefore politically difficult.
136 [how can anyone actually stop them if they choose to go?]
Tassieannie, handcuffs, shackles, whips,straitjackets, imprisonment, mental health orders, or perhaps some form of blackmail are the only options I can see. Whether any of these actually work is another matter.
onimod,
It’s an interesting idea, and in all sincerity it’s something that could be considered.
Now for the cynical hat: Labor only holds 4 seats in WA and probably won’t need to hold any of them to be in Government after the next election. So it could be done, I guess.
139 Steve – thanks. That’s pretty much what I thought. Why anyone should think that party loyalty would/will play any part is beyond me.
Crikey Whitey @ 115
Monsoon rains make guttering and downpipes pointless, they overflow quite quickly – house blocks are usually shaped to allow run off. AND the Cane toads are disgusting – huge and the smaller buggers can run fast, like chasing a little dog. No not the Liberal party, Cane toads. At least water isn’t an issue here nor air pollution during the wet season.
————-
The present polls are nothing except an embarassment for Nelson and the LNP. All they need to do is put in a respectable interim face, shut and say nothing and the polls will drift back by themselves. The more they say the more they get kicked in the teeth by their history.
I fear that Dr Nelsons plummet to to 7% maybe a Newspoll conspiracy. When or should I say “If” Dr Nelsons popularity poll bounces back to 9-10% it will be trumpeted by the MM as a staggering jump in personal approval ratings.
140 Dyno
I’m no economist either, and I’m not really advocating it. It just astounds me that Australia is heading to a more US style mentality where we consider ourselves so different to the rest of the world that we don’t readily consider or debate solutions that have been tried elsewhere in the world. In terms of standards of living, how can we not consider emmulating northern europe in so many ways? There are differences for sure, but there are more similarities than differences IMO.
A lot of the construction industry is doing it tough in europe right now. Now if we adopted building standards that paralleled theirs (better than ours) imported some of their personel and skills (a lot better than ours) we could make a positive change in so many areas. I honstly don’t know wether it would work – I just hope someone is thinking about it, because it’s pretty evident thinking was frowned upon for the last 12 years.
This post looks suspiciously familiar (it was on Sham’s blog). Has Tabitha changed team (and name to Craig)?
Liberals = Short term fixes + exploitive + exclusive = Dinosaurs
Labor = Long term solutions + sustainable + inclusive = Future
Go Nelson Go! The only way is up 🙂
HA!!!
What a joke they are. Always were of course, it’s just that the blind can now see.
My suggestion would be make Sophie M. leader, so when she goes off on maternity leave they can give few others a try on a weekly rotating roster in acting positions. Thatway they’d probably get 2 or 3 shots each and they could be assessed an performance. Glen and GP could have a go to, as new blood might be the only answer. And Tabitha. And my cocker spaniel.
Or else a DD: and wipe out the lot and start again.
Dontcha just love democracy!
146 JOM, sadly there is another Friday sitting coming up soon and with Hockey leading parliamentiary misbehaviour, I fear the only way for the Nelson Leadership is down.
What about an AFL/gen-Y solution – a ‘leadership group’ and a predefined rotating named leader?
Silly me – AFL teams are actually trying to win……..
Steve as long as he absorbs the Rudd honeymoon which coincidently never seems to end and enacts the changes to the party structure that will help the Libs become competative again it’s all good.
Besides, this far away from an election the averge voter doesn’t care or probably know who Breandan Nelson is.