Newspoll: 61-39 to Coalition in NSW

Courtesy of GhostWhoVotes, the latest bi-monthly Newspoll shows the executioner’s axe continuing to hang over the head of the Labor government in New South Wales, although they have just slightly out-performed their all-time low in the previous poll. The Coalition’s two-party lead is down from 63-37 to 61-39, although the primary vote changes are fairly minor: Labor up one to 24 per cent, the Coalition down one to 45 per cent, the Greens down two to 15 per cent and others up two to 16 per cent. Barry O’Farrell has taken a six point hit on approval to 42 per cent after what looks like an aberrant result last time, and his disapproval is up one to 33 per cent. Kristina Keneally is down on both approval (three points to 35 per cent) and disapproval (one point to 49 per cent). The “uncommitted” result for each is up substantially. Keneally has slightly narrowed the gap on preferred premier, from 42-35 to 40-35.

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.

155 comments on “Newspoll: 61-39 to Coalition in NSW”

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  1. One more thought about Sydney. Clover Moore’s been in parliament for 22 years… that must be close to the record for an independent (certainly recently). Who else would there be? John Hatton’s the only one I can think of offhand.

  3. BoP
    Thanks for that…I was indeed curious about the impact of redistribution, but had focused on the ALP vote, which this commentary on losing eastern liberal bits and gaining more nominal ALP western bits, is even more astonishing:
    1999 – 12,153
    2003 – 9,071
    2007 – 8,235

    (1999 was Vic Smith which I ween was a bit high profile, but I cant remember why!)

    Will be interesting to see outcome; personally, I think the Greens have done themselves a disservice with weak candidates, both last time and this time, and if their strategy is to pick it up after Clover goes (surely her last election), I reckon they ought to have someone with a bit more middle of the road credibitility than Chris Harris’ speechwriter. The EQOS (Evil Queen of Sydney) probably has a lock on it now (though she has made a few {more} enemies lately), and flow of preferences/exhaustion rate amonst the 3 other major candidates will be interesting.

  5. GG 104

    There is nothing right about what Keneally did, in fact what she did was an affront to democracy. Only a complete Labor hack could not see it.

    As her treasurer Rosenthal said, Keneally prorogued parliament early to ensure there is no scrutany on Labor’s sale of electricity asset, and he agreed with it

    The sale of the assets which 8 directors, with ALP link, quit the board of those entity in disguss at what NSW ALP did. That is hardly an endorsement to the sale.

    The NSW ALP also forced the directors to agree to the sale, which led to the mass resignation. Which is also a direct breach of the duty the directors have to the owner of the assets, the people of NSW.

    An enquiry is the only thing stopping the latest stuff up from this Incompetant and likely corrupt government. The fact that the ALP thinks it is a good idea to sell asset under their real value to finance their reelection bid, shows the arrogance and stupidity of this government. And the arrogance and incompetance of this premier

    Quite simply, if you are in NSW, and you do not work for the public service and you vote ALP, you are simply an idiot

  7. Dovif,

    The Government takes its legal advice from the Solicitor General. Unless you are heroic enough to want to say he was nobbled then the rest of your blustery bulldust is just so much hot air.

  9. Gusface

    Do you ever post anything in relation to politics

    Or are you so dumb that you are incapable of contributing anything of substance

    STFU

  10. GG

    At no stage am I talking about the advice from the solicitor general

    I am talking about the action of a premier, who tries to suit down the operation of parliament, so the public do not find out about the Electricity generator sale.

    8 member, some with ALP links quit in protest of the action of this government …. think about it!!!!

    The public have a right to know what KK would go to any length to shut the directors up…. that is facts

  11. Dovif,

    The SG Advice means Kenneally’s actions are legitimate. So, the first leg of your morality tale is rubbish.

    Now all you’ve got left is to quote Liberal and MSM talking points which are simply political speak. Your moral outrage is only matched by the shallowness of your argument. As ususal, we have all the ususual suspects saying all the usual things.

    Move along comrade. There’s nothing more to see.

  12. GG

    why not prorogue government 1 month into the new term, Parliament is there to make sure the government is acting on the best interest of the NSW people

    Which is something the NSW ALP had long forgotten how to do.

    And that is why NSW ALP will likely not get 25% primary vote at the next election

    The fact you are defending them says a lot about you

  13. dovif,

    Is rhetoric and personal abuse all you have? Based on the emotional claptrap you like to serve up, you’d make a hologram seem substantial.

    There is nothing unusual about Government’s proroging Parliament. It’s a political tactic available to all incumbant Governments. All your huffing and puffing doesn’t change anything.

  14. GG
    [The SG Advice means Kenneally’s actions are legitimate. So, the first leg of your morality tale is rubbish…Now all you’ve got left is to quote Liberal and MSM talking points which are simply political speak.]
    I don’t see how this follows.

    SG advice might go to legal implications of the prorogation. As far as I know, there has never been a question as to the legality of the prorogation itself.

    The questions raised have been to
    (1) some of its legal implications – ability to have committees; privelage etc, covered by the SG advice
    (2) its “legitimacy” – which goes to the very heart of the current NSW government’s political approach, judgement and tactics, which will be covered by the court of public opinion, along with other considerations, come 26 March.

  15. laocoon,

    Parliament is not a knock shop with a sly grog store and special sales out the back.

    Seems like a few would like to re define the meaning of Prorogue. This is simply politics as usual as far as I can see.

  16. GG

    Well, here in the Rum Corps colony, the very current Parliament Building was formerly a hospital, indeed financed by rum sales 😆 …and with the power of the hotel and club lobby in NSW, one might argue at the extent to which things have really changed!

    I agree it is simply politics. I am not so sure it is “usual”.

  17. laocoon,

    I’m midway through the latest biography on Bligh by Mundle.

    An amazing man who lead an amazing life.

    He was on the voyage when Cook was killed and eaten, the infamous mutiny on the Bounty was under his leadership. The descriptions of the journey by Bligh and eighteen crew across 3500 miles of treacherous sea in an open row boat are breathtaking. Of course the Rum Rebellion when he was Governor.

    My take is that he’s copped two hundred and fifty years of undeserved bad press. He was a master mariner.

  18. GG

    I hadn’t realised he was on Cook’s voyages as well…yes an interesting guy. Is the book a good read?

    Turnbull is named a Bligh too! I don’t think related/descendent, but a longstanding Turnbull family tradition in William Bligh’s honour

  19. Parliament is not a knock shop with a sly grog store and special sales out the back.

    It’s a bit hard to argue that given that in the early days of NSW “nursing was …widely considered to be a role suitable only for those of social and moral disrepute” and that convicts convicted of crimes in the colony and who were unfit for any other duties were sentenced by the magistrates to work in hospitals, that in recent times t we have had a number of MPs closely associated with professional Ugandan activities within the confines of parliament and beyond, and at least one MP who rorted the parliament’s discount bottle-oh

  20. [Parliament is not a knock shop with a sly grog store and special sales out the back.]

    You’re quite sure of that? Harry Hutton had this to say about the parliament at Westminster a while back:

    [The Palace of Westminster has seven bars. In fact, they are not so much bars as villainous drinking dens, since none of them has a licence and they are completely illegal. The Mother of Parliaments is fundamentally a low shebeen selling bootlegged gin. That, I’m afraid, is a fact.]

  21. It seems Parliaments go from getting down, to getting up to getting pissed.

    Thank goodness doe eyed furry small animals are safe.

  22. [http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/keneally-surrenders-in-power-fight-20110105-19gaq.html]

    GG, I would be very interested to watch you spin this one, why not give it a go?

    Can’t tell you how much I am looking forward to your response (your posts above have been a joy to read.

    Please tell us all just one more time how wonderful the NSW ALP government is and how well they are going to do in this year’s election- you were predicting they were going to win with Green’s preferences weren’t you?

  27. MY apologies, GG, I remembered it as being you predicting an ALP win.

    Of course, its possible both you and Gus were on the same page (albeit a page in the fiction end of the library)!!!!

  29. Although I completely agree that KK had every right to do what she did, and the good guv was well within her rights as well (and I mean good when using this adjective in her case), its still a bad look. Trust me, NSW populace is not scoring her on how politically savvy she is being, they are thinking how low can this mob go. (yes opinion, but lets see who is closer to the mark on that one!).

  32. I wasn’t blogging last time but I wasn’t predicting it then. This is a totally different situation. There was a new leader and an unpopular opposition leader with instability on the other side. Now there is nothing happening on the Lib side (and by that I agree nothing on the policy front and nothing in party terms either- the public not being interested in the right wing skirmish going on!) and we have had a leader per year! Pedophiles, Corruption, Byelections with record swings, each one larger than ever before and getting larger each time. When seats like Cabramatta are under threat you need to start sweating! Do you have any incumbents this time around? Haven’t most of them jumped ship? This is a 4 year trainwreck and we are the ones tied to the tracks by the 4 year term.

    This would be a contender for the worst government in Australian history and until I came to this site I had never heard a single person in NSW say they would support this government in March (not a single one of my ALP voting friends that means!)

  33. [nsw could do a tassie]

    Only if by that you mean ALP winning 10 seats!!!!!

    Anyway, I must get my beauty sleep! Its only a few dozen sleeps before we will all know for certain what happens in the NSW election.

    *the tick tock above was a political time bomb by the way and its still ticking*

  34. Mod Lib,

    These things always go the same way.

    I write one line. The evil Lib writes copious quantities of verbiage to try and rationalise a frenzied hope that this time things will be different. Ho hum.

    I reckon Labor putting the Greens last will just about get us over the line.

  36. OK, before I go can we have both your: primary vote, TPP and seat predictions for the record?

    We can return to this in April then and see what happened!

  40. Andrew Clennell in the Daily Telegraph:

    [Liberal and Labor sources are talking about just 18 Labor seats in the 93-seat Legislative Assembly after the election on the basis of current polling. Even safe seats like Heffron, held by the Premier by 24 per cent, is said to be at threat from the Greens.

    Maroubra, held by Police Minister and leadership hopeful Michael Daley by 16 per cent, is also said to be at threat from the Libs – although Labor sources argue the safe Labor seat has never been doorknocked properly and he is doing so now.]

  41. The chance of the ALP winning in NSW in March are zero, zip, nada (take your pick) – just returned from a few weeks in NSW and the topic of the state government came up quite a few times. The NSW populace are waiting to swing those baseball bats – even my rusted onto the ALP aunt is waiting to have a go at the ALP and KK. There is nothing in NSW but loathing and contempt for the current government.

  42. GG:

    Can we have your ALP primary vote, TPP and seat predictions please?

    We need goalposts to see who is in touch and who is in the dooda

  43. Greensborough Growler
    Posted Thursday, January 6, 2011 at 12:30 am | Permalink

    Mod Lib,

    These things always go the same way.

    I write one line. The evil Lib writes copious quantities of verbiage to try and rationalise a frenzied hope that this time things will be different. Ho hum.

    “I reckon Labor putting the Greens last will just about get us over the line.”

    Agee with principal of th last line GG ,
    Balleau tapped into reality that Greens is toxic to middle australien voters , and if one looks at 39/61 labor in q’ld there’s a similar threshold to NSW Greens dont go ovr , beyond which Liberols in both States get them voters Stats is there

    At min putting last will save furniture & leave Labor NSW making a stand on somthing

  45. [Mod LibPosted Saturday, January 8, 2011 at 12:53 am | PermalinkSo do you want to give us your NSW ALP predictions (Primary, TPP and seats)?
    GG appears to be in hiding…
    ]

    He’ll think you don’t exsist – especially after you show him up re his prediction about Ben wyatt 🙂

  46. [At min putting last will save furniture & leave Labor NSW making a stand on somthing]

    Do you mean ALP putting Greens last?
    I think Libs should put Green’s last (ala Vic), but if ALP did that in NSW they are deader than dead (they are going to rely on the reverse-Green1 ALP2- for any respectable result). I would be shocked if they get into the 30s in primary votes…

  47. [especially after you show him up re his prediction about Ben wyatt ]

    did I do that? I don’t even remember that- perhaps I was sleep typing?

  48. [Mod LibPosted Saturday, January 8, 2011 at 1:02 am | Permalinkespecially after you show him up re his prediction about Ben wyatt
    did I do that? I don’t even remember that- perhaps I was sleep typing?
    ]

    No, I did 🙂 He has now since disowned me.

  49. [ Can we have your ALP primary vote, TPP and seat predictions please? ]

    I might as well throw a few tips into the ring. 2PP: 60-40 or thereabouts to the Libs. Labor to lose every seat up the pendulum as far as Kogarah (17.7%), except for Macquarie Fields, Toongabbie, Smithfield and Wallsend. That’s 18 ALP seats or so (it’s late, I can’t be bothered counting them exactly). Greens to win Balmain and Marrickville and come second in Coogee, Heffron and Blue Mountains (and also Ballina and a pile of safe Liberal north shore / northern beaches seats). John Tate to win Newcastle, and another independent in one Illawarra seat. All existing independents to hang on with the possible exception of Dawn Fardell in Dubbo; I wouldn’t be surprised if Labor finish third in Lake Macquarie or fourth in Sydney.

    Roughies: Labor to lose Keira or retain Monaro and/or Bathurst. Might be good for a flutter… I imagine there’d be some pretty decent odds for Steve Whan hanging on.

  50. Mod Lib:

    [ I think Libs should put Green’s last (ala Vic), but if ALP did that in NSW they are deader than dead (they are going to rely on the reverse-Green1 ALP2- for any respectable result). ]

    I reckon the Libs will just do what they did last time in NSW and do a ‘just vote 1’ HTV… sidestep the issue. I can’t see why they’d go out of their way to save two Labor ministers, and if they did it’d blunt and confuse any campaigning against them. The ad pretty much writes itself: “What, they’re incompetent and need to be thrown out for the good of the state, but you’re protecting them from the Greens? Make up your minds.”

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