Morgan: 58-42

The latest Roy Morgan survey of 1804 respondents has Labor’s two-party lead unchanged at 58-42, with their primary vote down 0.5 per cent to 49 per cent and the Coalition’s down 1.5 per cent to 36 per cent. The Greens are up a point to 9 per cent. Much else to report:

• On Monday, Galaxy published a survey of 1004 respondents showing federal Labor with a two-party lead of 55-45. The primary vote figures of 43 per cent for Labor and 40 per cent for the Coalition are similar to those from the 2007 election, suggesting the two-party result flatters Labor a little. Furthermore, 17 per cent nominate themselves less likely to vote Labor if an early election is called against 12 per cent more likely. Kevin Rudd was rated “arrogant” by 31 per cent against 47 per cent for Malcolm Turnbull, while their respective ratings for being “out of touch with ordinary Australians” were 29 per cent and 48 per cent. However, Rudd performed worse than Turnbull on the innovative measure of “someone who can turn nasty if he doesn’t get his own way”, scoring 43 per cent to Turnbull’s 31 per cent. Peter Brent at Mumble has tables.

• Tasmanian Electrical Trades Union secretary Kevin Harkins apparently plans to proceed with his bid for Senate preselection, despite having been told by Kevin Rudd his chances were “Buckley’s and none”. Harkins was endorsed as candidate for Franklin ahead of the 2007 election, but was compelled to step aside four months beforehand after his colourful activities as a union leader emerged as a political liability. It was reported at the time that the pill had been sugared with offers of “an elevated union position, increased salary and a future Senate seat”. Harkins is the favoured candidate of the Left faction for one of the two safe Senate seats, with incumbent Kerry O’Brien set to be dropped to loseable third. The Hobart Mercury reports that the Left’s position is now likely to go to Australian Manufacturing Workers Union secretary Anne Urquhart, who is seen as acceptable to the Right. The Right’s position at the top of the ticket will remain with the low-profile Helen Polley.

• Michael Owen of The Australian reports on tension in the South Australian Liberal camp over Senate preselection, with Right faction colossus Nick Minchin “warning off” moderate state president Sean Edwards. Minchin says Edwards had undertaken not to seek preselection when he ran for the presidency in 2007 so he could focus on next year’s state election. A “party source” says the Right has secured the postponement of preselection until April next year so a newly elected state council can provide them with a more favourable result, potentially leaving the party unprepared for an early election. The Right’s chief concern is to secure a seat for David Fawcett, defeated in Wakefield at the 2007 election, at Edwards’ expense. Alan Ferguson, who is associated with the Right faction and the conservative Lyons Forum, is “expected to retire” rather than seek another term.

• After holding the seat since Malcolm Fraser’s departure after his 1983 election defeat, David Hawker has announced he will retire as member for Wannon at the next election. Andrew Landeryou at VexNews has a comprehensive form guide of potential preselection aspirants, including “complicated Costello loyalist” Georgie Crozier; Victorian Farmers Federation president Simon Ramsay, said to be facing a losing battle against former Howard government adviser Rod Nockles in his bid for the less appealing prospect of Corangamite; Institute of Public Affairs agriculture policy expert Louise Staley, who challenged Kevin Andrews for preselection in Menzies ahead of the 2001 election; former police sergeant and anti-corruption crusader Simon Illingworth; “farmer, vet and former local councillor” Katrina Rainsford; and the similarly credentialled Matt Makin.

• Left faction Victorian state MP Carlo Carli has announced he will not re-contest Brunswick at the next election, perhaps boosting the Greens’ vague chances of snaring the seat. Andrew Landeryou at VexNews once again offers a goldmine of detail on preselection contenders, describing the seat as an “area of conflict” between the competing Left faction camps associated with federal Bruce MP Alan Griffin and Senator Kim Carr. Griffin faction aspirants include former state secretary Eric Locke and Moreland councillor Alice Pryor, while the only identified contender from the Carr camp is 23-year-old Enver Erdogan, a staffer to House of Representatives Speaker Harry Jenkins. Apparently straddling the two camps is Danny Michel, an adviser to Public Transport Minister Lynne Kosky. Moreland’s Right faction mayor Lambros Tapinos is also named as a “wild card”.

• Yet more from the House of Landeryou: preselection challenges apparently loom against two senior Victorian state Liberals, Shadow Police Minister Andrew McIntosh in Kew and Shadow Health Minister Helen Shardey in Caulfield. The story in Kew goes that a Josh Frydenberg federal preselection victory in Kooyong would unleash “irresistible pressure” for McIntosh to be dumped in favour of “Costello loyalist” Kelly O’Dwyer. In Caulfield, “local power-broker” Frank Greenstein proposes that Shardey make way for David Southwick, who previously contested the federal seat of Melbourne Ports in 2004 and was narrowly pipped by short-lived Labor member Evan Thornley for an upper house seat in Southern Metropolitan in 2006. Ted Baillieu is apparently very keen that none of this transpire, as both McIntosh and Shardey are loyal to him.

• The Australian reports the June 30 deadline for Victorian Liberal federal preselection nominations has ratcheted up speculation about Peter Costello’s future plans, with the overwhelming expectation he will seek another term in Higgins. Kevin Andrews is expected to face a challenge in Menzies, but is “believed to have the numbers”.

• UMR Research has published one of its occasional polls on attitudes to republicanism, showing little change since November. Support is up one point to 51 per cent, opposition is up two to 30 per cent. Support for direct election of the president is up a point to 81 per cent, with opposition stable on 12 per cent. Fifty-three per cent support a referendum during the next term of parliament.

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.

1,451 comments on “Morgan: 58-42”

Comments Page 3 of 30
1 2 3 4 … 30

  5. Obscure Senators quiz: who remembers Karin Sowada, Robert Wood, Pat Field, Geoff Buckland, Len Harris, Cleaver Bunton, Tom Wheelwright, Irina Dunn?

  6. I’m guessing that 6/7 thing got written before the 2007 election (Ludlam and Hanson-Young being new then)?

  8. [No, as it would be totally hypocritical for William to Ban the T word to describe our Green friends, but the others are fair game.]
    Well I think it is the constant repetition of a term that drags the discussion down. So just mix up our epithets, variety is the spice of life!

  9. [Obscure Senators quiz: who remembers Karin Sowada, Robert Wood, Pat Field, Geoff Buckland, Len Harris, Cleaver Bunton, Tom Wheelwright, Irina Dunn?]

    No, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, no, no.

  11. [Obscure Senators quiz: who remembers Karin Sowada, Robert Wood, Pat Field, Geoff Buckland, Len Harris, Cleaver Bunton, Tom Wheelwright, Irina Dunn?]
    I only remember Len Harris, wasn’t he One Nation Party, Queensland?

    The Stateline story on the S.A. budget was just bizarre. It had footage of chips being friend, intercut with shots of Foley and Rann saying the budget was about jobs.

    I think ABC SA is going through a Louis Bunuel phase.

  12. [BTW Frank, Bob Brown is not a vegetarian.]

    Well he should be expelled from the Party Forthwith – issn’t it a pre-requisite to be one ? 🙂

  13. The Green websites are a dogs breakfast. They went for a spiffy “content management system” unfortunately they obviously do not have the resources to update this cms.

    Other websites let outdated pages fade from public view, the Greens cms keeps outdated pages live for our enjoyment. 😉

  14. [Well I think it is the constant repetition of a term that drags the discussion down. So just mix up our epithets, variety is the spice of life!]

    Hence my point about William applying the same standards.

  15. [The Green websites are a dogs breakfast. They went for a spiffy “content management system” unfortunately they obviously do not have the resources to update this cms.]

    They must have lost their “Work for The Dole kid-)

  16. [Other websites let outdated pages fade from public view, the Greens cms keeps outdated pages live for our enjoyment.]

    and their embarrasment 🙂

  19. BTW: as a Tofu lover. There is NO green Tofu. There are white, yellow, red, brown, stinking black (taiwanese version).

  20. Latest on Gordon Brown’s reshuffle:
    Alistar Darling stays as Chancellor/Treasurer
    David Miliband retains Foreign Secretary position
    Alan Johnson moves to the Home Office
    Brown will promote a few women to key jobs.

    Other senior ministers(Johnson, Miliband) publicly supporting Brown, for now!

  21. The ABC is taking the Chaser off air for the next 2 weeks, due to this week’s controversy. I guess if the show returns to the airwaves, it’ll be heavily censored by management. A shame that the conservative media wins, but inevitable.

  22. [The ABC is taking the Chaser off air for the next 2 weeks, due to this week’s controversy. I guess if the show returns to the airwaves, it’ll be heavily censored by management. A shame that the conservative media wins, but inevitable.]

    And speaking as a person with a disability, I didn’t find the skit offensive at all – it pointed out how a lot of these “Charities” care more about their public image than they do about the people they purport to assist. Especially when they cut serivces in one area while sending big money on company Cars and other perks for the CEO.

  23. The only way for a really left leftie to eat Dofu [sic] is to take it outback, pref near an open drain, and toast it with one of those old spirit blow-torches and “tr-rar!” Chou Dofu, Mao’s fave made a la his fave Changsha cafe. IMHO absolutely foul (tho the chili masks som of the ‘taste’, but still more taste than plain dofu. Probably explains a lot about China from the mid1920s. The rest of the food was great.

  24. I went to a restaurant attached to a temple in Shanghai, which specialises in dishes which look and taste like meat – pork, chicken, beef, prawn, fish – but which are in fact all made from tofu. You’d never have guessed. Damn cunning these orientals, what?

  25. I am sure there is a contradiction in this somewhere…. I think that should read a ‘strong belief in hypocrisy’

    [Kentucky Pastor Invites People To Bring Guns To Church

    “And we’re not ashamed to say that there was a strong belief in God and firearms _ without that this country wouldn’t be here.”

    Pagano’s Protestant church, which attracts up to 150 people to Sunday services, is a member of the Assemblies of God. ]

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/04/kentucky-pastor-invites-p_n_211498.html

  27. [I went to a restaurant attached to a temple in Shanghai, which specialises in dishes which look and taste like meat – pork, chicken, beef, prawn, fish – but which are in fact all made from tofu. You’d never have guessed. Damn cunning these orientals, what?]

    I think I was referring more to the Stereotype than anything else.

  28. The Republicans can’t understand a world without hate.

    [Fleischer criticizes Obama’s Cairo speech as being too ‘balanced.’

    Today, former Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer told CBS that he disapproved of President Obama’s speech in Cairo about the U.S. relationship with Muslim communities around the world. His problem with the speech? It was too “balanced”:

    The Obama administration has faced criticism for being too balanced in the past.]

    http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/04/fleischer-obama-balanced/

  30. The Comrades of the CCCCP are not happy with Hillary:

    [China slams Clinton’s June 4 comments (China Daily) – China Thursday expressed deep dissatisfaction and resolute opposition to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s remarks on the 20th anniversary of the events of June 4.

    “As to the political turmoil and problems that happened in the late 1980s, the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have already made a clear conclusion,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a regular press conference in response to a question about a statement released by Clinton on Wednesday.]

    http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-06/05/content_8250388.htm

    [China has accused the US of “crudely meddling” in its affairs after Hillary Clinton urged Beijing to account for those killed in a crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square 20 years ago.

    The US secretary of state last night also called on China to release those still imprisoned in connection with the protests, stop harassing those who took part and begin a dialogue with victims’ families.

    She urged the regime to “examine openly the darker events of its past and provide a public accounting of those killed, detained or missing, both to learn and to heal”.]

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/04/tiananmen-clinton-china-meddling-1989

    You sock it to them gal. Sigh, the stuff she has to endure to prop up Obi.

  31. [I went to a restaurant attached to a temple in Shanghai, which specialises in dishes which look and taste like meat – pork, chicken, beef, prawn, fish – but which are in fact all made from tofu. You’d never have guessed. Damn cunning these orientals, what?]

    There used to be a place in Perth called the “Happy Buddha” which did this as well. The “meat” made from soy products was virtually identical in appearance and texture to real meat which made it more than tolerable for meat eaters who were obliged to go to vegetarian restaurants. I am not sure if they are still around though.

  32. I haven’t seen or read the speech, so I’m not commenting on it, but it is a fair point to make that one cannot strike a spurious “balance” between right and wrong, good and evil, democracy and despotism. I presume that’s what he meant. Whether he was justified in making that criticism is another matter.

  33. Finns,

    As you pointed out earlier, the Americans have a rather benign view of their own atrocities.

    I think a lost of the US rhetoric is for home consumption only.

  34. [As you pointed out earlier, the Americans have a rather benign view of their own atrocities.]
    WOW! You sound like a left wing Labor hack!

  35. [it pointed out how a lot of these “Charities” care more about their public image than they do about the people they purport to assist]

    I don’t think that came across in the sketch at all. The charity in question might well be a fair target for a dose of ridicule (I can’t say as I do know anything about the way it is managed) but the sketch unfortunately failed big time. The thing that surpised me most is how the chaser team could present such a muddled message. They are very smart articulate guys and are normally on the money when firing sarcasm barbs.

    The two week lay off by the ABC is a cop out. Boo hiss! The Chaser guys must be fuming.

  36. Frank sick dying kids are a no go zone- the chaser is getting its just deserts. I appreciate the point about many charities, but having done a lot of work with and for SIDS i can tell you that some of these charities run on the smell of an oily rag and do so much.

  37. [The thing that surpised me most is how the chaser team could present such a muddled message. They are very smart articulate guys and are normally on the money when firing sarcasm barbs.]
    That seems to be the nature of comedy, sometimes you hit sometimes you miss, but if you censor the misses, then you don’t get any hits. You just end up with Hey Hey It’s Saturday, moronic gags by people who are too paranoid of upsetting advertisers or TV executives to actually use comedy as a method of social critique.

    Even some great comedians like Richard Pryor re-evaluate what they have done or said in the past.

  40. Yeah right and anything out of Fleischer is worth listening to. He’s just upset about the Palestinian state plans- nothing else

  41. [Frank sick dying kids are a no go zone- the chaser is getting its just deserts.]
    What about the “Oscar Bait” sketch with the homosexual / disabled / Thespian who was confined to a wheelchair?

  42. The Finnigans #130
    [The Obama administration has faced criticism for being too balanced in the past]

    Fleischer might have something – it is one thing for Obama to be balanced, but there’s a hell of a lot more required than just that. Kevin or any of his ministers could have assisted Obama here and told him, direct from any of their hymn sheets, that the important thing is “Getting the balance RIGHT.” I bet he hasn’t thought of that. If only Penny Wong had emailed him a few of the key repetitions before the Cairo speech he could have known and wouldn’t now be criticised by those wise Bush aides for that terrible failing of ‘balance’. Terrible weakness for a statesman, peacemaker and international mediator to be balanced, eh what?

  43. [Happy to be called Labor hack. Left wing is your paradigm. You can own that.]
    I’ve heard many in the Labor left complain about how many atrocities the U.S. has committed, you are slap bang in the wackaloon Labor Left fringe with comments like that.

    I’m glad you at least now appreciate that Left wing is a far broader term than just meaning Marxist-Leninism.

  44. [Frank sick dying kids are a no go zone- the chaser is getting its just deserts. I appreciate the point about many charities, but having done a lot of work with and for SIDS i can tell you that some of these charities run on the smell of an oily rag and do so much.]

    Bulldust – and there are Charities AND there are Charities – thier use of sick and disabled as objects of pity as a guilt factor to get money gets up my craw big time – and I know from personal experience that such organisations do play favourites on who they support – you don’t play by their rules, you get blackbanned effectively – they prefer compliant families whop do not complain, but get oh so precious if you dare question their motives – reminds me of a certain political party on this blog 🙂

  45. Sorry but I’ve got two young kids and nothing upsets me more than seeing kids that have suffered or are suffering. There are 2 many raw nerves for everyone. Pick on the charities if there is impropriatry but not the victims.

  46. [I’ve heard many in the Labor left complain about how many atrocities the U.S. has committed, you are slap bang in the wackaloon Labor Left fringe with comments like that.]

    #143, i assume there are now “good atrocities” (ala USA) and “bad atrocities” (ala Chinese). I am happy for your conscience.

  47. [Bulldust – and there are Charities AND there are Charities ]
    They should’ve gone after some of the charities that are actually Scientology front groups. Organisations like Narcanon that propose it is possible to cure heroin addiction using vitamin b injections.
    http://www.bestdrugeducation.org.au/

  49. ‘Balance’ in the context of Obama’s Egypt speech is better expressed as ‘impartiality’:
    [Impartiality is a principle of justice holding that decisions should be based on objective criteria, rather than on the basis of bias, prejudice, or preferring the benefit to one person over another for improper reasons.]
    Fleischer, Cheney et al can’t abide that concept – never could.

  50. [Sorry but I’ve got two young kids and nothing upsets me more than seeing kids that have suffered or are suffering. There are 2 many raw nerves for everyone. Pick on the charities if there is impropriatry but not the victims.]

    And they have suceeded in playing on your emotions. And the Charities know that and treat the poople they purport to support as a pawn to feather their own nests.

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 3 of 30
1 2 3 4 … 30