Newspoll: 52-48

The latest Newspoll shows Labor’s lead at 52-48, equal lowest since the election of the Rudd government. It is the first time the government has trailed on the primary vote, by 40 per cent (steady on the previous poll) to 41 per cent (up three points) – the previous 52-48 result from October 30-November 1 having had the parties on 41 per cent each. The Greens are steady on 12 per cent, with “others” down from 10 per cent to 7 per cent. Kevin Rudd has suffered no damage on preferred prime minister, leading 58 per cent to 26 per cent (both up one). More to follow.

Other news:

• Essential Research has Labor’s two-party lead at 56-44 for the third week running. It also finds that while the majority of Labor and Coalition voters are firm if not fruity, 24 per cent of Greens voters (double the rate for the majors) “might consider another party and leader closer to an election”. Seventy per cent say politicians “should not be giving advice on moral issues”. Fifty-seven per cent support the Shopping Centre Council’s call for a ban on politicians campaigning in shopping centres. Respondents want a republic but not a new flag, nor (what the hell is wrong with people?) a new national anthem.

• Political party financial disclosure returns, such as they are, have been published. Labor and the Coalition parties were evenly matched on receipts, Labor receiving $42.9 million for 2008-09 against $38.4 million for the Liberals and $5.2 million for the Nationals – sharply down on last year due to the absence in the period of so much as a by-election. The Australian counts $4.65 million in donations to Labor from unions (the opposition makes it $11 million), the Coalition parties received $800,000 from Clive Palmer, and the Westfield Corporation evenly divided $230,000 between the two. Stephen Mayne in Crikey points to the disparity between the Queensland and WA branches of the ALP in a period when both had state elections: $14.3 million in receipts and $15.8 million in expenses for the victorious party in Queensland, against $4 million and $4.5 million for the defeated party in WA. Labor is $7 million in debt, the Liberals $4.2 million.

• Tim Dick of the Sydney Morning Herald reviews the recall election issue. All of the American examples cited refer to individual offices – a very different matter from dissolving an assembly, which the Coalition proposes to look at once in government. However, the article also notes the Canadian province of British Columbia has allowed members to recall their local MPs since 1995. Only one attempt managed to procure the required 40 per cent of voters’ signatures, and the MP in question obviated the need for a recall election (as distinct from a by-election) by resigning. In the current environment in New South Wales, that would obviously inspire efforts to knock off enough Labor MPs to cost the government its majority.

• Toni Bell of the Manning River Times reports John Turner, Nationals member for the NSW state seat of Myall Lakes, has announced his 23-year parliamentary career will end at next year’s election. Turner lost the party’s deputy leadership in 2003 and was dumped as Shadow Mineral Resources and Lands Minister in December 2008. The electorate, which covers the north coast north of Newcastle and south of Port Macquarie, will presumably become of interest to the Liberals.

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.

2,522 comments on “Newspoll: 52-48”

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  1. The Greens are steady on 12. It’s a stretch to think that the Greens may have lost 3 points to the Liberals and picked up 3 from somewhere else. Not impossible, but you are talking about 25% of it’s support.

  2. the comments re greens is this on the essential poll
    the media never mention this poll i have sent these results to the abc i bet they dont mention them. Why is that why do they only use news poll.
    and also of course they take a lot of their news from the aust.
    and where is Neilson

  4. yes so is this refering to the news poll or essential
    as i could not see where william has mentioned the greens in the news poll area.

  5. Sam Bauers @ # 101

    [The Greens are steady on 12. It’s a stretch to think that the Greens may have lost 3 points to the Liberals and picked up 3 from somewhere else. Not impossible, but you are talking about 25% of it’s support.]

    Or it could be the Fundies First/Christian Dems, who are attracted to Tony’s stance on Horizontal Folk Dancing before the Honeymoon 🙂

  7. @Frank Calabrese

    That’s pretty close to my guess. The Liberals have been leaking on the far right for a while. Abbott brings them back a bit. It’ll be a while before the wet Liberals catch on.

  12. @William Bowe

    Fair enough. Though you should probably assume that those Greens supporters are rabid enough to have sought out the figures if they aren’t mentioned. 🙂

  15. Ron

    Is your definition of a “bit rogue” poll, any poll that varies from the previous average score.

    Wouldn’t that mean that practically every poll would be a bit rogue.

  18. William, how the heck is it that Bob keeps getting threatened with a banning, while Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all?

    Of those two, there’s one who can hold a conversation while a) maintaining the topic, and b) not descending to partisan insults each and every time, and it ain’t GG or Ron.

  22. Diogenes @ # 1249 of previous thread.

    Actually it is Garnaut’s recommendation and argument but you probably haven’t heard of him. He is Rudd’s Climate Change Advisor.

    Again you distort. What Garnaut argued for was an ETS that the Greens voted against, twice. The question must be asked is why must we support this supposedly Garnaut proposal now supported by the Greens when the Greens did not have the sense to support his first choice, a cap and trade scheme in the form of an ETS.

    It is a symbol of you lack of logic. Ignore and vote against Garnaut’s first choice but then insist on support for supposedly Garnaut’s second choice

    Looks like you and the Greens cant make up you mind what you want to or where you want to go.

    Penny Wong is wrong for saying that putting a price on carbon will reduce emissions.

    Again, misleading and deceptive statement. Wong argued for an increase in the price of carbon together with a cap on carbon emissions. This is what the Labor Government wants and what Garnaut argued for but against which the Greens voted twice.

    Zero is not a number, contradicting 2500 years of mathematics.

    Semantics. Nothing to do with the issue. A red herring put forward by someone that has no understanding or comprehension of the issue and is just parroting the political line to which he is wedded.

    Not having a target means you have a target of 0%.

    Because that is exactly what you are planning for. If you don’t know where you are the only chance you have is to get lost.

    As I mentioned before and which you never addressed what is the justification of taxing business in excess of $21 Bil gross. What are we going to get for these costs imposed on all of us? To accept your (and the Greens) argument is to buy a pig in a poke. Because as the Greens have/wont stipulates what we will get for this tax there is only one conclusion that can be made. It is a target of $0. Any other figure is so rubbery that not even the Greens are silly enough to put it in the policy document because they know that it cannot be substantiated.

    Under the Greens policy householders and emission intensive industries will be compensated. How will this reduce their emissions? For all business except exporting ones it becomes a zero sum game. Cost go up by $X, prices go up by $x and the consumer has to find the extra money that, it appears, will come from the compensation to consumers as per the greens policy documents.

    Getting a reduction of 2% in CO2 emissions in two years is “doing nothing”.

    Where did this 2% come form? It is not in the Greens policy documents. It is just a made up figure with no basis in any facts presented by the Greens. It appears to be just decoration without any substance. If it had any substance it would be in their policy documents.

    And you continually whining about being criticised when your first post of the day is a pig-ignorant runt in the ground at Greens.

    Again, I will leave it to the gentle readers to make their minds up.

    It would appear that you have problems with understanding English language. You are the one that continually resorts to insult and hyperbole to support you “arguments’.

  24. Also that Nielsen is for Victoria. Labor would still win comfortably and Big Ted is still well behind Brumby. Yep, that’s a great poll for the Libs and Ted as the article suggests.

  25. [William, how the heck is it that Bob keeps getting threatened with a banning, while Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all?]

    Because you don’t see the revolting things Bob says, which are a great deal worse than anything either of those two say, because I delete them. Or are you more tolerant about holocaust and cancer jokes, or women being called “street whore” and “stupid bitch”, than I would immediately assume?

  27. [Of those two, there’s one who can hold a conversation while a) maintaining the topic, and b) not descending to partisan insults each and every time, and it ain’t GG or Ron.]
    Surely you jest Rebecca.

  28. Gusface @ # 92

    Not given up just have a life to live.

    Can’t spend 24 hrs a day here 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

    But I do appreciate Ron’s input.

  29. “Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all”

    They apparently do it with class 😉

    Just asked them 😀

  30. William, how the heck is it that Bob keeps getting threatened with a banning, while Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all?

    Of those two, there’s one who can hold a conversation while a) maintaining the topic, and b) not descending to partisan insults each and every time, and it ain’t GG or Ron.

    Does not compute.

  33. Oh the Devine Miranda is in Gloat mode:

    [mirandadevine

    Gee -all the verballing of Abbott, all the sneers and bigotry, and Newspoll records the best result for the Coalition since ’07. Fancy that. 6 minutes ago from web ]

  34. Age
    “The November Age poll, taken by a DIFFERENT company, showed the Government with a commanding 58 per cent to 42 per cent lead in the two-party preferred vote.”

    do not know MSN can just say this , as a throw away coment

  36. Diogenes, 1267 in the previous thread:

    [ don

    I think I need a few hours of your time. I’m about 3/4 of the way through a book on the Riemann Hypothesis and my brain is telling me that it is in pain but I’m going to finish the book if it kills me. ]

    Heh, good luck with that. There’s a couple of good books on Riemann written for the layman (well, anyone with a high school maths education), but being a problem that’s been unsolved for 150 years and has a million dollar bounty on its head, it gets inevitably hard towards the pointy end. I’ve got a maths degree and some of that stuff makes my brain want to crawl down my neck and hide.

    Which book have you got – Derbyshire, du Sautoy, something else?

  37. Christ Almighty the Labor Hacks are out in force tonight.

    Take it for what it is… a bad poll for Rudd and a good poll for Abbott.

    Maybe people are finally getting the shits with Rudd talking to them like a naughty child who needs a lecture on why it’s bad to take lollies from the lolly jar without first asking.

  38. The thing I love about Bob is he is hated more than me by the Labor Hacks in here, yet is a leftie. Makes me chortle quite a bit.

    I guess the Greens imposing on their “territory” muddles the waters quite a bit.

  42. In the meantime, in America……The great crisis recedes…..

    http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aNr9tQOU1KKI&pos=1

    [ Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) — Manufacturing expanded in January at the fastest pace since August 2004, spearheading the U.S. recovery from the worst recession since the 1930s.

    The Institute for Supply Management’s factory index rose to 58.4, exceeding the highest estimate in a Bloomberg News survey of economists, from December’s 54.9, figures from the Tempe, Arizona-based group showed. Readings greater than 50 signal expansion. The gain reflected increases in orders, production and employment.

    Factories are stepping up production as stimulus-fueled gains in demand and record cutbacks in inventory boost orders. After job cuts of 7.2 million in the last two years, some companies such as Ford Motor Co. are beginning to hire again, laying the groundwork for sustained gains in spending….]

  43. [138
    TheTruthHurts

    The thing I love about Bob is he is hated more than me by the Labor Hacks in here, yet is a leftie. Makes me chortle quite a bit.]

    Have you been drinking again, HTT? Don’t kid yourself: I despise everything you stand for. I couldn’t care less about Bob, who is just a pain in the neck.

  44. [William, how the heck is it that Bob keeps getting threatened with a banning, while Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all?

    Of those two, there’s one who can hold a conversation while a) maintaining the topic, and b) not descending to partisan insults each and every time, and it ain’t GG or Ron.]

    Rebecca, i know that The Amigos are too classy for you. That’s OK. You cant win them all.

  45. [William, how the heck is it that Bob keeps getting threatened with a banning, while Greensborough Growler and Ron seem to worry you not at all?

    Of those two, there’s one who can hold a conversation while a) maintaining the topic, and b) not descending to partisan insults each and every time, and it ain’t GG or Ron.]

    I think Rebecca meant to say was ‘one of these is a Green and therefore above reproach.’

    You gotta give them credit for loyalty – somebody came into bat for bob last time as well.

  46. I nearly fell off my chair when I read ABC’s headline this morning: “Coalition overtakes Labor in Newspoll”. Then I realise they were only referring to primary vote, not 2PP
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/01/2807260.htm

    Even so, words need ot be spoken to whoever wrote that! Still, it is clear that, even if this is a rogue, the governments lead has shrunk, though I would still be amazed if it was not bigger than at the last election.

  47. For whom the Soto soup pours, well it certainly will be for Obi in Indonesia. We can always try the meatpies with a fair shake of that tomato sauce:

    [US President Barack Obama will travel to Australia and Indonesia next month, the White House said today.

    “This trip is an important part of the president’s continued effort to broaden and strengthen the partnerships that are necessary, to advance our security and prosperity,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.

    He said Mr Obama and his family would make the trip in the second half of March.]

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/obama-to-visit-australia-indonesia-next-month-white-house/story-e6frg6n6-1225825731462

  48. Pick the odd one out:

    The Australian
    “Abbott keeps pulling back Labor’s lead: Newspoll”
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/tony-abbott-keeps-pulling-back-labors-lead-newspoll/story-e6frgczf-1225825707527

    The Australian
    “Tony Abbott closes gap to Kevin Rudd: Newspoll”
    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/tony-abbott-closes-gap-to-kevin-rudd-newspoll/story-e6frg6n6-1225825683416

    Sydney Morning Herald
    “Abbott gaining ground on Rudd: Newspoll”
    http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/abbott-gaining-ground-on-rudd-newspoll-20100201-n91n.html

    BigPond News
    “Abbott gains ground”
    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2010/02/01/Abbott_gains_ground_423886.html

    The ABC
    “Coalition overtakes Labor in Newspoll”
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/02/01/2807260.htm

  50. Oh dear, La Grattan and Fran have just wet themselves over the latest Newspoll on ABC RN:

    Fran asked La Grattan: “Do you think Kevin Rudd is scared of facing Abbott in the Parliament?” – of course, Kev is so sacred that he has also wet himself.

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