James J relates that Newspoll has Labor up further on a surprisingly strong result a fortnight ago: the Coalition’s two-party preferred lead is down from 54-46 to 53-47, and the primary votes are 35% for Labor (up two), 45% for the Coalition (steady) and 11% for the Greens (up one). Labor was last this high on two-party preferred in March, and on primaries when Labor enjoyed a brief spike in the days before Kevin Rudd’s leadership challenge. Despite this, Julia Gillard’s personal ratings have weakened still further, her approval down two points to 27% and disapproval up one to 60%, while Tony Abbott continues what seems to be a steady upward trend over recent months: his approval is up two to 34% and his disapproval is down two to 54%. And on another counter-intuitive note, the latest poll nonetheless has Julia Gillard drawing level on preferred prime minister at 38% apiece, compared with a 38-36 lead for Abbott last time.
UPDATE: Morgan’s face-to-face poll covering the last two weekends also gives Labor it’s best result since March: their primary vote is up 2.5% to 34.5%, although the Coalition is also up half a point to 44%, with the Greens down 1.5% to 10%. On two-party preferred, the Coalition lead is down from 56-44 to 54-46 on respondent-allocated preferences and 53.5-46.5 to 53-47 on previous election preferences.
Newspoll having turned in results which look relatively kind to Labor twice in a row, I thought now might be a good time to review the recent performance of the pollsters relative to each other. I have done this by calculating averaged quarterly results for each regularly reporting pollster going back to the start of 2009 (with separate results included for the respondent-allocated and previous-election figures from Morgan’s face-to-face polls). The first chart shows the progress over that time of Labor’s two-party vote.
This shows an impressive consistency of trends once weekly/fortnightly/monthly fluctuations are ironed out. The closest we get to an aberration is the April-June 2009 result from Nielsen, which conducted only one poll in that period. A clearer indication of pollsters’ “house biases” can be provided if we convert the results into deviations from the average of the four pollsters (using the previous election measure for Morgan for the sake of consistency).
This indeed shows that Newspoll has lately been more generous to Labor than at any other point in the time covered, but the difference with Essential Research is still fairly modest. Nielsen, it would seem, has reliably been a point or two worse for Labor than Newspoll over the entire period. Essential favoured Labor in the early days of operation, apparently due to methodological teething problems, but has closely matched Newspoll throughout the current parliamentary term. It is true that a gap has opened in the two most recent observations, but I would want to see this continued over a longer time frame before reading much into it.
The widely recognised lean to Labor in Morgan-face-to-face polls is shown up fairly clearly on the respondent-allocated result, although the other pollsters “caught up” with it at the peak of the Rudd honeymoon. As I’ve probably said about a million times now, the gap which opened up between respondent-allocated and previous-election two-party results in early 2011 is an inexplicable quirk of Morgan’s. The respondent-allocated results produced by Nielsen show no such pattern, and if I had gone to the bother of including separate measures, it would have hugged the previous-election line as closely as Morgan’s did over the first half of the chart.
Taken together, the average two-party results for Labor since the 2010 election have been 45.9% from Newspoll, 44.2% from Nielsen, 45.7% from Essential, 48.1% from Morgan previous-election, and 45.9% from Morgan respondent-allocated.
Other polls:
• Essential Research has primary votes unchanged on last week, at 32% for Labor, 49% for the Coalition and 10% for the Greens, although rounding has resulted in an increase in the Coalition’s two-party lead from 56-44 to 57-43. Also featured are questions on power prices, with 37% thinking power companies most responsible against 28% for the federal government and 23% for state governments; price increases under the carbon tax, which 52% (including 68% of Coalition voters) say they have noticed and 36% say they haven’t; and the various aspects of the Houston report recommendations, which find very strong support for limiting the ways boat arrivals can bring their families to Australia, opinion divided on increasing the humanitarian program and strong opposition to the Malaysia solution, but strong approval for implementing them all as per the new government policy.
• Channel Nine in Brisbane tonight reported results of a statewide ReachTEL automated phone poll of over 1000 respondents, which showed the LNP on 42.2% (compared with 49.6% at the election), Labor on 31.6% (26.7%), Katter’s Australian Party on 9.6% (11.5%) and the Greens on 9.2% (7.5%), for an LNP lead of 56-44 (62.8-37.2) on two-party preferred. Daniel Hurst of Fairfax has more results from the poll, including the finding that Campbell Newman’s disapproval rating (42%) has nearly shaded his approval (44%). This adds to the impression from Morgan polling (see below) and last fortnight’s ReachTEL Ashgrove poll of a solid shift away from the LNP over recent months, albeit nowhere near enough to threaten their lead.
• Morgan has published a headache-inducing release on state voting intention which details results from various small-sample phone polls conducted over the past two months. Last week they polled between 319 and 343 respondents in each of the four biggest states; a month ago they polled 648 respondents nationally for a poll on “the most important public problems facing Australia”, from which tiny state-level sub-samples have been derived for comparing the latest results with. Every individual set of results is from too small a sample to be of much use, but you can see them all here if you’re interested. They can at least be used to derive combined July-August results for New South Wales and Victoria from passable samples of just below 500 and margins of error of around 4.5%. For New South Wales, the results are Coalition 54%, Labor 25% and Greens 10%, with the Coalition leading 61-39 on two-party preferred; for Victoria, Coalition 45%, Labor 35% and Greens 12%, with the Coalition leading 51-49. In each case Labor and the Greens get similar results to the previous elections, but the Coalition are three points higher on the primary vote in New South Wales and four points lower in Victoria.
• Jamie Walker of The Australian reports research conducted for Labor by UMR Research in March found Clive Palmer was viewed favourably by 26% of men and 16% of women, and unfavourably by 35% of men and 22% of women. Forty-two per cent of women and 26% men said they had never heard of him.
Preselections:
• Barnaby Joyce said last week he would “definitely” run for preselection in the outback Queensland seat of Maranoa if its 68-year-old incumbent, Bruce Scott, decided not to seek another term. Should Scott remain intransigent, he will “seek the counsel of party people in the electorate”.
• The NSW Nationals have confirmed state independent Richard Torbay as their candidate to take on Tony Windsor in New England.
• Fairfax reports Jane Prentice, the LNP member for the Brisbane seat of Ryan, faces preselection challenges from Jonathon Flegg, son of state government minister and former Liberal leader Bruce Flegg, and pharmacist John Caris.
• The ABC reports that Michael Burr withdrew as Liberal candidate for the northern Tasmanian marginal seat of Braddon last month, a fact which escaped by notice when I compiled my “seat of the week” entry a fortnight later. The front-runner to replace him would appear to be Brett Whiteley, who held a state seat in Braddon from 2002 until his defeat in 2010. Former Senator Guy Barnett says he was approached to fill the vacancy, but is instead focusing on entering state politics. The two unsuccessful candidate for the original preselection, veterans advocate Jacqui Lambie and Poppy Growers Tasmania president Glynn Williams, have indicated they might try again.
• Barry Kennedy of the Sunbury Leader reports Sunbury businessman Ben Collier and two other candidates will contest Liberal preselection for McEwen on the weekend. Rob Mitchell gained the seat for Labor at the 2010 election and scored a free-kick at the redistribution to take effect at the next election, which adds Labor-voting Sunbury to the seat and boosts his margin from 5.3% to 9.2%.
• Warring factions in the NSW Liberal Party are reportedly negotiating a compromise after a “hard Right” push to entrench preselection plebiscites led to fears numerous sitting MPs would be targeted with branch-stacking. Together with a raft of state MPs, Sean Nicholls of the Sydney Morning Herald reported those affected might include Philip Ruddock in Berowra, Scott Morrison in Cook, Bronwyn Bishop in Mackellar and Alex Hawke in Mitchell. Heath Aston of the Sun-Herald reports the compromise would likely involve sitting members being protected, branch members required to be members for two years before being entitled to a plebiscite vote, limitations on state executive’s power to impose candidates and, in a concession from the hard Right, a requirement for direct attendance at elections for state executive positions to guard against postal vote rorting. At the root of the dispute is the decision by state executive, which is dominated moderates and the centre Right, to impose centre Right candidate Lucy Wicks in the seat of Robertson.
• Shannon Tonkin of the Illawarra Mercury reports John Rumble, a Wollongong nurse and son of former local state MP Terry Rumble, will challenge incumbent Stephen Jones for Labor preselection in Throsby. It had been widely reported that the Right was gathering strength in local branches in preparation for a push by Mark Hay, son of state Wollongong MP Noreen Hay, but he announced earlier this month that he would instead pursue work commitments with the Royal Australian Navy.
Whew thanks Puff
Centre & ruawake
[ Apparently Albanese has been quoted on Sky News as saying that some Liberal front benchers have told him they’re embarrassed about the Sales/Abbott interview.
I think the entire Liberal Party should be embarrassed. ]
The entire Liberal Party should be embarrassed with or without Abbott.
Centre, you have a gambling problem!
Doyley
I am but a simple truck driver passing on views that i hear around the place.
Sometimes the news is good ,sometimes bad.
Depending on who you vote for of course.
[I cant believe he lies about having told Sales that he hadnt read the document. Its as clear as day, he says he hasnt read it. How can this man lie like this when it is so obviously disproven?]
The good news is that the 7.30 interview has had extensive coverage on the Net, TV and print. There were people at my workplace who spoke about the interview, laughed at Abbott’s lies the following day and expressed respect for the PMs presser yesterday. These are people who never talk politics. Two real mod Libs actually brought the issues up with me. They’ll probably remain Libs but I reckon a few ‘swingers’ will move to Labor and certainly a few ex Labor voters will follow the trend and move back home where their best interests are catered for.
lizzie
Re ruawake’s post. Here is the Curious Snail’s take.
[
QUEENSLAND’s Premier has been accused of lowering parliamentary standards after calling Labor MP Curtis Pitt “a thug” and “a grub” and telling him to “get a real job” during debate on changes to the Public Service Act.
In an extraordinary series of interjections, Campbell Newman repeatedly heckled Mr Pitt who was speaking against the government’s eleventh hour amendments to the Act to strip job security from public servant agreements.]
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/premier-accused-labor-mp-of-being-a-grub-and-a-thug-during-parliament/story-e6freon6-1226457436401
[Seriously, who else have they really got?]
That’s the problem. When his own formerly compliant media start to go at him Rabbott’s rooted. The media want a victim and JG is one very tough, very determined, very prepared, extremely capable individual and won’t “lay down and die” to quote Rabbott, and he’s next man standing, for while anyway. He’s the only victim they are going to get.
Rabbott is basically a placeholder for Howard and with no renewal since 2007 (Wyatt Roy, anyone?) there is no one except Howard retreads left which is a great shame, and we’re all worse off for it. The Wallabies are only as good as they are because of constant AllBlack opposition. Unfortunately the LNP are no competition for Labor and haven’t been for a long time now under Rabbott and I’m not sure that they can reinvent themselves even with a new Leader in time for next year’s Election.
Comparison of the two front benches is starkly revealing. Hockey for Treasurer? Bishop in FA?? BBishop? Kero anyone? Pyne hasn’t asked one question about Education this year!! Turnbull couldn’t even pick a fake email (Grech) so he’s nowhere. Truss? Truzzzzzzzzzzz …..
Nothing to see here ….. move along.
The polls have been confected Murdoch bullshit for two years now as we shall see and Rudd and the Rudderless are now well rooted.
Sportingbet have the ALP at $5.20 for the next Election. Money for nothing.
[How can this man lie like this when it is so obviously disproven?]
As Tones’ personal confessor Pell must spend all day Sunday attending to Abbott.
dedalus @ 5131
Might want to read this before you go any further down that road.
http://andrewelder.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/sinodinos-exposed-as-lightweight.html
Sportsbet still have the ALP at $6.00. mfn
will be visiting my mum who only hears MSM, staunch Lib will be interesting to see what she has heard, how she takes it
Campbell Newman is Kennett on steroids, and is emerging as Labor’s secret weapon. He might just save Labor’s bacon in the NT tomorrow.
I have a question to anybody with some knowledge or experience with probability in betting markets:
While, of course, nothing is certain or impossible and things change, at around what price range does an implausible outcome become a plausible one?
And elsewhere.
Davidwh
Hmmm
I might watch you a bit closely next time I pass around the garlic bread.
Psephos,
Do the residents of NT take much notice of what is happening in state politics in QLD?
[William
If you did not know John Connolly has stated his intention to stand for preselection in Fairfax for the LNP.]
Thank you Ruawake – noted.
10 to 1, but there are always the roughys.
BTW, I reckon she gets info from what you post.
If I might be so indulgent as to quote my latest NT election post:
[Opposition Leader Terry Mills is said to have “flip-flopped under pressure on public sector jobs at last night’s People’s Forum”, first guaranteeing no public service jobs would go, then clarifying that this only applied to those who were “serving the interests of the public”. This calls to attention the major disservice done to the CLP’s election prospects by Campbell Newman’s economy drive in Queensland. According to 2006 census figures (this particular data not yet being available from 2011), 16.5% of the workforce in the federal electorate of Solomon (covering Darwin) and 13.4% in Lingiari (covering the remainder of the territory) were employed in “state/territory government administration”, compared with 8.4% nationally.]
Just Me
[dedalus @ 5131
Might want to read this before you go any further down that road.
http://andrewelder.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/sinodinos-exposed-as-lightweight.html ]
Thank you for the link. I had a theory that Sinodinos was “Howard’s Brain” because his departure signalled a series of Howie missteps re reading the public . Looks like I was wrong……………again 🙂
Psephos,
Abbott was in the NT recently crowing about the upcoming victory being all about federal issues.
He hitched himself to what he thought at the time was a “certainty “.
It will be interesting indeed especially with the $100 million shortfall in the libs costings and the link to ps cuts being made by Henderson.
I may be wrong but I believe the PS accounts for 20 – 25% of the NT workforce so any Qld blow back will be interesting .
On a Qld. perspective Newman just doesn.t understand what he is doing.
People don.t want slash and burn all the time and shitting on every public servant will bite him hard.
Phespos said this is Kennett on steroids it is more like Howard on speed. Crazy
I note Williams post at 5218 so my 20 – 25 % stat was a tad high.
C@tmomma Posted Friday, Augus
5002
How facinating ,,read it all
C@tmomma
Have you thought of sending your post the anthony albanese
Doyley, “state/territory public administration” would not account for the entire public service. The bottom line is that Darwin in particular rates second only to Canberra for public service-ness.
Evening all.
[Abbotts interview with Wilkinson is extraordinary.]
Has Abbott done another shocker interview?! Peta must be on leave this week for Abbott to unravel so spectacularly.
Doyley
[Psephos,
Abbott was in the NT recently crowing about the upcoming victory being all about federal issues.]
In the NT the rest of Australia may as well not exist when it comes to politics. As long as you do not scare the barra fishers then you are pretty sweet 🙂
Joe6pack
ruawake@5183
This is how he carries on in Parliament now he took the cameras out. There is an opposition of 7 plus 4 independents, against his 78 sitting on the government benches.
Why would he choose to act like that?
What an awful man.
William @5224,
Thanks for that.
That is pretty much the bottom line.
So, seriously, what are people going to do about Jessica Wright’s defamatory allegation?
That PMJG set up a “trust fund”?
Nothing, nothing at all.
Yet you’re all saying how good her article was, but you don’t understand how Jessica Wright’s article can be used to undermine JG, a la zoomster’s commenst on unsubstantiated online reports.Ya know, because it’s online, it must be true.
If only you had photographic memories. Ha ha ha.
William Bowe
[The bottom line is that Darwin in particular rates second only to Canberra for public service-ness]
Damn right. It is why I believe that this is one of those rare occassion when the southern states will affect the NT election. In this case Campbell Newman having a negative effect on the CLP vote.
puff
The joh years are returning, but the majority is so huge talk about a 1 term is fantasy land. 2 maybe
[and expressed respect for the PMs presser yesterday. ]
I had a shock over a work lunch today when a colleague who frequently says the most outdated and appalling things about women in positions of leadership (dumb given our CEO is a woman), had nothing but praise for the PM and the way she’s handled this latest bout of mud slinging.
“Julia has cast iron balls” was his take on it all. FWIW.
Campbell Newman, the ar*e that just keeps shitting.
Doyley
Joes 6 pack wrote
I am but a simple truck driver passing on views that i he
Joe i can assure you , you are most valued.
With out your profession, things would not proceed , for most business
That after all are interconnected
kezza2
Why so mad?
Clam down love
[Do the residents of NT take much notice of what is happening in state politics in QLD?]
AT the News ltd peoples forum thing in Darwin I watched last night, a large number of the questions put to Terry Mills were about cuts with references to what is happening in Qld.
Make of that what you will.
Frank Calabrese @frankscan65
@jesswrightstuff @GenGusface Read his Tweets there is MOAR MOAR MOAR !!!!!!
poroti,
fair enough.
Mills was hit with a number of questions at the forum on cuts to the PS.
He tried to put out the fire so to speak but they kept on coming so I think people are aware of what may possibly in store.
Has Can do and others let loose a ‘Workchoice ” style contagion ?
Cheers.
confessions
[“Julia has cast iron balls” was his take on it all. FWIW.]
Helen Clark had the same sort of “praise” and like JWH, although not loved, won the respect of many for standing up to ferocious personal attacks. Respect that no doubt turned into a lot of votes
The real figure of people in the NT who are in one way or another government employees or dependants is higher than the formal numbers of the PS. Cutting the PS in the NT would have very serious economic and social knock-on effects. I expect Henderson has been flogging this as hard as he can in the last week of the campaign, helped by the CLP’s flip-flopping.
[Joe6pack
Posted Friday, August 24, 2012 at 8:03 pm | Permalink
kezza2
Why so mad?
Clam down love]
Not mad.
I think you mean “calm up”!!
[Thomas. Paine.
Posted Friday, August 24, 2012 at 6:40 pm | Permalink
….
People to step out of this site where the pulic live and gets some perspective.]
When labor is ahead, will you still post the same old, same old.
George Mega on 7.30 SA very interesting analysis.
confessions
[Make of that what you will.]
What I make is that CanJoh is now 2 laps in front in the “Labor’s best asset” race. His actions have cut through to Darwin. Very very hard to do. Praise be to Campbell. Life membership of the Australian Labor Party may be his by the end of 2013 😆
kezza2
my mistake
[Just finally, I want to clear up a misconception in parts of the media that Insiders – and The Australian – stopped using Glenn Milne as a commentator because he pursued the Julia Gillard-Slater & Gordon-Bruce Wilson story.
The Australian can speak for itself, but Insiders stopped using Milne after he was acknowledged by The Australian (who publicly apologised) as having written a column containing inaccurate or inappropriate material.
ABC News Management determined that this posed an unacceptable editorial risk for a live television program based on guests freely providing analysis and comment on political matters. So it related to issues around the reliability of Milne’s work and not its subject matter.]
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-08-24/cassidy-gillard-abbott-hours-of-maddness/4220582
But as I understand it Insiders still utilises the services of Piers, who presumably is deemed less of an editorial risk than Milne. This is despite Piers’ own hysterical obsessions with events which happened many years ago – Heiner for eg.
And surely the reliability of Piers’ commentary is at best debatable? He followed Andrew Bolt in denouncing AGW as some kind of leftist conspiracy, and I have vague recollections of him questioning the existence of a stolen generation as well.
Gidday Joe, how’s things?
Anytime you’re in Sydney, drop in (truck parking available!).
[Campbell Newman is Kennett on steroids, and is emerging as Labor’s secret weapon. He might just save Labor’s bacon in the NT tomorrow.]
The NT LOTO this morning said on AM that “no frontline PSjob is in danger”.
Given that this is Campbell NEwman said – and then changed the definition of “front line” – it seems a tad stupid of him to put it that way, to me.
Fess/Poroti
[TheFinnigans天地有道人无道 @Thefinnigans
This morning on ABC702 radio. A small “vox pox” on PM Presser. OMG, they were impressed with her including some Lib voters, vote changing]
crikey whitey,
Analysis of….?
poroti:
I’ve observed as way back as last year of politically disengaged friends exhibiting a grudging respect for the PM in her firm stance in the face of appalling attacks. Most esp among women, who perhaps understand the kind of crap she’s been subjected to.