Newspoll: 58-42 to Coalition

GhostWhoVotes reports that Newspoll shows little change from a fortnight ago, with the Coalition’s two-party lead down from 59-41 to 58-42. However, it wouldn’t be a current opinion poll if there wasn’t an unpleasant twist for the government, and this time it’s a new low on the primary vote of 26 per cent, down a point on last time. The Coalition are down as well, by two points to 48 per cent, with the Greens up one to 13 per cent. Julia Gillard’s personal ratings have recovered from last week’s disaster, although they are still the second worst she has ever recorded: her approval is up four to 27 per cent and disapproval down seven to 61 per cent. Tony Abbott has failed to hold on to an improvement recorded last time, his approval down five to 34 per cent and disapproval up two to 54 per cent, and his lead as preferred prime minister has narrowed from 43-34 to 40-35.

This week’s Essential Research shows no change in voting intention, and indeed the series has not recorded any shifts worth mentioning since mid-June. The current scores are 32 per cent Labor, 49 per cent Coalition and 10 per cent Greens, with the Coalition leading 56-44 on two-party preferred. Further questions find respondents believe to be the world in general and Australia in particular to be less safe than at the time of the September 11 attacks; little change in opinion on the carbon tax, with support down two points since August 1 to 37 per cent and opposition up one to 52 per cent; continuing broad support for the idea when it is specifically tied to compensation and investment in renewable energy; a belief nonetheless that the current scheme has been rushed; and a confused picture on whether governments should control either or both houses of parliament (though it is clear not many would opt for neither).

Further:

• A by-election looms in the north coast NSW state seat of Clarence following the resignation of Nationals MP Steve Cansdell. Cansdell has admitted to signing a false statutory declaration so that a staff member could take the blame for a 2005 speeding offence, which would otherwise have cost him his licence. The last time there was a by-election in the Grafton-based seat, in 1996, the result was a triumph for Labor: months after losing his seat of Richmond at the federal election, Labor candidate won the seat from the Nationals with a swing of 14.0 per cent, adding a handy buffer to what had previously been the one-seat majority of Bob Carr’s government. This time, Labor need not bother fielding a candidate: after winning the seat on Woods’s retirement in 2003, Steve Cansdell consolidated the Nationals’ hold in 2007 before picking up a swing of nearly 20 per cent in the electoral avalanche that was the March state election, pushing his party’s margin above 30 per cent.

• The Prime Minister has flagged support for trials of American-style “primaries” as part of its preselection process for some Coalition-held seats ahead of the next election. In keeping with the recommendation of the post-election review conducted by Bob Carr, Steve Bracks and John Faulkner, 20 per cent of a preselection ballot will be determined by those willing to register as official party “supporters”. Sixty per cent will be determined by branch members and 20 per cent by affiliated trade union members. The NSW Labor Party has resolved to follow a more radical path in five electorates before the 2015 state election, with 50 per cent determined by primaries and the remainder determined by branch members and unions. Two such experiments were conducted last year, by the NSW Nationals in Tamworth and Victorian Labor in Kilsyth. The former was a highly successful effort in which 4293 voters participated in the selection of Kevin Andrews, who duly unseated independent incumbent Peter Draper; the latter was something of a damp squib, attracting only 170 participants and selecting an electorate officer who did nothing to hold back the anti-Labor tide. The lesson seems to be that a degree of community enthusiasm is requried for the procedure to be worth the effort. This is least likely to be forthcoming when the party is not a serious prospect of winning the seat, and most likely in areas where the party is traditionally strong. Herein lies the catch: it is not in such areas where party branches are moribund, which is the very ill that primaries presume to cure. All that being so, trials in Coalition-held seats do not seem greatly promising at a time when every indication suggests seats will be swinging the other way.

• Antony Green has published analyses of the New South Wales election in March and the Queensland election of October 2009. Among other things, these tell us that the respective two-party splits were 64.2-35.8 to the Coalition, with exhausted minor party votes accounting for 12.9 per cent of the total formal vote; and 50.5-49.5 to Labor, with 7.7 per cent exhausting. In New South Wales, Labor’s primary vote of 25.6 per cent was its worst result since 1904, while the Coalition’s 51.8 per cent was its best result since 1932.

• The delicate balance in the Northern Territory’s Legislative Assembly shifted a fortnight ago when Alison Anderson, who won her outback seat of MacDonnell as a Labor member in 2008 and quit the party the following year, joined the Country Liberal Party. The numbers in the chamber are now 12 each for the Labor government and CLP opposition, with Nelson independent Gerry Wood continuing to provide Labor with a decisive vote on confidence and supply.

• The New South Wales government has introduced a bill that will ban donations to political parties from organisations of any kind, and include spending by affiliated unions within caps on party spending during election campaigns. One of the Keneally government’s final acts was to set caps of $9.3 million on electoral communications spending by parties and $100,000 for each candidate, and to ban donations from the alcohol, gambling and tobacco sectors.

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.

5,432 comments on “Newspoll: 58-42 to Coalition”

Comments Page 108 of 109
1 107 108 109
  1. [GS

    tsk tsk. There you go. Calling me hypocritical when I was telling the truth]

    Right Wing Projection from GS, Gary Sparrow (aka “Glen”), the Liberal spinner? Surely not!!

  2. [Your NOT comparing Australians with the American public I hope, they have been crapped on by the Republicans and the religious right for decades, and they keep begging for more!.
    They have a corrupt political, and legal system and fail to take care of their people, thats why they hate WELFARE in any form!.]

    1934pc – not saying I disagree, but what on earth does that have to do with mobile phones and their effect on polling?

    * Polls said Repubs were going to do really well

    * Left-leaning people on the net shrugged off the polls, said that they were inaccurate because old people who vote Repub anyway are more likely to have landlines than young people who vote Democrat

    * Polls turned out to be extremely accurate, Repubs did really well

    So, why exactly do you think mobile phones vs. landlines means that the current polling in Australia is inaccurately skewed in favour of the Coalition? I just think this is quite a common article of faith, and that it really isn’t backed up by what I’ve seen happen.

  3. [Mr Denmore
    @MrDenmore
    This fake Rudd putsch story is almost a textbook case of how the media-political complex constructs its own reality to justify its existence
    5 hours ago via Mobile Web]

  4. [At least we’ll have a way to reason and analyse the why. ]

    Whereas, their’s will be “Gillard didn’t give me enough dole money and baby bonus! And there are too many darkies here!”

  5. [Cuppa@5337
    The ABC used to be OK but have sold out like all the rest.]

    Given the quantity of its output (hourly and, in some dayparts, half-hourly news bulletins + national current affairs programs), I believe the ABC to the THE MOST biased news organisation in the country.

  6. himi

    Strange the ip address was for Hostworks.
    [Hostworks is the only managed services company in Australia that can genuinely claim this position. It has and continues to deliver business critical services to all the major online and digital media market leaders such as: ninemsn, Network TEN, ABC, Prime, Ticketek, Carsales, Seek, realestate.com.au, AHL and many more.]

    For any budding journo dig into 202.59.37.129. 🙁

  7. Dunno why certain people around here are on about latte-sipping elitists.

    I live in the inner west of Sydney and just happen to have as my local, just down the road a bit in Enmore, the best coffee shop in the area.

    As a caffeine addict, I visit the almost place daily at different times (depending on the demands of ther monkey on my back).

    Its customers of an early morning include loads of Ute-driving tradies, who park their Maloos outside in Enmore Road and dash inside for their large take-away lattes before hooning-off to whatever Inner West terrace renovation they’ll be doing the plumbing (or wiring or carpentry) for on that particular day.

    Mid-morning brings in for their skim-milk cappuchinos, the wives and young children of the doctors and lawyers whose houses the Ute-driving tradies are working on.

    Lunch time sees said doctors and lawyers themselves drop in for a quick cup and bite from the offices along the street.

    Afternoons are for the elderly gents of ethnic origin, who drop by for their short black or turkish and a bit of a yarn.

    All-up, the place seems to attract a pretty generalised corss section of the community: Bogans, Wogs, buttoned-down professionals and their better halves, all at different times.

    So what was that about elites?

  8. [Short Answer…

    The LNP Broadband Policy is better because the old saying is true one size does not fit all.]
    Yes I agree with Glen. People should be free to have crap internet connections.

    We need the flexibility for people to not have fibre internet connections.

  9. Welcome home, Arunta. As you can see, nothing much has changed in Oz except for Swannie getting a gong.

    [SHY doesn’t give press conferences, she has tantrums.]

    We happened to catch part of the Senate Committee thing on AS . The Lib Senator was pretty rude but that’s a given for Libs from WA.

    However, SHY needs to learn that she is one very ugly young woman when she is questionning public servants. I know she is passionate re onshore processing but I can’t find an excuse for her behaviour today. Bob Brown needs to tone her down.

  10. [I don’t care – I don’t listen or talk to Bogans]

    It is hardly surprising that Labor’s polling numbers are in the gutter when those that loudly proclaim true support for Labor show out and out snobbery as expressed in comments like the above. And George is not alone as a Labor supporter expressing such sentiments.

  11. george

    [terrible argument. Will the LNP Broadband solution come in different colours?]

    Here is a re link to a couple of pages about Richard Alston. Winner of Worlds Worst Comunications Minister. You will see the LNP policies have progressed not a whit. Remember all the cries about broadband being only about downloading porn faster ? Well surprise surprise that was just what Dick said to dismiss the need for any.

    [The man you see pictured above may be the greatest luddite the world has ever seen, which is particularly ironic because he happens the be the minister for Communications, Information Technology and The Arts for the Australian government.

    Meet Senator Richard Kenneth Robert Alston.]

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/03/28/this_man_must/

    [Senator Luddite says broadband takeup linked to porn]
    http://whirlpool.net.au/news/?id=956&show=custom

    [This assessment was based on the facts that Senator Alston wanted to introduce a law to make online gambling illegal. He also wanted to make forwarding email a crime.

    Six months later he was at it again when he rubbished a proposal to roll-out broadband across the country describing it as a “costly waste of time”.]
    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/09/29/worlds_biggest_luddite_to_retire/

  12. [The current policy which as far as I am aware allows for a pleathera of different broadband initiatives to give people choice, high speeds and low costs.]
    Australia’s internet connectivity is on average half the speed and on average twice as expensive as the OECD average.

    Australia has amongst the slowest and most expensive internet connectivity in the developed world.

  13. [The current policy which as far as I am aware allows for a pleathera of different broadband initiatives to give people choice, high speeds and low costs.]

    Which is what the NBN is delivering.

    Example, ADSL2:

    200GB + 200GB ADSL2+ Speeds (around 20MBit down speed, 1-2MBit up) $99.95/month

    NBN:

    500GB + 500GB NBN3 Speeds (100MBit down speed, 40MBit up) $99.95/month

    hmmmm, but does it come in yellow?

  14. [Gary Sparrow
    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 4:58 pm | Permalink
    The current policy which as far as I am aware allows for a pleathera of different broadband initiatives to give people choice, high speeds and low costs]
    Problem is, you’re not aware.
    pleathera or plethora notwithstanding.

  15. @GS/5349,

    Rubbish, Turnbull keeps quoting recently NZ, which has higher Wholesale costs than the Australian NBN does.

    Keep talking rubbish.

  16. Ruawake: hah – I didn’t bother looking up the actual address, I just recognised the 202.59.blah . . . That’ll learn me for not doing enough research before posting 😉

  17. Gary Sparrow
    [The current policy which as far as I am aware allows for a pleathera of different broadband initiatives to give people choice, high speeds and low costs.]

    Admit it!, you don’t know what you are talking about!, technically illiterate!.

  18. [ruawake

    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 5:03 pm | Permalink

    himi

    Strange the ip address was for Hostworks.

    Hostworks is the only managed services company in Australia that can genuinely claim this position. It has and continues to deliver business critical services to all the major online and digital media market leaders such as: ninemsn, Network TEN, ABC, Prime, Ticketek, Carsales, Seek, realestate.com.au, AHL and many more.

    For any budding journo dig into 202.59.37.129.
    ]

    Which shows as
    chatswood.broadcastaustralia.com.au [202.59.37.129]

    🙂

  19. [Dunno why certain people around here are on about latte-sipping elitists.]

    Because they are intolerant elitists themselves.

    Don’t give me that dogshit about Labor abandoning its base either. What a bunch of people say on a blog is different to ALP policy.

    Yeah, the ALP are really known for targeting inner-city seats in their policy strategies. Whereas those outer-suburban blue collar seats (eg Western Sydney) are just ignored. What Universe? Seriously?

  20. Cheers Poroti, off to the club to discuss World Cup, (NZ/France in particular), Warriors League game Sat night and the Eagles heading to the grand final..should be a solid 3 hours coming up, couple kiwi shearers in the group, booked the ride home for 6-30pm..all the best.

  21. Remember.too.Abbotts.argument.that we.aren’t.goodenough or wealthy enough for good.broadband we.only deserve rubbish second rate broadband – when he is pm his argument will be valid he will be.that bad

  22. Fulvio, Doyley, et al (circa 5100) re G. Bird:

    jRe the exchange rate dropping below parity: I dunno why you bother responding to that crap. Glen is a troll of the first order. I wouldn’t waste my energy on him.

    Swannie is doing the heavy lifting. His predecessor swung away sipping malibu and coke.

  23. [Gary Sparrow

    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 5:10 pm | Permalink

    ShowsOn

    How are they going to afford it since the Govt has decided a monopoly is a best way about it ffs?
    ]
    NBNCo is a WHOLESALER like your beloved Telstra that Unca Johnny Flogged off.

  24. [blackburnpseph
    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 5:06 pm | Permalink
    I don’t care – I don’t listen or talk to Bogans

    It is hardly surprising that Labor’s polling numbers are in the gutter when those that loudly proclaim true support for Labor show out and out snobbery as expressed in comments like the above. And George is not alone as a Labor supporter expressing such sentiments]
    Here, I’ll give you a heads up, bbp
    You lot are the bogans.
    Got it now?
    Benighted you stand, benighted you fall.

  25. [Welcome home, Arunta. As you can see, nothing much has changed in Oz except for Swannie getting a gong.]
    Thanks BH. missed some of the gossip but still catching up….for what its worth ..peeps we spoke to in USA looking for a messiah to deliver them from recession..but not sure Republicans can deliver….Republican candidates very similar to Abbott , promise to fix everything at no extra cost and of course no GBNT and stop the illegals.

  26. [ShowsOn

    How are they going to afford it since the Govt has decided a monopoly is a best way about it ffs?]
    The entry level NBN packages are half of what I am paying now. If I could join up to the NBN now I would be about $30 a month better off.

    I would also have a much faster connection.

    What you don’t seem to understand is that a fibre network is a natural monopoly. We only need one of those. Once it is built companies then buy access to the NBN network at the same rate irrespective of if they are a state based ISP or Telstra.

    At the moment we have the absurd situation where the company that owns the copper network also competes against other companies that pay to access that network. It is an idiotic situation that we should’ve never got to.

    But anyway. You are completely wrong. The NBN will end up saving a lot of people a lot of money, and Telstra can finally for once and for all go and screw itself.

  27. @GS/5371,

    Stop telling fibs, NBNCo is level 2 bitstream provider, it provides only the lastmile.

    Competition is and will be provided at the POI level, similar to the DSLAM rollout.

    And instead of rolling out to every single exchange(over 5000 exchanges), including 3rd party backhaul, they do that at the POI level.

    The FIBS that SOLD Telstra has had about 20 different PLANS for broadband, especially in the last couple of years, and none of them worked.

  28. Re General Assembly
    ALL member nations almost 200 of them have a single.vote …

    The latest betting is that overwhelmingly the Palestine will get a huge majority in the Assembly vote

    However in the Security Council ,the 5 permanent and 10 other members will vote.(15)..again it’s said by many observer…that there will be a substantial vote for Palestine there in the SC,but the US has the veto.and will use i

    Thus .destroying any goodwill Obama has left in the Arab World…but he is under the thumb of the world’s richest and most determined Lobby in the USA,so he has to bend,as they have a grip over the Jewish voters in key states like NY and Florida and N.J

    In that case the General Assembly may defy the USA and seat Palestine as a non -voting observer,with what called “Vatican” status..which explains itself.

    All the countries of the islamic world from Morocco to Indonesia are pledged to vote for Palestine,as well as major states like China,Brazil,Argentina,India and most of Latin America and African states too.

    Palestine will be sponsored by Egypt Brazil and Turkey,once friendly to Israel,but no longer so since the revolutions in the Arab world and the attack on the Gaza ships from Turkey and the murder of Turkish citizens in the ships by Israeli death squads
    Some states may abstain as Australia will I quess…but,costing Rudd his dream of a seat on the SC next year,as the 60 or so Islamic states won’t forget that vote

    Still as Gareth Evans said today those who oppose Palestine’s bid are on the wrong side of history…Gillard’s sadly is among those.

    The new democracies in the Arab world like Libya and Tunisia will also vote for Palestine…no Arab govt can ignore..”the arab street”.. where public opinion is passionately pro-Palestine and anti-Israel

  29. supercededman

    i dont know why the pbs respond to under bridge people either, this is a better place with out trolls if only william would see that, last night not one troll and i read the whole debate when i went to bed last night , so interesting with our sarcasm and rudeness, all so i strikes me about these people is also their gravitates pictures ext.

    most pbs have roses flowers dogs, or nothing. no nasty look O for the exception of PB who has a very nice gentleman who was a teacher of management, i googled him and a very worthy person to have as you gravartis
    and also Danny with her picture of the PM, has any one else noticed that

  30. [Abbotts.argument.that we.aren’t.goodenough or wealthy enough for good.broadband we.only deserve rubbish second rate broadband – ]

    Yes, and coming generations are only good enough for Third World workplace pay and conditions, so bring on SerfChoices. Public health and education are too good for the likes of Australians, so would need to be dismantled. Democracy is too good for us too, so will be transformed to “Gudided” democracy.” Freedom of thought is too good for us, so there’ll be religious and right-wing indoctrination at every opportunity. And it’s not good enough that government should be “of the people, by the people, for the people”, so it will be made “of the corporates, by the corporates, for the corporates.”

    Welcome to Abbott’s Third World fascist fantasy…

  31. [ShowsOn

    How are they going to afford it since the Govt has decided a monopoly is a best way about it ffs?]

    What about this one, still faster than today’s fastest ADSL2+ connection:

    NBN: 25/5 (up/down) 100+100GB, at $69.95/month

    ADSL2+ equivalen (at slower speed) $79.95/month

    Hmmm, but does it come in beige ?

  32. …(women hate her [the Prime Minister] with a pasion).

    That’s an obvious overstatement & I can prove it.

    My 90 year old mother loves her and turns her hearing aids up whenever she appears on the box.

    Whereas, when your man appears, the aids come off and the mute is applied.

  33. david

    Cheers Poroti, off to the club to discuss World Cup, (NZ/France in particular), Warriors League game Sat night and the Eagles heading to the grand final..should be a solid 3 hours coming up, couple kiwi shearers in the group, booked the ride home for 6-30pm..all the best]

    Sounds like an action packed weekend.A weekend where in the words of Rampaging Roy Slaven and HG Nelson “Too much sport is never enough” 🙂

  34. What is the neal thing about ;
    its not politcal so i suppose i am sticky beaking if its not political dont both answereing i dont have to know

    but how strange isnt this the lady that had the run in with mirrabella in parliement a few years ago,

  35. [Mr Denmore
    @MrDenmore
    This fake Rudd putsch story is almost a textbook case of how the media-political complex constructs its own reality to justify its existence
    5 hours ago via Mobile Web]

    Denmore is always spot on. It’s quite sad that the journos know it’s a Lib beatup and yet they run huge stories on it. Did we get any articles about the bills passed in the HoR this week? Betcha it wouldn’t have filled a page.

    I was in a Newsagent this morning buying birthday cards and the cash register lineup put me next to the dailies. I was checking the headlines on the SMH and OO when the bloke behind me said ‘don’t bother lady – it’s manure’. I agreed and then he said ‘funny how the country is doing so bloody well. It must be Gillard’s fault’. We both laughed and had a little chat about Abbott and Baldwin. It was nice to meet another oldie up here who isn’t enamoured of either.

  36. Deblonay re your argument on women politicians in Australia.

    The ACT has had women from both sides elected the leadership role in their own right – Rosemary Follett from the ALP and Kate Carnell from the Libs.

    Clare Martin was elected in her own right (at least twice) in the NT. An achievment that cannot be overlooked.

    Anna Bligh is a very different from Kirner, Lawrence and Kennally. She was elected party leader when the government was doing well and she has gone to win an election since. Kirner, Lawrence and Kenneally were all cynically handed the poisoned chalice as women cleanskins to try and save the furniture in governments that were doomed to start with. Lara Giddings is probably in the same boat.

    If Redmond is elected, she will be the first women to win an election from opposition in a state (rather than a territory) so it may still happen.

    Julia Gillard – not only first woman PM – but also the first woman to be a serious contender for the top job. History and the voters will make the judgment on her success (or not).

  37. Boerwar
    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 4:31 pm | Permalink

    Hmmmmmmm

    The All Ords cracked the 4,000 barrier by the Close today.

    Put slightly differently – The All Ords now need to increase 72.8 % to get back to its peak of 6873 in 2007.

    Todays close of 3978.5 is about the same level as in November 2004.

  38. [george

    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 5:17 pm | Permalink

    ShowsOn

    How are they going to afford it since the Govt has decided a monopoly is a best way about it ffs?

    What about this one, still faster than today’s fastest ADSL2+ connection:

    NBN: 25/5 (up/down) 100+100GB, at $69.95/month

    ADSL2+ equivalen (at slower speed) $79.95/month

    Hmmm, but does it come in beige ?
    ]

    Is Glen channeling Di “Bubbles” Fisher ? 🙂

  39. TLM @ 5134

    [Definition of trolling according to “the vocal Poll Bludger majority” – not wholeheartedly supporting Prime Minister Julia Gillard/supporting Kevin Rudd or any other alternative Labor leader/supporting Tony Abbott, or the Coalition in general.]

    I am sure that I will not be in the minority amongst PBers when I say that those who clothe themselves in nom de plumes implying their nominal Labor sympathies (ie; Thornleigh Labor Man) but relentlessly parrot the same talking points propagated by those on the right of the political spectrum might be suspected of being Coalition trolls on this site, or at least right wing wolves parading around in left wing sheep’s garb?

    Get off the high horse you’re on, TLM, and embrace your conservative suburb – you live in Liberal Central, so why pretend otherwise with this tissue of falsehood about being a disillusioned ‘Labor’ man?

  40. [Yeah, the ALP are really known for targeting inner-city seats in their policy strategies.]

    Carey, both the inner city and the outer suburbs used to be the reliable Labor heartland. Both have changed and both were ignored – the Greens have made inroads in the inner city, the Libs in the outer suburbs.

  41. [charlton
    Posted Friday, September 23, 2011 at 5:18 pm | Permalink
    …(women hate her [the Prime Minister] with a pasion).

    That’s an obvious overstatement & I can prove it.

    My 90 year old mother loves her and turns her hearing aids up whenever she appears on the box.

    Whereas, when your man appears, the aids come off and the mute is applied]

    now i have not read who said this but i can guess,

    ME to Charlton,

    i have told this story twice now so the blogger didnt take any notice.

    i was in the bank yesterday 10 woman three men and the day before supermarket and visiting new friends from S Africa who bought my mothers old home

    well to a tee they bought up the conversations not me, very critical of the abc.
    and all said how they love Julia one lady said she fronts up, and the whole bank said YES, they all commented how they hate abbott and are very scared one lady said we want have a pension we will all be in the poor house, in year,

    he will also tax our super more, , said she heard that somewhere, well there you .go
    one very older lady said i love my red hair more than ever she makes me proud

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 108 of 109
1 107 108 109