GhostWhoVotes reports Newspoll has come in at 56-44 to the Coalition, down from 57-43 last time, which exactly matches Essential Research’s progress over the last week. In Newspoll’s case, the picture on the primary vote is very much the same as a fortnight ago, with Labor, the Coalition and the Greens all up a point at the expense of “others”, to 29%, 48% and 12%. Personal ratings offer multiple stings in the tail for Julia Gillard. Where last time she was up three points on approval and down four on disapproval, those results have exactly reversed, putting her back at 28% approval and 62% disapproval. Tony Abbott has seized the lead as preferred prime minister, gaining four to 41% with Gillard down one to 39%, and his approval rating is up three to 35% with disapproval down four to 54%. GhostWhoVotes also relates that Gillard’s “trustworthiness” rating is down from 61% to 44% since the 2010 election, with Abbott’s down from 58% to 54%. Presumably this portends a battery of attitudinal results concerning the two leaders.
Essential Research had the primary votes at 48% for the Coalition (down two), 31% for Labor (steady) and 11% for the Greens (steady). Also featured were its monthly personal ratings, which had Julia Gillard’s approval steady at 32% and her disapproval down three to 58%, Tony Abbott’s respectively up two to 38% and down two to 50%, and Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister shifting from 40-37 to 38-36. Support for the National Broadband Network was up a point since February to a new high of 57% with opposition down three to 22%, and 46% saying they will either definitely or probably sign up for it. There was also a question on appropriate areas for federal and state responsibility, with the states only coming out heavily on top for public transport and “investing in regional areas”.
I now offer a Senate-tacular review of recent happenings relating to the upper chamber, where it’s all happening at the moment:
• There has been talk lately about the potential make-up of the Senate if the Coalition wins next year’s election in a landslide, which might upset long-held assumptions about the political calculus under an Abbott government. Half-Senate elections usually result in each state’s six seats splitting three left and three right, and the territories’ two seats invariably go one Labor and one Coalition. However, four and two results have not been unknown, usually involving Labor winning three and the Coalition two with the last seat going to the Greens or the Democrats. The only four-right, two-left results were when John Howard gained control of the Senate at the 2004 election, in Queensland (four Coalition and two Labor) and Victoria (three Coalition, two Labor, one Family First). There is also the occasional unclassifiable like Nick Xenophon, who is up for re-election in South Australia next year and presumably likely to win, and perhaps even Julian Assange, of whose aspirations we have heard nothing further.
The difficulty for the Coalition is that a four-left, two-right result in Tasmania at the 2010 election (three Labor, two Liberal and one Greens) will carry over to the next parliament. However, on the basis of Newspoll’s recent state breakdowns it is easy to envision this being counterbalanced by a four-right, two-left result in Queensland, either through a repeat of 2004 or, perhaps, a Katter’s Australian Party Senator joining three from the LNP. This would leave the left with 38 and the right with 37 (including the thus-far low-profile Victorian Senator John Madigan of the DLP, a carryover from 2010), plus Xenophon – still leaving the left with a blocking majority, even when Xenophon voted with the right. However, the Queensland election wipeout and a further dive in Labor’s federal poll ratings encourages contemplation of further four-right, two-left results in New South Wales and Western Australia. Assuming no cross-ideological preference deals such as that which produced Family First’s win in Victoria in 2004, a rough benchmark here is that the combined Labor and Greens vote would need to fall to about 40%. This compares with Labor-plus-Greens results in 2010 of 42.2% in Queensland, 43.7% in Western Australia and 47.2% in New South Wales. Any two such results would be enough to get the carbon tax repealed, given the likely support of Xenophon, and all three would leave a Coalition government similarly placed to its state counterpart in New South Wales, where Labor and the Greens can be overruled with the support of the Shooters Party and the Christian Democratic Party.
• Bob Brown’s announcement he will exit parliament at the end of June creates a plum parliamentary vacancy for the robust Tasmanian Greens. Speculation first fell upon the party’s current leader in state parliament, Nick McKim, who if interested could have followed the path from state leadership to the Senate previously trodden by Bob Brown and Christine Milne. He immediately ruled himself out though, which has left Bernard Keane of Crikey, Sid Maher of The Australian and Gemma Daley of the Financial Review identifying Peter Whish-Wilson as the front-runner. Maher’s report describes Whish-Wilson as a “wine-growing, surf-riding economist”, while Daley offers that he “worked in equity capital markets for Merrill Lynch in New York and Melbourne and for Deutsche Bank in Hong Kong, Melbourne and Sydney”, before moving to Tasmania in 2004 and making a name for himself as the operator of Three Wishes Winery and a Gunns pulp mill opponent. Daley reports former state leader Peg Putt is “understood to have ruled herself out”, as has former Greenpeace International chief executive Paul Gilding. An ABC report also mentions Hobart deputy lord mayor Helen Burnet as a possible starter, while Sid Maher offers “Wilderness Society campaigner Geoff Law and Geoff Couser, candidate in the federal seat of Denison”.
• A fiercely contested battle over the order of the Victorian Liberal Senate ticket has ended with Scott Ryan taking second place at the expense of Helen Kroger, who is demoted to third, with Mitch Fifield as expected secure in first. Fifield won on the first round with 251 votes to 92 for Ryan and 71 for Kroger, before Ryan achieved a surprisingly strong 276 to 139 victory over Kroger on the second round. VexNews offers a revealing account from a no doubt interested party who says Ryan took advantage of new preselection rules introduced under the “Kemp reforms” to empower the party membership. These provide for one third of the vote to be determined by the members, but the system allocates six delegates to each federal division – rather an odd way of going about it, given that Liberal members appear to number only in the dozens across northern and western Melbourne. Ryan, it is said, has assiduously cultivated support in these “rotten boroughs” to turn the tables on the Kroger camp, which has its power base at higher levels of the party organisation.
• Nick Butterly of The West Australian reports some WA Liberals are “frustrated at the calibre of candidates coming forward” to fill its looming federal parliamentary vacancies: retiring Judi Moylan and Mal Washer in Pearce and Moore, and now, sadly, Senator Judith Adams, who succumbed to cancer on March 31. A further addition to the list is Senator Alan Eggleston, who has announced he will not seek re-election next year. The current form guide is evaluated as follows:
Among the most promising candidates being considered for either a Senate or Lower House spot are State Liberal Party treasurer Dean Smith and aerobatic pilot Drew Searle. Wanneroo councillor Ian Goodenough is so far the only declared candidate for Dr Washer’s seat, while Hyden farmer Jane Mouritz and former Liberal staffer Alex Butterworth are also being touted in some corners as options for Senate spots. One Liberal said yesterday they would push for retiring WA Mines Minister Norman Moore to sit in the Senate.
abbott keeps painting himself into a corner –
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/tony-abbott-promises-to-get-rid-of-carbon-pricing-scheme-within-six-months-of-being-elected-to-power/story-e6frf7l6-1226334281970
Greensborough Growler
[Oh dear, more trouble in the Liberal camp as they squabble about the Aged Care reforms]
Sophie Mirabella pushing her Aged Care plan ? 🙂
my say
Some people can’t believe anything good ever came of religion. Some people feel the same about thunderstorms, or snakes, or cockroaches. Don’t get upset with all of us because of that. Just ignore the ones you don’t agree with.
You won’t change their attitude, any more than you can persuade someone who won’t eat “offal” to try a little lamb’s heart, which is actually muscle.
😆
my say
Lizzie has some good advice. 🙂
[(en those run by members of religious orders, and there are penalties for not doing do (though I’ll believe that re religious folk after I see pigs flying).)
I expected better from you oz poll …
Its quite insulting, how much longe do i have to put upwith this,]
You’re letting your belief system blind you to reality, my say, if you think people have no right to speak their minds if their opinion (or experience) deviates from yours, or must tailor their responses to your wants! This country is a democracy which signed up to Freedom of Belief – and Freedom of Speech, and there’s been far too much covering-up of horrendous crime and cruelty by RC clergy and others not to let the truth be told.
This is not the first time I’ve posted re what my father suffered at the hands of an RC surgeon. It’s the plain, bald truth. The only time I’ve been inside an RC church since is to attend a few family weddings & funerals. I and my siblings have lived for decades with the results of just how selfish & brutal RC fanatics can be. Of a big family, only 2 believers are left, and even they as antsy about where they’ll have major medical treatment.
You obviously haven’t heard your aged dementia-sufferer father’s horrendous screams (we thought it must have been someone with massive crash injuries, so horrendous were they) in a Public Hospital, as his foot was, despite a legal do not resuscitate order, amputated by an RC doctor without anaesthetic or even morphine, because of the risk of his dying on the table.
We did not want the amputation, but were told that death by gangrene was terrible, so agreed to the operation. My siblings with enduring power of attorney had a conference with the doctor before hand, during which they stressed his dementia, the gangrene option and do not resuscitate order, and that his not surviving the operation was, sadly, the best possible option.
At no stage did the doctor indicate his religion, his personal problems with the order, death under anaesthetic, or that he intended to impose his own religious beliefs on my helpless father – putting him through unbearable torture for those religious beliefs. It took him two terrible weeks to die. As the torturer defended himself after we lodged a formal complaint, it was against his religion (1) to obey the do not resuscitate order, (2) to operate with anaesthetic or morphine because this might cause premature death, or (3) even disclose his intentions because another surgeon might respect the order, and he couldn’t allow that.
Nor is this an isolated case. There have been credible media (Fairfax) stories of similar interventions in church-run aged care homes, including much prolonged (6 mths) medical intervention, on religious staff orders, to keep alive people dying of cancers. Nor, as was reported at the time, was this unusual.
With Aged Care, Howard style, one didn’t get the facility of one’s choice – in my mil’s case the one which, during the per- & building stages, she and fil had crucial roles (he was treasurer) – one got what was available, with no consideration of the old person’s wishes or needs.
When OH was dying, at home as he and we wished, we were subjected to considerable pressure to admit him to the hospice – which is run by a nun. We were assured his “living will” decisions would be obeyed; but after Dad’s torture, and other well-reported incidents, who’d believe it? Certainly not OH or us.
Like the sexual abuse cases, it’s the truth about what happened; no always, not even most of the time; but it does happen. Imposing one’s religious beliefs and sensitivities on others, whether or not they share those beliefs, is both undemocratic and a breach of the UN Four Freedoms. And the reason such abuses continued to flourish & probably still do.
[A few hours later, Mr Abbott revised his response to the Government’s reforms which are designed to ensure that funding for the high-cost sector can be sustained.
It’s as if he got the message that the aged care industry and many of his colleagues support the changes.
“I won’t be commenting in detail until we’ve had a chance to study the announcements when they are all released later today,” Mr Abbott said.]
But he already had 😛
Lizzie,
My Say is absolutely right. Imagine how your gratuitous little piece of nonsese would seem were you to add three letters:
, it’s a legal document which homes, hospitals, hospices must obey, even those run by members of non religious orders, and there are penalties for not doing do (though I’ll believe that re non religious folk after I see pigs flying).
In recent statements Robb, Hockey and Turnbull are trying to put down some guiderails for Abbott’s policy.
Together they have the numbers to roll Abbott, but not the trigger, or the will to work together.
bg
Do you believe they have the numbers?
[bg
Do you believe they have the numbers?
]
Only if those three withdrew support and acted together.
[TONY Abbott has pledged to get rid of carbon pricing within just six months of the Coalition winning government.]
Interesting change in the media now correctly calling it a carbon price. About time too.
Vic
It will also depend on the coalitions response to the budget.
If they score points then it is business as usual. If not, it will be knives out against Robb and Hockey and also knives out against Abbotts profligacy
GG
It seems that there is some bigotry on this site especially towards catholic people. I find it a little disconcerting. I was raised a catholic and my mum is still religious. Most catholics I know are the nicest and most caring people around, and usually with a great sense of humour. Of course, there are some who are not so nice. The catholic church covering up abuse is an absolute disgrace, but people on this site should show tolerance and understanding that the majority are good people. Evil is in every part of our society and institutions. Catholic bashing is getting rather lame
Hockey’s speech, excluding the ever stupid examples he adds, is standard conservative stuff.
It does allow him to differentiate himself from Abbott but also gives him much wriggle room to pork-barrell by altering the mix of payments later as a treasurer or leader.
bg,
Sounds like a description of the ingredients required for a fire: Fuel, Oxygen and an ignition source.
With all the leaks going on, it seems like a few of the Libs are looking for a gas leak with a lit match. They better hope they don’t find it.
[Mark Tobin @MarkTobinSydney
O’Farrell announces Bikie colors banned from Kings Cross]
Did I not say there would be a bikie/gun crime announceble before the next session of NSW Parliament sits?
GG
[, it’s a legal document which homes, hospitals, hospices must obey, even those run by members of non religious orders, and there are penalties for not doing do (though I’ll believe that re non religious folk after I see pigs flying).]
That wasn’t my post.
I wouldn’t say anything like that.
Abbott appers to be lying again if he is saying he will repeal the carbon price within six months by calling a double dissolution.
From Anthony Green:
“As from 1 July 2011, whether the Gillard government continues in office or the Coalition take office with or without an election, nothing can be done to Senate terms without a double dissolution. Writs for a half-Senate election for those Senators elected in 2007 cannot be issued until 1 July 2013, and the election must be held between August 2013 and May 2014, with new Senators to take their place on 1 July 2014.
What all these dates point to is that if the Gillard government is defeated in the House in circumstances that force it to resign, then the Coalition would probably want to go to an election as soon as possible rather than try to govern for the balance of the current House term.
One other point to make is that if the Labor government makes it through to the end of its term in the second half of 2013 and the Coalition won that election, then the Coalition would probably find it impossible to hold a double dissolution until the first half of 2015.”
http://blogs.abc.net.au/antonygreen/2011/06/what-chance-a-double-dissolution-in-the-next-three-years.html
[TONY Abbott has pledged to get rid of carbon pricing within just six months of the Coalition winning government.
The Opposition Leader said that if blocked in the Senate he would immediately call another election, a double dissolution, and invite the ALP to commit “suicide twice”.]
Can he? I thought Antony Green had explained the length of time it would take before the Senate can be dissolved, given the terms of some senators & the length of time that new senators had to sit (ditto).
Yep. here it is. Calls for a Double Dissolution are Constitutionally Impossible
This was the situation 11 August 2011:
[(A side note. The terms of the four Territory Senators are tied to the term of the House, so any early House election would also include the four Territory Senators. The state Senators cannot face election before 3 August 2013 unless there is a double dissolution, and the current State Senators would retain their seats until 30 June 2014. If the current Labor government stays in office until 2013, any new Coalition government could not begin the process of developing a double dissolution trigger until after 1 July 2014, making it nearly impossible to have a double dissolution election until 2015.]
So Abbott couldn’t have his DD election prior to 2015. That’s far more than 6 months.
Either Abbott is an ignorant idiot – in which case he shouldn’t be LOTO – or he’s deliberately misleading people AKA Abbott’s lying his head off yet again
roaldan1000
[Abbott appers to be lying again if he is saying he will repeal the carbon price within six months by calling a double dissolution.]
It’s just an ‘aspiration’.
👿
People should be a little more careful in the bits of a post that they cut and paste.
It is sometimes difficult to see who’s answering what.
Use of the #post number would also help to sort out some little spats.
lizzie
I suspect GG got confused.
OzPol Tragic
[Either Abbott is an ignorant idiot – in which case he shouldn’t be LOTO – or he’s deliberately misleading people AKA Abbott’s lying his head off yet again]
There is a third possibility. He’s an ignorant idiot lying his head off yet again.
GG
Please apologise for accusing me of
[your gratuitous little piece of nonsese ]
I’m very disppointed that you think I’d write that sort of thing against anyone.
victoria
I think there’s been too much about atheism lately and it’s got a few people stirred up.
@Bluegreen
I suspect Hockey and Turnbull might be tempted to work together on a joint ticket if Abbott continues to steer the Liberals so far from their traditional values. They might see a scenario where Hockey makes for an affable leader with Turnbull as a credible treasurer.
Whether the MSM picks up on it remains to be seen, but there is a real battle taking place within the Libs. it goes beyond short-term polls and is about fundamental party ethos.
It’s on Abbott Vs Hockey Vs Robb – over mean testing & Joe’s Manifesto – http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/tony-abbott-furious-over-labor-plans-to-means-test-high-level-care-but-not-andrew-robb/story-e6frf7l6-1226334432785 – but where is @TurnbullMalcolm ?
Another sign the times are a changing.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/tony-abbott-promises-to-repeal-the-carbon-tax/comments-e6freuzr-1226334268211
Comments 15 against 10 for Mr Abbott.
I heard the aged care announcement over the radio and was impressed with the PM’s presentation.
I hope she can keep up that standard, because with the Coalition starting to fray over aspects of economic/social policies, I think Labor may now have a very good opportunity at the moment to getting its message through.
F
lizzie
I respect everyone has a pov on religion, but catholic bashing is a favorite past time here on PB. OPT has explained her feelings and she should be entitled to them. The horrendous treatment her father endured is inexcusable. But as OPT said herself, not every RC person has had that horrible experience.
I wonder how people would feel if there was the same vitriol directed at muslims and judaism on this site?
The second problem Abbott faces is the usual Oz voters’ reaction to DDs called because the PM didn’t get the parliament s/he wanted at the election – with the Back to the polls, you mugs, and get it right this time inference.
A third problem is that DDs lower “quota” advantages small parties & independents. Abbott would have to factor in the possibility that Greens could get 12-14 seats, esp in a DD over an ETS system that’s about to be/ already is implemented, and Labor/ Indies enough to hold the Balance of Power throughout the new government’s term & into the next one. The general (but not universal) trend of such DD elections is that the government loses support in both Houses.
Howard’s control of both Houses after election04 is a rarity in modern Australian politics.
[poroti
Posted Friday, April 20, 2012 at 1:14 pm | Permalink
mari
.
Some choir practise news.
James Murdoch ‘could face U.S. lawsuit over claims of a cover-up at hacking paper’
Mr Lewis revealed for the first time that he has been contacted by people who accused Fox News and The New York Post, which are both owned by News Corp, of engaging in criminal behaviour
American lawyers working for him would be the ones to speak to James Murdoch about the £700,000 ($1.1million) payment he authorised in 2008 to Gordon Taylor, the head of the Professional Footballers’ Association.
The settlement has proved controversial as critics claimed it was an attempt to hush the affair up.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2132407/James-Murdoch-face
Poroti I have just come back home and though I must watch out for Poroti and the Hallelujah which as you say is getting closer and closer, we obviously have ESP ?? My whole body is starting to get the rhythm , just have to hope I can play it at its undiluted best before I leave for O/S end of May!
The Finnigans
[where is @TurnbullMalcolm ?]
Watching the rest of them try to knock each other out.
Talcum will wait for his chance to steal the silver spoon – although they’d have to a lot of people wiped out before he’d have enough support ie a ‘last man standing’.
victoria
I wasn’t referring to OPT. That story is a terrible one.
It’s unfortunate that the RC church’s narrative on paedophiles has not read well, but it’s silly to attack single people for their beliefs IMO.
Everyone has a framework in which they place their lives, even those who believe nothing. 🙂
Thank you.
OPT – Phew! we are guided by our experiences and that’s an awful one that would be hard to put aside. As you say ‘freedom of speech’ was a hard fought battle and nobody has the right to bully others to put it aside.
Nobody is forced to lurk in the shadows or participate.
vic,
Yes, it does raise its ugly head from time to time and it’s quite surprising at the people that slip in to such behaviour when they feel they are losing an argument.
It’s as if some people believe that accusing me of being a Christian, Catholic and regular church goer is a sign of weakness when the opposite is the truth as far as I’m concerned.
That said, I try not to introduce my religion in to my posts unless it is in context. But, a few of the usual suspects will remind me of my Christianity because this apparently makes their arguments stronger. You can only laugh at these sad individuals.
I agree that the Catholic Church has done some bad things and fully support the clean up that is occurring. Unfortunately, the never ending publicity about the evil of some individuals often hides the enormous amount of good done by Christians and people of faith. But, such is life.
CTar1 – I think too many in the Libs lost their soul when they voted for Abbott so may not want to give it back to Turnbull. The DLPers would be fighting for Abbott plus the RWers and there are not many moderates there. The new pollies who Abbott picked up in 2012 would surely vote for him so I can’t see a change coming at all.
guytaur
[Another sign the times are a changing.]
Also in the Telegrapgh with a bold black headline.
[Conservative Australia is suddenly in bed with reds
SO Julie Bishop has a Huawei-donated iPad. Dangerous. Dangerous for her and dangerous for Australia if she becomes foreign minister.
The iPad is but one of the micro details to emerge from Bishop’s visit to China as a guest of the Chinese telco. Some Liberals led by Bishop, together with vested mining interests, questioned the Gillard government accepting ASIO’s advice against letting Huawei bid for NBN. But the bar has wider significance because the controversy it has sparked illuminates the most vexing issue of Australian foreign policy – our relationship with China.]
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/conservative-australia-is-suddenly-in-bed-with-reds/story-e6frezz0-1226333634436
[Either Abbott is an ignorant idiot – in which case he shouldn’t be LOTO – or he’s deliberately misleading people AKA Abbott’s lying his head off yet again
There is a third possibility. He’s an ignorant idiot lying his head off yet again.]
I’d be going with the third possibility. Established pattern of behaviour…
lizzie,
My Say had a quote at the top of her 3848 which I believed she was quoting you from an earlier post.
If this is not the case, then I withdraw and apologise.
mari – you’ll be able to keep us informed of how it is all seen from that side of the world among your rellies, friends, etc It will still be running full bore while you are in the UK.
I see that they build a bouncing StoneHenge for London Olympics. i been trying to fit ULuru in my backyard for ages, still having problem
One thing about Abbot that I personally think important is that his professional career before parliament was as a journalist/media rep.
While certainly from the right, I think ideology is far less important to him than just winning and that for him would be winning the daily headlines battle.
I suspect that is why he has been successful so far. As opposition leader he doesn’t need to do detail; he just has to exploit with his opponents’ weaknesses and mistakes – and in honesty Labor has given him plenty to work with.
The great drawback for him tho’s is ongoing negativity rebounds on him; that’s why he’s now trying to broaden his approach – which now may be an opportunity for Labor to use, since the Coalition hasn’t settled on detailed policies to sell.
F
I think the Catholic Church gets picked on because of its dogmatic behaviour. It is so close to what it should be. It does do a lot of good. Just ask any of the relatives of Aids patients who died at the St Vincents hospice.
Then it does bad things. Some obviously so. Cover ups of child sex abuse. Some not so. Like opposing contraception. Even when knowing that condom use can save lives and contraception in general prevent pregnancies. Condemning gays by pretending they love the sinner but condemn the sin. No such standard when it comes to sins like divorce.
Then there is the fact this is all presented with pageantry and concentrated in the Vatican and the person of the Pope.
This is why I feel Catholics get attacked the most out of Christians. They are the most likely to hold fast to their beliefs even when it may conflict with society mores.
It’s been a good week for the govt topped off with a very positive reform announcement for aged care.
In the past, the good vibe would be deliberately hijacked by a certain leadership aspirant resulting in negative focus being re-applied – thank goodness those times are behind us
I wonder what all those angry eastern state senior citizens think of these reforms?
See it while its there:
There’s a hilarious parody of one of those pro-mining ads at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbYO4MLvP7E – it might disappear soon as Xstrata is throwing legal threats around …
Two iconic giants in trouble, NOKIA & SONY. Billion dollar losses, no hit products, dated technology and muddle strategic business direction
GG
Thank you.
I’ve searched back and it was OzPol who made that statement.
I now understand Victoria’s later explanation.
So glad it’s all straightened out. I hate to think I’ve insulted anyone.
:kiss:
guytaur
I can say with confidence that I know hundreds of catholics and none of them have held onto their beliefs at all. Maybe 50 or 60 years ago, but no one follows the doctrines of the heirarchy anymore. For eg. The other day I spoke to an elderly woman who has been a practising catholic all her life. A lovely person. We talked about the catholic church etc. she said organised religion was created to control the people and when we die nothing happens. She enjoys being part of her parish for the friendship and community work they
do. She is agnostic at best. I am just fed up with the bigotry on this blog
Finn
They are going to be in more trouble. Intel is entering the mobile phone market. Starting in India. Called xolo.