Newspoll: 50-50; Galaxy: 52-48 to Labor

Amid talk of Labor internal polling showing the situation for them souring in New South Wales, The Australian tells us a Newspoll survey conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday has the parties locked together on 50-50, after Labor led 52-48 at the poll conducted over the weekend. It appears Newspoll surveyed 800 people on both evenings and will do so again tonight, producing a 2500-sample poll that will be published in the Weekend Australian. More to follow …

UPDATE: GhostWhoVotes reports Galaxy has Labor 52-48 ahead. Miranda Devine of the Sydney Morning Herald tweets that the Coalition primary vote in Newspoll is up three points, which means 44 per cent.

UPDATE 2: Most excellent comments contributor Lukas relates the Galaxy primary votes are 38 per cent Labor, 41 per cent Coalition and 14 per cent Greens.

UPDATE 3: Herald Sun report on Galaxy here. The sample was 1200, bigger than the Galaxy norm. The report informs us that 38 per cent of voters in New South Wales and Queensland “say they are less likely to vote Labor because of toxic state ALP governments”.

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.

805 comments on “Newspoll: 50-50; Galaxy: 52-48 to Labor”

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  1. Steve @ 112,129

    That image was a shocker for Labor in NSW – no wonder that Anna Bligh has been kept at arms length. I posted here last week that KKK invading the PMs personal space was deadly in NSW. What may save Labor is that the Libs didn’t believe they could win seats like Lindsay and Greenway so left it too late.

  3. Don’t tell me a hung Reps is possible. All my dreams will come true. I’ll have to give up work and be a go-for for the indies and Bandt. And assist them with their evil plans for proportional representation. 😎

  6. [633
    Kevin Bonham
    Polling says 60% of Australians believe in same-sex marriage.]

    I think this would be about right. I can’t think of anyone under the age of 50 – apart from a few happy-clappers – who would oppose gay marriage.

  9. blackburnpseph at 151

    I agree with you. I could never understand why Abbott was spending so much time in Qld and so little in NSW. Maybe he was lulling KKK and JG into a false sense of security.

  12. “And assist them with their evil plans for proportional representation.”

    Sounds good to me – then we almost never have a Tory govt!

  13. BrisOZ

    [@Mike, I would have thought Preferred PM taken into account as well?]

    Tacit point, Bris, but not historically. Now Julia has had precious little time to look prime-ministerial, but has done a damn fine job nonetheless.

    The problem for an opposition is that people really can’t imagine them in that role well enough, so they are usually behind. In fact, if they are ever in front in opposition, it is almost a dead cert that the opposition will get over, because it is the very last measure that sways.

    More important is the ‘beauty contest’, the net satisfaction. Neither is doing well at this compared with the stratospheric popularity of Kevin last time. Abbott’s has had plenty of time to plummet but has just bubbled mostly under zero. Kev’s was terminal as was Turnbull prior to Tony’s very close win into opposition leader.

    My feeling is that it was a wrong call to go to the polls so soon for Julia. Too much reliance on the ‘honeymoon’, whereas, having seen her in this campaign, I think she would have done far better in October.

  14. No 138

    No it doesn’t say that at all. If you want to keep productivity up, PPL has to be a wage replacement. It’s got nothing to do with valuing one baby more than another. Tony Abbott said it right on Q&A:

    [TONY JONES: And so I just want to clarify this point. A woman earning more than $150,000 a year would get paid $75,000 for the six months under your scheme. A woman earning $60,000 the case she just sighted, would only be paid $30,000. Is there equity there?

    TONY ABBOTT: Well, if the woman on $150,000 goes on annual leave, she’s paid at the rate of her salary. If the woman on $60,000 goes on annual leave, she’s paid at the rate of her salary. If the women in question go on sick leave, they’re paid at the rate of their salary. Now, if this is going to be leave, as opposed to a welfare benefit, it’s got to be paid at the rate of salary. Now, surely, if we are going to do justice to the workers of this country, the female workers in particular of this country, well, parental leave have got to be paid at their wage.]

  16. [What may save Labor is that the Libs didn’t believe they could win seats like Lindsay and Greenway so left it too late.]

    The TWS poll showed Labor keeping Greenway by only 50.8%.

  18. possibly even worse than tony abbott pm will be the legitimisation of howardism and the inevitable theft of labor’s legacy. all of that time and effort wasted to give tony abbott a platform to crow about how fantastic the libs are. ugh.

  19. I must say, Im still scratching my head as to why JG was seen with coo-ee of anyone from the NSW govt.

    I dont recall approving that here on PB. 🙁

  22. If the Liberals do win, we will be able to say that the politics of climate change will have destroyed two Opposition Leaders, two Prime Ministers and one Government.

  23. [1. NBN unnecessary
    2. Mining tax an egregious attack on our economy
    3. PPL scheme from the Liberals is far better for families]

    1. GP yu obviously have no idea — if you worked with said technology you wouldn’t begin to question it’s necessaity.
    2. Yes, let export all our profits at the expense of our local companies — great idea.
    3. Wonderful. Make the rich richer and devalue the children of the average person’s child. But hey — the libs NEED the money, they might not be able to pay for their 2nd merc or their 5 bedroom mortgage while they take time out to have kids.

    It’s obscene. The narrow minded, thoughtless and short-sightedness of Liberal policy is ridiculous.

  24. [The only place I have read this is in the MSM (the Australian, I believe), which, correct me if I am wrong, you inferred that I was a moron for believing just two weeks ago? Do you selectively choose the stories you’d believe?]

    I don’t remember why I inferred you were a moron, but I’m sure it wasn’t for that reason. There is zero chance of the Greens supporting a Liberal government. Every non-moron knows this.

  27. @Mike/163,

    I disagree, I don’t think the matter of going early or going late would have made much difference from a voters point in view, people’s view has spoken on both parties, neither one which they like, it’s all upto who gets the most votes.

  28. In the Know:

    [What?

    I am talking about the normal statistical errors associated with any sample polling. A sample of around 1600 people would have a 2-3% margin of error, regardless how close to the election it is.]

    I was joking, hence the ;). But for the future I will use the </sarcasm> tag as it is more obvious.

  29. No 150

    Centre, the thing is, the Liberals would never propose an NBN at the scale or cost of Labor’s ridiculous policy. That’s the truth.

    At best, we would be investing money in regional and rural telecommunications and let the private sector fight it out in the cities. That’s a sound and affordable approach.

    As for the mining tax, no I would NOT support any Liberal proposal that would seek to dramatically increase the tax rate for the miners. And such a policy is unlikely to ever come from the Liberal party at any rate.

    Again, you don’t know what you’re talking about.

  30. madcyril
    [Mick W

    Adam Bandt has openly said he can only support a Labor government]

    oh, ok, I’ll count as ALP then, cheers!

  31. The rumour from Labor is that QLD is looking better for them, but NSW could be a disaster zone on Saturday night.
    I’ve got to agree that Julia making that announcement with Kristina Keneally was a completely dud decision – why associate yourself with the toxic New South Wales state government?
    Anna Bligh at least has had the good sense to stay out of the limelight.

  34. [This says it all for NSW voters.]

    Don’t understand you annabella.

    I think this means Victoria has moved, maybe the 55-45 state vote hasn’t held up.

    Don’t forget, 50-50 isn’t a seat count, its a 2PP. I think one of the southern states must have come in below previous previous results

  36. [and labor were at 60-40 in the polls and ppm? liberals in complete disarray, an electorate that had begun to believe in climate change? come on. does anyone really not believe that if rudd had pulled the trigger he would have smashed the liberal party to flinders? the liberals certainly believed it.]

    What this election is showing is that Australians are very susceptible to scare campaigns.

    Scares about debt
    Scares about boat people
    Scares about pink batts

    All bullshit, but people can be made to believe it by negativity, mantras AND an unscrupulous, complicit media all too eager to propagate the campaigns.

    Australians can be made to feel scared of their own stupid shadows. They can be convinced that climate change is ‘absolute crap’.

    They could also be convinced to reject climate change mitigation if scares for the hip pocket nerve can be manipulated.

    Never underestimate the gullibility of the electorate.

  41. And yes, if Labor loses – there go the political careers of Arbib/Bitar/Shorten/Farrell.
    It’d be truly ironic if one of the few swings to Labor is in the seat of Griffith. 😉

  42. GP 164

    PPL is a government payout to support the costs associated with having a child. The vast majority of children have the same needs – the children of marketing executives should require the same spend on nappies, food, toys, clothing, etc as the children of nurses, cleaners, receptionists, etc.

    It’s a disgusting proposal.

  43. Bris

    [@Mike/163,

    I disagree, I don’t think the matter of going early or going late would have made much difference from a voters point in view, people’s view has spoken on both parties, neither one which they like, it’s all upto who gets the most votes.]

    Really? You don’t think more time for the ‘knifing Kevin’ story to fade, or maybe have him with another job lined up overseas wouldn’t have been better?

    Abbott would still have been Abbott. She could have done more repairs to the shocking government, if possible, and then put it to the punters.. Yeah, I think Late Oct, early Nov would have been far better.

  47. madcyril @ 10
    I agree, ALP win, majority increased by 2 seats. Not based on polls, I just think Australians, as individuals, really want to do this.

    I will put my pennyworth in now, and if I turn out to be wrong, then I will be so miserable on 22/8 I won’t care if I am wrong for all to see. And as I said it is nothing to do with polls.

    I do not think this is an election where there is a great collective wave or movement towards or away from any one issue. I just think that more people than not will act on their own will and vote for Julia Gillard. They have not been given any convincing reason not to do so. She is competent, personable and attractive enough for blokes to have a second look and a bit of thrill at seeing her in control (double entendre alert!) but not enough to put the sheilas offside.
    JG is spruiking health, education, family; all good ‘womanly’ things, but in doing Kevin in she gives the impression she wouldn’t hesitate order up the missiles if there was a threat.

    Tony Abbott has given no great reason to vote for him instead of Julia, neither in personality, presentation nor policy. He has been presented as competent, predictable and safe, but nothing more.

    There has been no big game changer, no great scandals and no driving force for change.

    There is just not a pressing reason to decline to mark the candidate who represents Julia Gillard on the ballot paper, no reason to be unable to say in the future,”Yes, Julia Gillard was our first female Prime Minister and, yeah, I helped put her there.”

  49. lefty e
    Posted Thursday, August 19, 2010 at 11:03 pm | Permalink

    “I must say, Im still scratching my head as to why JG was seen with coo-ee of anyone from the NSW govt.”

    Reason is self explain as you’d know , there’s lots of marginals on fringe with traffic congrstion plus crying out for a rail line , so polisy and politcs a plus , and downside risk is as you say and i did cringe as well seeing visuals kk and julia together

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