Morgan has published results from a phone poll of 523 respondents conducted between Tuesday and Thursday, which have Labor on 36.5% of the primary vote, the Coalition on 44.5% and the Greens on 8.5%. Morgan’s headline two-party result is 51-49, but this comes from the dubious respondent-allocated preferences measure: the more reliable measure using preferences from the previous election has the Coalition’s lead at 52.5-47.5. This being a phone poll, it should not have the Labor bias associated with Morgan’s face-to-face polling. It also reverses the consistent trend of the face-to-face series in giving Labor the better result on respondent-allocated preferences (I have consistently had grave doubts about the face-to-face polling on this score). However, the poll shows no gap in voting intention between men and women, which perhaps illustrates the difficulties you can get with small samples. The margin of error on the poll is about 4.3%.
Morgan has also taken on the tricky job of framing questions appropriate to the knotty AWU matter. The most useful of these asks if respondents approve or disapprove of Gillard’s response, coming in at 37% and 28% respectively. A question on whether the Prime Minister should resign if scandal allegations are true has 43% saying she should against 27% saying she shouldn’t, but this rather overlooks the enormous range of the allegations that might be levelled (had they started a few days later they could simply have asked if respondents agreed with Christopher Pyne). Another question asks whether Gillard was aware that the AWU ‘slush-fund’ was illegal when she resigned from Slater & Gordon in 1995, which seems simplistic at best. Thirty-three per cent answered in the affirmative (including 10% of Labor voters and 20% of a tiny sample of Greens voters) against 26% negative, 17% couldn’t say and 24% not aware of the scandal.
There is also an entertaining plethora of questions on preferred party leaders, the chief head-to-head scorelines being Gillard 49 Abbott 36, Turnbull 59 Gillard 31, Gillard 46 Hockey 44, and Turnbull 54 Rudd 38. Not featured: Gillard versus Rudd or Abbott versus Turnbull.
Seat of the week: Perth
The electorate of Perth extends north-eastwards from the city centre to accommodate an area bounded to the south by the Swan River, extending from Mount Lawley and Maylands to Morley and Bassendean. An electorate bearing the name has existed since federation, with the entirety of the metropolitan area having been divided between it and Fremantle until the expansion of parliament in 1949. It then assumed more familiar dimensions, with Swan being drawn into the metropolitan area and Curtin created to accommodate the western suburbs.
Perth was held from its creation until 1922 by James Fowler, first as a Labor member and then as a Liberal and Nationalist following his defection in 1909. It thereafter remained in conservative hands until the Labor landslide of 1943, when it was won by Tom Burke (father of Brian). Burke held the seat until defeated in 1955 by Liberal candidate Fred Chaney Senior, whose son Fred Chaney Junior was a Fraser government minister, Senator and member for Pearce. Chaney was in turn unseated in 1969 by Joe Berinson, who became a junior minister in the Whitlam government and later a state Attorney-General. When the 1975 debacle cost Labor all its WA seats except for Fremantle, Berinson suffered a narrow defeat at the hands of Liberal candidate Ross McLean.
Redistributions in 1977 and 1990 respectively reoriented the seat westwards to the advantage of the Liberals and eastwards to the advantage of Labor. Australian hockey captain Ric Charlesworth was able to gain and hold the seat for Labor in the more difficult conditions after 1983, and Stephen Smith came to a seat with a solid Labor margin when he succeeded Charlesworth in 1993. It continued to trend in Labor’s favour thereafter, remarkably producing a slight positive swing amid the 1996 landslide, and surpassed Fremantle as Labor’s safest WA seat at the 2010 election. However, such has been the party’s progressive malaise in WA over the past decade that the margin has worn down to 5.9%.
Stephen Smith had been an adviser to Paul Keating and a state party secretary before entering parliament, emerging as a senior figure in the Right faction. He was elevated to the front bench after the 1996 defeat, and became Foreign Minister when the Rudd government came to power in 2007. He relinquished this role with displeasure when it was given to Kevin Rudd after the 2010 election, instead being assigned to defence. His desire to return to the foreign ministry was thwarted when Bob Carr was drafted after Kevin Rudd’s failed leadership challenge in February 2012. Smith also served as Trade Minister from Julia Gillard’s ascension to the prime ministership in June 2010 until the reshuffle which followed the subsequent election.
A Liberal preselection in June 2012 was won by Darryl Moore, a former mining engineer now involved in investing in and managing the family’s commercial and industrial real estate portfolio, ahead of Geoff Hourn, a former lieutenant-colonel in the Australian Intelligence Corps.
confessions
Respect indeed.
zoomster@696
52-48 = 4
The margin is 4%
zoomster, check out how Anthony Green and others calculate margins.
[Not one mention of an “Internal Poll”, leaked or otherwise.]
Oh dear, you really are naive.
[So where haven’t I applauded the achievements of the ALP Government?]
Ummm, when was the last time you applauded the govt for an achievement?
Thank you, I rest my case.
Confessions
I am not being gamed by internal polling. I actually believe most of the ALP’s problems are self inflicted and won’t be solved until the organisation has been reformed (very doubtful it will happen under the current leadership) in order to be more open to the 21st Century instead of being stuck focusing on the blue collar, manufacturing, industrial economy and constantly chasing Tony Abbott on the values debate instead of defining what the party stands for (currently it’s “we are us”) and having a consistent, inspiring and connected policy story backing it up
Night all
what a shock that Galaxy would commission a poll after a week of wall to wall negative headlines for the PM. And the polls havent shifted much. It’s not nice to see a 54 for the rabble though.
Labor’s TPP is sitting between 46-49%, which is still a losing position, but a great deal better than earlier in the year.
Labor’s biggest challenge is not Abbott; he wont change, it is the OM. It is going to very hard for them to win with the OM solidly against them.
Dont buy the fact contrition from Hartcher or Grattan. They will be all over the PM again soon enough
New thread.
Bemused
I live in regional NSW but I have worked in Maroochydore where there are the offices of Somnalay and Slipper. There is a very large NZ expat population on the Sunshine Coast and they do not want socialism. They want a business plan to rescue them from the poor economy of NZ.They are opportunist migrants and they are there in numbers and they are distorting the culture with their opportunism.
They want wealth and insofar as they are able to vote they will do it and distort the vote like so:
We know the Qld results at the last Federal Election, we have the State Election Results and we have State figures from opinion polls. It is possible to make some deductions from those and the continuing antics of Can D’oh and the effect it is having.
confessions@705
Whenever there is something to say that has not already been said by someone else.
I have repeatedly said the PM has done absolutely nothing wrong over the AWU matter and written detailed reasons. Didn’t notice?
funny day for a poll
and well why put it up
why can it not go under morgan
just wondering william
morning bludgers
well well well margo kingston has jogged michelle’s memory http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/abbott-has-his-own-slushy-history-20121201-2anjy.html
PBers and tweeters have been talking about this for weeks – michelle very slow on the uptake but grudging credit to her for publishing the facts
[ … defenestrated …]
Boerwar,
Great word. Difficult, though, to inject into normal conversation.
I first came across its usage while reading a Gore Vidal novel.
This point may have been made but Perth was a Liberal gain in 1910 Fowler elected as Labor in 1906 defected to Liberals by 1910. He was a strong free trader. Overall WA swung slightly to Libs in 1910 an early example of going against national trend.
On AWU etc. remarkable that none in media has picked up on how extraordinary for an opposition to campaign on a promise of an inquiry into long ago actions by a PM to best of my knowledge no opposition has ever made this type of pledge. The Easton Royal Commission although remarkable was modest compared to this.
On NSW Labor’s chances in Page, Eden-Monaro better than some think as the real problem is greater Sydney but Labor’s margin in Richmond looks flattering no absolutely safe.
You might want to think twice before you slap on some sunblock. (Warning for the ultra-sensitive, this post contains references to tits):
http://theconversation.edu.au/blue-beauty-why-male-tits-work-harder-for-attractive-partners-11093