Morgan: 60-40

Morgan’s second poll in consecutive weeks shows a big stimulus package bounce to Labor, albeit one following a dip in the earlier survey. Labor’s primary vote is up five points to 51.5 per cent, and its two-party lead has widened from 56-44 to 60-40. The Liberals are down 2.5 per cent to 35.5 per cent, and the Greens are steady on 8 per cent.

UPDATE (14/2): Today’s West Australian has a Westpoll survey of 403 respondents in WA showing federal Labor leading 55-45, after trailing 51-49 in October. Kevin Rudd’s lead over Malcolm Turnbull as preferred prime minister has increased from 54-35 to 63-22. The result in WA at the 2007 election was about 53-47 in the Coalition’s favour.

• Today’s passage of the fiscal stimulus package through the Senate will probably take the heat out of early election speculation, but don’t let that stop you reading Antony Green‘s overview of the procedural and constitutional hurdles.

• This website has been dutifully reporting on Tasmania’s periodic upper house elections sice 2004, so it’s a great pleasure to report that this year’s will actually be interesting for a change. For this we can thank Harry Quick, formerly the maverick Labor member for the federal seat of Franklin, has announced he will nominate for Greens preselection to take on Bartlett government Treasurer Michael Aird in his Hobart seat of Derwent.

• Yesterday was the anniversary of the first sitting of the current parliament, which means the Electoral Commissioner has presumably conducted his determination of the number of House of Representatives seats each state is entitled to. As head counters will be aware, this will mean the initiation of redistribution processes in Queensland and New South Wales, which will respectively gain and lose a seat.

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.

1,154 comments on “Morgan: 60-40”

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  3. Newscorp are getting a bit hysterical now. Where were their journalists hiding while the economic stimulus package went through the Federal Parliament last week to hold the line on unemployment.

    [If an election is not called tomorrow, then the ALP’s next window of opportunity would be in two weeks for a March 28 election, which would allow the Queensland Parliament to be recalled next week. The election must be called by September.

    While party sources were yesterday still vague about the election date, the ALP would have concerns about possible continuing strike action by train drivers and having the latest unemployment figures announced in early March.]

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25058646-5006786,00.html

  4. GP 920

    “Mind you, much of the silly private vs public debate would cease if a voucher system was in place for education funding.”

    Interesting that vouchers for education was one of the ideas suggested by Milton Friedman in that book Free to Choose. Just a coincidence; there are no libertarians in the Liberal Party – GP said so 😀

  5. Vera, that Kenneth Davidson’s article is indeed and excellent article, particularly like these two points:

    [1. The Federal Government has obtained parliamentary approval to increase the limit on Commonwealth borrowing to $200 billion, which will provide room for it to finance its infrastructure package. All this can be justified as debt financed. It will not be a burden on future generations, as claimed by Turnbull, unless the additional spending adds to inflation or wasteful imports rather than creates demand for goods and services produced in Australia. Providing the money borrowed by the Government is spent wisely]

    and this later:

    [2. Now is the time for the Government to borrow for infrastructure when there is an unlimited supply of investment funds seeking relatively risk-free investments.]

    http://business.theage.com.au/business/stimulus-an-investment-in-the-future-20090215-8849.html?page=-1

    As the GFC events have proved, I have to disagree with Davidson, Merchant Bankers are economically illiterate. They are merchants, not bankers.

  6. I just love this from the man who likes to push people around, Glenn Milne:

    [Take this bleak assessment issued recently by investment house ABN Amro: “The Obama stimulus package has a multiplier or bang for the buck of around one” ABN told its clients. “This means that there is around $1 of GDP added for each $1 of stimulus spent.

    “The Rudd stimulus package seems to have a much lower multiplier of 0.3 in its first year and no more than 0.6 in its second year. The multiplier is much lower because the Rudd package chooses to spend its money on social infrastructure rather than economic infrastructure.

    “In terms of economic impact, the bang for the buck in the Rudd package is so soft it must be rated as a dull thud. The object of the stimulus package appears to be to simply take the edge off the current recession until such time as the cut in interest rates administered by the RBA generates a recovery in private investment and recovery in the Australian economy.

    “Put together, this stimulus package has more bonuses than Wall Street.” ]

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25058438-33435,00.html

    Quoting an outfit like ABN-AMRO is like quoting Dracula to support the Blood Bank. The likes of ABN-AMRO were the partner in crime of the merchant & investment banking industry that have created the GFC.

    Guess who owns ABN-AMRO? Royal Bank of Scotland – that great British banking institution that has been driven to bankruptcy and has to be bailed out by the British taxpayers to the tune of $50B. Please note $50B, that is more than the entire Australian Govt SP of $42B. That is $50B to rescue A BANK.

    You have to do better with your research Glenn.

  7. When we discussed firebugs, you might remember I said they were often firefighters. Sadly, it was (allegedly) true again. I linked an article about why they do it.

    1. excitement-motivated arson;
    2. vandalism-motivated arson;
    3. revenge-motivated arson;
    4. crime concealment-motivated arson;
    5. profit-motivated arson; and
    6. extremist-motivated arson.

    There is a lot more on firefighter arson in the original article “Bushfire arson : a review of the literature. ”

    [THE man accused of starting one of the deadly Victorian bushfires was a member of a country fire brigade whose members cheated death fighting the blaze.]

    http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25060018-5006301,00.html

  8. Actually, I’ve got a feeling you Victorians aren’t allowed to know that for legal reasons. Just pretend I never linked it. 😀

  10. Fins

    ABN Amro was also one of the biggest funders of PPPs too. They will be quite resentfull now that that bank-fee gravy train has been derailed.

    I find their comments on the GDP multiplier quite implausible; I’d love to see their assumptions. People I worked with years ago who calculated multpliers found that they were above 0.5 for almost ANY category of government spending – even welfare payments, because at least some got spent on services that employed people. Calling the education spending “soft” is also a bit hyperbolic given that it is to build facilities. Conversely I have read pessimistic statements about the Obama package because of the high proportion of tax cuts, which many will simply save or use to reduce debt.

    As I have suggested before, most of these guys (merchant bankers) are salesmen not analysts. That is why most of the (credible independant) economists I read are in academia. ABN Amro are just trying to talk down government investment in areas they don’t make money in, hoping to transfer emphasis to areas they profit from.

  12. Fins

    If you want to have a good laugh at economic forecasters, go to a library with a good archive adn look up the newspaper finance sections the week or month before “black friday”, October 1987. Most of them had no idea what was coming.

  16. Oh dear. The OZ is trying to whip up a plagiarism scandal by claiming that Kevin Rudd in his recent Monthly essay had, get this, used the same quotes (of Nicolas Sarkozy and Wang Qishan) as Roger Altman in January’s edition of Foreign Affairs. These quotes were, of course, properly referenced.

    For the benefit of the unnamed moron who wrote this article, here is the OED definition of plagiarism: “The action or practice of taking someone else’s work, idea, etc., and passing it off as one’s own.”

    Repeat: passing it off as one’s own.

  17. [ here is the OED definition of plagiarism: “The action or practice of taking someone else’s work, idea, etc., and passing it off as one’s own.”]

    also known as doing a “bishop”

  18. Kevin Rudd was the dux of Nambour High School and received a scholarship to attend ANU. If anyone knows the technical requirements of writing essays it would be him. Sounds like the OO is trying for payback for their girl, Bishop, being busted (serially) for plagiarism. How spiteful!

  19. Thinking about Bishop, and how much Swan has improved after a year of working with Henry and Stevens (Swan is smart and a fast learner), Bishop really has not improved in the same time. Yet her CV says she is smart and should be capable of learning too. This makes me wonder -who is advising her? Does she need to get better advice? Whoever replaces here will certainly need to.

  21. They’re up to their old tricks again, adopting the “tarred with the same brush” spoiler strategy that worked so poorly for them during the 07 campaign … (their assumption being that most people can’t make the distinctions required to separate, for example, plagiarism – bad- from coincidental quoting – not bad).

  23. Ahh the Murdoch flagship still living in denial lashing out as it continues to fail like its owner. Yes,I understand they have a core readership of toxic Liberals that thrive on pointless attacks on the enemy, but plagiarism?

    Well, a referenced quote must signal the end of the honeymoon. That is it for poor old Rudd, the gig is up.

  24. Actually, I think the OZ is trying to give Bishop a soft landing. As deputy leader of the Liberal Party, her plagiarism misjudgements plus her (abject) portfolio failure will be a liability for the Coalition at the next election.

    Chris Mitchell has put the word out …

  25. The Libs have clearly known about Rudd’s “plagiarism” for a while but haven’t released anything on it because it’s so unbelievably lame. In their desperation to save Chucky’s Mum, they are clasping at straws.

  26. Apologies. The “unnamed moron” I referred to earlier, is in fact, a named moron. The author of this flaccid, undergraduate and mis-targeted attack on Rudd’s scholarly honour is none other than the OZ’s chief political correspondent, Matthew Franklin.

  28. This is getting interesting.

    [The New South Wales Health Minister, John Della Bosca, says he would not oppose the Commonwealth taking over state responsibilities for primary health care.]

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/16/2492289.htm

    The report’s arguments about the positives of a federal take over seem to make a lot of sense. I wonder if Rudd has the ball’s. In my opinion every big reform he takes from now can be cast in the “During the biggest recession since WW2 I implemented paid maternity and reformed Australia’s health system etc” mould. Unfortunately, he seems to be backing away from the former even though Gillard’s comments were negated by the draft report anyway. Hopefully he won’t back down from this.

  31. Hockey to take over. Coonan in finance. Bishop to FA. Announcement today.

    A sad, sad day for the Labor Party. One of our best assets gone. 😉

  38. Dunno about that Adam. My wife, who is suitably left wing, is a big fan of Uncle Joe. I suspect he has a much larger following than JB.

    [Julie Bishop is expected to step down today as shadow treasurer and move to foreign affairs.

    In return for stepping aside voluntarily, Ms Bishop will remain as the Liberal Party’s deputy leader.

    She is expected to announce her decision in Perth at 11.45am AEDT.

    Malcolm Turnbull is then expected to announce a broader reshuffle around lunch time.

    The finance spokesman Joe Hockey will be elevated to the treasury job while Senator Helen Coonan will move from foreign affairs to finance.]

  39. Will Hockey still be The Oppositions Leader of the House? We’ll all miss his tactical flair if it goes to someone else.

  40. It’s time for the fast food tax to come out- balance the budget, increase gov revenue and reduce obesity. With the opposition treasurer resembling a stuffed pig they dare not say anything.

  41. In 11 years Costello went through six shadow treasurers (Evans, Crean, McMullan, Latham, Crean, Swan – have I missed anyone?). Swan is now on his third in 15 months (Turnbull, Bishop, Hockey). At this rate he will break Costello’s record in one term.

  42. Just to show how sharp Matthew Franklins political antenna are he managed to say this in the OO today. He must be seriously pissed off. Yet again, the OO doesn’t know what’s going on in it’s own party. 😉

    [LIBERAL frontbencher Julie Bishop looks safe as the Opposition’s Treasury spokeswoman in the short term, despite widespread concern among her colleagues over her performance.

    However, several sources told The Australian Ms Bishop retains the crucial support of Malcolm Turnbull, who would be the one to decide if she should move to a different role. ]

    Bishop retains Turnbull backing
    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25059400-5013871,00.html

  43. I believe the current thinking is to bundle all the toxic policy into one securitised platform which is then tranched out so that the downside risk is distributed to the lower grade voters. A new instrument: Promise Default Swaps will be offered to the discerning investors to further hedge against negative returns.

  45. [RUDD’S ARMENIAN MASSACRE]

    You can be arrested in Turkey for supporting that (Orhan Pamuk was). And you can be arrested in France for denying it.

  47. Hockey’s other problem (apart from toxic policy) will be keeping his temper. Despite the CMT boosting him as “jovial Joe” he actually has a very short fuse, and is frequently in either a grump or a sulk or both when he doesn’t get his way. Albo is particularly adept at baiting him. He will be easy meat for the Fab Four to goad into doing his block for the cameras.

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