Galaxy marginals polls and the rest

News Limited have unloaded what they had promoted, accurately I believe, as “the largest opinion poll ever conducted in Australia” – a 4000-sample monster covering four marginal seats in each mainland state. This poll has been dubiously reported, thanks to a national total calculation which has credited the Coalition with a 51.4 per cent two-party vote. This appears to be a straight average of the five states’ results provided by Galaxy, without regard to population relativities between the states or the fact that the seats targeted were 2 per cent weaker for Labor than the national total in 2007. A balanced appraisal of the results points to a swing of about 1.7 per cent, which would produce a national Labor two-party vote of 51 per cent if consistent – slightly at the lower end of the recent phone poll trend. The poll shows a 2.4 per cent swing to the Liberals in the NSW seats of Eden-Monaro, Gilmore, Macarthur and Macquarie; a 1.6 per cent swing to Labor in Corangamite, Deakin, La Trobe and McEwen in Victoria; a 5.4 per cent swing to the Liberal National Party in Bowman, Dawson, Dickson and Flynn in Queensland; a 2.1 per cent swing to the Liberals in Hasluck, Stirling, Cowan and Swan in Western Australia; and no swing at all in Boothby, Grey, Kingston and Sturt in South Australia.

The rub for Labor is that the New South Wales and Queensland swing figures are right where they need to be to maximise the Coalition seat haul in uniform swing terms: over the 4.5 per cent mark needed for a tenth seat in Queensland, and just reaching the threshold that would cost them seven seats in New South Wales (it would take a further 1.5 per cent to bag an eighth). A straight loss of this many seats would single-handedly cost Labor the election. With no swing recorded in South Australia, the only counterbalancing gains would be the two Liberal marginals in Victoria, La Trobe and McEwen. The result would be a bare absolute majority for the Coalition.

However, any haul of 17 seats in New South Wales and Queensland would have to include a few they are generally expected to retain, such as Eden-Monaro and Page. Possibly some of the seats selected for the poll are a bit unflattering for Labor. There is a concentration of western Sydney in the NSW sample, an area yesterday’s poll of four seats for the Daily Telegraph showed to be tough for Labor (it appears Galaxy have conducted separate polls for Macarthur for each release). The Queensland sample also includes Bowman, which Labor has probably written off (UPDATE: Mark Bahnisch at Larvatus Prodeo says “Labor is barely running a campaign, with reports appearing for weeks in the Brisbane Times that their candidate is invisible, and the local papers can’t get hold of her for an interview”). Note that for all the vastness of Galaxy’s total national sample, as far as all-important Queensland is concerned the results are less sturdy than yesterday’s Newspoll, which targeted eight Queensland seats rather than four and 1600 respondents rather than 800. That poll produced a swing of 3.4 per cent against Labor compared with Galaxy’s 5.4 per cent, which in uniform swing terms would mean a difference of no fewer than four seats.

The table below shows swings recorded in state-level Newspolls and Nielsens through the first three weekends of the campaign (with one Westpoll thrown in for good measure), plus the targeted polling we have seen over the current weekend. For the former, samples for any given observation are 765 for NSW, 665 for Victoria, 585 for Queensland, 465 for WA (865 in week three, achieved by throwing in the Westpoll result) and 445 in SA, producing margins of error ranging from 4.6 per cent in South Australia’s case to 3.6 per cent for New South Wales. The composite of the most recent two Nielsen figures has smaller samples of around 250 for the smallest states. The latest Galaxy polls have samples of 800 per state and margins of error of about 3.5 per cent. The Newspoll marginals poll had samples of 600 in Victoria (4 per cent margin of error), 1200 in New South Wales (2.8 per cent margin of error) and 1600 in Queensland (2.5 per cent margin of error).

  TOTAL NSW VIC Qld WA SA  
Week 1 0.2 1.4 3.7 -3.8 0.1 4.0  
Week 2 -3.6 -9.1 1.7 -3.3 -2.9 0.4  
Week 3 -2.0 -1.8 -1.8 -5.5 -3.4 4.4  
Nielsen (2 week) -1.7 -2.7 3 -3.4 -2.7 0.6  
Galaxy marginals -1.7 -3.1 1.6 -5.4 -2.1 0  
Newspoll marginals  0.6 -1.3 6.2 -3.4      

UPDATE: Remiss of me not to have noted when the poll was conducted: from Sunday to Thursday, and hence not as timely as some of the more favourable recent polling for Labor.

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.

441 comments on “Galaxy marginals polls and the rest”

Comments Page 4 of 9
1 … 3 4 5 … 9

  1. Morgan’s analysis:

    [On these figures the Election will be close, however if the swing continues in the last week, the L-NP should easily win Government next Saturday.]

  2. Morgan records a swing in Leichhardt, then proceeds to tell us all the other qld seats that will fall. Ditto Macquarie. What a fool

  5. Hobart Sunday paper hyperventilating about Abbott’s chances of winning. So was I till I came on here.

    Maybe it’s a good thing and will mobilise a horrified anti-Abbott vote.

  6. Lord D
    If 9 (nine) people had given a different answer to Morgan in Macquarie, a devastating loss for Labor would have become a massive victory and the end of Markus

  11. Has anybody done a count of the number of seats Morgan says the Libs would gain on his figures? I count 10 with possible gains for Labor in Victoria of 1 or 2. So where does he get the hung parliament from?

  14. Anyone watching the Cassidy interview should, regardless of Cassidy’s softness, form the opinion that the unhinged one is unfit to govern.

  15. [Brisbane Courier Mail says that Rabbott deserves a go]
    Coincidentally, that might also help the paper’s owner’s chance of getting a fair go at new media owneship laws.

    Has Abbott been asked one question about whether he intends to change media ownership laws if he wins? It is the obvious quid pro quote, and Rupert’s newspapers are sinking in value.

  16. Swan or the media should explain how the Treasury does costings. I would imagine that there’s a team of people who all have access to the same information and check each other’s work. Instead they just accept at face value Tony’s and Andrew’s assertions that the process could be corrupted.

  17. Did you get the impression Tone had those I/v questions beforehand and had prepared answers? There was a real air of rehearsal about it.

  19. [Disappointing that none of the Insiders team were prepared to have a go on who they thought would win.]

    Why would they give away that they’re plumping for Tone and have been for months.

    They’ll just do what they have to do this week to help him by the sound of today’s program.

  20. The pollsters are going mad.

    On WA as well Morgan is weird.
    His latest in WA was just a poll of Brand (fairly safe ALP).
    He finds a 3.1% swing to Libs.

    He says that such a swing statewide in WA would mean Libs pick up Hasluck.
    But then he says his own recent marginal seat polling in Hasluck itself shows that kind
    of swing and gives a link.

    But what his own polling in Hasluck actually shows is a swing of about 1% to the
    libs and a result too close to call.

  23. The unhinged one was begging, just begging for another Rooty Hill forum.
    But there was no way he would contemplate a one-on-one proper debate.
    What budgies??

  24. [Levine from Morgan predicts a hung Parliament or if the swing to the Coalition continues, a Coalition victory]

    What swing? As far as I am aware, all of the major polls are showing a swing to Labor – even the Morgan telephone poll which went from 50-50 to 51-49 Labor.

  26. Any suggestion of a swing to the coalition last week is just implausibe, when almost everyone concedes Labor had a very good week.

  27. Sorry…

    that is on their main online page.

    Only if you click on the “more” button then you see Antony’s correction

    Is that dishonest of the ABC?

  30. This “we’ve polled 200 people in 4 marginals showing a swing of x%, therefore the entire state will show a swing of x%” goes against the whole idea of polling.

  31. [Thanks. Obviously, Abbott did not agree to a debate then.

    What a slime!!]
    Yeah. Lower than a snake with a belly full of buckshot!

  32. [This “we’ve polled 200 people in 4 marginals showing a swing of x%, therefore the entire state will show a swing of x%” goes against the whole idea of polling.]
    I’d hate this mob to be in charge of quality assurance in a manufacturing process requiring good statistical control.

  33. Abbott is pretty good on his feet. He’ll do alright on Q&A, and in a Town Hall-type meeting.

    I’d bet that Labor will be strutinizing the attendance list a lttle closer if there is another Town Hall though. And you’d think they’d insist that someone other than Galaxy does the sampling.

    Frankly, this crap about “undecided” voters is getting on my goat. It’s been shown they can’t keep out ring-ins. Why not just have each party provide a tranche of the faithful and be done with it? Set some strict “no heckling” ground rules in place and let ‘er rip.

  34. Bushfire Bill,

    [I rang my sister to tell her not to worry about the Telegraph “monster” poll, as it was arse about in the 2PP numbers.

    She told me that the guy from Galaxy has been on News Radio saying it’s all over for Labor based on this poll.

    For those thinking that maybe Galaxy were going to correct the Tele’s wrong interpretation, don’t hold your breath. Galaxy are endorsing the interpretation. ]

    As far as I am concerned, Galaxy has committed commercial suicide with their Rooty Hill episode and their dodgy polls being grabbed upon for partisan political purposes by the MSM.

    That Briggs doesn’t see fit to correct that just reinforces the fact that Galaxy “deserves” to be discredited at every opportunity from now on until they deservedly crash & burn into obscurity.

  35. From Possum on twitter:

    [I wish someone would microwave Brian Toohey #insiders Good grief]

    Again I am disappointed to note that these journalists have no clue on what fiber optic is. No clue on wireless and its limitations. They cannot even bother reading articles from technology sites. Yet they feel the need to comment about the technologies they have no clue about. 🙁

  36. Gillard should not do another Rooty farce. An economic debate or nothing.

    And Scorpio, given Galaxy will not correct the false 2PP, their claims to not be a biased organisation will never stand up

    BTW, has anyone contacted Galaxy directly?

  37. Morgan does a telephone poll, all taken in one day which shows a 51-49 lead to Labor.

    Galaxy produces a 200 per seat sample of twenty marginal electorates – which everyone, even on Insiders, has panned – suggesting Labor could be wiped out..

    Nielsen brings out a poll conducted over the normal three days (I think it was) showing Labour at 53-47.

    Yet no-one on Insiders or on this site is even mentioning the Nielsen poll, which out of the three would seem to have been done in the most plausible way.

    Why?

  40. Darn, it doesnt fit the knife edge election meme, thats why. And thats actually good for Labor at this point. The punters need to know they cant just protest against Labor

  42. [This “we’ve polled 200 people in 4 marginals showing a swing of x%, therefore the entire state will show a swing of x%” goes against the whole idea of polling]

    I rest my case.

  45. I avoided INSIDERS today and I won’t be watching Q&A either – the less of Abbott, the better.
    Of course Galaxy is a partisan, anti-Labor polling outfit – we’ve known that since 2007.
    Everyone is forgetting that Julia should get some momentum out of her campaign launch tomorrow, particularly if she and Rudd are seen to be united(at least for the TV cameras).
    All Abbott has got going for him is boat people, which obviously is a winner in Western Sydney and parts of QLD, but it doesn’t register at all in VIC and SA.
    Speaking of Rudd, he was helping Maxine out yesterday in Bennelong – funny that none of the TV news bulletins in Sydney picked that up.

  46. Darn – at the moment, any poll pointing to a close race will be run with. There is nothing worse for the media than a 53-47 poll with a week left. In 2007, every single poll pointed to a Rudd win easily, we all knew it, the media knew it. What did all of the media outlets keep discussing? A 52-48 poll where the marginals were “very close”. They’re playing around with figures to paint a closer election than what it will be (not that it won’t be close).

    If Newspoll shows Labor ahead (even 51-49) then it is almost statistically and historically impossible for Labor to not win re-election.

  47. Brian Toohey on Insiders.. “Well micro waves are getting faster every day.”
    Why do these people think they can get away with such absolute crap. FFS.
    This comment totally sums up the ignorance and ineptitude of journalists in the Australian context. The amount of times I’ve seen serious experts/pollies front the media to have some work experience journo about 20 years old ask the most rediculous q.
    No wonder online is becoming the chosen form of information gathering.

  49. [Darn, it doesnt fit the knife edge election meme, thats why. And thats actually good for Labor at this point. The punters need to know they cant just protest against Labor]

    Fair point Andrew, but let’s not fall forr it ourselves, at least until we have further evidence. The Newspoll will be very interesting tonight.

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 4 of 9
1 … 3 4 5 … 9