Morgan: 61.5-38.5

This week’s Morgan poll combines two weekends’ worth of face-to-face polling, producing a large sample of 1891 voters. Labor leads 61.5-38.5 on two-party preferred (with Labor down 1 per cent on last week’s phone poll and 0.5 per cent on the previous face-to-face), and 54.5 per cent to 33.5 per cent on the primary vote.

Other news:

• Voters in two of the districts which form Tasmania’s 15-member Legislative Council, Huon and Rosevears, will go to the polls tomorrow to rubber-stamp the re-election of sitting independents Paul Harriss and Kerry Finch. Tasmanian super-pundits Peter Tucker and Kevin Bonham have more here and here. I’ll have something up tomorrow, including my annual audit of upper house divisions and half-hearted live coverage of the count.

• Antony Green’s ABC Elections page has been given a revamp. From this I learn for the first time that draft redistribution proposals for the Northern Territory parliament were unveiled last week, on which Antony has much more.

• The Lindsay pamphlet case came before a Sydney court on Tuesday. Greg Chijoff, estranged husband of Liberal candidate Karen Chijoff, has pleaded guilty and will be sentenced next week. Jackie Kelly’s husband Gary Clark and Right faction powerbroker Jeff Egan have pleaded not guilty and will be back in court in late May. One of the remaining two charged has sought an adjournment, and the other has had his charge dismissed by Magistrate Pat O’Shane, who unfortunately felt it necessary to complain of a “political climate of divisiveness and disharmony” from which the country had “moved on”. She was on firmer ground in complaining that the penalty provided by Section 328 of the Electoral Act – a $1000 fine – was inadequate for the alleged offences, though whether her proposed new offence of “racial slander” would be a suitable remedy is another matter.

• As the new government moves to reform public election funding arrangements that boost Pauline Hanson’s coffers each time she runs for the Senate, Glenn Milne reveals Hanson has moved $200,000 of such funding out of a bank account for her United Australia Party and into one controlled by herself and a friend. Hanson, who should know a thing or two by now about the public funding laws, insists it’s all above board.

• Thomarse in comments answers (courtesy of News Radio) an oft-heard question: the Federal Court will resume hearing Labor’s appeal against the Liberals’ 12-vote victory in McEwen on May 24.

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.

58 comments on “Morgan: 61.5-38.5”

Comments Page 1 of 2
1 2

  1. No doubt not covering the shenanigans with the WA Libs, I wonder how Newspoll will reflect Nelson’s support of Buswell, particularly amongst female voters ?

  4. I wonder what happened in the Federal Court today with the hearing about McEwen?

    When will a decision be handed down? It must affect the timing of the Gippsland by-election.

  5. I though Magistrate Pat O’Shane comment “political climate of divisiveness and disharmony” from which the country had “moved on”, was suitable punishment.

    Sort of along the lines of saying, you get off, but what you and the people you represent suck big time. An lets be honest, the voters sort of said the same thing.

    Sometimes jail and fines are not he best punishment.

  6. Remiss of me not to have linked to added those links without prompting, Peter. They’re there now.

    Sceptic, I heard only that the McEwen case had been adjourned until “May” – does anyone have anything more specific?

  7. About time they means tested the Baby Breeders bonus.

    [Federal Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson says the Government is picking on mothers and young families in its bid to cut spending.

    Dr Nelson says the Prime Minister should value all babies equally.

    “I would have thought that Mr Rudd – who’s already tried to pick on seniors and carers – would find another group other than families to pick on and it’s very, very important that Mr Rudd understands that every mother loves her baby and this should be an Australia where all babies are equal,” Dr Nelson said.]

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/05/02/2233970.htm?section=justin

  10. Nelson may try to make political capital out of protecting the babies of the rich but my political antenna suggests he will be whistling Dixie on this one.

  11. …and this should be an Australia where all babies are equal,” Dr Nelson said.

    Does that include the babies of … UNION BOSSES?

  12. There’s a small factual slipup in part II of our joint effort that was entirely my fault – somewhere while piling through the usual mountains of past election results I have crossed a wire and inadvertently elected Mark Rickards to the Huon Valley Council (he is not, in fact, a Huon Valley Councillor. I probably got him mixed up with the previous Greens candidate for the seat, Liz Smith, who is.)

    I intend to be here tomorrow night during the early stages, at least until we see what % the Greens are on for in Huon and whether they can actually win a booth! They have an excellent chance of winning Woodbridge, and some booths on Bruny Island might be close because of current logging proposals in Adventure Bay. Last time Labor topped just two tiny booths on Bruny Island and tied the similarly miniscule Southport booth and Harriss, quite remarkably, topped all the rest.

    May not stick around for the final figures though.

  13. Can’t see Mcewan in today’s law list (on the website), so it might not have happened today.

    As for the poll: Nothing changed.

  17. There was news on McEwen today at http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2008/s2178127.htm

    If the ALP can find 21 or more disputed votes that go their way (ie. the current margin of 12 plus the 8 mulitiple voters that have been identified) then is it possible the result could be reversed in favour of the ALP candidate?

    Nobody has mentioned this as a possibility. Afterall the result has already been reversed once.

  18. Heh, heh, sad. Politics mmmmh, yep. Every now and again I take up footy, tipping that is, otherwise I would hardly care. Blues are about to win!

  21. It is now over 100 days since Springborg proposed his Pineapple Party amalgamation of Conservative parties in Queensland and here is a progress report. Thank God this lot had nothing to do with merging dozens of local councils if they are having all this trouble merging two parties.

    “QUEENSLAND Liberal Party members are moving towards supporting a merger with the Nationals, but on terms likely to disappoint their state Coalition partner.

    Queensland Liberal president Gary Spence said yesterday submissions representing more than 1000 members, delivered individually or by party branches, had “overwhelmingly” endorsed the merger concept.

    But the model for the merger, proposed by Nationals parliamentary leader Lawrence Springborg, is causing division within Liberal ranks, with many members refusing to endorse any move to establish a new entity without the support of the federal Liberal organisation.

    Mr Springborg has threatened to go it alone and establish a new conservative party if the federal Liberal organisation does not endorse a merger in Queensland within months.”

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23637457-5006786,00.html

  22. So what they are saying is that after more than one hundred days the position is the same as day one. The Nationals want the Pineapple Party and the Liberals are split on the issue. The conservatives in Queensland are once again showing they have no idea about how to advance a political issue.

  25. 24

    Interesting that Pyne is described in that article as being from the Liberal Party’s moderate faction,…

    Not sure I would describe him as moderate.

  27. Re #17:

    “If the ALP can find 21 or more disputed votes that go their way (ie. the current margin of 12 plus the 8 mulitiple voters that have been identified) then is it possible the result could be reversed in favour of the ALP candidate?”

    I’ve seen this mentioned as a possibility, perhaps in Crikey, around the time the original 12 vote margin was announced.

    William – Metro willing, I’ll be online around 6:30 for tonight’s Leg Council non-event. If there were bookies fielding on this one the main item of interest would be which incumbent will win with the biggest margin.

  28. Does anyone know what happened to Iemma and the power privatisation business at the N.S.W. Labor Conference today?

  31. Is Iemma a dead man walking? When you’re in a party, it helps if you have the party with you. Will he defy the party and if so, will the caucus go with him? Do they think they can defy the party membership and survive?

  34. Blair S. Fairman at 31.

    [Is Iemma a dead man walking?]

    You gotta reckon. I heard on radio a young woman declaiming in some public place against electricity privatisation in the case of NSW, she said she cannot believe herself, as a young Labor voter, finding herself against a Labor Government.

    What is with Iemma, or Rann, or Tony Blair or his unfortunate successor? Not to mention the most recent loser. Do they never learn? Labor or Liberal.

  36. Labor in NSW have made too many promises to their mates. They probably have buyers lined up, and these people are leaning on the government to deliver.

    It was easy for Howard when he had the same problem. He just ran a multi-hundred million dollar advertising campaign that was doomed from the start. While we were laughing at its ineptness and high-fiving each other about how easy it was going to be to win the election, the Libs’ mates were shovelling taxpayers’ money into their treasure chests like nobody’s business.

    State and Local Labor are altogether smaller fry. The price for the developer in Woollongong to get his $10 million beachfront scheme up and running was only $20k. The entire Electricity system of NSW will go cheap at $8 billion. Most of that will be slotted to be spent on a suburban Metro railway from the city to the North-West (which will likely never be fully built). It’ll be easy to “lose” a few million of that here and there for politicians’ “retirement funds”.

    State Labor in NSW is floundering badly. But the Libs are still run by the Opus Dei and ex-Ustashi fanatics who think that this time they can’t lose. Of course it’s what they’ve been expecting for the last three elections, and old habits die hard. Don’t expect reform of that rotten culture any day soon. Paradoxically, the worse Iemma and his consigliares behave, the more patently inept they show themselves to be, the greater the naked greed they display, the greater their chances of re-election, as the Libs fail again to reform themselves in the expectation of an easy victory.

    It’s sad, really.

  37. Why does Mr Bolt think that if he laughs hysterically like a schoolgirl that there might be some agreement by transference with his viewpoint?
    Why does he think it’s his duty to continue to restate his viewpoints ad infinitum?

    That method of operation is a fundamentally poor way of getting a point across, and in fact is a pretty clear fundamental position of a reverse psychology argument, and I’m sure he doesn’t mean that.
    ie – the more he states it the more it cuts his credibility and the less believable his claims become.
    Very strange for someone who considers himself intelligent…
    You’ve made your statement Andrew; we know what it is. That’s enough.

  38. Bolt does sometimes make some very valid points (Nelson damaging the Liberal ‘Brand’). But then he goes off a totally the planet an issue not being discussed (like about greenhouse gases or stolen generation).

    Still he’s better on the insiders than Ackerman or Milne.

  39. Bushie Boy, I suspect you’re right sadly, about the N.S.W. political situation. The last I heard was that Iemma got rolled on privatisation and Rudd got a standing ovation, who’s clearly for privatisation. Go figure.

  40. onimod, Bolt is just tedious. There was a bloke, an economist I think, who was on “The World Today” spruiking the view that if we have to pay taxes for stuff, there better be a bloody good reason for it, and he didn’t see any reason to pay any more tax on account of unproven, in his view, human fuelled climate change. Hmm, I thought, Bolt may be the most boring and anticipated in his responses, however, there are some others out there talking absolute twaddle. He did have some other interesting ideas about promoting a creative culture, but clearly didn’t have a clue about science and how it operates.

  41. On the Iemma dilemma: What happens if it gets to the point where there is no viable government with fixed terms?

  42. The really is nothing wrong with selling off assets when the market is up. If investors in government debt are willing to give the government debt higher rating when there is less assets backing it, go for it.

    Kennet pretty much got the top off the market, for moving some assets over to equity financing he got the rest of the debt rated AAA. Stupid market, smart Kennet ( well Alan Stockdale)

    Iemma’s problem is he is looking at selling the assets of at the bottom of the market, and that is the only problem, very poor timing. You can only sell the assets once if you sell them cheap. If you sell them for a good price you could buy em back when they are cheap and sell em again in theory.

    Have a look at the UK government, they are picking up banks for the cost of pulling them out of the fire, something they thought they had to do anyway.

  43. Carpenter must be pinching himself. It can’t be surely. Yes, the WA Libs have voted to keep Buswell on.

  44. On “Today Tonight” – “Kevin Rudd has done nothing for the pensioners as yet.” Ah? The bloody budget hasn’t been delivered yet.

  48. Heard Jeff Kennett on the radio. Spruiking the benefits of privatisation, as against say, 50,000 job losses. All good, he says. Unbelievable, the number of person who have approached him, as he said a former and displaced teacher, now running a change of life and successful lawn mowing business. Not in Victoria, though. What a win! Jeff reckons NSW can learn.

  50. Newspoll: Nelson back to 9%. No change really but still funny.
    Big drop in TPP split 57 – 43. End of the honeymoon clearly. 😉

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 1 of 2
1 2