Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition

Newspoll’s recent run of erratic form has come to an end with a voting intention result only slightly different from last fortnight’s. However, there’s a significant move on Tony Abbott’s personal rating – and once again, it’s downwards.

James J reports Newspoll has ticked a point in the Coalition’s favour, so that they now lead 51-49 on two-party preferred. This is down to a two-point increase in their primary vote to 43%, with Labor steady on 36% and the Greens steady on 10%. There is yet again bad news for Tony Abbott on personal ratings: his approval is down three points to 27% and his disapproval is up five to 63%. This marks a new low for him on net approval, and has been matched since the inception of Newspoll (in late 1985) only by the polls which preceded the downfalls of Alexander Downer in January 1995 and John Hewson in April 1994, and several for Andrew Peacock in the lead-up to the 1990 election. Julia Gillard meanwhile is respectively up two to 37% and up one to 52%, and her lead as preferred prime minister has widened from 45-34 to 46-32.

Today’s Essential Research survey included its monthly personal rating questions, and these too found Abbott falling to new lows. Whereas the previous survey showed both leaders up in the immediate aftermath of Julia Gillard’s sexism and misogyny speech, the latest result has Abbott down four on approval to 33% and up four on disapproval to 58%. Gillard is steady on approval at 41% approval and down two on disapproval to 49%, and her lead as preferred prime minister is up from 43-36 to 45-32, her best result since February 2011.

Essential is also chiming better with Newspoll now on voting intention, with the Coalition’s lead now at 52-48 (down from 53-47 last week) from primary votes of 37% for Labor (steady), 45% for the Coalition (down one) and 9% for the Greens (steady). Also canvassed are options on how the government might rein in the budget, with reducing or means testing the baby bonus and increasing tax for those on high incomes respectively coming on top.

Preselection news:

• Ben McClellan of the Blacktown Advocate reports there are “at least” 10 candidates for the Liberal preselection in Greenway, of whom the highest profile is former Rose Tattoo singer Gary “Angry” Anderson. However, the presumed front-runner is the candidate from 2010, Jayme Diaz, whose work as a migration lawyer and family background in the locally numerous Filipino community is believed to stand him in good stead. Diaz is aligned with the David Clarke “hard Right”, but he apparently has an opponent in Tony Abbott, who no doubt has a strong recollection of Diaz’s failure to win the crucial seat last time. Also mentioned as starters have been Ben Jackson and Brett Murray, who are associated with federal Mitchell MP Alex Hawke’s “Centre Right” faction.

• The Tasmanian Liberals have preselected Brett Whiteley, who held in state parliament from 2002 until his defeat in 2010, as their federal candidate for marginal north-western seat of Braddon. The party originally chose local businessman Michael Burr, but he withdrew for health reasons. Whiteley did not contest the original preselection, saying at the time he was focused on returning to state politics.

• Chris Johnson of the Canberra Times reports that Kate Hamilton, a former councillor in Leichhardt in inner Sydney, and local party member Stephen Darwin will join former GetUp! director Simon Sheikh in the contest for Greens preselection for the Senate in the Australian Capital Territory.

• Phillip Coorey of the Sydney Morning Herald reports on the prospect of federal executive intervention if Noreen Hay, state Wollongong MP and member for the Right, uses her influence over the local numbers to back a preselection challenge against Stephen Jones, federal member for Throsby and member of the Left.

• Don Farrell has agreed to accept relegation to the second position on Labor’s South Australian Senate ticket in deference to Penny Wong, after his victory in the state conference ballot met a hostile response within the party and without.

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.

3,942 comments on “Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition”

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  1. Steve777

    BISON’s are the highly evolved and sophisticated descendents of PJK’s “Beautiful set of numbers” . BISON’s ( Beautiful Inspiriang Set Of Numbers ) are looked after by The Finnigans who is their herdmaster keeping them sleek and well groomed.

  2. Can someone please explain what the BISON references in these posts are? Pardon my ignorance but I normally find acronyms, abbreviations and Internet slang in Google, but all I can find for BISON are large, even-toed ungulates.

    “BISON are large, even-toed ungulates” I believe is the Finns’ nickname for Joe Hockey…

  4. There is nothing new, I believe, in what is happening in Israel/Palestine ATM, not in the rather predictable responses by various supporters or opponents of either side. But there are some wrinkles:

    Why did Israel wait until after the US presidential elections to begin its response to rockets coming out of Palestine? The missiles were already being fired out of Gaza before the election date.

    Here is a second question: is HAMAS losing control of extremist elements who appear to have triggered the current flurry of exchanges of high physical and chemical energy.

    Here is a third question. Is it true that Netanyahu was rebuffed by the Israeli military when he wanted to bomb Iran before the US presidential election.

    Here is a fourth question. Assume that Israel is doing its best not to get overtly dragged into the dissolution of the Syrian state, have Gazan extremists sought to trigger a general M-E conflagration?

  7. Evidently the confession thing is a complete red herring as

    1. No-one goes to confession any more
    2. The few who do never confess to anything serious

    [During the nine-year Ryan Commission into child abuse in Ireland, the issue of the confessional never arose once, he said.

    Father Hodgens said that while priests would respect the seal of the confessional, they were such gossips that he would expect something very general to emerge. He had never heard anything significant in his 40 years. Even when he began in 1974 almost no one went to confession.]

    http://www.theage.com.au/national/a-debate-about-nothing-confession-booth-emptied-long-ago-20121116-29gk3.html#ixzz2CMcWPbBE

  10. [i wonder do i have areason to vote labor any more

    mr abbott is looking more safe and good to me every day]

    Go ahead and vote for Abbott. Just stop making a big deal about it. Just stop being drama queen.

  12. [ Just propose forced conversion of the entire populations, Jews & Moslems to Christianity.]
    The problem is that half would become catholic, one third Greek orthodox and the rest bloody Mormon and they’d start killing each other over the sacraments and how many wives they can have our some other frog shite

  16. The real group SEX. when the head bull elephant mates his chosen cow, the whole herd got excited & rejoice with a baby comes in 2y

  17. [He had never heard anything significant in his 40 years. ]

    He must have sat there for 40 years waiting for someone to confess to something decent. I’d be very disappointed with 40 years of confessions and nothing worth listening to. Even my patients have managed better than that.

  20. [The problem is that half would become catholic, one third Greek orthodox and the rest bloody Mormon and they’d start killing each other over the sacraments and how many wives they can have our some other frog shite]
    Mormons aren’t Christians

  23. My say at 3525

    [o and what do you tell your chidren,,why they
    are receiving presents,

    my grandchildren,,tell me its becauce baby jesus is born
    we celebrate his birthday, we cannot give to him
    so we give to each other.
    gees i am glad i a christian
    ]

    You are celebrating the wrong day then as Jesus was born some time in September or autumn in the Middle East.

    December 25 is the traditional holiday for pagans as I tell my loving children and a good one at that

    The census of Quirinius that required Joseph to travel from Galilee to Bethlehem would most probably have taken place after the fall harvest when people were more able to return to their ancestral homes (Luke 2:1-5). Besides, it was customary in Judea to do their tax collecting during this period, as the bulk of a farmer’s income came at this time.

    Another point is that Joseph and Mary had to find shelter in a barn or some other kind of animal shelter like a cave or grotto because the inns were full (verse 7). This indicates that the pilgrims from around the world had begun to arrive in Jerusalem and surrounding towns. Thus, the fall festival season had already commenced. There would have been no similar influx of pilgrims in December.

    Also, as the shepherds were still in the fields with their flocks (verse 8), Jesus’ birth could not have occurred during the cold-weather months of winter. Sheep were normally brought into centrally located pens or corrals as the weather turned colder and the rainy season began, especially at night. If this were not significant, it begs the question, “Why would Luke have mentioned it in such detail if not to convey a time reference?”

    Notice what commentator Adam Clarke writes regarding this:

    It was a custom among the Jews to send out their sheep to the deserts [wilderness], about the passover [sic], and bring them home at the commencement of the first rain: during the time they were out, the shepherds watched them night and day. As the passover [sic] occurred in the spring, and the first rain began early in the month of Marchesvan, which answers to part of our October and November, we find that the sheep were kept out in the open country during the whole of the summer. And as these shepherds had not yet brought home their flocks, it is a presumptive argument that October had not yet commenced, and that, consequently, our Lord was not born on the 25th of December, when no flocks were out in the fields; nor could He have been born later than September, as the flocks were still in the fields by night. On this very ground the nativity in December should be given up. The feeding of the flocks by night in the fields is a chronological fact, which casts considerable light on this disputed point. (Clarke’s Commentary, vol. V, p. 370)

    Read more: http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Library.sr/CT/ARTB/k/568/When-Was-Jesus-Born.htm#ixzz2CMfgVrro

  24. BW

    [have Gazan extremists sought to trigger a general M-E conflagration?]

    Like the mortar fire out of Syria into Turkey or into the Golan.

    On the balance of probability more likely done by the rebels than the govt forces.

  27. my say

    Voting Liberal will do you no good. They are voting to support enabling legislation for a RC.

    You need to look for somewhere like the Bob Katter party to avoid voting for a party voting for the Royal Commission.

  28. Thank you all for answers re BISONs and the links.

    The Middle East seems to be the very definition of the word ‘intractable’. The people who say God gave them the land 4,000 years ago versus those whose ancestors have lived there for possibly as long. It might be possible to find a solution with common sense and good will on both sides, but there seems to be precious little of that on the ground over there. It must be great for someone to feel in their heart that they are absolutely right, backed by the Creator of the universe, and everyone with a different view is totally wrong and probably evil. But it certainly doesn’t make for the only possible future – peaceful co-existence and mutual respect. But then, look at many old enemies today, e.g. France and Germany. Maybe there’s hope.

  29. It is worthwhile to contrast the public persona and public comments of Archbishop Philip Asninall (who followed Hollingsworth – remember him?) and George Pell.
    Aspinall is a highly decent person.
    (Disclaimer: I have no connection with the C 0f E whatsoever.)

  30. Refer:
    http://www.abc.net.au/technology/articles/2012/11/16/3634499.htm

    Update 2: Jim Madigan, NBN Account Manager at SPATIALinfo – a Victorian contractor for NBNco – confirmed to us that what the contractors said at the conference stands – albeit with a slight variation. To clarify: for the first half of next year the contractors will be passing 6000 homes per day. For the second part of the year they will be passing AND CONNECTING 6000 homes per day. This means that the rollout speed is EXCEEDING the aims of the NBNco corporate plan which aims to pass 6423 premises per day in 2015. This will doubtless be discussed further in other articles but for now, the primary points of this article stand.

    Rollout speed is EXCEEDING the corporate plan with 6434 premises per day instead of the 6000.

  31. CTar1 @ 3436,

    [Next trip looks like it’s not far away – I’ll make sure I’ve got a puzzle with me in case I decide to walk the last bit.]

    Sorry for the delayed response – the plane had to make an emergency landing – er, umm, I had to attend (willingly) bits of the annual PhD Conference.

    The reason I like sudoku on long flights is that it’s the sort of thing where you can do a bit, snooze for a while, wake up, do a bit more … unlike a book where you have to remember where you were up to before you dozed off.

  32. [The Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, today announced that applications for funding through the Indigenous Broadcasting Program (IBP) for 2013-14 are now open.

    “The IBP supports a wide range of Indigenous media organisations that provide unique and valuable services to Indigenous communities throughout Australia,” Senator Conroy said.

    “The program currently supports the operational and technical costs of urban, regional and remote Indigenous radio stations, including for broadcasting, training and content production.

    “The Indigenous broadcasting and media sector helps build safe and supportive communities and plays a critical role in promoting indigenous languages, culture and wellbeing and distributing local messages effectively.]

    Hey Conroy you missed out Authentic – maybe Tony nabbed em all.

  34. Dio [He had never heard anything significant in his 40 years.]

    One of my friends was a ‘Harassment Contact Officer’ at his work for a decade or so. His complaint was that while their were things he had to see to none of it was even faintly entertaining.

  37. Christmas was only about father christmas delivering presents when I was a kid, there was absolutely nothing religious about it, rather like easter and chocolates and easter eggs.

    Same for my kids.

    Kids don’t need religion for a time when they get presents!

    And as detailed above by another writer, christmas is a pagan festival, not a religious one.

  38. [THE state’s top lawmaker is reviewing Right to Information legislation, saying too much public scrutiny is scaring people away from becoming politicians. ]

    Yeah too right, why can’t we be secretive little pollies like Russ Hinze and Joh?

    The LNP have gone bananas.

    Its called being accountable – cretins.

  41. my say@3555


    i wonder do i have areason to vote labor any more

    mr abbott is looking more safe and good to me every day

    If that is the case, then by all means vote for him. It is a free country, do what you like.

  42. Business groups have upped the rhetoric in the last two days re IR reform.

    While the primary purpose of the OO’s feral concentration on the AWU issue from 20 years ago is to destroy the PM I think News is also trying to feed into the theme of general union corruption along with the HSU issue.

    They are trying to put doubt into peoples minds about the “honesty ” of the union movement along with the OM’s megaphone support of the constant big business attacks on productivity and need for changes to the IR system otherwise the economy is doomed and jobs will be lost etc etc.

    A early assault on the union movement before the election is under way.

    However, I have my doubts as to how effective it will be especially with the actions of the lib state governments.

    At the end of the day people turn to unions for support when their jobs are at risk and their pockets might be hurt. Simple human reaction. That is why the attacks on Workchoices were so successful.

    I would be happy to put my money on the union movement to win again.

  44. It is now clear that @TurnbullMalcolm has started his “Look at moi, look at moi” #Malstoration tour while Sloppy licking his fingers

  45. TomTFAB @ 3586

    Perhaps. But it is standard Christian doctrine.

    The Holy Roman Inquisition (it has some namby pamby name nowadays) has a nice economy of language: “negative”
    http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20010605_battesimo_mormoni_en.html
    (this was when the prefect was Cardinal Ratzinger! :D)

    At some distance, this is a Southern Baptist view
    http://www.christianity.com/christian-life/political-and-social-issues/mormonism-is-not-christianity-11628184.html

    And sort of in between, some generic Christianity:
    http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bibleandculture/2012/08/27/why-mormons-are-not-christians-the-issue-of-christology/

  48. [Aspinall is a highly decent person.]

    He was on the radio today saying he had asked Howard for a RC 10 years ago, nothing done, asked Beattie for one. Beattie said no because a national RC was needed as the problem went across state lines.

    Aspinall has come across as a genuine decent bloke who wants the problems solved.

  49. Want a good laugh.

    [Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter could face financial penalties under a Coalition plan to curb online bullying of children.

    It has suggested setting up a children’s e-safety commissioner with the power to monitor online content and seek the removal of harmful material.

    However, given most large social media websites are based overseas and therefore not subject to Australian law, the scheme would rely on “cooperative regulation” between the government and affected companies]

    Dear mr twitter will you please pay this cooperative fine?
    Rack off noddy and ya monkey mate.

  50. [Destroy the Context ‏@SpaceKidette

    Seems Peta finally got wind of the fact that the LNP has a policy vacuum problem but it’s apparent they now have a vacuous policy problem. ]

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