The Australian offers geographic and demographic breakdowns of the last two Newspoll surveys, achieving reasonable samples from each subset due to the unusually large samples (around 1700) Newspoll uses during the election period. Age breakdowns offer the interesting finding that Labor has bounced back under Gillard in the 35-49 bracket, but if anything gone backwards among the young and old – or rather, remained stable on the primary vote while the Coalition has picked up a few points. The gender gap is four points on voting intention, seven on Gillard’s approval rating and ten on preferred prime minister, and appears to have widened steadily through the year on Tony Abbott’s approval.
The state breakdowns give us a useful opportunity to confirm their findings with Nielsen, the Fairfax papers having conducted a similar exercise from the three most recent polls (extending it to four for South Australia and Western Australia to boost the sample). I also offer a third measure of what the betting markets think, which involves a rough estimate of the statewide swings suggested by the odds SportingBet and SportsBet are offering on individual seats (more on this subject from occasional Poll Bludger commenter Dr Good). The table shows Labor’s two-party preferred vote:
| 2007 | Newspoll | Nielsen | Bookies | |
| NSW | 53.7% | 49% | 51% | 53% |
| Vic | 54.3% | 59% | 54% | 54% |
| Qld | 50.4% | 46% | 47% | 47% |
| WA | 46.7% | 46% | 46% | 46% |
| SA | 52.4% | 56% | 51% | 53% |
Some further (alleged) intelligence courtesy of internal polling:
• Phillip Coorey of the Sydney Morning Herald reports Liberal polling in NSW has them doing “well” in “about five Labor-held marginal seats”, which include Macquarie and Robertson and to a lesser extent Dobell. The other two presumably include Gilmore, with a fifth harder to identify: the pendulum suggests Bennelong, Eden-Monaro and Page, where in each case the markets favour Labor. However, they Liberals were also said to be in trouble in Hughes and Macarthur. In Queensland, Leichardt and Dawson are said to be at risk, but Labor looks set to hold Longman and Flynn.
• The West Australian reports Nationals polling has Wilson Tuckey leading them in O’Connor by just 51-49, from primary votes of 38 per cent for Tuckey, 23 per cent for Nationals candidate Tony Crook, 21 per cent for Labor and 8 per cent for the Greens, with 10 per cent undecided.
• Markus Mannheim of the Canberra Times reports Liberal polling in the ACT shows the Greens vote actually falling since the 2007 election, which if accurate would put their dream of a Senate seat well beyond reach, if the Democrats’ decision to direct preferences to the Liberals hadn’t done it already.
We’ve had conflicting reports in recent days on party finances and campaign spending:
• Richard Gluyas of The Australian today reports the Liberals are struggling to raise funds. A media-buying source is quoted saying Labor ad spending has been especially conspicuous in the past week, with $19 million in advertising commitments for the length of the campaign splitting “55:45 in favour of Labor”.
• The Sydney Morning Herald, by contrast, reports Liberal television advertising has been 51 per cent more active than Labor’s, “as measured by audience exposure”:
Labor officials wondered aloud where a cash-strapped Liberal Party had managed to find the money, an answer which will not be disclosed officially for a year and a half. And the Liberals were struck by the fact that Labor had all but withdrawn from the advertising market in the second week of the campaign. After an active first week, Labor advertising airtime fell to zero in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth, and near zero in Sydney, in week two. Labor continued normal campaign-level advertising only in Brisbane, presumably reflecting the high concentration of at-risk seats in Queensland. In a week in which Labor was taking a hiding in the news media and in the polls, the party decided to stop trying to reach voters with paid advertising as it husbanded its resources. “Labor have obviously come off for a reason,” Mr Durrant said. “I can’t see that it would be because they have run out of money but more likely it is a strategic decision to perhaps blitz the market in the final stretches when people are closer to making a decision, which could be quite smart given how much coverage and PR is being generated by them both.”
I can only say that the the Liberal Party doesn’t seem starved for funds in Western Australia. As well as running highly visible campaigns even in Labor’s safest seats, there is talk the state branch has found $1 million to spare for the national campaign.
So much for what they’re doing with their own money – here’s some of what they have planned for ours.
Petrie (Labor 2.3%): Last week Labor promised to spend $742 million building a fabled rail line from Petrie to Kippa-Ring. The Liberals responded by bringing forward their own planned announcement that $750 million would be put into the project. This evidently came as news to LNP Petrie candidate Dean Teasdale, whose initial reaction to Labor’s announcement was that this was not the time for such an expensive project. Tony Koch of The Australian notes the rail link has been the subject of fruitless election promises for 40 years, and it was first proposed as far back as the 1890s. The state government dropped plans to build the link six years ago after a study suggested it would be unviable, but last year was reported to be pushing to get the project “shovel ready” so it could be considered for federal funds. It emerged as an issue in the state election last March when Shadow Transport Minister Fiona Simpson flew solo with a promise it would be built by 2016, causing great embarrassment to her party.
Leichhardt (Labor 4.1%), Dawson (Labor 2.4%), Flynn (Labor 2.3%), Herbert (notional Labor 0.4%) and Hinkler (Nationals 1.5%): Queensland’s regional coastal seats were clearly the target of Tony Abbott’s announcement last week that they would limit the future expansion of marine parks, by requiring “peer-reviewed scientific evidence of a threat to marine diversity”. The announcement was made at Mackay in Dawson. Mackay has also been the scene of a bidding war over the construction of a new ring road: Wayne Swan promised $10 million for a feasibility study into a new ring road one week into the campaign, and Tony Abbott trumped him two days later by promising $30 million for design and engineering work.
Hasluck (Labor 1.0%) and Swan (notional Labor 0.3%): Labor last week promised to provide $480 million of $600 million sought by the Western Australian government to improve roads around Perth Airport, which will include widening Tonkin Highway to a six-lane freeway. There was also an as yet uncosted promise to provide funding to an upgrade of 4 kilometres of Great Eastern Highway.
Bass (Labor 1.0%): Last week Labor promised $11.5 million in finding for Launceston’s flood levees as part of the Natural Disaster Resilience Program.
Sturt (Liberal 0.9%) and Makin (Labor 7.7%): The Prime Minister last week announced $100 million in funding for stormwater harvesting and reuse, the first cab off the rank being a $10 million contribution to a pitch for $33 million by councils in eastern Adelaide. With the councils to fund half the cost, this left a $6 million hole which Labor wanted filled by a previously reluctant state government. The next day Tony Abbott trumped Labor by promising to put up the full $16.5 million. The Coalition has also promised $7.5 million to improve Fosters and Gorge roads in Sturt.
Gilmore (notional Labor 0.2%): Late last week Tony Abbott promised $20 million to upgrade a notorious section of the Princes Highway between Ulladulla and Batemans Bay.
Legal action:
• The GetUp!-sponsored legal challenge against the law requiring the electoral roll to close on the day the writs are issued will be heard in the High Court tomorrow. According to the Australin Financial Review, GetUp! will be supported by most of the legal team that acted for Vickie Roach in the 2007 action that overturned a Howard government law prohibiting prisoners from voting.
• A “Tasmanian antique dealer” has launched a legal challenge against Eric Abetz’s right to sit in parliament, arguing he remains a citizen of Germany, from which he emigrated in 1961 at the age of three. Constitutional expert and Labor preselection aspirant George Williams tells The Hobart Mercury there are “numerous pitfalls for any politician born overseas, or whose parents or even grandparents had been born overseas, to fall into, unawares and without intent, which could make them ineligible to sit in Parliament”.
Finally, there has as always been some interesting wash-up from the unveiling of Senate group voting tickets on Sunday, which I have summarised for an article in Crikey. Note the launch of the new awareness-raising website Below the Line, on which voters are encouraged to order and then print out their own Senate “how to vote” card.
Dovif
Still waiting for any credible evidence that your claim at 132 is based on facts. I know you won’t find any, so why don’t you just admit you are wrong? Psychologically incapable of it? If so, don’t get that condition confused with “being right”, or “fooling anyone else into believing you”.
Dovif,
I can read studies mate – and taxation has a direct effect on smoking.
Even better, it has an effect on uptake – meaning less smokers into the future.
I am on the right side of this argument, ethically and factually.
Could higher taxes on cigarettes potentially blunt people from getting an addiction to them to start with dovif?
Would the cutting of taxes on cigarettes increase consumption?
Cuppa
Most white collar people (educated by university), or small business would normally support the Liberals
Most Blue collar “union” people would normally support the Labor
[Senator Nick Minchin praises smokers for ‘dying early’
A senior Liberal politician has encouraged smokers to keep up their habit, saying smokers who die early save the health system money.
Senator Nick Minchin has criticised the Federal Government’s plan to increase the tax on cigarettes as he told smokers to: “Go for it”]
That is extraordinary. Who could have believed the Liberals would stoop that low? Surely Labor can cream them over this.
You would think the new feisti Julia would be onto it like a shot. .
For Dovifs education, here is a health economics paper titled “The Effect of tobacco advertising bans on tobacco consumption”
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/hs/pubhealth/p9740/readings/saffer.pdf
Guess what? There is a significant negative effect! Dovif 132 is wrong.
>>>>No way in the world there is a 5% + swing to the Libs in NSW. It just wont happen.
You’re right. I’d reckon it’s more like 9 to 13.75%.
I think you cannot underestimate just how much the NSW populace dislikes the ALP and can’t wait for the opportunity to wreak revenge. Part of the problem is the same inept and arrogant union and factional hacks and placemen who have stuffed NSW are now among the principal actors in the Federal ALP.
I’d have thought that this was increasingly LESS the case. There are lots of blue collar conservative voters and heaps of university educated people are left leaning.
dovif
Do you actually have a degree in economics, or do you teach in finance/business management?
Still waiting for your admission of error at 132.
[You do not know much about addiction.]
And you know bugger all about marketing. Why do you think the cigarette companies want the new packaging canceled? Why do you think they have a begun a campaign if the new packaging will have no effect? Their main concern is that potential new customers will be better informed and rejecting the dangerous product altogether.
Has Abbott been questioned on the big tobacco link? Surely, he can’t use the “Labor smear” line? Or can he?
Catching up on the posts after I signed off last night on the previous thread, I came across these “gems”!
[Ryan
Posted Wednesday, August 4, 2010 at 12:11 am | Permalink
Scorpio, you’re clutching at straws. To argue that Labor manage money better is difficult. They are addicted to spending our money and hocking us with debt. Not only federally, but in every state too.
Most Labor supporters are comfortable enough with the social dividends paid by accruing government debt. You seem to want to push this argument that somehow going into debt and running up huge deficits make Labor great economic managers. Unfortunately it doesn’t work both ways, champion.
It just makes you look like an idiot. ]
[ Ryan
Alright, I’ve had my fun. Night. ]
The first one was in reply to my earlier one that the Coalition left office with the economy in structural deficit and had been for the previous four years.
This is how a Coalition supporter responds to an actual economic fact that is damning to their fanciful claims as good economic managers and how their political masters do also.
By totally ignoring the fact that the Coalition under Howard/Costello were actually economic dunces and were just lucky to have a competent Treasury & Reserve and were blessed with the biggest mining boom in Australia’s history.
I’m pretty sure the “IDIOT” here is not me who this juvenile comment was directed to, but the economic moron who did so.
Get back under your bridge son! 😉
[Senator Nick Minchin praises smokers for ‘dying early’
A senior Liberal politician has encouraged smokers to keep up their habit, saying smokers who die early save the health system money.
Senator Nick Minchin has criticised the Federal Government’s plan to increase the tax on cigarettes as he told smokers to: “Go for it”]
Just a further comment on that Cuppa. I honestly thought you were making a joke and having us all on. It just seemed such a surreal thing for anyone to say. Straight out of a Yes Minister episode.
Thanks No tone. Not too hard. A number of other posters here could do better than ALP HQ as well.
Noticed a feww typos and errors though. ‘crap’ should be ‘boring” tpp. Getting my Abbott climate change and economic policies confused.
Really Abbott is a goldmine of material.
Re CC.
Start off;
Tony Abbott has stated that climate change is crap. Last December Tony Abbott reneged on a deal reached by the government and the liberal party to bring into law a scheme to reduce carbon pollution in our environment.
How can anyone trust Tony Abbott on climate change?.
Simple short no music, start off with a background of blue skies and clear water, cloud them over with smoke fade to black.
dovif
[Most white collar people (educated by university), or small business would normally support the Liberals
Most Blue collar “union” people would normally support the Labor]
As leftwingpinko said, more nonsense. Got any evidence for that? The Liberals biggest demographics are old people, country people, and small business people, all of whom would have below average rates of university education.
The tobacco lobby’s advertising campaign is is just another…. errr… coffin nail in the ALP’s coffin.
[You’re right. I’d reckon it’s more like 9 to 13.75%.]
No chance.
As I have been saying recently, it is game over for Labor and very early. Polls like this with consistency more than two weeks out are usually a death knell.
the ALP would do well to batten down the hatches and protect the beacheads now.
blue_green, for what it’s worth Albert also thinks Labor will lose Chifley because Ed Husic is muslim.
Albert Ross,
You honestly think the tobacco industry advertising on behalf of the Coalition is a vote winner for the Coalition?
[Most white collar people (educated by university), or small business would normally support the Liberals
Most Blue collar “union” people would normally support the Labor]
That might have been true back in the 50s … but surely you can’t make such a generalisation now.
This sort of blather might resonate over the watercooler at Liberal Hack HQ, but your average punter couldn’t give an f about union bosses, faceless men etc.
blue_green – but what on earth is making you so certain that there is no major swing on in NSW? Please explain.
Gillard press conference coming up.
MW –
Howard’s polling in 04 was worse and he increased his majority.
Look at the polls – the undecideds are huge.
The election is anybody’s at this point.
Socrate
I have not been looking… have to work.
I have friends who smokes and I hate people who smokes, I stop going out with a girl once, when I found out she smokes and I have asked my friends to stop smoking… my friend tells me it is their body clock that tells them when they need a resupply of smokes. they need no advertising. The tobacco company have done it so that most people smoke a pack a day and the smoker get into the routine of buying a pack at the same time and same place everyday…. for these people I have no doubt that ads have no impact on their smoking
I agree higher cost might reduce uptake … but the uptake is done at the teenager level …. where being “cool” is more likely to be a bigger issue. But I agree less advertising would have some effect here.
Most of the advertising is done in films, which I think is a good place to start and education is another good place to start, but taxes has little effect.
If someone is in a shop to buy cigarette …. the packaging I suspect will do very little to stop people … currently we have packaging that says “SMOKING WILL KILL YOU” if that is not stopping people buying … I would suggest changing the colour will do very little
Off to work
[blue_green, for what it’s worth Albert also thinks Labor will lose Chifley because Ed Husic is muslim.]
Very funny.
BigBoob- it wore a joke. Back in the day “coffin nail” was a slang term for a ciggie.
Albert @ 174,
Sorry, you have been down on the ALP, so I thought you were serious!
[Most white collar people (educated by university), or small business would normally support the Liberals
Most Blue collar “union” people would normally support the Labor]
For a start you cannot necessarily conflate tertiary education with intelligence. Perhaps it’s that Liberal forked-tongue speaking again, dovif?
Second, the biggest and solidest bloc of Coalition support is the older demographic. In their day, tertiary education was uncommon. As a generalisation, the older the person, the less likely they are to be tertiary educated, and the more likely they are to support the so-called Liberals.
Why do you think the Howard Liberals reduced funding of tertiary education (a federal responsibility) – going against OECD trends? Because tertiary-educated people should (in theory anyway) have the tools and training to be able to think for themselves – a situation that is anathema to the brainwashing-and-spin-focused conservatives.
[Aust stands out in OECD figures for uni funding drop
ABC News Online, 24 April 2007
A new international report has found that Australia is defying global trends when it comes to spending on tertiary education.]
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200704/s1905348.htm
If too many people were equipped to think for themselves and look past Liberal lies, spin and rewriting of history, the Liberals would be reduced to minor party status. Win-win!
Albert @ 174,
And I hope how you spelt my name was a Freudian slip 🙂
I see dovif has run off to hide, and has confirmed my hypothesis that he is incapable of admitting error. I better do some work myself.
Good luck again today Julia (and Rick Sarre!).
I said that Chifley might be a bolter – not a dead set certainty for the Liberals. Husic has form turning a safe ALP seat into an unexpected Liberal pickup.
The analysis on here can’t be right. I know this because the host of Radio National declared more than once this morning that these polls showed the Liberals will win the election in Queensland and NSW alone.
At least two guests tried to correct this, but it didn’t seem to register.
The reporter embedded with the Libs said reporters at Abbott’s press conference yesterday saw nothing wrong the no means no comments. This is odd because journos tweeted about it from the presser.
[Polls like this with consistency more than two weeks out are usually a death knell.]
What consistency? Last week we had 52/48 and 53/47 Labor. This weeks Essential still has Labor in front.
You’re getting a little to excited and ahead of yourself.
[Howard’s polling in 04 was worse and he increased his majority.]
I thought polling was contradictory throughout the campaign with Newspoll showing slender Labor leads and Nielsen showing slender to large Coalition leads.
Albert Ross
[blue_green – but what on earth is making you so certain that there is no major swing on in NSW? Please explain.]
I know you are just trolling 😛 Here are some good lyrics you can use for your trolling anthem: http://idle.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1719124&cid=32904278
Also what about Greenway – that could be another bolter. There are a lot of self employed contractors in the electorate and they are becoming very very depressed about Nick Sherry’s “reforms”.
[blue_green – but what on earth is making you so certain that there is no major swing on in NSW? Please explain.]
The polls indicate a 5% swing to Tone on the back of a bad week to the ALP. These polls tend to be a reaction to recent policy announcements rather than true voting intention- they are fluctuating too much (ie Nielsen 55-45 to 48-52).
You rail against the ALP machine in NSW (like I do) but they have won the last 4 state elections and held NSW for Labor in all of the recent fed elections.
Western sydney/central coast marginal seat campaigning is the ALPs bread and butter. The Libs have no decent campaign infrastructure there, they have very few local members in local/state/fed to build a campaign on.
The ALP will not lose many of these seat but will gain Macarthur and Hughes.
[The reporter embedded with the Libs said reporters at Abbott’s press conference yesterday saw nothing wrong the no means no comments. This is odd because journos tweeted about it from the presser.]
It is probably that these journos want to keep their jons, therefore they are towing the company’s pro lib line. But their tweeting is another question.
jons = jobs
[Brothers at my Catholic college had pretty good idea about family values, even though they didnt have their own families”]
did abbott say that or the poster i think its abbott
i just shook my head and ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
now i think that is about what every one in aust that heard that will say.
They are removed from society in a different way to Julia / what planet his he on.
My daughter who is single was there when nieces and nephews where born baby sat them from day one fed them bathed them dressed them etc.
they often stay over night. I bet Julia has had similar experiences with her nieces and nephews not to mention other things in her life is say again ahhhhhhhhhhhh
As much as i loved and admired most of the nuns that taught me i doubt they only understood the things they bought from their own child hood and upbringing keeping up with family trends is harder i do know some very modern nuns who are out and about who do know a lot and help people well look at Mother Teresa etc but well not back in tones school days, the rules for religious where much stricter and they had very little communication with the children’s families out side school hours today its different they can come have chat visit any time now its as though the nuns live at the convent and work from the convent now but dont spend much time there any more its so different now but not back then. Well thats my humble opinion for what it worth
i end my case
Stating the obvious time: Big Tobacco wouldn’t be running a campaign if “there was no evidence it will reduce the number of smokers”.
Plainly, they are running a campaign because they know it will.
Do we have to go over the evidence about smoking again? I’ve put all the research papers here several times and some people still have no idea.
BigBob is 100% correct. Raising excise on cigs leads to a decrease in consumption (as he said a 10% price hike drops smoking by about 3%, mainly due to less kids smoking). And cutting back ads also reduces smoking (although we don’t know what the plain packaging will do as we are the first in the world to do it).
Labor would be well advised not to make too much about the Libs taking money from Big Tobacco as it will just remind all those smokers of Labor’s stance on smoking. I reckon they lost plenty of votes on that (one of the few brave decisions they took which I agree with).
Dio @ 190,
Yep, I mentioned the ALP took a hit for hiking the tax by an amount that would make a real difference.
The ALP just needs to state that they are working to reduce smoking related deaths and leave the Big Tobacco ads to fill in the gaps.
While waiting for Gillard’s press conference, the Sky News people, including Gilbert have announced the polling in Qld and NSW is too late in the campaign for Labor to turn around. There are 2 and a half weeks left in the campaign. The election is anyone’s.
Albert, do you think David Barker would’ve been preselected by the Liberals if they thought they might win the seat?
[While waiting for Gillard’s press conference, the Sky News people, including Gilbert have announced the polling in Qld and NSW is too late in the campaign for Labor to turn around. There are 2 and a half weeks left in the campaign. The election is anyone’s.]
Just like Mike Rann’s polling?
I’d at least wait for the next round of polling to come out before declaring the Liberals the victors. If they show the same support or stronger for the Liberals it will be a strong sign they will win.
[My 129 was in answer to Darn’s question about the sophomore surge]
Thanks Bigbob