Roy Morgan has again rained on Julia Gillard’s poll parade, with a poll of 800 voters in four Queensland marginals showing Labor no better placed than they were said to be before Kevin Rudd’s demise. The four seats targeted are outer suburban Longman and regional Flynn, Dawson and Leichhardt, and if by some coincidence the figures for each are accurate – which is unlikely, as the margin of error on each 200-sample poll is about 7 per cent – Labor stands to lose all except the latter with respective swings of 7.3 per cent, 8.2 per cent and 3.4 per cent, with no change recorded in Longman. However, it would be more instructive to combine the results and think in terms of a collective swing of a bit below 5 per cent and a margin of error of 3.5 per cent. If consistent across Queensland, this would cost Labor eight seats held actually and two held notionally. Helpfully, three of these seats were covered in Newspoll’s marginal seat survey of Tuesday before last, conducted during Kevin Rudd’s last weekend as Prime Minister, the exception being Leichhardt. This showed a 6 per cent swing from a margin of error of 4 per cent. Presumably Morgan will offer a face-to-face poll from last weekend tomorrow, the first such poll conducted on Gillard’s watch.
There is better news for Labor from The Advertiser, which has Labor leading 56-44 in the Adelaide seat of Hindmarsh, held for Labor on a margin of 5.1 per cent. The survey involved 633 respondents and would have a margin of error of a little below 4 per cent, although this presumes a random sample which The Advertiser probably lacks the expertise to obtain.
Federal preselection news:
• The Socialist Left faction of the Victorian ALP, which dominates the local branches, has chosen ACTU industrial officer Cath Bowtell as its candidate for the federal preselection for Melbourne, to be vacated on the retirement of Lindsay Tanner. The faction’s secretary, Andrew Giles, had been favoured by some for the position, but agreed to stand aside in favour of Bowtell, whose endorsement is now considered a fait accompli. The preselection will be conducted locally on Sunday and finalised by the party’s public office selection committee on Tuesday.
• Queensland’s troubled Liberal National Party has picked a new candidate for the Brisbane seat of Moreton, which Labor’s Graham Perrett won from sitting Liberal Gary Hardgrave in 2007, after the original nominee, Michael Palmer (20-year-old son of mining magnate Clive), withdrew citing health concerns. The winner was Malcolm Cole, former Courier-Mail journalist and staffer to former Senator Santo Santoro, who defeated local businessman Steve Smith.
• It’s been noted lately that the New South Wales Liberals are dragging their heels getting candidates in place in important electorates: Lindsay, Parramatta and Greenway. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, these will be resolved over the next fortnight. The Penrith Press reports two candidates have nominated in Lindsay: marketing manager Fiona Scott and casual teacher Margaret Grand.
State preselection news from New South Wales:
• The Nationals’ ground-breaking “open primary” preselection for Tamworth was conducted last weekend, delivering victory to local businessman Kevin Anderson. The ballot was open to anyone registered in the electorate, attracting 4293 voters. Anderson won 2110 vote (49.4 per cent) to 1100 (25.7 per cent) for James Treloar, 648 (15.2 per cent) for Russell Webb and 414 (9.7 per cent) for Mark Rodda, with the distribution of Rodda’s preferences electing Anderson. A similar effort by the Victorian ALP in the Liberal-held state seat of Kilsyth in April only attracted 170, although the only procedural difference was a requirement that participants register online. The winner on that occasion was former electorate officer Vicky Setches with 75 per cent of the vote.
• The Sydney Morning Herald reports the Liberal preselection for the safe Liberal NSW state seat of Baulkham Hills, to be vacated at the election by retiring Wayne Merton, has been postponed after originally being scheduled for tomorrow. The preselection is the latest front in the war between state upper house MP David Clarke and federal Mitchell MP Alex Hawke, former allies in the Right. At issue is the validity of the membership of 14 Clarke supporters who attempted to join at an infamous Baulkham Hills Young Liberals meeting in Hawke’s electorate office last year, which ended with Hawke calling the police. The Hawke forces are backing state Civil Contractors Federation chief executive David Elliott, who unsuccessfully challenged Clarke for his upper house preselection earlier this year. Clarke supports Damien Tudehope, solicitor and Australian Family Association spokesman Damien Tudehope. Also in the field is Hills Shire deputy mayor Mike Thomas. It appears the preselection will be postponed until the federal election is out of the way, in the likely event that it is called shortly.
• Greens state upper house MP Sylvia Hale, who earlier made what most presumed to be a retirement announcement when she said she would not seek re-election, has announced she will seek to run in the highly winnable lower house seat of Marrickville. She must first win next week’s preselection vote against Marrickville deputy mayor Fiona Byrne, the candidate from 2007.
• Crikey’s Tips and Rumours reports Peter Fraser, former chief-of-staff to John Brogden, might emerge as a starter in the endlessly confusing preselection to choose a successor to Peter Debnam in Vaucluse. The remainder of the field is summarised as “Left numbers woman Gabrielle Upton, independent restaurateur Peter Doyle, Woollahra mayor Andrew Petrie, Turnbull branch fixture Mary Lou Jarvis and Sydney gymnasium tycoon and right-winger Peter Cavanagh”.
BK,
[For heaven’s sake – with a sample size like that we may as well rely on scorp’s erstwhile efforts.]
I didn’t poll on voting intention as I already knew most of their intentions except the Undecideds/swingers.
Best to leave that up to the likes of Morgan and his lot seem even more dicey than mine would if I had actually polled! 😉
For those who are sensible enough to avaoid Gary Morgan – this is his tax rant precis.
[When Governments nationalise an industry they take the risk, the Gillard ALP Government wants to take 30% of the Mining Industry Profits with NO risk!
In 1950 the Roy Morgan Gallup Poll showed Australians found 75% of Australians agreed “a special referendum was necessary before any industry could be nationalised”, only 17 % disagreed while a low 8% were undecided – nothing has changed!
If today, any Government wants to nationalise the Mining Industry or any other industry they would need a referendum. And if the Mining Industry or another industry were nationalised the Government would then take the risk and the reward.
The proposed 30% Mining Rent Tax means the Federal Government takes 30 % of the reward with NO risk – an outrageous proposition!
Today’s new 30% Mining Rent Tax represents the ‘thin edge of the wedge’. The Government has created the platform for a ‘Rent Tax’ on a broad scale. If the Gillard ALP Government is re-elected they, with the Greens, can:
• Expand the Rent Tax coverage to include gold mining, banks, retail, media etc…]
Is this really a pollster?
[The Green polling will come back to Gillard until she drops the mining tax to 22% then it’ll swing back to 14% for the Greens once the election is called, …]
I’ll believe it when I see it.
Those Morgan polls are good value – and I hope they run them through to the election.They are effectively tracking polls.
But we need to remember that with sample sizes of 200, we have MoE on the buggers of 7% – which is why they’ll have good value of they’re done regularly.
If you look at the aggregations, NSW marginals with a sample of 800 show a 1% swing to Labor.
WA marginals with an 800 sample size show a swing towards the Coalition of 0.2%
The 4 Qld marginals show a swing against the ALP of 4.75%
That is all about right considering what we know from elsewhere.
So the individual results are nothing to pay attention to as stand alones (although they can become vauable if they are repeated regularly) – the aggregations to the state level are pretty much on the mark compared to what others are reporting.
ru
just for the sake of the discussion, how many Labor seats do you think would fall in queensland if there was a 4.75% swing in that state? (as Morgan seems to be suggesting).
Its Time,
[Greens are polling around 10% in Qld, so there’s no reason to think that Capricornia is representative. Or do you prefer your prejudices to data?]
Not quite sure what you’re getting at here. If it doesn’t change here and there’s little or no change in every other Qld electorate running a Green candidate, then why is my statement wrong?
What’s being shown by the polls is a softer than usual Labor vote in rural & remote marginals. Labor won’t be as stong for Gillard as cities. Don’t forget there’s a lot of sexist voters. Of course the swinging One Nation types will be swamped by the clearer thinking profesionals in the city, but expect some shock results for Labor nationally in the polls and the elction.
[In 1950 the Roy Morgan Gallup Poll showed Australians found 75% of Australians agreed “a special referendum was necessary before any industry could be nationalised”, only 17 % disagreed while a low 8% were undecided – nothing has changed!]
Too funny. On what does he base his opinion that ‘nothing has changed’?
[just for the sake of the discussion, how many Labor seats do you think would fall in queensland if there was a 4.75% swing in that state? ]
You don’t need to ask, you can do the swings yourself with Antony’s pendulum machine:
http://www.abc.net.au/elections/federal/2010/calculator/?swing=state&national=0&nsw=0.8&vic=4.7&qld=0.6&wa=7.3&sa=8.6&tas=3.3&act=0.8&nt=3.3&retiringfactor=1
[On what does he base his opinion that ‘nothing has changed’?]
On the fact that Australia is exactly the same as it was in 1950, of course.
You call a 22% tax “Nationalised” so that means anyone working full-time is “nationalised? Itep?
[Don’t forget there’s a lot of sexist voters. ]
Are they the ones who voted Bligh into power?
I think that I may have a few readers. Thanks all!
In metaphoric terms; Julia is a good shunter, but she is no S Class. Shunters aren’t designed for long haul travel. The S Class could still run competitively, but old steam trains are a little hard on the rails. We have some great trains in Australia.
For the past 60 years, rail transport technology has stagnated because of the track, not the trains. We don’t have the best trains in Australia, the Japanese have them. Time to change that.
[Are they the ones who voted Bligh into power?]
No, they’re the ones that rejected perrenial loser Springborg.
[ru
just for the sake of the discussion, how many Labor seats do you think would fall in queensland if there was a 4.75% swing in that state? (as Morgan seems to be suggesting).]
There will not be a 4.75% swing in Qld. Labor will hold all its seats and win the ones that are notionally theirs. The Morgan polling has been made irrelevant by the mining tax decision today.
Qld regional seats are not heterogeneous, Longman for instance, Bribie is very different to Caboolture or Glasshouse. Impossible to poll acurately with a small sample.
New thread.