Newspoll: 53-47 to Coalition

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.

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.

5,425 comments on “Newspoll: 53-47 to Coalition”

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  1. Mod Lib

    But but, are the polls um changing in any way, but they were stuck on 56/44 just a short while ago.

    But all the polls were showing 56/44. 56/44 for ages and ages and ages.

    No they can’t change, NO, Gillard has to go!

    CLOWNS – start to confess all of you or I will start to name names 😀

  2. BH,

    Thanks BH. There’s not time to polish them so I always look back at them and go I shoulda said this or put it this way. No time for editing!

  4. Thomas Paine,
    Julia Gillard is not swinging from a tree,twisting in the breeze, she is swinging from tree to tree, like a female Tarzan!

  8. I suspect the LNP vote is getting softer, and its showing first more on phone polls (a more spur of moment response?) than on the online Essential one. Just a guess.

    I’d agree with that. Best case i can see at the moment is that the polls are picking up a slow trend to the ALP. Libs seem to be getting a more panicked edge, and they STILL haven’t pushed the substantive policy button.

    Take :monkey: on schools. He may have played to his immediate audience (how surprisement!!) but seems to be threatening funding for public schools?? Did someone advise him that this was a smart thing or was it just one of his brain-farts?? And if it was, well, that doesn’t mean it wont end up as what the Fibs laughingly call “policy”.

    If the mid year economic review comes in with the Govt still on track for a surplus, AND they have started funding NDIS, AND they have a credible response to Gonski out there for discussion, then with the Carbon Price becoming a non-issue, what have the Fibs got??

    Well, there is always………BOATS!!!!

  10. [Actually I think the opposite is true….the PM usually has a 3-4% better net approval on average over the years I remember seeing.]

    Correct. Since Nov 1985 the mean PM netsat has been 2.5 points higher than the mean PM netsat and the median has been 3.5 points higher. But this is for a sample with a median 2PP of 50.

  11. Right now, the real hope given by polling like this is that the ALP will probably still have plenty of seats after the election and would be competitive at the following one. Also, the Senate may not be as great for Abbott. That’s the level of optimism we’re at. But things do change – both ways.

  12. Centre: the polls have been essentially 55-45 plus noise for 15 months.

    They have peaked at 59 and there have been troughs of 53, but there has never been a breakout from 56 +-3%.

    I don’t begrudge you the enjoyment of the night, but don’t get too carried away!!!

  14. [The trend, the trend, the trend, it’s the trend!

    C’mon Showy, how about you go first ]
    Hey come on!

    There IS a slight positive trend for Labor over the last month on these figures.

    But it still isn’t great. We can say that Labor is now in the low 30s on the primary with an improvement in the 2pp but of a smaller scale.

    It’s still not great, and if Labor went into an election with these figures then more than likely the result would be a comfortable Coalition victory rather than a total landslide.

  15. [Correct. Since Nov 1985 the mean PM netsat has been 2.5 points higher than the mean PM netsat and the median has been 3.5 points higher. But this is for a sample with a median 2PP of 50.]

    I take it you mean mean PM netsat +2.5% vs. mean LOTO netsat?

    Is it normally distributed? I can’t imagine it is, so the median would be the more useful number (i.e. 3.5% “advantage” to the PM for netsat readings)

  17. I’m not getting carried away.

    I don’t give a rats about the stupid polls.

    But honestly, It’s a shocker for Abbott. I sais 45% chance he goes before xmas, I now revise it to about 52.5%.

    *night*

  19. [Let’s not get carried away. Labor’s primary vote more than likely isn’t currently trending at 35%, it is most likely a bit lower than that.

    Let’s see Labor get another few polls in the mid 30s before we say that is where they are at.

    Oh, and even if they are on 35, they got 38 at the last election remember, and that was considered a bad result.]

    The comment was that the spines of the caucus would be stiffened. I was by chance chatting with a member of caucus (solidly Gillard) a couple of days ago and he flat out said the move was planned for mid Sept (hardly earth shattering news I know but to acknowledge it so matter of factly was interesting), but they don’t have the numbers and the previous Newspoll had cheered the party a fair bit and pretty much put it on the back burner. Another poll showing an increase in the PV is only going to make Gillard’s position stronger.

    It needs to stay around here certainly, and obviously needs to be at least 3% higher to have any chance of actually winning, but the talk of the caucus being in despair is a bit of selective reporting (now I wonder who might want to promote that idea?) if the member I was talking to is any guide.

  20. A slow trend is good; it indicates people changing their minds as the result of a series of factors, rather than a one off event – which can be easily countered by another one off.

    That said, I think Labor will need a significant event of some kind to allow people to justify their shift (so I think the votes will shift anyway, but both the media and voters like something seminal to point to).

    The trouble with significant events is that they can’t be engineered. The bright side is that the media will make any event significant if they have to cover their asses.

  21. 3 pages already! We’re excited! 😀

    Night all. Sweet dreams are made of this. Clutching at straws maybe, but after Troy Bramston made his comment earlier tonight, I was expecting a swing back below 30% PV. Just relieved that wasn’t the case after all.

    Onwards and upwards and keep up the hard work. It’s all we in the ALP have got.
    We certainly haven’t got the majority of the media on side like Abbott does. That’s for sure.

  22. [GhostWhoVotes ‏@GhostWhoVotes
    #Newspoll Gillard: Approve 27 (-2) Disapprove 60 (+1)]

    Wow, did Ghost just make a mistake? Gillard’s disapproval was 60 last poll so there is no difference!

  23. The government is givin the impression it is listening to people. Voters like that. Talking about cost of living, power bills, even the asylum change.
    If people think you are listening to their concerns they will warm to you. That doesn’t make their concerns right,
    But it’s Politics – perception is reality.

  24. [I take it you mean mean PM netsat +2.5% vs. mean LOTO netsat?]

    Yes, apologies.

    [Is it normally distributed?]

    That I have not checked. I’ll see if I can find a way to do so quickly.

  28. IF jacksons judge lawler is not above suspicion, why should temby be above suspicion.

    We have ex judge in jail

    [See Mylan’s letter to Temby and Temby’s reply To Mylan in full.

    Why was Temby so adamant that he was only there to investigate Michael Williamson — ignoring any evidence of corruption by any other party?

    I am in no way whatsoever trying to say that allegations against Michael Williamson are unfounded or give any opinion of his innocence or guilt.

    I am, however, saying that there is more than one person in this union that warranted investigation. It would appear to me that there is an agenda at work here.

    It seems everyone looking into the HSU either has a puppet master, wears blinkers, fails to follow trails of evidence, or just knows nothing of due process.

    Speaking of due process and failure, Kathy Jackson was due to appear in Federal Court again last Tuesday — of course, she didn’t bother showing up.

    I hope in the upcoming elections, members decide to give the union the cleanout it really deserves.

    We’d all like to see the members regain control of their union.

    After all, it once belonged to them.]

  29. Burgey,

    WIIFM. The first part of the JG term has largely been stuff that didn’t directly relate to day to day lives or were long haul preparation reforms. Now the stuff the govt is discussing directly answers the question of “What Is In It For Me?”

  30. 53 to 47 this far out from an election is not decisive, given an improving trend for Labor.

    It’s encouraging for the Government, but no cause for celebration.

    For Mr Abbott, it’s extremely worrying. He’s there on sufferance, safe only as long as he keeps supplying large Newspoll leads.

  31. [spur212
    Posted Monday, August 20, 2012 at 11:10 pm | Permalink
    Hey Poliquant

    Love your site!]

    Ditto!

    Saves me heaps of time the way you project the house like that!

    Thanks.

    🙂

    Good night all. See you on the other side of Galaxy…

  32. [A slow trend is good; it indicates people changing their minds as the result of a series of factors, rather than a one off event – which can be easily countered by another one off.]
    Well it is encouraging that there is a small but consistent trend back to Labor over about the last 5 weeks even though a lot of asylum seeker boats have been arriving during that period.

    If the boats stop, then that would take a nagging issue away that clearly stops a lot of people from even considering voting Labor.

  34. [That I have not checked. I’ll see if I can find a way to do so quickly.]

    I wouldn’t bother if you haven’t looked.

    Whats 2.5% vs 3.5% between friends eh?

  35. [• 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”.]

    Does that mean that Barnaby expects the wise counsel to be that Scott will be hung, drawn and quartered if he remains ‘intransigent’?

  36. A few points about the trend on the 14-day TPP average.

    1. The budget was the turnaround point. At that time the average was at 58% Coalition TPP.

    2. It has been a slow and patchy trend. At times in July I thought the trend was over.

    3. Tonight the TPP average has been the lowest for the Coalition since 19 March, but it is still in landslide territory.

    4. The trend can still be mugged by events (dear boy…) and Nielsen.

    5. Also, Essential (at this time) isn’t buying the trend and a further confirmation by Nielsen would also be good.

    So, in my mind there is a trend but it has its weak points.

  37. Aguirre @ 27
    [ALP just want to hold it around there for the moment.]
    Agree.

    The ALP’s best bet is to have Abbott as Coalition leader at the election. So they need to stay a little behind in the polls until it is too late for the Coalition to change leaders. Put as much pressure on him as they can in the meantime, but without destabilising him just yet.

  38. [I have made the “Devil you know” point about the election in 2013 for months now. What other way will JG fight it?]

    I don’t place a lot of store in what Mumble says, but I do agree with him that Gillard’s refusal to “be” the Prime Minister was a massive hurdle for her at the last election. It was as he says a battle between two Leaders of the Opposition.

    Abbott won’t have that gift if he is up against her again next time. Labor can and will campaign strongly on their record. They’ll campaign on the economy, on health, on education, on infrastructure (particularly the NBN), they’ll campaign on all of the things they’ve put in place and how the real wrecking ball through the economy will be Abbott and his promise to tear it all down.

    Unpopular Prime Ministers with a strong record and an economy going well don’t lose to unpopular Opposition Leaders with a grab bag of uncosted thought bubbles that include new taxes and cutting back benefits and services to large swathes of the population. Laziness and hubris will do the Libs in.

  42. [So, in my mind there is a trend but it has its weak points.]
    It is a Poll Bludger motto that we will only be learn the significance of the polls that we currently have when we get some more polls. 😀

  43. …that said, I think I’m saying that a ‘real’ one – an external event along the lines of Tampa, rather than a particular action of the government – would seal the deal for Labor, as it would give ‘permission’ to people to change their votes.

    So it’s not necessary, but it helps.

  44. Thks Zoomster – just saw that as I was closing off. Fingers crossed then. Garrett was good on LL and passionate about his subject. G’night

  45. [It is becoming the ALP’s to win.]
    Let’s see how Abbott deals with the pressure if the polls are tied.

    Surely at that point the game will change to him needing to put out some policy instead of getting by by simply attacking the government.

  49. Not surprised in the least. The Coalition has had an ordinary time throughout July and August and Labor has had some clean air to focus on key policy issues. The fact the Liberal premiers messed up over the NDIS helped the Labor cause and even the backdown by Labor over Naru was a neutralizing impact.

    Not really sure why Essential seems out of sync as they have been the more steady polling for the past 18 months. Perhaps their methodology makes it less likely to pick up trends. Perhaps William has a view on that?

    Regardless there does seem to be a material improvement in the Labor primary vote and perhaps a fair amount of that is coming from QLD.

    Should get Nielsen as well as Newspoll in the next three weeks which will be interesting.

  50. [Let’s see how Abbott deals with the pressure if the polls are tied.]

    If that happened, all of his internal problems will come to the surface.

    He certainly has a lot of people who are not too keen on him in the party room who are biting their lips because, like it or not, he is winning. And it’s obvious his leadership was the catalyst. Ideological and structural squabbles are better fought from inside government than inside Opposition. So, as long as they lead, he is safe. As soon as there is doubt, the cracks will show.

    Operative word, of course is ‘if’ and, at the moment, I think such a scenario is still unlikely.

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