Essential Research: 54-46 to Coalition

Essential Research records next to no change on voting intention, and a general lack of sympathy for the view that unemployment benefits haven’t kept up over the years.

The latest weekly Essential Research result maintains the outfit’s record of consistency with the major parties unchanged on last week – the Coalition leads 48% to 36% on the primary vote and 54-46 on two-party preferred – and the Greens up a point from last week’s unusually poor result to 9%.

Whereas attitudinal questions often point to a social democratic bent among the population at large, questions posed this week on Newstart indicate that this particular buck stops with unemployment benefits. Fifty-three per cent agreed with the proposition that the current welfare system created a “culture of dependency”, with only 30% opting for the alternative proposition that current benefits are “the least a civilised society should provide”. In relation to Newstart benefits specifically, 33% said they were not high enough, 30% about right, and 25% too high. As Bernard Keane notes in Crikey today, variation by party support was not as pronounced as it often is in relation to such questions.

Further questions dealt with trust in various industries, with good rankings for agriculture (72%), tourism (68%) and manufacturing (56%) and poor ones for banking (33%), mining (32%), media (30%) and, tellingly, power companies (18%). Crikey will tomorrow publish Essential’s biannual “trust in media” results, which always makes for fun reading for critics of the fourth estate.

UPDATE (25/1/13): An automated phone poll for the Tasmanian seat of Bass, conducted by ReachTEL for the Launceston Examiner, has produced a dire result for Labor, with incumbent Geoff Lyons trailing Liberal candidate Andrew Nikolic 60.3-39.7 on two-party preferred. The primary votes are 54.7% for Nikolic, 26.7% for Lyons and 8.7% for the Greens. The sample size for the poll is 543.

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.

3,884 thoughts on “Essential Research: 54-46 to Coalition”

  2. I’m going with Kevin’s Essential 2% bias to the Coalition and Newspoll’s 1% bias to Labor and sticking with 52/48 until we get more information.

  4. On my first day in Crete, summer 1978, I thought I’d try a bottle of the Greek beer I’d heard so much about – retsina 🙂 Worst hangover in my life, but lesson learned.

  5. davidwh on the last thread

    Just remember when Newspoll and Nielsen were reporting 58/42+ 2PP results Essential was the poll to want to believe. They never has the Labor primary vote fall below 30%.

    Yes, people did do that. Its the fact Essential seem to move so little when the other phone polls have moved together one way or another makes me wonder about it now.

  6. davidwh@2


    I’m going with Kevin’s Essential 2% bias to the Coalition and Newspoll’s 1% bias to Labor and sticking with 52/48 until we get more information.

    If the Kevin in question is me then I am currently assigning Essential a 1% bias to Coalition and Newspoll a 0.5% bias to Labor. The only major pollster with a 2% bias (perhaps more like 2.5) is Morgan F2F allocated by last election.

    We can see from those Newstart results why the Macklin gaffe had very little impact.

  9. Sorry Kevin I made you twice as reliable as you are. I guess I can say I am with you in direction but not in degree. 48% primary for the Coalition just looks too high to me by 3/4%.

  10. What I can never get is how economics and politics writers in the OM have the temerity to criticise the government for mismanaging the economy and governance when their own firms are going out the door backwards so fast they need a high range gear shift for reverse.

  13. Essential’s primaries of 48, 36, 9 leaves only 7 for others.

    Last election others polled 6.61 and while the indie vote may well be down (because Windsor and Oakeshott will take massive hits) there is also KAP now which will presumably be getting several % across much of Queensland.

    I wonder if Essential’s captured support for Others is a shade low with a possible reason being that KAPpers would be difficult to capture by their sample methods.

  19. rossmore

    retsina would be techically closer to wine rather than beer but not that much….may have impacted yr hangover if you sculled a few pints but

  20. http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/twitter-spam-bots-not-mine-says-greg-hunt-20130121-2d295.html

    Twitter ‘spam bots’ not mine, says Greg Hunt
    January 21, 2013 – 1:39PM
    Asher Moses
    Technology Editor

    Opposition environment spokesman Greg Hunt’s office denies it is responsible for an army of fake spam Twitter accounts that social media experts say retweeted his post and other anti-Labor missives.

    The spambot claims first appeared on Sunday in a Storify document that quickly spread, and appeared to be backed up after Twitter disabled several of the alleged “bot” accounts referred to.

    The suspicious retweets were on Mr Hunt’s tweet from last week that claimed the carbon tax was partly responsible for job losses at Penrice Soda in Adelaide. It has had over 200 retweets compared to the single digit retweets his other posts get.

    Includes link to the original post.

  23. I cannot see how a web-based poll, or one that only calls landlines for that matter, could be in the slightest bit accurate – surely they are making it up as they go.

  24. Rossmore
    Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 1:36 pm | PERMALINK
    On my first day in Crete, summer 1978, I thought I’d try a bottle of the Greek beer I’d heard so much about – retsina Worst hangover in my life, but lesson learned.

    Love it and I can assure you still as potent 😉

  26. Sorry Wazza and Bananaby, I can think of about a million things I’d rather be doing, and a million ways I’d rather spend $1000.

  27. I can’t imagine Abbott would be interested in taking the word of Oakeshott unless he suggested changing sides completely.

  28. Retsina has the same alcoholic content as other whites. It must have been the sun beating down …

    I had ONE afternoon of drinking alcohol in the sun.

  29. Key independent MP Rob Oakeshott has urged the Coalition to bring its broadband policy more into line with the government ahead of this year’s federal election, saying it could swing his support if the poll result hung in the balance again.

    Trying to hedge his bets to get re-elected?

    I doubt it will influence the election outcome for him, either way.

  30. Technology usage is changing at breakneck speed. For example I have a number of web-sites which focus on English exam preparation (video and quizzes). The sites get a about 100,000 views a month from 160+ countries. I can see that 6 months ago about 10% viewed the sites on a mobile – then it was 13% and 18% – now it is about 23%. If technology use changes that quickly how can polls possibly keep up. Surely they must be irrelevant now.

  32. Kevin

    wonder if Essential’s captured support for Others is a shade low with a possible reason being that KAPpers would be difficult to capture by their sample methods.

    are you suggesting the Campin’, Fishin’ and Shootin’ Katter supporters in FNQ wouldn’t be registered with an online survey outfit?

  33. zoom, having thought about your other post a little:

    If politicians primarily serve a networking function, then perhaps people take more notice of those actions that help to connect them to things they are interested in.

  34. I took Oakeshott’s comments to be directed to his own voters, with no expectation of any interest whatsoever from the Liberals/Nationals; more brand differentiation…

  35. I took Oakeshott’s comments to be directed to his own voters, with no expectation of any interest whatsoever from the Liberals/Nationals; more brand differentiation…

  36. Zoomster (From Fisher topic):

    BTW, I find it a fascinating exercise to get my Year 7s to run an election campaign. Another class is identified as the constituency, parties are formed, leaders chosen, and a date set for the leader’s speeches.

    The students instantly turn into the worst kind of politicians (one winning party bribed the constituents with lollies). Off their own bat, they bombard the other class with leaflets stuffed into their lockers, harass them in the playground, etc etc. The dirty tricks campaign is dreadful to behold, and alas, the party with the best policies and arguments often doesn’t win…

    I can well believe it. The most capable students begin with what they’ve worked out about the world — that if you want something you don’t have, you can either build it yourself or have someone do it for you and you are going to need leverage. For them, this is a game like any other, rather than an exercise in ethics. Ethics is always IMO, the hardest thing for humans to conceptualise and apply in the real world. Choosing to apply them to a kind of competitive game is never going to be the first thing that occurs to them. Anyone to whom that question would occur would ask if anything intrinsically important was at stake, see nothing obvious, watch others playing hard and assume that was fine.

    I suppose if you were going to run a game like this, you’d probably have to remind students of the no-bullying policy, and perhaps do some preparatory work — some role-playing perhaps, in which the students can work out modes of address — perhaps as is done in speech pathology. You’d get the audience involved as they performed and get them to spot what they thought was going on and why they thought it. It could be a really fun exercise.

    It would be important to prompt them to reflect on why they were doing this. It’s important to understand motive in others and to read body language and tone so that you can really understand other people and to distinguish what is “playing nicely with others” from “only caring about what you want”. Everyone would get to explain what they had learned.

  38. Albo op-ed in the Oz, here repeated on his own site.

    http://anthonyalbanese.com.au/uniform-transport-laws-bring-a-nation-into-line-opinion-the-australian

    Jan 21, 2013
    Uniform transport laws bring a nation into line – Opinion – The Australian

    Few people reading this over breakfast will have put much thought into how the juice, bread and cereal reached their table. But getting it from the farm to the table depends on a remarkable process called logistics. It comes down to precision timing and connections and an army of truck drivers who criss-cross the nation, often alone, bar a large silent companion in the form of a foot high ring-binder of compliance and registration papers.

    ……….

    After several years of intense effort by political leaders and transport operators, the end to this bureaucratic madness is in sight. This week, with the exclusion of Western Australia which is yet to sign up, the new National Heavy Vehicle Regulator will open for business in Brisbane. That means that every vehicle over 4.5 tonnes will be subject to identical rules – one set of laws, one set of registration and compliance papers, one log book and an end to myriad pieces of red tape that have hung like a giant weight around the neck of the trucking industry for 112 years. Importantly, there will be one clear road map showing what size vehicles can use which roads. No longer will the mostly family-run trucking operators be burdened by the cost and confusion of contradictory rules that have beset them for generations.

    It’s a similar story for rail. This week, Adelaide will become home to Australia’s first National Rail Safety Regulator. In the future, every train driver and worker in the country will follow one clear set of signalling systems, one compliance approach and pay one annual accreditation fee. South Australia, NSW, ACT, Tasmania and the Northern Territory are the first to sign up to the new regulatory system. The other States will follow by the end of the year. In March, a single regulator for the maritime sector will also come into being. It will finally remove imaginary borders on our coastal waters and the mountain of red tape that is faced each day by commercial shipping operators.

    worth reading it all

  39. zoomster and fran

    The students instantly turn into the worst kind of politicians (one winning party bribed the constituents with lollies). Off their own bat, they bombard the other class with leaflets stuffed into their lockers, harass them in the playground, etc etc. The dirty tricks campaign is dreadful to behold, and alas, the party with the best policies and arguments often doesn’t win…

    Between you, you have opened my eyes to why I would never have succeeded in Big Business. I now realise that I have an ineradicable ethical muscle that doesn’t allow cheating or bribing.

    No wonder I’ve never been rich or influential.

  40. sprocket_@32


    are you suggesting the Campin’, Fishin’ and Shootin’ Katter supporters in FNQ wouldn’t be registered with an online survey outfit?

    Yeah something like that. 🙂 I’m reckoning the KAP party appeals a lot to older voters, who still don’t generally use the internet as much, although that is changing.

    On house effects, http://marktheballot.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/poll-aggregation.html has an up-to-date analysis for all the pollsters based on the last 6 months.

  41. lizzie

    I used to be bewildered by fellow staff members who brought the Principal flowers. Couldn’t believe that any decisions made by someone in that kind of position would be influenced by blatant sucking up like that.

    ….hence my present life of penury….

  43. Steady as she goes for TA according to Essential victory is a near certainty come September/October. Fine words from Andrew Bolt regarding the Gillard government:

    “Opposition Leader Tony Abbott will soon be back in the fray, having had time for reflection over the break. He may, with profit, have decided that much as he may wish to respond to Labor’s slimy character assassination, his wisest course is to relentlessly wrench the conversation back to the economy and to trust. What Labor has promised – and is promising – must be contrasted with its actual delivery. Can we believe a word Gillard says? Can we really trust her with our money and our jobs? This reckless spending must stop. The green tape must be slashed. Let’s create wealth before we let government spend it.

    And I’d plea for an end to such bitter division and the punishment of dissent. Australians shouldn’t be in fear of criticising their government. Newspapers shouldn’t be threatened. Journalists should not fear the sack for what they say. Australians shouldn’t be scared to speak their mind, whether at work or at the football. Time for some sunshine.

    One thing may have to be fine-tuned. unless Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare has decided to no longer announce boat arrivals, no asylum seekers have arrived by boat so far this year.”

  47. Lizzie:

    It took many years before I woke up that the rest of the world didn’t think like me.

    I’m not sure whether it was a benefit or a hindrance, but I found that out almost immediately. I knew other people thought differently. I spent a very long time trying to understand how and why.

    Then again, what else are you going to do? How else can you help to make the world a better place?

  49. Fran, my experience has been that “ethical” positions are frequently not ethical at all. They are merely self-interest in disguise. And, to make this worse, those who have the most success in securing their own advantage usually end up being able to define “the ethical” in ways that consolidate their advantage. At least, they work actively to try to ensure this.

    More abstractly, humans are very adroit at dealing in “value-tokens” with each other. They do this in order to maintain or reach their own most-preferred positions. This entails a form of mutual “calculation”, and, seen this way, the “ethical” is simply another “value” which can be and frequently is subject to bargaining. Inevitably, this relies on successful deception – deception of others and of oneself.

    This being the case, what is an ethical person to do? It is tempting to think the essence of an ethical life would be to refuse to bargain at all and to place the interests of others ahead of one’s own. And yet all this does is to put the ethical person at a practical disadvantage, to either immobilize them or open them to exploitation by the unethical.

    I think the social test of what is ethical is usually resolved within a utilitarian framework, which is hardly a satisfactory situation at all. This just means that the interests of the socially-, ethnically-, culturally- or numerically-marginal can be easily ignored by the numerous and the dominant.

  50. leone
    Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 2:05 pm | Permalink
    Sorry Wazza and Bananaby, …………. ]
    Ah the possible names for the cruise. The Ship of Fools, Voyage of the Damned, Das (Gum)Boot …… 🙂

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