Morgan phone poll: 50.5-49.5 to Coalition; Seat of the week: Bonner

A new phone poll corroborates Newspoll. Or does it?

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Roy Morgan has published a poll which, so far as the headline figure goes, is extremely interesting in that it a) is consistent with the Newspoll result, and b) was conducted by phone, and thus cannot be anticipated to suffer the pro-Labor bias typical of Morgan’s face-to-face polling. However, the headline figure to which I refer is from respondent-allocated preferences, which for so long have been flowing to Labor in confoundingly weak proportions in Morgan’s face-to-face polls. In this poll however they have flowed to Labor inordinately strongly. If using the measure which allocates preferences according to how they flowed at the previous election, which I and all other pollsters recommended, the Coalition has a somewhat more comfortable lead of 52.5-47.5. The primary vote results are striking in being high for both major parties: 39.5% for Labor and 47% for the Coalition, against 8% for the Greens and a very low 5.5% for others.

The poll was evidently conducted from Monday to Thursday (despite some confusion in Morgan’s heading) from a sample of 668, with a margin of error of about 3.8%. Other questions were also posed by this poll, so stay tuned for more detail.

NOTE: As you may have noticed, Crikey has a new look and its implementation is characteristically being accompanied by teething problems – most seriously the failure of comments thread pagination, which has caused the previous 5000-plus comments thread to not work terribly well. Presumably this one should be okay though, for at least as long as it remains fairly short.

UPDATE: Further findings from the Morgan poll are that Julia Gillard recorded a fairly solid approval rating of 40%, with disapproval of 51%, which represents changes of 3% and 6% since Morgan last posed the question in January. Tony Abbott meanwhile is respectively down four to 32% and up four to 60%. On the question of better prime minister, Gillard has remained steady on 45% while Abbott has dropped four points to 37%. Abbott has also lost further ground to Malcolm Turnbull on the question of best leader for the Liberal Party, the former down three to 19% and the latter up five to 42%. That leaves Abbott nearly level with Joe Hockey, who is down one to 18%. Julia Gillard continues to trail Kevin Rudd as preferred Labor leader, with Gillard up three to 22% and Rudd up one to 34%.

And not forgetting …

Seat of the week: Bonner

To commemorate Labor’s improved position in the polls, Seat of the Week takes its first excursion to the Coalition side of the electoral pendulum.

The Brisbane electorate of Bonner extends south-westwards from the bayside Wynnum-Manly area to Mount Gravatt. It was created at the 2004 election, and has remarkably been left unchanged by the two redistributions conducted since. The seat is also remarkable for having changed hands with each election, starting with the Liberals’ success in overhauling a 1.9% notional margin in 2004. The defeated Labor candidate was Con Sciacca, a Keating government minister who held Bowman from 1987 to 1996 and again from 1998 to 2004. Sciacca took the safer option when the transfer of Wynnum-Manly to the new seat left Bowman with a notional Liberal margin of 3.1%, but he was unable to withstand an adverse swing of 2.4%. Labor appeared to be especially hampered by the loss of Kevin Rudd’s personal vote in those areas of the electorate which had previously been in Griffith.

The inaugural member for Bonner thus became Ross Vasta, a staffer to Senator Brett Mason, former restaurant owner, and the son of noted Brisbane barrister and Bjelke-Petersen era Supreme Court justice Angelo Vasta. Vasta’s main source of publicity in his one term in parliament was his involvement in the scandal surrounding misuse of electoral printing allowances, for which he was cleared by the Director of Public Prosecutions shortly before the 2007 election. He was always going to have his work cut out defending the Coalition’s most marginal Queensland seat at the 2007 election, and duly fell victim to a 5.2% swing which compared favourably with a statewide swing of 7.5%.

Bonner was then held for a term by Kerry Rea, previously a Brisbane councillor representing a ward that included the area around Mount Gravatt. Vasta meanwhile returned to his old job with Brett Mason and unsuccessfully contested the Wynnum-Manly ward for the Liberals at the 2008 Brisbane council election. The newly constituted Liberal National Party then gave him the chance to recover his old seat, which did not seem a likely proposition in the political climate of the time. While that had certainly changed by the time of the 2010 election, Vasta’s victory on the back of an emphatic 7.4% swing was a serious disappointment for Labor, making Bonner the “safest” of its nine notionally held Queensland seats to fall to the LNP.

Labor’s preselected candidate for the next election is Laura Fraser Hardy, an associate with Hall Payne Lawyers.

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.

1,563 comments on “Morgan phone poll: 50.5-49.5 to Coalition; Seat of the week: Bonner”

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  1. PTMD@149,

    If you have Greasemoney installed, go into it and disable comment preview.

    It worked for me.

    Wow! You’re a legend! It worked for me too! 😀

  3. The Big Ship@153,

    Suck eggs, Abbott – Manly flogged by The Storm!

    Or, to put it another way…Abbott/Manly flogged by Gillard/The Storm. 🙂

  4. Wow. I am going to have to watch Lateline on Iview. Caught the end of Emerson vs Dutton. Mr Emerson was on fire from my viewpoit and little I saw.

  5. I’m trying to get used to the new format but it’s hard when you are old. There is this banner at the top which means I have to hit return twice so I can see what I’m typing. I have enough trouble making sense when I can see what I’m saying and would have no hope if I can’t see.

    The font is great.

  12. Dutton is running the gov’t spending too much rubbish. Then says Swan should apologise to the Republicans. So Emmo tells him if the USA goes over the cliff so does everyone else.
    Emmo says Abbott is the next Campbell Newman.

  13. Now Emmo says wtte if Latham’s taxi-driver incident can be to the character of Latham it is good enough for Abbott’s past to be looked at.

  14. Yikes – hope a few of these site issues are ironed out soon. I was only just getting used to following the threads, it’s a skill in itself let alone having to deal with layout changes.

    Good on the Swans – just need the Crows to get through tomorrow and I will be a happy chappy.

  15. deblonay,
    I’m thinking, if President Obama has a 2nd term mandate, Bibi Netanyahu better watch out!
    BN has been playing fast and loose with the President, and it’s about time he got taught a lesson about respect for people that are bigger and better than you on the world stage.
    President Obama understands better than most that attacking Iran would be like stirring up a Hornet’s nest and would more likely than not create a situation of full court conflagration across the Middle East and Northern Africa.
    I mean, I thought World Leaders were supposed to work towards peace, not war?

  16. Dutton brought up the nutter trucker signs anf=d that Abbott has spent two yaws vilifying the PM but as soon as he is attacked he starts crying and everyone runs around going “poor Tony.”

    Dutton got most of the airtime though.

  20. Did anyone who watched Lateline take note of Duttons swipe at Emerson alluding to his former relationship with the PM saying he “knows Emerson is very close to the PM” and Emerson saying “what do you mean by that”

  23. Netanyahu runs an ad in Florida
    ______ ________
    With the Lobby’s backing… Netanyahu is running an antiObama ad on Florida TV…in a marginal state too

    Obviously hoping to gain support for Romney from the large retired NY jewish group who”migrate” to Florida on retirement …Netanyahu is to be seem on this TV ad which is pro-war and pro-Romney
    It comes from the site”Mondoweiss” run by anti-Netanyahu-likud left-wing NY Jews

    //mondoweiss.net/2012/09/florida-election-theatrics-netanyahu-fearmongering-on-the-campaign-trail.html

  26. davidwh 311

    ‘The company is excellent Crikey. The politics is a challenge for me on occasions.’

    I am not surprised that it is a challenge. Your general take is that of a decent Liberal voice.

    Not the born to rule of old days, nor the flagrant me me of Tony Abbott, who is so about himself, not principle. I wish I could even fathom what Liberal stands for, at the moment.

    It must be pretty difficult to represent a defence. I admire your courage and morality.

    We on Pollbludger are closer to you for your efforts.

  30. After having had all sorts of bother even finding Pollbludger tonight, much less logging on……

    New format ok, apart from the position of the comments box.

    Testing…..

  32. Oh so you’re all here then! I was lurking on the last thread and thought the world had ended. No ‘New Thread’ indication.

    I’m on Mac using Firefox and the visual aspect and comments box seems okay for me.

    My understanding is the comments box will return to the bottom later this morning and that pagination @ 50 comments/page will also be restored. Is this correct?

    My personal preference is for the last comment to remain at the bottom, not top (sorry Puff)

    And without being too much of a whinger 😆 the preview box is behaving a tad weird and the links to Possum etc have disappeared.

  33. My understanding is the comments box will return to the bottom later this morning and that pagination @ 50 comments/page will also be restored. Is this correct?

    I’m certainly advised the latter will be the case, but the former I can’t tell you about.

    And without being too much of a whinger the preview box is behaving a tad weird and the links to Possum etc have disappeared.

    Nuh-uh! Go up to “view a blog” at the top and the whole panoply of Crikey blogdom rolls out before you. And while you’re up there, observe how the array of other links better integrates the site with the remainder of Crikey. It’s true that the electoral commissisons and parliament links and such have gone from the sidebar, but having a blogroll as long as your arm is rather old hat.

  36. [Imacca, you have a comment in moderation because you submitted it under your real name. Was this your intention?]

    Nah. Dump it thanks. have been having a lot of problems logging in and then being able to comment and stuffed up. I exclusively use Imacca here and do not sockpuppet.

  38. Pumpernickel
    [ Did anyone who watched Lateline take note of Duttons swipe at Emerson alluding to his former relationship with the PM saying he “knows Emerson is very close to the PM” and Emerson saying “what do you mean by that” ]
    Yes, Dutton did say that. It was a real grub moment.

  39. Puff
    [Some sites let you choose whether to have the newest or oldest comment at the top.]

    Having a choice would be perfect then everybody would be catered to. Maybe William can make it so!

  40. William @ 233

    Apologies for delay in acknowledging you William I scrolled right by your post and only just caught it now. (There’s another improvement to consider – a return to ‘moderator yellow’ to sort the wheat from the chaff)

    Gotcha re links thanks – it seems I’ve a new playroom and I haven’t looked in all the cupboards yet. 🙂

  42. And there I was, fighting the right battle on the wrong thread. Quite funny, really.

    OK,

    Chrome, everything working fine except that AdBlock+ doesn’t

    CCCP enabled in Tampermonkey and working fine except that the preview text is right-justified.

    Firefox:

    If CCCP is enabled in Greasemonkey then the comment box disappears. If CCCP is disabled then I can post (?) but not preview.

    AdBlock+ works.

    The new font looks very good in both.

    I would not favour new comments at the top. A refresh / Reload takes you to the last comment you saw, currently.

    Gee, that was frustrating reloading 5000+ comments!

  44. Good morning, gorgeous Bludgers!

    The sun is up.

    The birds are singing.

    Labor is still in government.

    Julia Gillard is still Prime Minister.

    Wayne Swan is the World’s Greatest Treasurer.

    Albo is the World’s Greatest Infrastructure Minister.

    Tony Abbott is no longer the World’s Greatest Dickhead. That award is now owned by Cory Bernardi. But never mind, he is First Runner Up, so if Bernardi is ever caught in a compromising position with a goat, Abbott can reclaim his title.

    There is now no doubt at all that The Narrowing is on. Gillard’s popularity is increasing and the Rabbott is heading south at a rate of knots. Something’s got to give soon; who’s putting their hat in the ring come #Libspill time?

    And if that isn’t enough, you have those magnificent, majestic, formidible BISONs! What more can you say?

    GO TEAM LABOR!

    PS Yes I am in a good mood this morning 😀

  46. I thought I’d repost. If I wait for Bilbo it will no longer be morning 😉

    [Good morning, gorgeous Bludgers!

    The sun is up.

    The birds are singing.

    Labor is still in government.

    Julia Gillard is still Prime Minister.

    Wayne Swan is the World’s Greatest Treasurer.

    Albo is the World’s Greatest Infrastructure Minister.

    Tony Abbott is no longer the World’s Greatest D*ckhead. That award is now owned by Cory Bernardi. But never mind, he is First Runner Up, so if Bernardi does a hammy then Abbott can reclaim his title.

    There is now no doubt at all that The Narrowing is on. Gillard’s popularity is increasing and the Rabbott is heading south at a rate of knots. Something’s got to give soon; who’s putting their hat in the ring come #Libspill time?

    And if that isn’t enough, you have those magnificent, majestic, formidible BISONs! What more can you say?

    GO TEAM LABOR!

    PS Yes I am in a good mood this morning]

    😀

  50. [And if that isn’t enough, you have those magnificent, majestic, formidible BISONs! What more can you say?]

    Oh Danny Boy, the BISONs, the BISONs, are calling
    From prairie to prairie and down the mountain side,
    The winter’s gone and soon the monkey will be fallin’
    it’s you, it’s you must go and i must bider

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