Essential Research: 52-48 to Coalition

The latest weekly Essential Research survey has the Coalition gaining a point on two-party preferred after three weeks at 51-49. This sets a new record for their best ever performance from Essential Research, which began polling in early 2008. The Coalition primary vote is up a point to 46 per cent, with Labor and the Greens both down one to 37 per cent and 10 per cent. I guess we have to wait another weak for questions on Wikileaks: this week’s supplementary questions relate to whether it’s been a good or bad year for various industries, the environment, political parties, politicians and the respondents personally. Respondents were also asked which news sources they use, which more than any such question I’ve ever seen suggests the long hegemony of television news is under serious threat from “internet news sites”. Six per cent said they used blogs to get news on an average weekday, with intriguing party breakdowns: 10 per cent among Greens supporters, 7 per cent among Coalition supporters and 4 per cent among Labor supporters. Public broadcasters maintain solid lead as the news sources considered most trustworthy.

UPDATE: Roy Morgan phone polled another 528 respondents between Friday and Sunday to add to the 550 polled on Wednesday and Thursday for Friday’s 55-45 result. The additions to the sample have only slightly reduced the Coalition two-party lead, to 54.5-45.5. Together with a weekly Essential Research sample that was bad enough for Labor to drag the rolling fortnighly total from 51-49 to 52-48, there is now meaningful evidence to suggest the Coalition two-party vote is at least as high as 53 per cent. Morgan also has state breakdowns of Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott’s personal ratings, though it probably wouldn’t do to read too much into them.

UPDATE 2 (14/12): Westpoll has published a survey of 400 respondents showing the federal Coalition with a two-party lead of 54-46 in WA, compared with 56.4-43.6 at the election, from primary votes of 48 per cent Coalition, 33 per cent Labor and 13 per cent Greens. The poll was conducted between Monday and Wednesday last week, and as usual the sample was 400 and the margin of error about 5 per cent. The poll also finds 61 per cent of respondents supporting gay marriage against 33 per cent opposed. Figures published from the survey yesterday had 35 per cent saying they would be less likely to vote for the state Liberals if Troy Buswell was returned to cabinet, against “almost one in six” more likely and 45 per cent no impact.

UPDATE 3 (14/12): Roy Morgan has now published full figures from the phone poll alluded to in the first update, remembering that half of this is the 55-45 result which was published on Friday. Taken together, the poll has Labor on 31 per cent, the Coalition on 46 per cent and the Greens on 13.5 per cent, with the Coalition’s two-party lead at 54.5-45.5. Results are provided for that half of the survey conducted since the results published on Friday, which are only slightly better for Labor than the Friday figures. Rather pointlessly for a national survey with 1078 respondents, they have also provided us with state breakdowns: here are the Labor two-party figures for each state followed by the election results in brackets, then a rough margin-of-error after the comma. The Victorian figure suggests to me that static from the state election might have been a factor there.

New South Wales: 45.5% (48.8%), 5.25%
Victoria: 47.5% (55.3%), 6%
Queensland: 36.5% (44.9%), 6.75%
Western Australia: 50% (43.6%), 9.5%
South Australia: 52% (53.2%), 10.5%

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.

3,482 comments on “Essential Research: 52-48 to Coalition”

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  3. [Manager of Adelaide and Bendigo Banks, in an interview on ABC24, said that the Oppn were wrong in their criticisms of the new regulations.]

    lizzie – Hockey was so contradictory on agenda this afternoon and Graham Samuels followed and said wtte that some economists and commentators are sounding stupid and don’t know what they’re talking about. He included Alan Fels in that.

  6. [“Mis speak, mis promise, mis represent, plain old mis report — all are falsities and in this contemporary world of cyberspace there is plenty of room for mistakes,” the real Bishop wrote.

    “Twitter is a classic. Tony Abbott had his fair share of fake Tony Abbott Twitterers. Julie Bishop has been known to have them, as do I.

    “For myself, I do not tweet. Yes, I use Facebook but I do not use Twitter.

    “Every now and again there is a flurry of interest in what a fake Bronwyn Bishop Twitterer tweets. Such was the case last week when a particular journo did a mis report and used a fake tweet which he attributed to me.

    “In this day and age of cyber fraud it just goes to show you can’t believe all you see or read. One telephone call would have saved said journo a heap of embarrassment.”]

    So it’s a fake. I knew it!

  7. Further evidence that Swan was working on the bank reforms long before Joe had anything to say on the matter:

    ‘‘The government has been quite consultative over the last 18 months,’’ {NAB chief executive} Mr Clyne told the Senate inquiry, adding that none of the initiatives were especially surprising.

    ‘‘The talk about the reform on exit fees has been discussed, and has been floated for some time.’’

    Mr Clyne said NAB had been given the opportunity to provide input into the policies, even if it wasn’t told of the exact announcement beforehand.

    “‘On every element in the package, I can certainly say that we had had discussions with Treasury and the government over the last six to 12 months about the nature of the industry,’’ he said.

    (my emphasis)
     http://www.theage.com.au/business/banks-erred-in-following-rba-rate-moves-clyne-20101213-18uv9.html 

  12. [Manager of Adelaide and Bendigo Banks, in an interview on ABC24, said that the Oppn were wrong in their criticisms of the new regulations.

    So did Gottliebsen]
    The boys on radio replacing Mitchell were adament that most commentators were against the new banking regulations. Even quoted, wait for it, Terry MCrann. One of their own guests put them staight though saying The Age’s Tim Collbach(?) gave them the thumbs up.
    They interviewed Swan and said afterwards that he was all spin. He actually went into great detail and explained the case very well. They were really out to be negative. Amazing stuff.

  13. [Malcolm Farnsworth (bless him) has audio coverage of the 1975 election count:]

    Ah William – can I stand listening to it tho! sob, sob

  14. [They interviewed Swan and said afterwards that he was all spin. He actually went into great detail and explained the case very well. They were really out to be negative. Amazing stuff.]

    Gary – email them all the links you can find of decent and balanced coverage and ask them to present something other than Liberal cant.

  16. Gary,

    You could remind them that seeing as they are owned by Fairfax they should promote someone like Tim Colbatch rather than News shills like McCrann.

  18. I wouldn’t trust Terry McCrann with the office tea club money let alone his views on the government’s banking reforms. Remember when he had that article published chastising Swan for an interest rate rise that didn’t happen? And his argument that (wtte) we don’t need the NBN because iPads are becoming popular?

  23. [I wouldn’t trust Terry McCrann with the office tea club money let alone his views on the government’s banking reforms. Remember when he had that article published chastising Swan for an interest rate rise that didn’t happen? And his argument that (wtte) we don’t need the NBN because iPads are becoming popular?]
    Swan said in the interview that McCrann hasn’t agreed with anything Labor has done over many years.

  25. SK:

    McCrann has also lent his ‘expertise’ to climate change – unsurprisingly to disagree with the government. For a finance columnist he’s really quite versatile; he isn’t constrained by the limits of expertise on any subject from what I can gather. 😆

  27. [ Greensborough Growler
    Posted Monday, December 13, 2010 at 7:09 pm | Permalink
    Laurie Oakes just won a Walkley for receiving leaks and hasn’t signed
    ]

    His signature is under the Walkley’]]s Board

    [Walkley Advisory Board
    Gay Alcorn
    Mike Carlton
    Helen Dalley
    John Donegan
    Peter Meakin
    Laurie Oakes
    Jeni O’Dowd
    Alan Kennedy
    Malcolm Schmidtke
    Fenella Souter
    ]

  28. GG

    Oakes in a signatory (down the bottom)

    Frank

    [ In that Walkley’s letter, there is one notable omission.

    The Editor of the OO.]

    Yes. I wonder what the story is with that. Was it too strong, too weak or what? Is Mitchell upset about the press’ reaction to Possetigate? Or is he jealous of Fairfax?

    Given that Assange has run that op-ed it is even more noteworthy.

  29. confessions@175

    SK:

    McCrann has also lent his ‘expertise’ to climate change – unsurprisingly to disagree with the government. For a finance columnist he’s really quite versatile; he isn’t constrained by the limits of expertise on any subject from what I can gather.

    Yet, McCann is strongly suspected by some financial journos of getting prior inside info from someone in the RBA on interest rate decisions.

    The whole idea sounds *implausable* but for a long time he consistently had accurate info. One of the explanations was that the RBA was using him to *condition* the market.

    Believe what you will of it all.

  35. [ Diogenes
    Posted Monday, December 13, 2010 at 7:29 pm | Permalink
    Frank

    The West Australian editor isn’t there either. Why are the two most right-wing papers not there?
    ]

    Neither is the Editor of the Sunday times – who were the subject of a raid in 2008.

  38. Sensible views on both the value of the Wikileaks and the likelihood of future revelations because of the technology, by Paul Barrratt the “former intelligence analyst and a former secretary to the Defence Department”:

    “In the hubris of power and their desire to stay in office solely for the purpose of being in office, modern governments routinely mislead us in two ways. They feed us an endless stream of misleading drivel manufactured by spin doctors, and they withhold information about their real agenda and other inconvenient truths the public has a right to know about. This is now much harder to sustain.

    Julian Assange will no doubt pay a heavy price for his role in this inevitable development, but in the long sweep of history he will be seen more as hero than as villain.”

    http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/the-net-will-win-against-deception-20101212-18txe.html

  40. [ William Bowe
    Posted Monday, December 13, 2010 at 7:37 pm | Permalink
    Neither is the Editor of the Sunday times

    Yes he is.
    ]

    Indeed he is – and I wondedr if the Rod Quinn who is thr edior of the Canberra Tmes the same Rod Quinn from ABC LOcal Radio Overnights/fill in for Tony Delroy ?

  42. Frank

    Rod Quinn usually does three nights every week, I think on ‘Overnights’. He’d be working pretty hard to be editor of the Canberra Times. Or is that just a small local rag?:lol:

  43. confessions@181

    dave:

    Interesting. Does the market take any notice of him?

    Some of his fellow journos were very jealous & resentful.

    Not sure about the market.

    The RBA’s approach is still to nudge markets if they are heading the wrong way with interest rate movement assessments. RBA believe overall in a *no big surprise* approach. But the last several decisions seem to have muddied the water somewhat.

  45. TP,

    I’ve never heard a defence lawyer say their client is guilty. At this stage we only have Assange’s ‘side’ of the debate. The comments about the motives of the Swedish Government and the process used would probably constitute a contempt in most jurisdictions.

    The assertions re the alleged secret indictment panel in the US are stated as fact without conclusive proof.

    The statements about releasing all encrypted information reeks of an average James Bond movie.

    It seems that Assange and co are more about the PR war than anything else.

  47. [While these polls are like this Labor is sure to keep the support of the indies. Which party do you think benefits by these polls at the moment, which party would go to the polls at the drop of a hat if they could to benefit from their poll standing and which small unaligned parliamentary group of individuals don’t want an early election?]

    Spot on Gary

  49. Sensible views on both the value of the Wikileaks and the likelihood of future revelations because of the technology, by Paul Barrratt the “former intelligence analyst and a former secretary to the Defence Department”:

    God know why Rudd needs to attempt to big note himself behind the scenes. I understand that most leaders have super egos but the behaviour is unnecessary and creates the opposite effect. And Rudd actually doesn’t need to that sort of stuff, he has the skill set for it all. Hopefully he will have learnt something from these WikiLeaks and drop that stupid behaviour.

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