Nielsen: 52-48 to Coalition

The latest Nielsen poll gives Julia Gillard her best preferred prime minister rating since February 2011, best net approval rating since March 2011, and Labor its best two-party preferred result since November 2010.

GhostWhoVotes reports that the latest Nielsen poll has the Coalition leading 52-48 on two-party preferred, compared with 53-47 last time – Labor’s best result from Nielsen since November 2010. The primary votes show Labor steady on 34%, the Coalition down two to 43% and the Greens up one to 11%. Julia Gillard has made substantial gains personally, to the extent that she has very nearly broken even on her net rating for the first time since March 2011: her approval is up five points to 47%, and disapproval down five to 48%. Tony Abbott is up one on both approval and disapproval, to 37% and a new high of 60% respectively. On preferred prime minister, Gillard’s lead has widened from 47-44 to 50-40, her best result since February 2011.

Also, James J reports The Australian has published results of Galaxy Research poll commissioned by unspecified unions targeting two marginals in Queensland (Blair and Moreton), one in New South Wales (Greenway) and one in Victoria (Deakin), which finds Labor doing much better when respondents were asked how they would vote if Kevin Rudd was leading the party. The results for a Gillard leadership are 37% for Labor, 44% for the Coalition and 11% for the Greens, with the Coalition leading 51-49 on two-pary preferred. With a Rudd leadership, this becomes 48% for Labor, 37% for the Coalition and 9% for the Greens, with Labor leading 57-43. However, I personally find little value in this kind of exercise, which gives partisan respondents from the other side an opportunity to create mischief. The combined results in these seats at the 2010 election was 52.2-47.8 to Labor, with primary votes of 40.1% for Labor, 41.0% for the Coalition and 11.5% for the Greens. However, redistribution has since weakened Deakin for Labor by 1.8%.

UPDATE: Full tables from Nielsen here, and leaders attribute ratings here. There’s nothing too sensational in the gender breakdowns in terms of changes on the last poll – indeed, the big shift is on preferred prime minister among men, from 48-43 in Abbott’s favour to 48-42 in Gillard’s. However, there’s no reflection of this in the personal ratings, with Gillard improving in the same proportions among men and women.

The headline finding of the attribute figures is that 43% consider Tony Abbott “sexist”, although another 53% think Gillard “easily influenced by minority groups”. Gillard is well favoured on foreign policy, social policy and openness to ideas, Abbott on “has the confidence of her/his party”. Abbott also has slightly leads on “trustworthy” and “firm grasp of economic policy”. The poll also finds a clear majority of 57% to 42% now in favour of the parliament running its full term. The Coalition is still clearly favoured to win the election, on 56% to 32% for Labor.

UPDATE: Essential Research is unchanged on last week, with the Coalition on 47%, Labor on 36%, the Greens on 9% and the Coalition leading 53-47 on two-party preferred. Also featured are their six-monthly question on “trust in organisations and institutions”, which interestingly has everything up a few points after an across-the-board drop last time. Questions on “sexism and discrimination against women” find 62-67% of women and 49-55% of men believing it present in workplaces, media, politics, advertising and sport (politics scoring highest), but smaller numbers in schools (39% of men and 48% of women).

UPDATE 2: The Roy Morgan face-to-face polling conducted over the previous two weekends has Labor in front on the headline respondent-allocated preference measure for the first time since January, and opening a 52.5-47.5 lead on the previous election preference measure – remembering as always the consistent bias in this series to Labor. The previous poll had the Coalition with respective leads of 52-48 and 51-49. This is off the back of the weakest primary vote for the Coalition since the election, down 4.5% on the previous poll to 38.5%. Labor has gained only half a point on the primary vote to 37.5%, with both Greens and others up two, to 12.5% and 11.5%.

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.

5,727 comments on “Nielsen: 52-48 to Coalition”

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  2. Carey Moore@5649


    Any word from Chris Murphy who the SA pollieis whose career is about to end?


    If true, probably a Senator, which means quiet resignation and unceremonious replacement by another Lib…

    That would be so…mean, to deprive us all.

  4. Puff, could you please put your champers/popcorn and rolling on Youtube so I can enjoy it too.

    I think I will take the following day off; buy a carton of James Squier Pale Ale and watch ABC News 24 all day – then ROFLMAO

  5. Carey Moore # 5608 – a fellow Bill Bailey fan?

    From his Part Troll: Three blokes go into a pub. One of them is a little bit stupid, and the whole scene unfolds with a tedious inevitability

  10. I managed to snaffle 6 bottles of the Grant Burge Pinot Noir bubbly NV at half-price ($13). In the cellar wardrobe for Christmas or earlier, if there is MOAR.

  14. Another death for nothing
    ________________________In the same BBC news program yesterday there was a reference to the death of the latest Australian in Afghanistan and news of the final preparations for the French withdrawal from Afghanistan next month

    The dead Australian boy lost his life in vain as the war is lost as we all know… and his death is of no meaning in the long term
    All is lost as we know
    When can our leaders tell the US we’re off ??…or are they totally captives
    Abbott and Gillard…on Foreign Affairs… it’s tweeldum and tweedlede

  15. C@tmomma@5656


    Joe6Pack,
    I’d be more than pleased to meet another truckie!(My step-dad was a truckie, my dad was a truckie )

    In 40+ years of driving I have been very impressed with the courtesy of truck drivers. Only on one occasion did one get way too militant up my bum. I stopped and called the police. They chased but I have no idea about the outcome: he went off on a side-road.

    I am supremely conscious of you liking to not have to brake. Easy on merging but, on undulating territory, it is sometimes hard to judge which lanes are best for both of us.

  16. [Carey, a Senator? That is disappointing if true. How do you know that? Are you speculating. I am hoping it is You Know Who?]

    I am 100% speculating.

    Ideally, if an SA Lib were to actually be embroiled in a resignation-worthy scandal, I would want it to be Bernardi. While Pyne seems obvious, Bernardi is far more embarrassing to have in Canberra…

  22. TLBD, a lovely drop. I pay about $23 for it here in QLD.

    At $13, as my father would say “At that price you can’t afford to be sober.”

  24. I will leave you tonight with an uplifting thought.

    On the ABC news this week, when the MRRT was revealed to have brought in no revenue in the First Quarter of the Financial Year, Mark Simkin said that a senior executive in the Mining Industry told him that he thought that revenue in the last 3 quarters would see a rebound and the MRRT would indeed make money for the government then. 🙂

  25. Joe6P

    Sorry I didn’t answer your question about females telling sexist jokes earlier.

    Got caught up in a conversation with my son (who’s heading back to Europe on Sunday night).

    He reckons he can’t remember me telling any and isn’t sure if it’s only because I’m hopeless at telling jokes and tell the punch line too soon.

    He just told me a joke, but danged if I can remember how it goes. Something about a bar and bloke who comes in with a bag and produces a foot-long grand piano which he places on the bar along with an equally small bloke who plays it.

    Day after day this happens, and the barman asks how he came to have the baby baby grand. Bloke says he found a lamp and when he rubbed it a genie popped out.

    Barman says well why did you ask for a baby grand and a small piano player.

    Bloke says, bit of a misinterpretation/language barrier. Do you really think I asked for a 12-inch pianist!

  26. TLBD,
    Responsible truckies know that the cowboys give the industry a bad name. Anyway, the real bustards are the business owners, not the truck drivers! 😀

  27. Lynchpin,

    It was through a wine club (Woolies owned. Cringe). An especial favourite of my daughter’s. They’ll be here for Christmas so it’ll be cold meats, prawns, salads and bubbly in Canbra (that is how we pronounce it).

  29. Marrickville Mauler@5655


    Carey Moore # 5608 – a fellow Bill Bailey fan?

    From his Part Troll: Three blokes go into a pub. One of them is a little bit stupid, and the whole scene unfolds with a tedious inevitability

    Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you! I just hunted it up on YouTube. The giant breaking a twig is hilarious. @23.00
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vVVPSowWNc

    Did you hear Bailey in an interview in Australia describing one of his early gigs? He was travelling with a little two-hander doing clubs and his partner got sick but he thought he could just soldier on by himself. As he tells it, he was dying on stage and tried to rescue himself with a ‘guy walks into a bar’ gag which he confesses had no punch line. By his account he strung it out for about five minutes. I’ll see if I can find video of it. Very funny man.

  30. Father says shot Pakistani girl ‘will rise again’
    Updated 55 minutes ago

    [The father of a Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot in the head by the Taliban this month has described her recovery as a miracle.

    Malala Yousufzai, a 14-year-old education activist, was attacked by the Taliban while travelling on a school bus on October 9.]

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-26/shot-pakistan-girl27s-father-speaks/4336758

    Wonderful news, but why does the Australian msm including the ABC insist on calling Malala an “education activist”? She’s a women’s rights activist FGS.

    Or is that being biased towards women/

  33. [Fiona, are you planning on spending the entire evening lecturing Diogenes for telling a bloody joke?]

    WTF. Diog tried to be funny?

  35. ABC News Radio have consistently been calling Malala a proponent for the rights of girls to be educated.

    I would happily support her nomination for the Peace Prize.

  38. Republican hardliners now the Mainstream
    ________________________
    The mad God Botherers have taken the main position in the matter of rape and abortion…snd their insistence that a woman MUST bear a child produced by a rape…it”Gods’s Gift”

    In a way the Republicans ane now kind of theocratic party
    How Eishenhour or Nixon would have been surprised by this developoment

    http://www.theage.com.au/world/hardline-views-on-rape-in-republican-mainstream-20121026-28b40.html

  46. I e-mailed Ron to let him know about Vera but I haven’t got a reply yet.

    He doesn’t check his e-mails very often but I bet he’ll be shattered as I am about Vera’s passing.

    I wonder if there’s some way we can draft an E-Card for all of us to sign with our screen name & maybe a simple one line message that can be sent to Vera’s husband & family.

    She was much loved here and I for one am shattered at her passing.

  47. This little black duck,

    [ You have not been on PB long enough to work out Diogenes. ]

    How do you think poor Mrs Diogenes feels? She has to live with the beggar! 😉

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