Newspoll: 58-42

The Australian reports no change in Labor’s Newspoll lead from last fortnight: 58-42. Kevin Rudd is steady on 67 per cent as preferred prime minister, while Malcolm Turnbull’s is up one to 19 per cent. More to follow. Otherwise:

• Essential Research has Labor’s lead down from 61-39 to 60-40. Bonus questions on financial stimulus payments and how they will be spent; who will benefit from the national broadband network (everybody, it seems); and some no-brainers on the banks.

• Antony Green offers a thorough overview of results from the Western Australian election courtesy of the WA Parliamentary Library, which has assembled a page compiling all manner of helpful electoral paraphernalia. Antony calculates the two-party result as 51.9-48.1 to the Liberals.

• Ben Raue at the Tally Room has posted the nominees for Greens Senate preselection in New South Wales, where state MP Lee Rhiannon is presumably the front-runner, and Victoria, where previous candidates Richard di Natale and David Risstrom stand out in a crowded field. A productive comments thread ensues.

• Also from Ben Raue, Christian Democratic Party MLC Gordon Moyes says he “may accept an invitation from Family First” after falling out with Fred Nile.

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.

1,556 comments on “Newspoll: 58-42”

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  1. Well Scorpio – they had to fill their papers with something.

    They sure as hell didn’t want to write about the lousy mob at James Hardie. Crikey had a good piece today about that. The Fairfax press wrote extensively about it but barely a word from News Ltd.

  3. It’s a matter of dispute how much day to day control Murdoch exercises over his papers. It may be that the climate fetishist is Mitchell, or someone else in the hierarchy, and Murdoch is too busy at the moment losing billions of dollars in China to bother with such trivia.

  4. And ain’t that music to the ears altho I hate to think how many people he will put out of work if he loses any more.

    Heard yesterday that his Fox cable network is not doing well even tho they build themselves up as the best thing since sliced bread.

    More than losing his money I reckon he would hate losing his power.

  5. Adam

    It wouldn’t take long for Rupert to ring Mitchell and tell him that News Ltd has a policy of accepting the IPCC’s judgement as a group, which is what the site says. It does raise the fascinating ethical issue of whether a paper should follow it’s own official policy or report whatever it’s journos and editors feels like.

  6. I don’t see it as an ethical issue. Murdoch owns the paper and he can publish anything he likes in it. Or, he can appoint an editor and let run run whatever he likes so long as the paper makes money. It’s entirely up to him. If we the public don’t like it, we can (a) not buy his papers, (b) start our own papers, (c) give up on the old media and find other ways to write and read the news. I’m doing (a) and (c).

  7. I mean for the journalist. Do you follow company policy, which is that AGW is real, do you report what your editor says, what you think or an “unbiased” report?

  10. Diogenes @ 1507,

    You publish only pieces that can hopefully give the Libs a leg-up no matter what the subject matter or it’s accuracy or value to informing the public on serious, matters of concern to them.

  11. If Rudd made a speech in favour of raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens, The Australian would find something to oppose about all of them. Paul Kelly would write 5,000 words of Spenglerian prose denouncing all of them as threats to western civilisation. Alan Wood would explain why they all lead to national bankruptcy and ruin. Janet Albrechtsen and Christopher Pearson would add hysterical commentaries.

  13. Adam and scorpio

    But does that sell papers? They’re not going to deliberately lose money. Murdoch didn’t get where he is by losing money, unless the OO is a “loss leader”.

  14. I believe The Australian has lost money for most of its history. It’s Murdoch’s vanity paper, he does it so he can pretend to be the Lord Rothermere of his age, and also reassure himself, and his mum, that he’s not just a tits and arse publisher. Frank Packer kept The Bulletin alive for the same reason.

  15. [Turnbull masters stating the bleeding obvious. ]
    [Australia should aim for a “no boats” border protection policy, Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull says.]
    Oh ok, I guess that means a Turnbull government will use taxes to fund QANTAS chartered flights for all asylum seekers from Indonesia to Christmas Island.

    As far as I know, that is the only definitive way to stop boats coming – fly them to Christmas Island instead.

  16. [I believe The Australian has lost money for most of its history.]

    So has the NY Post – the other Murdoch flagship. It’s an ego thing for Rupert…

  17. [But does that sell papers?]

    Btw, it seems clear the Oz is trying to position itself as the “conservative” broadsheet (or newspaper of record) in Australia, staring defiantly in the face of the “left-wing” Fairfax broadsheets.

    In this respect, it seems that News Ltd is trying to re-create the current situation in the US where the WSJ tries to provide a conservative counterpoint to the liberal NY Times and Washington Post.

  18. Murdoch no longer makes much money from me. I bought the Oz six days a week from the first edition right up to about two years ago. The same with the Qld Courier Mail and Sunday Mail.

    He might make a cent or two whenever I link to his on-line versions but that is the extent of my contribution to his financial status. The fact that people such as myself no longer support his publications financially should be of concern to the people who work for him because if enough of us bail out, then their source of income is in a state of jeopardy also.

    I don’t think they are intelligent enough to realise that.

  19. GB at 1467 and other PBs

    Don’t know if this refers to the same thing, but I heard part of a news item today, in my car, on ABC Radio National that included an interview with a man (from, I think, Iraq) who had been trying for a number of years to be recognised as a genuine refugee.

    He said he was on a boat coming to Australia in 2001 to seek asylum but the boat was turned back to Indonesia by Australia. I think he said he’s been in (detention? in) Indonesia since then, and about nine months ago was finally officially declared by ?UNHCR to be a genuine refugee.

    As I said, I only heard part of the brief interview, so I’m not sure what the presentation angle was, and I hope I’ve recalled this with enough accuracy (happy to stand corrected). However, I got the impression this man wasn’t excited about any apparent ‘softening’ of Australia’s approach, it was more that a genuine refugee seeking asylum in Australia in 2009 might be treated fairly, as opposed to how genuine refugees were treated by Australia in 2001.

    Don’t think it backs up the Opposition/No Position Party inference, in my opinion, that our Government (our out-of-its-depth, deluded Government) is certain to be manipulated by hoards of undeserving opportunists.

    I suppose it would be too much to hope for any coherent, well-thought out comments from the NoPosition leading up to the budget.

    Helen

  20. Mesma’s just been on Sky’s Agenda. When sort of pressed on what the Opposition’s policy might be she merely said that it was up to the government.
    Hopeless!

  21. For the record, MT and Kev agreed on their football tips this weekend. The West publishes an 8 to 10 supplement every Friday about the upcoming rounds games. Today is the first time I’ve seen it and likely one of the only times you will see them agree upon anything 😉 …..

    Vera, both picked the Swannies as well as North; Glen and AIC, they picked Adelaide ….

  22. Jack points out that the Ruddster has taken a leaf out of Howie’s book recently and has been very keen to thump the populist tub and consign the villains of the issue de jour to hell or to rot in jail. The Ruddster doesn’t seem to have a very progressive view of our prisons.

    [On 17 April, 2007 the Prime Minister declared that people smugglers were the “vilest form of human life.”

    “They trade on the tragedy of others and that is why they should rot in jail, and in my own view, rot in hell,” the Prime Minister said.

    On 10 February, Mr Rudd stepped forward to offer a view on those suspected to have contributed to the bush fire tragedy in Victoria by lighting fires.

    “My own personal view is they should be allowed to rot in jail.” Mr Rudd said.

    And last month, Mr Rudd declared, “Bikie violence, bikie thugs, and organised criminal activity from my point of view should have zero tolerance.”

    “I find it unacceptable. It is unacceptable. It’s repugnant,” he said.]

    http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/jacktheinsider/index.php/theaustralian/comments/hell_is_other_politicians

  23. Adam

    Can’t you throw Costa out of the Labor Party for crap like this? Or has he already quit? He wants to stop all the Stimpacs, the ETS and the NBN. Even Turnbull hasn’t been as critical of Rudd as this.

    [Political positioning, not good policy, is driving the Government. Good government requires leadership that is able to adapt its commitments to changing circumstances. This requires a deeper level of honesty with the electorate which, on a number of policy fronts, the Rudd Government is lacking.]

    [Rather than accepting the advice of state education officials with more knowledge and experience that the policy was ill-conceived, the Government attempted to bulldoze its agenda on the states.]

    [The Government emissions trading scheme, the Orwellian-named carbon pollution reduction scheme, is another example of the Government valuing unrealistic election commitments over sensible policy and the national interest. The present ETS is fatally flawed.

    Thanks to the Senate inquiry into the ETS, convincing evidence is accumulating on its disastrous economic effects.

    It is foolhardy to continue the implementation of this scheme. ]

    [The economics of fibre to the home, Broad argues, don’t stack up. The Government’s proposal is, in Broad’s view, extravagant and represents an irrational decision with taxpayers’ money.]

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25376458-5017272,00.html

  25. Hey Dio check this out!!

    Liberal staffers defy Hamilton-Smith by stacking online polls

    http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25379426-2682,00.html

    [DIRECTIONS from Opposition Leader Martin Hamilton-Smith not to stack media polls – including those on AdelaideNow – are apparently being ignored by Liberal staffers.

    Frontbench opposition MPs Duncan McFetridge, David Pisoni and Mitch Williams have been named on ABC Radio today for apparently sending out emails to their staff urging them to vote in online polls.

    Co-announcer of ABC 891’s morning program David Bevan said he had received an envelope – believed to have come from offices within the Liberal Party – full of emails from the three MPs.

    “What these emails are doing is asking for people who are associated with the Liberal Party to go on to websites and vote,” he said.

    “Duncan McFetridge, the person who sends the email, says: ‘Dear members and staff, Duncan would greatly appreciate if you could vote on his website that Patrick Conlon should be sacked as Transport Minister’.”

    Another email, again from Dr McFetridge’s office stated: “Dear members and staff, Duncan asks whether everyone can please vote on the AdelaideNow website saying, ‘Yes I’ve had enough of our public transport system’,” it said.]

  26. Anyone on the blog tonight from Adelaide? How bad is the rain atm? And how wet during the day, will it be a mess for AAMI?

  28. Gary, that is why internet polls are useless.
    I dont think the Libs are the only side who fudges these kinds of polls.

  29. [Gary, that is why internet polls are useless.
    I dont think the Libs are the only side who fudges these kinds of polls.]

    I left a comment on that site for HYPOCRITE comments like yours.

    We have proof in the article that Liberals are doing this. We do not have proof that Labor does this. So who do you attack in your response to this article? Labor.

    Bloody rusted Liberals.

  31. The best bit is this response only days ago:

    [Readers have accused the LIberals of playing the same trick on other stories, so we contacted chief Liberal minder Kevin Naughton. He said his people didn’t have the software available to manipulate our polls, but he was sure Labor did.

    “We wouldn’t do it because we want to know what people really think… but we don’t take any notice of the figures after three or four hours because we know that Labor would be doing it (manipulating the numbers) by then,” he said.]

    http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25359298-5006301,00.html

  32. On poll manipulation in SA, Adelaide in particular, they need to talk to the staff of Pyne’s office. He’s the expert down there 😉 …. I reckon that the SA state Libs follow his m.o. 😀 …….

  34. We may need to relocate many parts of Australia, Adam. Did you see the fairly detailed post directed to you from Boerwar earlier in the thread and have you checked out the cumulative posts by Brian on Larvatus Prodeo? The beliefs or hopes of the early white explorers of an inland sea may not be all that far off the mark. Lake Mungo might come to rival Lake Burley Griffin.

  36. Juliem

    I live in the western suburbs not that far from AAMI stadium and have had 26mm of rain. The forecast for tonight is for abating winds and no rain so conditions shouldn’t be too bad. Go the Power!

    On another subject completely did any other Adelaideans watch Today Tonight tonight. Kevin is now to blame for not paying the Papuan fuzzie wuzzies for their help on the Kokoda Track during the war. WTF, what will they blame him for next.

  38. After have close to a metre of rain in the last month Adelaide can have it. 200mm of rain in a couple of hours is not too much fun.

  41. Ahh hilarious.

    So the NSW Labor Party is officially split on prison, waste, lotteries and superannuation privatisation as well.

  42. Harry “Snapper” Organs:

    [Lake Mungo might come to rival Lake Burley Griffin.]

    Come now. Have you ever been there? It is close to the NSW/VIC border.

    You need to go a lot further north before the rain from climate change starts to have an impact.

    Lake Mungo has been dry for nigh on 20 000 years, and that is not going to change soon.

    😛

  46. Adam in Canberra @ 1455

    Playing catchup here – the quote about getting a dog if you want a friend in politics, which you attribute to Keating, has for a much longer time been attributed (in the form “if you want a friend in Washington …) to Harry Truman (thought if and when Truman actually said it still seems to be disputed).

    And while I have the podium, the quote often attributed to Whitlam that he had a deal with McMahon, that if McMahon didn’t lies about Whitlam, Whitlam wouldn’t tell the truth about him, seems to go back at least to Adlai Stevenson.

  48. Adam
    Dona Maria del Rosario Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart y Silva was/is the most titled noble in the world
    b. 1926 28/3
    9 Ducal titles,15 Marchioness’s,19 Countess’s,20 Grandess’s,1 Viscountess and Baroness

    I think she was countess of every month except March
    😉

  49. [And while I have the podium, the quote often attributed to Whitlam that he had a deal with McMahon, that if McMahon didn’t lies about Whitlam, Whitlam wouldn’t tell the truth about him, seems to go back at least to Adlai Stevenson.]

    Whitlam actually said it about Gorton during the 1969 campaign, I remember it well. It may of course be older. I’m disappointed to hear that Keating didn’t coin “Get a dog,” it’s such a Keatingesque thing to say.

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