Essential Research: 66-34 to Coalition in NSW

Essential Research has produced a final poll for the NSW election, and while the scale of the Labor wipeout indicated is on the high end, it’s best viewed as yet another poll within the same range (62-38 to 66-34) that all polls have been registering throughout the year. The Coalition primary vote is up a point to a dizzying 55 per cent, with Labor down one to 23 per cent and the Greens down one to 11 per cent. The data comes from “three week averages”, which I take to mean part of the sample was covered in the previous Essential result. Regional breakdowns point to a result of biblical proportions for Labor in Sydney, where their primary vote is at 20 per cent compared with 42.5 per cent in 2007. Outside of Sydney the Coalition’s lead is 58-42 – pointing to a modest-under-the-circumstances swing of 6 per cent. The poll shows a remarkable consistency between the three designated age groups, except that the Greens poach an extra four points from Labor in the 18-34 bracket.

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.

143 comments on “Essential Research: 66-34 to Coalition in NSW”

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  1. Too early for predictions?
    Here’s mine for the seats Labor will still hold after the tsunami on March 26:
    Auburn
    Bankstown
    Blacktown
    Canterbury
    Liverpool
    Mt Druitt
    Shellharbour
    Wallsend
    Heffron
    Maroubra
    Macquarie Fields
    Swansea
    Toongabbie
    Campbelltown
    Too close to call: Granville, Monaro, Strathfield

  5. Cabramatta, if won by liberals, will have as MLA, Dai Le, who Darren Laver (#60) is ready to write off as a member of the Coalition of happy clappers, racists and crazies. Which one Darren or is she all three?

  6. [I just got a *hand written* letter (in pen! handwriting!) from one of my neighbours personally urging me to vote for Kevin Greene here in Oatley. I suspect it’s the guy at the top of my street, he’s the one with the signs.]

    It could be one of these machines: http://www.realsig.com/atlanticplus.htm

    I haven’t gotten any handwritten pleas to Keep Carmel. I suspect Newtown has already descended to the 7th Layer of CDP’s Hell.

  7. . . . and was the member for Kogarah, Cherie Burton, also lying when she said she’d pursue legal action against the Sunday Telegraph, or was she prepared to purger herself Jeffrey Archer-style?

    [When Ms Burton was questioned about the incident by The Sunday Telegraph two weeks ago, according to the journalist pursuing the story she denied the accident had occurred and threatened to pursue legal action against the newspaper if it published the allegations.

    But on Tuesday, Sydney radio station 2GB broadcast the claims, prompting Ms Burton to admit to receiving a police fine over the incident.]

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/call-for-axing-of-labor-mp-for-lies/story-fn59niix-1226027019619

  8. Prepolls in Cabramatta has gone through the roof, by yesterday 6,000 pre-polls had already been made, and they ran out of voting papers, that represents about 15% of the electorate.

    Looks like the people of Cabramatta are going to vote early and vote often

  11. just some stuff i heard on the ground from some of the closer electorates which have been mentioned as being close.

    Independent in Blue Mountains looking good, ALP likely to run 4th on primary behind independent, libs and greens

    balmain line ball in terms of primary between greens and libs, labor to run third there

    to add to 101 id have Macquarie fields too close to call and monaro looking likely to be favouring Whan to hold on

    still too close to call for Pt Macquarie and also for the IND v ALP in Newcastle, looking very close

    Independent in Upper Hunter will run close to the nats, but expecting nats to hang on by around 2-3% on 2pp.

    Clover Moore will hang on but a lot closer than people put it.

    Cabramatta, wtf is happening there, its as if the margin that should be used is the by-election margin which was 7.2% not the margin from the last election as it is seen as 50-50, but still favouring ALP to hang on

    looks likely that labor will end with between 15-20, predicted 2pp 61-39 coalition favour

  15. Frankie V and deconst.

    Here’s the letter for your amusement. The fine print at botton is “Authorised by Steve Machon…”


    I’m particularly at how honest it is “The Labor Govt is going to lose this election no matter what happens here. This election is about how we want our local MP”

  18. I suppose I could have put worthwhile in front of contribution for David Oldfield query. There is footage of the Oldfield/Hanson reunion. I will not give you the link in the interests of preserving good taste.

  19. Afternoon all,

    Sertse at 50, the care factor for this election outside of political nerds like us is less than zero. The ABC will rate very poorly; especially as the results in the most interesting contests will not be known for a week, or a few days in the very least. I’d include Balmain and Cabramatta in that category. The ALP scrutineering in Blacktown will be so professional they probably already know the result. Besides, I will be live posting on the Poll Bludger on election night for want of anything sensible or productive to do.

    Rebecca at 69, that’s the best news I’ve heard in a long time. Now Lylea can go back to eating children or whatever it was she did before she decided to infect the ALP with her presence. What Union is Watson from? (please god, don’t say SDA, AWU or ASU, please god, just this once…)

    Frankie V at a hundred and something. That is very bloody funny. I’d love to have a beer or twenty-eight with you at the White Eagle club one night and share stories.

    Aaronkirk at 111. The Greens in the Blue Mountains have tanked. Haven’t you been paying attention? Tanked mate. Can’t staff booths. Can’t get campaigners. Their candidate can’t be taken seriously. They will be lucky to get their deposit back. Trish Doyle is doing OK in the circumstances. She’s got some good support (Phil Davey for one) and should poll in the mid-high teens and come third behind Sage (the Springwood Dentist and climate change denier running for the Liberal party) and Janet Mays, the Independent. Doyle is preferencing Mays.

    And evan14, I didn’t realize you lived in the Kalang Valley?

  20. Evan14 at 70: No opposition? Opposition to executive government – for that’s all we really have in this day and age – doesn’t come from within parliament in any real sense. It comes from outside it, in places like the media, industry groups, lobbyists, donors, handshake and wink arrangements on Hunter Street and on the Finger Wharf at Woolloomooloo. Didn’t you get the memo that went around?

    Socrates at 87 is right on the money.

    If you want to get someone elected, join a political party. If you want to change public policy, do anything but. If you want to cheer for your tribe when they take on another tribe, follow football. True political strength lies in being outside the tent pissing in rather than the other way around, as I feel Nathan Rees is about to demonstrate.

    Those cowboys over at Holt Street will feel O’Farrell owes them big time when he owes them three fifths of f^ck all. So if O’Farrell doesn’t do what they want, watch for the inevitable News Limited tantrum. The dumboes from the ALP will be too stupid to see it for what it is and will fall in behind it out of a sense of relief more than anything else for they, too, have no idea why this is all happening to them. They don’t live as you or I do. News’ political sausage machine will also be fed by the inevitable aggrieved members of O’Farrell’s ‘team’ (there is no I in ‘team’, but there is two in ‘idiot’). After a honeymoon this government will leak like a Filipino ferry. An earlier poster pointed to the Jeff experience. I am expecting the same, especially amongst an increasingly volatile youth vote that is up for grabs if anyone decides to grow a brain and start to address, gee, I dunno, maybe it’s POLICY concerns.

    Shellbell at 86, the ALP couldn’t build a lean-to around Whan and Rees for the simple fact that they won’t attract any money, and certainly not from the SDA, ETU and AWU who prop up the show at Sussex Street. Why do you think policy is so low down on the agenda for the likes of Arbib and Dastyari? Their primary focus is the making of dosh for the spending of to effect the getting elected. That’s it. Closed loop. Has been since John Ducker’s day onwards. That’s their entire raison d’etre. Why do you think they get so exasperated that members want things all the time. It interferes with the promises they make to their financially adept benefactors. The trots could raise more money than an ALP lead by Whan and Rees. It’s sad, but true. And if you think money backed professional advertising campaigns don’t matter, I give you exhibit A, the super profits tax and the Minerals Council of Australia.

    That said, The campaign against electricity privatisation started in Phil Koperberg’s electorate in November 2007 (I think we were first from memory) and the only thing it had was a $400 public liability policy and an email list! I think any casual observation of that issue shows how things can quickly get out of hand if you wipe enough turps over the sit down apparatus.

    But as for the ALP as a source of progressive social reform?

    Stick a fork in its arse and turn it over. It’s done.

  21. Hence why the best thing that could happen to the ALP is if Barry banned union donations after the election.

    That’d be something the Greens would get behind.

  22. OK, onto late breaking news:

    Robbo is home in Blacktown on my mail. They won’t say as much publicly but no stone has been left unturned and campaign workers have all been caught up in the adrenaline of it all. The message is to talk down the ALP’s chances as much as possible (the Hanrahan effect) to get people to lodge a ‘protest vote’ against Barry. It’s a bizarre tactic. Someone said it came off the Kerry campaign, but I doubt that.

    The statewide campaign has descended into ennui with news editors in both TV and print media realising it’s a massive turn-off for viewers and readers who really are sick to death of it. Notice how websites at News and Fairfax are being subtly scaled down. Less writers. Fewer stories. No breaking news or exclusives going on. Everyone going through the motions. This helps the ALP.

    Everyone I’ve spoken to in Queanbeyan today thought the Carbon Tax rally was really funny. Genuine laugh-out-loud funny. I just can’t get a handle on how this is playing out in the street apart from a suspicion that the cost of things will go up to help “bludgers”. Thus is the wisdom of Queanbeyan’s working class this Thursday lunchtime. When asked if this meant they wouldn’t vote Labor anymore people either quickly said no, or said they voted Liberal anyway. So not changing votes that one, at least in Queanbeyan take Away.

  23. Deconst – agree.That would give them a big cup of relevance deprivation syndrome. Christ, that long piece of misery that runs the SDA might have to get off his backside and do something for the poor stiffs being sat on by Coles and Woollies. I’d like to see that!

  24. Blue Mountains – Ben Raue at the Tally room Reckons the Greens vote is going to the Independent Mays – supports eddiedward at 119 in his take on that electorate.

  26. The Green vote in the Blue Mountains is not going to Mays, it is racing across the street and flinging itself at Mays, and quite possibly stalking her during the evenings.

    Greens will be lucky to get their deposit back in the Blue Mountains. They selected a candidate who simply isn’t respected in the community. Hatton people in force so this seat will be a big loss for them in terms of LC vote as well.

    Has anyone else seen Hatton’s print ads? He also had a TV Ad so has some fair coin behind him. Anyone heard any radio ads?

  27. Deconst, just re-read your post and ‘got’ it.

    Of course, the Gtreens got horribly wedged on this a while back, backing in the ALP’s reforms with their get-out-of-jail-free card for the union donations.

    Yes, I think we MAY revisit that issue, but it remains to be seen whether anyone will really need the Greens vote this time.

  30. OC, Next you’ll have Barnaby Joyce befouling the wharf at North Beach.

    Re, the Greens. Breaking story has LC lead candidate Shoebridge quoted in an AAP story that says the Greens were looking to increase their four LC seats (that would mean winning three at this election) and winning ‘at least one’ lower house seat.

    “The party was expected to win at least one lower house seat and add to the four seats they already have in the upper house”

    Hmmm, have they given up on Marrickville? Are we managing expectations here? Or is this just so much AAP guff?

    Well, Shoebridge offers a direct analysis (something a politician should never do.

    “The current polling shows that if we get a sufficient number of Greens in the upper house, then together with whatever rump of opposition is left from the ALP, we may have the numbers to control that balance of power in the upper house.”

    So they think they can get Jem Birmingham up as a third Green MLC. Good luck with that.

  31. I’ve just been informed that an email has gone out today from the Greens under the subject heading ‘Help Stop The Attacks’.

    Paranoid much?

    I, for one, welcome our new Coalition overlords.

  32. stanny,

    In response to your question on the previous thread, I don’t listen to John Laws great Trucking Songs, but I have had TISM’s, Great Truckin’ Songs of the Renaissance on high rotation lately. It’s the truest document this country has ever produced.

    Shock jocks are overrated. They are like environment groups, and trots, they preach to the converted. The trick to winning any issue is getting people who don’t give a sh*t to give a sh*t. If you do that you win.

    And on that note, remember, LANG IS RIGHT!

  35. Well, I am glad that the ALP is FINALLY starting to listen to my ideas of campaigning as if they are going to get smashed…and it will work, especially now the media and the public has got bored with it all.

    So, the ALP are saying, BOF will be Premier, keep your (good) local ALP member. Tick.

    They are concentrating on the winnable (around 30 or so) seats only, conceding they will lose so many that they are toast. Tick.

    They are attacking a possible unfettered Liberal landslide is unhealthy for democracy. Tick.

    All that needs to happen now is for KK to admit tomorrow that they will be mashed and congratulate BOF, and repeat a line that hopefully some ALP MPs will be saved for an effective opposition.

    If she says that they still have a chance, that’s another 5 seats gone.

  36. IT

    The people of NSW have probably stopped listening to KK, in fact, they stopped about 12 months ago, too late to save the furniture now.

  37. OC

    As I said, the National wants to send a message, and we will find out in a few days

    I think I have done pretty well so far
    – letting people know that Smithfield and Cabramatta is in play
    – ALP struggling in every seat down south
    – Liberals is leading in primary in Balmain
    – Newcastle might have quite a few independant

    Most of the community in here has picked this up, we will see how much I got wrong on Saturday

  40. #Newspoll NSW 2 Party Preferred: ALP 36 (-1) LNP 64 (+1) #auspol #nswvotes
    #Newspoll NSW Primary Votes: ALP 23 (-3) LNP 50 (0) GRN 12 (+1) #auspol #nswvotes
    #Newspoll NSW Keneally: Approval 33 (-1) Disapproval 59 (+1) #auspol #nswvotes

    (ghostwhovotes)

  41. #Newspoll NSW O’Farrell: Approval 48 (-1) Disapproval 39 (+2) #auspol #nswvotes
    #Newspoll NSW Preferred Premier: Keneally 32 (-3) O’Farrell 48 (0) #auspol #nswvotes

  42. @139

    Is Lalich so bereft of supporters he doesn’t have anyone to do his dirty work for him ?

    My political punting days are over. About 6 months ago I took $9 on Labor hoping to trade out at $4 or $5 during the election campaign. At Betfair Labor is now at $55.

    Must be record odds for a runner in a 2 horse race.

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