Morgan: 58-42 to Coalition

Roy Morgan has published results from its last two weekends of face-to-face surveying, with one period before the High Court ruling on the Malaysia solution and the other after. The poll actually shows a slight improvement for Labor on the poll covering the two weeks previous: their primary vote is steady on 32.5 per cent, but the Coalition is down three to 46.5 per cent and the Greens up 1.5 per cent to 12.5 per cent. On the respondent-allocated preferences two-party preferred measure, this translates into a shift from 58.5-41.5 to 58-42; allocating preferences as per the result of the previous election, the shift is from 55.5-44.5 to 54.5-45.5. This is the biggest disparity yet recorded by Morgan between the two preference allocation methods, with Labor receiving just 45 per cent of minor party and independent preferences compared with 65.8 per cent at the election.

Also:

• I have been informed that an unpublished survey of 400 respondents in Western Australia, conducted six weeks ago by Patterson Market Research (which conducts, among other things, Westpoll for The West Australian), had federal voting intention at 57 per cent for the Coalition, 27 per cent for Labor and 9 per cent for the Greens, suggesting a two-party result of about 63-37. This points to a swing of about 6.5 per cent: Labor’s margins in the three Western Australian seats they still hold are 3.3 per cent in Brand, 5.7 per cent in Fremantle and 5.9 per cent in Perth. The margin of error on the poll is a bit under 5 per cent.

• Arthur Sinodinos, former chief-of-staff to John Howard, looks set to fill the NSW Liberal Senate vacancy created by the resignation of Helen Coonan after confirming his intention to nominate.

• In the Sunshine Coast seat of Fisher, Mal Brough’s election as Liberal National Party divisional branch chairman ahead of the preferred candidate of sitting member Peter Slipper is universally being interpreted as a portent of looming preselection defeat of the latter by the former. Slipper had said his position as an LNP member of parliament would become “untenable” if his candidate was defeated, but after the event claimed he had “never threatened to resign”.

• Jessica Wright of the Sydney Morning Herald reports that as well as Brough, Tony Abbott has approached former Lindsay MP Jackie Kelly and Parramatta MP Ross Cameron with a view to returning to parliament at the next election. Also on Abbott’s wish list is Tom Switzer, editor of The Spectator Australia and former opinion page editor for The Australian. Kelly at least has been unequivocal in denying any interest in a comeback, while Switzer appears to be holding out for a seat in Sydney after being discussed as a possible contender in Craig Thomson’s central coast seat of Dobell. It has further been reported that Gary Hardgrave and De-Anne Kelly, who lost their Queensland seats of Moreton and Dawson in 2007, have also “come in for attention”.

• Labor’s Bendigo MP Steve Gibbons has announced he will bow out at the next election. Gibbons won the seat from the Liberals on the retirement of Bruce Reid in 1998 and consolidated thereafter, winning last year by a margin of 9.5 per cent. There was speculation that Senator David Feeney might seek refuge in the seat, having been unable to advance up the batting order from his highly loseable third position on the party ticket. However, Andrew Crook of Crikey described such reports as “erroneous”, and quoted Gibbons saying he “wouldn’t support David Feeney or anyone else administrative people from Melbourne impose on us”. Also mentioned by The Australian was Ben Hubbard, local native and chief-of-staff to the Prime Minister.

• Christian Kerr of The Australian suggests WA Liberal Senator Matthias Cormann has his eyes on preselection for the lower house seats of Pearce and Moore, to be vacated at the election by the retirements of Judi Moylan and Mal Washer. This threatens to be factionally problematic, as Cormann is of the Right whereas Moylan and Washer are noted moderates. Kerr’s report also foreshadows yet another preselection challenge to Tangney MP Dennis Jensen, who has twice required intervention from higher up to save him from preselection defeat at the local branch level.

• Alex Sinnott of the Warrnambool Standard reviews Liberal preselection jockeying for Corangamite, where Sarah Henderson is hoping for another crack after narrowly failing to unseat Labor’s Darren Cheeseman last year. She may face competition in the shape of Rod Nockles, an internet security expert who also sought preselection last time. Robert Hardie, an adviser to Senator Michael Ronaldson, was identified as a potential starter but declined to comment.

• Victorian Liberal Senators Helen Kroger and Scott Ryan are shaping up for a preselection contest for the second position on the party’s ticket at the next election, to be determined early next year. Kroger was elected from number two and Ryan from number three in 2007, but Ryan has since attained a more senior parliamentary position and is thus by party convention entitled to the higher place.

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.

3,038 comments on “Morgan: 58-42 to Coalition”

Comments Page 2 of 61
1 2 3 … 61

  4. Socrates

    In Britain they had a disqualification law, but repealed it earlier in the year. The concept is to give a example as to people with disabilities participating in normal life. I guess the principle is that the large number of people with mental illness deserve representatives too. If their constituency doesn’t like their performance, they can vote them out.
    [Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has announced that the Government will repeal Section 141 of the Mental Health Act – a law which forces an MP to stand down from their seat if they are sectioned for more than six months.]
    http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/215577.php

  6. Generic Person
    Posted Friday, September 9, 2011 at 3:09 pm | Permalink

    GO TONY GO

    Agreed. Just GO AWAY.

    But no more than 12,000 miles because then he would be coming back.

    Go with him gp.

  15. Not looking goood for Mary Jo.

    “Defence counsel Michael Abbott, QC, failed on Friday to have evidence given by the store security guard and a policeman ruled inadmissible.

    Magistrate Kym Boxall ruled that that comments made by the guard did not amount to an inducement to Senator Fisher to make admissions”.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/fisher-details-battle-with-depression-in-court/story-e6frf7jx-1226133180767

  16. Test cricket is not dead.

    The stadium is filled with at least 17 people, 16 of whom appear to have been paid to wave Australian flags in order to provide how excitement crowd footage.

  17. The SMH story starts out:

    [THE Labor MP Craig Thomson and the union leader Michael Williamson, who is on the ALP national executive, allegedly received secret commissions from a major supplier to their union.]

    … but it doesn’t actually say who’s making the allegations. It seems to be just the SMH making them.

    Thomson has made no comment and Williamson is denying the allegations.

    If the credit cards were provided but were not used, or if they were not provided at all (in both cases ruling out “secret commissions”), then someone at the SMH is in a lot of legal trouble.

    As is Brandis for rushing to the police with possibly half-baked claims.

    What does Brandis know about this that isn’t in the newspaper? And who told him what he knows? Is it a matter for NSW police or the Victorian police?

    So much left unsaid, except I’ll say something right here: I would like nothing better than to see Kate McWhatsername, Senator Brandis and the quincing Phillip Clarke put in a legal chaff bag and dumped in an ocean of pain of their own making over this.

    http://www.smh.com.au/national/thomson-new-credit-card-claims-20110908-1jzz2.html#ixzz1XQfVZavl

  19. This little black duck
    Posted Friday, September 9, 2011 at 3:13 pm | Permalink

    dave,

    12,000 miles up. No limit. No return.

    Well he is *on* something most of the time, he wouldn’t need helium.

  21. I see that the legal industry is doing its very, very best to get Ms Fisher off.

    Only the legal industry could fail to see what an ass it is making of itself with the blather about ‘admissable’ evidence.

  24. I agree Boerwar. You should just let anything and everything in as evidence in a trial.

    Unless it’s the allegations against Craig Thomson, I presume.

  26. [“Defence counsel Michael Abbott, QC, failed on Friday to have evidence given by the store security guard and a policeman ruled inadmissible.

    Magistrate Kym Boxall ruled that that comments made by the guard did not amount to an inducement to Senator Fisher to make admissions”.]

    An old barrister’s trick. A classic case of manufacturing grounds for an appeal. This could go on for years.

    If a witness, employed by the aggrieved company to supervise security matters can’t give evidence in a shop stealing case because she didn’t do it in the right way, or asked the accused whether she’d done the deed or not, then that would throw out most charges of this type.

    We don’t have a Fruit Of The Poisonous Tree doctrine here to anything like the extent they have in the US.

    Seems to me that Mary Jo’s silk knows she’s busted and he’s trying to fend off anything immediate happening to her while Thomson is supposed to be the No. 1 Case of the Century.

    Even if she gets convicted but with a suspended sentence, she’ll be liable to expulsion from the parliament as the offence carries a penalty potentially greater than 12 months imprisonment, which is all the Constitution says it needs to have to justify expulsion.

    In the case of a casual vacancy arising from a criminal conviction would the SA government have to just replace her with a Liberal? Or is there some wriggle room here?

  30. Boerwar
    [Only the legal industry could fail to see what an ass it is making of itself with the blather about ‘admissable’ evidence.]
    I’ve got an opinion about Senator Fisher’s conduct, and I’ve heard several things about her that might be relevant. Why shouldn’t the court take my evidence?

    In fact, to hell with this nonsense industry of a ‘defence’ advocate testing the ‘evidence’ to ensure the prosecution proves its case, let’s go back to putting a heavy stone on people’s chest.

  31. B

    Goodness no, you should not let any old thing be admissable as evidence.

    But when it comes to hair splitting designed to prevent people who were there from telling what they saw and heard, then the legal industry is making an ass of itself.

    The fact that the legal industry cannot comprehend why taxpayers might resent having to subsidise this sort of legal industry tom foolery shows just how much the inhabitants of the legal industry live in a world of their own.

  33. [In the case of a casual vacancy arising from a criminal conviction would the SA government have to just replace her with a Liberal? Or is there some wriggle room here?]

    Wasn’t Albert Field a National Party Member ?

  34. Brandis , in his submission to NSW police, has stated wwte “on the basis of the information that is published.. ” or so it is reported.

    Does not read like he has much else. Could be wrong.

    However, I think the big question is what does the reporter have apart from so described “allegations” ?

    Big call on her part if she has nothing. Why not one of the main journos anyway if such a big story ?

    Just observations.

  36. [Wasn’t Albert Field a National Party Member ?]
    Rule on replacement has been changed. Now same party, I believe.

  39. Boerwar @ 5494 (previous thread):

    [I know nothing of course.]

    It takes a person of some character to make such an admission and in consequence my opinion of your opinion has changed markedly.

  40. [In the case of a casual vacancy arising from a criminal conviction would the SA government have to just replace her with a Liberal? Or is there some wriggle room here?]

    Some answers from Wikipedia on casual Senate vacancies:

    [{The Constitutional amendment’s} intended purpose was to prevent major changes in the balance of power in the senate in the middle of a parliamentary term, but as it did not provide any time limit within which the appointment had to be made, the state legislature remained free to decline to fill the vacancy. As Section 11 of the Constitution permits the Senate to carry on despite the failure to fill any vacancy, the amendment did not completely solve the problem.]

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_referendum,_1977_%28Senate_Casual_Vacancies%29

    If Abbott can’t bring himself to provide pairs for great Australians’ funerals, or for the birth of Labor kiddies because there is misbehaviour merely alleged, can the SA Premier refuse to replace Mary Jo for proven criminality?

    I mean, why should the Coalition not pay a penalty for the criminal acts of one of its members?

    Have patented “The Thomson Doctrine”.

  41. ru

    [Senator Fisher should have taken sick leave when diagnosed with chronic depression. It is not a joke it is a serious illness. Who let her continue to work while so ill?]

    Most people who are diagnosed with major depression continue working and don’t take sick leave. Her psychiatrist would have made the decision.

  45. [Most people who are diagnosed with major depression continue working and don’t take sick leave. Her psychiatrist would have made the decision.]

    So the psychiatrist says it’s OK for her to continue to be a national legislator, sitting on important committees etc., but then covers for her when she biffos a security guard and tries to steal goods from a supermarket?

    Nice to have a shrink around when you need one.

  46. [Most people who are diagnosed with major depression continue working and don’t take sick leave…]

    So Andrew Robb should have continued with his day job?

  50. Is that 1,000,000 audited comments or just William’s own number?

    Half of them are from Frank and we know he’s just a pseudonym for W. Bowe (his alter ego, if you like, the Evil Twin). There’s goes 500,000 straight off the bat.

    And does anything GP writes actually qualify as a comment? Bang! Another -100,000 or so.

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 2 of 61
1 2 3 … 61