UPDATE: Now we have Newspoll as well, and it’s Labor’s worst result since July: the Coalition leads 56-44 on two-party preferred, compared with 51-49 a fortnight ago, from primary votes of 32% for Labor (down six), 48% for the Coalition (up four) and 9% for the Greens (steady). The poll also has Julia Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister all but vanishing, down from 45-33 to 41-39. Gillard is down two points on approval to 36% and up three on disapproval to 52%, while Tony Abbott is up four to 33% and down two to 56%.
GhostWhoVotes reports a Galaxy poll to be published tomorrow shows the Coalition leading 54-46 on two-party preferred. The primary votes are 35% for Labor, 48% for the Coalition and 10% for the Greens. Tony Abbott does unusually well on personal ratings relative to Julia Gillard, with 36% satisified and 57% dissatisfied against 38% and 57% for Gillard. Fifty-five per cent say the election should be held in September against 38% who want an election now. As is all too often the case with Galaxy, a further question seems to have been set as bait for anti-government headlines in the News Limited tabloids which publish the poll. In this case, respondents were asked if they believed Julia Gillard’s explanation for announcing the election date, rather than the more obvious question of whether they approved of her doing it. Trust in politicians being what it is, this came in at 53% for no and 41% for yes, which if anything is surprisingly high. The poll was conducted from Friday to Sunday from a sample of 1015, for the usual margin of error of around 3%.
UPDATE (5/2/13): Essential Research, reporting a day later than usual, has Labor down a point on the primary vote for the second week in a row, down now to 34%, its lowest since September. However, the Coalition and the Greens are unchanged at 48% and 10%, with the Coalition’s two-party preferred lead likewise steady at 54-46.
UPDATE (6/2/13): Morgan published a result from last weekend’s face-to-face polling while I wasn’t looking, and it has the aggregate major party vote returning to normal after a slump in the poll for the previous two weekends. Labor is up 2.5% to 38.5% while the Coalition is up 3.5% to 42.5%, with the Greens down 3.5% to 8.5%. That pans out to a slight gain for the Coalition on two-party preferred, extending their lead from 50.5-49.5 to 51.5-48.5 on respondent-allocated preferences and reversing a 50.5-49.5 deficit on the previous election measure.
Poroti – that’s an interesting link. I’ve kept it for future reference. It was also presented earlier by Space Kiddette. The comments attached to the article are interesting.
The Coalition’s strategy for this term of Parliament has been based on the old saw: “A lie repeated often enough…”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_by_assertion
Of course it helps if you have most of the media backing you up.
Say what you want, Labor said there would be no carbon tax and a surplus, when there is in actual fact a cabon tax and no surplus. In other words, they lied.
Abbott may have supported an ETS, but he clearly changed his mind, hence his ascension to the leadership. He said that a carbon tax were effectively the lesser of two evils.
Not that I would expect lefty hacks to see.
[“I had a mate who was a teacher who said a door was left off”, what codswollop.]
Indeed.
The complaint rate was 3%, of which half was related to preferences (Library v. Science block, green fence rather than a blue one etc.) and the other half was loosely termed “VFM – Value For Money” complaints.
Of which 90% were dealt with and solved to the satisfaction of all.
Read the audited report, turkey, rather than relying on anecdotal evidence from “a mate”.
Amazing.
What do the LNP mob hope to achieve?
[THE drug and corruption scandal enveloping Australian sport has snared six National Rugby League clubs, with the revelation they are named in the Australian Crime Commission’s explosive report.]
It’s probably not too much of a stretch to imagine the Gold Coast Titans are involved given they found hidden urine samples in their toilet plumbing.
Matty D
[there is in actual fact a cabon tax and ]
We have a market of tradable permits with a fixed price for three years”. There is no tax.It seems “rightard hacks” are even slower than “lefty hacks”
[Say what you want, Labor said there would be no carbon tax and a surplus, when there is in actual fact a cabon tax and no surplus. In other words, they lied.]
You have the word “lie” explained to you. It does not apply to Labor in these two circumstances.
The hung parliament killed off the No Carbon Tax assurance.
The GFC flow ons killed off the surplus. Silly to promise it, maybe, but one of the principal complaints of the Liberals has been that Swan cut too MUCH trying to achieve it. Even Hockey admits Swan tried.
MattyD how could the Government deliver a surplus and keep the country out of recession?
While I am here I would like to remind people that the start of the Rudd unpopularity happened ( I think) when he advocated a “big Australia” at a time when there was a lot of resentment for migrants flooding into Sydney’s Western Suburbs.
There still is a lot of hostility for this in places like Penrith where the locals do not distinguish between refugees and other migrants. At this stage we had a population growth of 2.1% because there was a rush to avoid the GFC elsewhwere on the planet.”Students” were studying cooking a lot in dodgy bros technical schools in order to gain residency.
Come to think of it I have seen figures from a university in Melbourne (I forget which) which says that there are about one million workers on all sorts of visas currently in Australia at a time when Morgan Polls says there is a 10% unemployment rate and an 8% underemployment rate .
Matty D – just because someone says something that doesn’t come to pass does not make it a lie. If they believed what they were saying was true at the time, then it wasn’t a lie.
If I ask you what you will be doing tomorrow and you tell me what you intend, what you promise may not come to pass for many reasons outside your control – that doesn’t make you a liar.
Sheesh, where is the critical thinking?
Matty D – I don’t think any of us ‘left wing hacks’ (or ‘far left wingnuts’ as another poster would have it) are going to change your mind.
Presumably you support the Liberals because you’re a social conservative; or perhaps because you believe in free markets (I don’t know why, big corporations don’t); or maybe you have what might be called a ‘Social Darwinist’ approach to life (a slander on Darwin, it’s really Spencerism); or you believe that your interests closely align with those who control big corporations and most of this country’s wealth. Or perhaps you identify with an agglomerations of values that might be called ‘middle class respectability’. Or you might be a patriot. We lefties by and large distrust patriotism and nationalism (well I do, others can speak for themselves). Whatever. The great thing about democracy is we can agree to disagree.
From the point of an individual user, that may be the case, but from the point of view of developing applications for it, it’s not enough to not rip what’s already there out of the ground, it needs to be completed. Someone developing applications for it will want to be able to depend on reliable, high capacity connections to every home. With a fragmented system they’ll simply settle for the lowest common denominator.
TONY Abbott’s office has vetoed his rival Malcolm Turnbull from replacing him on Channel Nine’s Today Show after the Liberal leader dumped his regular spot.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/tony-abbott-bails-on-tv-spot/story-e6frf7jo-1226574519268
With regard to the BER, didn’t most of the problems come from NSW. I seem to recall reading that. If it’s true, put two and two together :P.
Danny Le Roux
The Zone Allowance is based on remoteness (from Government, shopping, rellies, etc) and it’s stil allowed in NT, but it’s not a matter of a different Taxation rate – just an allowance – and it’s quite minimal.
And Abbott keeps running away;
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/tony-abbott-bails-on-tv-spot/story-fndo28a5-1226574519268
Surely the rest of the country will wake up to this fraud?
Won’t they?
Oh snap Victoria…
Victoria
“Mr Abbott’s chief of staff Peta Credlin told staff to stay off Twitter and watch out for waiters with recording devices, citing the covert recording of US Presidential candidate Mitt Romeny at a fundraiser” So they don’t want any of us to know what they really think, or say, or do, or…..
Geez and people say Tone is an alpha male mmm actually more like a wuss
If Tone truly believes he is the best person to run the country then he should ever be camera shy.
Henry
😀
Night all
Now we’re just playing semantics. Call it a lie or not a lie (I call it a lie) Labor made two commitments, and they didn’t honour either one, and their supporters have the audacity to complain about the polls.
Tomorrow’s Nielsen poll will be very interesting.
Smokes are already cost more than $20,00
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/government-could-control-taste-of-cigarettes-raise-taxes-in-battle-against-smoking/story-fncynkc6-1226574529787
Everybody at some point changes their mind or position and to do so is not a lie.
This is why I don’t accept the claim that Howard lied over the GST and the same applies to Jules.
To lie is to say something that you know is untrue at the time of saying it.
Matty D
The BER was a nation wide construction project to build 10,000 buildings across Australia. One or more buildings in every suburb of the country. The Fed Govt was the major customer in this process and subbed out the work to the private sector via Sate Govts. It was the State Govts who managed the detail of the process with varying degrees of success.
As with most large projects, you have to pay respect to the objective. It was to roll out construction projects quickly to save jobs. When you run into problems about results and achievements, always judge them against original objectives, not some invented fantasy of several years later.
It is more than a bit bizarre to go blaming the customer putting up the money for the failures of the builders. The various reports written after the event put the wastage rate at 3% and the total over-budget amount at 6% which I think was characterised at the time as “better than industry best practice” for a 2 year project. You should be cheering the parsimonious success of socialism!
And don’t get me started on the Pink Batts. Again the Govt was the customer and got the blame for the negligent incompetence of the private enterprise installers.
But Scringler, a good Aussie-Italian won’t have a lawn to mow, it’ll be concreted over… (And don’t forget to save the parmesan cheese rinds for the ragu bolognaise).
The Oz covered (the lack of) truth in political advertising laws today http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/truth-an-optional-extra-in-campaign/story-fn59niix-1226574281544
Christian Kerr, I should say is a decent reporter; at least he attends to facts, legal detail and accurate quotes. (I’m the nob quoted through the tail of the story. I suspect the sub-ed spun the headline & first para).
But I was amused to have to point out to Christian that a media which railed against Finkelstein’s call for an independent body overseeing misleading journalism, might at least see the reasons the major parties reject a similar offence/tribunal oversight for truth in political ads.
And was not surprised the Oz didn’t mention the analogy…
Right, so “lie” may not be the right word – a commitment not kept would be a much better description.
The reason why words are important is because they have specific meanings. “Lie” is very emotive and implies deliberate deception, which is obviously a strong negative for a politician.
A politician not keeping a commitment is a slightly different kettle of fish.
Of course politicians should keep commitments they make if they can, but it is an order of magnitude different in terms of “sin”.
As I tried to answer, seriously, initially, the judgment of the Australian public re: carbon price will probably:
* yes, be connected to the “lie” meme
* however, the fact that the negative impact of the carbon price has been all but invisible, and certainly a far cry from the doom claimed by the LNP will be taken into consideration “it’s not really that bad is it?”
* if there is the public will to take genuine action on AGW then I think the public may reach the point of saying “well maybe it was actually for the best” whether or not they buy the “lie”/broken commitment
Further, what the LNP are promising in repealing the carbon price is promising to reopen the whole tortured debate. I think a lot of Australians just want to say “let’s just shut the door on that debate and keep the carbon price in place so we don’t have to go through ALL THAT PALAVER AGAIN”.
If the public are not feeling positive to action on AGW and/or want to punish the broken commitment then of course it’s going to be a problem for the ALP.
I am concerned that Matty D missed Tricot’s challenge which was unfortunately placed at the bottom of the page.
I shall repeat it here as I am also interested in the set of policies that the Liberal members here are most keen to introduce.
[As a mini test, to show how open minded we can be, just provide me with 5-6 ways in which we in Oz will all be better off under a conservative regime.
The only proviso is, you have to exclude the “no mores” by which I mean ‘no more MRRT, CT, boats, low unemployment, low interest rates, cuts to government services’ which is at best, all the Liberals can come up with at the moment.]
kevin rudd shouldn’t have lost his nerve in that video in the first place, tough luck if it gets leaked in this day and age where everything is digital
about time paul keating and bob hawke come out and make a speech denigrating him, calling for his retirement or even better – expulsion from the party. that is certain to at least knock some sense into him and alan griffin.
the party is all the healthier without him, good riddance. that one man is honestly the only thing that stands in between labor and a once in a lifetime landslide win
more on BER for Matty D
I don’t know about other states, (I thought there problems in Vic?) but there was a guy called Bob Leece in NSW who monitored all of the BER projects in NSW and did reports showing the costs were below industry standard cost at each stage of the construction.
He also reported that most of the problem schools belonged to a group of 55 that no-one wanted to tender for, because the sites had problems or were remote or whatever reason was used. He said these were bundled into one large tender on the principle that no school should miss out, and the tender was granted to Reed Constructions. Leece described the amount paid as probably excessive but warranted on equity grounds. It was these schools that dominated the Ray Hadley/Australian front page stories.
I wonder what happened to Reed Constructions?
Failed building group Reed Constructions may well have been trading while insolvent for several months before it officially entered administration, the liquidator of the company has suggested.
Liquidator Mark Robinson of PPB Advisory told SmartCompany this morning that although an investigation is still ongoing, it may very well be Reed was insolvent as early as March.
The company had been in dispute with the New South Wales Government over some projects. The report even says this may have contributed to the company’s collapse.
http://www.smartcompany.com.au/construction-and-engineering/051055-liquidator-reveals-reed-constructions-may-have-been-insolvent-for-months-before-collapse.html
Bemused @# 5870
”But it is absolute folly to then go and make them rock solid ‘promises’ when they are subject to revision due to all sorts of exogenous factors over which neither Treasury or the Government has any control. It is a trap for mugs.”
You don’t get it do you.
Unless you make that rock solid guarantee then you are not taking ownership. You are saying that you inflation figures are wrong. You are saying that your unemployment figures are wrong. You are saying that you don’t have a clue what will be spent on health education etc. You are saying that the entire budget is not worth a can of beans.
You are saying that the figures in your budget are wrong and cannot be trusted.
That leads to economic and political death.
Jeremy Sear has a theory on that:
http://somethingwonky.com/podcast/2013/2/8/31-tony-abbott-is-trying-to-pull-a-fast-one.html
Obama’s License to Kill…and fight endless wars with Drones.__________________Wars without end
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/obamas-license-to-kill-999/
New thread.
Henry@6345
I hope I don’t shock you Henry as we have different opinions on Rudd, but I don’t see why he continues to pursue this. I don’t think there is any interest by voters in it and I doubt most of Caucus cares.
Re bolognese sauce—pork and veal mince is the only one to use.
Made saltimbocca last night, too late saw someone had drunk the half bottle of white wine I had seen in the fridge earlier. So bubbled half a stubby Maibock into the frypan with the veal, sage and prosciutto, tbs sherry vinegar as well. Perfect! Different but perfect!
Big news: renewables now cheaper than coal and gas.
http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/renewables-now-cheaper-than-coal-and-gas-in-australia-62268
The modeling from the BNEF team in Sydney found that new wind farms could supply electricity at a cost of $80/MWh –compared with $143/MWh for new build coal, and $116/MWh for new build gas-fired generation.
These figures include the cost of carbon emissions, but BNEF said even without a carbon price, wind energy remained 14 per cent cheaper than new coal and 18 per cent cheaper than new gas.
“The perception that fossil fuels are cheap and renewables are expensive is now out of date”,
The Abbott bill is a dead giveaway – after the election he can pass through both houses he controls a bill to delete the letters ‘mis’ from misuse. Perfect IR policy.