Newspoll: 58-42 to Coalition

The Australian reports the Coalition’s lead in the latest fortnightly Newspoll has blown out to 58-42 from a below-trend 52-48 last time.

The Australian reports the Coalition’s lead in Newspoll has blown out to 58-42, from primary votes of 30% for Labor (down four on the previous fortnight’s result) and 50% for the Coalition (up six) and 10% for the Greens (down one). There has also been a big move to Tony Abbott on preferred prime minister, going from 42-38 behind to 43-35 ahead – remembering that the result of the previous poll was well above the trend for Labor. More to follow.

UPDATE: Julia Gillard has recorded her worst personal ratings since September 2011, while Tony Abbott’s ratings are the best they have been since the middle of that year. Gillard is down six on approval to 26% and up eight on disapproval to 65%, while Tony Abbott is up three to 39% and down five to 50%.

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.

2,831 comments on “Newspoll: 58-42 to Coalition”

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  1. @GP/2441

    It’s not MORE spending that is required, but it’s where it’s applied.

    The Coalition Party does less because that’s what they always DO.

  2. rummel

    [No, it’s a BBQ stopper.]

    What if its too cold for a BBQ? I know you live up north but it gets pretty cold in Adelaide between now and the election.

    It will definitely stop something if it happens. 👿

    I should add that I have almost no super but I hope to start putting money in it over the next few years.

  3. [I am not arguing against nothing. The way this government has sold Gonski is primarily to do with the additional billions in funding.]
    Well duh, the report finds that Australia spends significantly less in terms of GDP on education than other developed countries. It also finds that developed and developing Asian countries have massively increased investment in education, which means we are direct competition with better resourced education systems.

    But of course what you did in the post above was write “forget Gonski” which means you just dismissed the entire report out of hand, so it is a bit rich for you to now say that you are just dismissing the government’s position on the report.

  4. The problem with gonski isn’t spending more money on disadvantaged kids its cowardice in refusing to cut back on excessive funding to private schools. Why does a kid in mt druittt have less spent on them then a kid in Waverley ?

  5. [2432
    ShowsOn

    I don’t mind cutting. More efficiency dividends and more mass sackings. Delay the NDIS, forget Gonski. It’s really very easy to reduce the welfare state.]

    The term “welfare state” is a very outmoded one, in my opinion.

    GP, you should reflect a moment on the benefits that every individual derives from the education provided to all others in a community.

    Consider, for example, what it would be like if you were the only person who was literate. What point would there be to literacy in this case? Where would new learning come from if there were no other educated persons? How could learning spread if there were no other readers and writers?

    Clearly, the more that is done to improve the education of each citizen, the more all others will also gain because learning has its own inherent multiplying and self-replicating effects. So the benefits – cultural, psychological, economic – of education are both socially-distributed and socially-realised. This is the best argument for increasing social spending on education.

    It is also very obvious that once a person has been “endowed” with learning, they have the capacity to create new learning for themselves. The creative capacity of our species means investments made in education generate exponentially increasing returns over time. This means the more that is spent on human education, and the earlier in a person’s life that investments are made, the greater will be the economic returns to investors – that is, to the community as a whole.

    This is practically the entire story of the industrial and technological revolution and of the enormous expansion in economic welfare that this revolution has enabled.

    Arguing against education spending is like arguing for a future with fewer services, goods, technologies or other resources. It is really arguing for a future pay cut, not only for others, but for yourself.

  6. The best thing about Gillards Super mess is that she can now not only be pictured as a threat to family’s in the short term but a threat to family’s in 30 to 40 years time.. And that threat can only be removed by giving Abbott the senate and the power to clean up the Gillard shamozzle post haste after the election.

  7. The interesting thing to consider that if the Libs applied the same standards of proper management during their reign as they now insist applies to Labor, they should have left a surplus of $200 billion and not the trifling $20 bill that Costello boasts about.

    You only have to read the menu commentary from Costello regarding the 2004 election platform to realise the Libs weren’t in to restraint.

  8. meher

    [All to pay for pay rises for whinging schoolteachers who have 13 weeks holiday a year. ]

    Er, what?

    Sort out your Federal and State responsibilities, sunshine.

    Federal money does not and cannot go to paying teachers.

  9. No 2459

    Nonsense ESJ. Public school students receive the overwhelming majority of federal and state funding. It’s an irrefutable fact.

  10. [No 2457

    I note you’ve dropped your silly spending ratios argument.]
    I never presented a “spending ratios argument” so you are arguing against nothing (as usual).

  11. [Nonsense ESJ. Public school students receive the overwhelming majority of federal and state funding. It’s an irrefutable fact.]
    And so they should because that’s where most students go!

    The Gonski report actually found that some independent schools are funded as high as 80% by the federal government, which means they are really “independent schools” in name only.

  12. The problem with gonski isn’t spending more money on disadvantaged kids its cowardice in refusing to cut back on excessive funding to private schools.

    Agree – surely funds can be found for supporting the disadvantaged by reducing funds where they are not needed, especially to schools that screen out the disadvantaged – people pay so their kids don’t have to mix with them. They have the right to make that choice but I see no reason to subsidise it.

    Funny, GP hasn’t mentioned government subsidies of private choices in education and health insurance.

  13. While we are debating Labor’s lack of money, I would like to reflect back to NSW LIBs under ofatty who found a Billon dollars through an accounting issues 🙂

    Talk about a problem 🙂

  14. GP, I realise this is all a bit of a game for you….the languid dismissal of learning, as if it is an indulgence that cannot count, a mere bonbon that will not be missed. But your ideological conceit does you no credit. It is nothing but the fatuous indulgence of the spoiled.

  15. guytaur,

    Yep, done that. Waxed lyrical about the vital importance of education – whether kids be black, white, or an odd shade of brindle … whatever.

    Also called for equality. Oh, and no wars. Anywhere.

    Resisted the temptation to call for all religions to be declared morally bankrupt and placed into administration.

    Not confident that one has legs.

  16. [The problem with gonski isn’t spending more money on disadvantaged kids its cowardice in refusing to cut back on excessive funding to private schools. Why does a kid in mt druittt have less spent on them then a kid in Waverley ?]

    They don’t. Children in public schools get more funding per head than those in private schools.

  17. Checking in late here. Is the superannuation shock any better than the media shock? My immediate impression is that other issues would be better fought right now, 6 months before an election.

    Maybe deep reaching retirement issues with unknown fear factors amongst baby boomers should be prosecuted early in the term with charasmatic leadership, rather than in these cicumstances.

  18. GP

    which, at the moment, is a decision entirely made by the States.

    That’s like saying that your employer is responsible for the way you spend your wages.

  19. No 2484

    Ah no, the Constitution allows the feds to attach strings to the grants they give to the states. The feds can and do this regularly, Labor or Liberal.

  20. No Rummel, Baird through his incompetence misplaced, mislaid and then found 1 billion. If it was Swanny it would be a sackable offence apparently.

  21. ESJ,

    You’re right and you’re wrong.

    The problemis that Federal Governments are responsible for Private Schools while the states are responsible for the Public system.

    First order of priority is an honest discussion of how much public money in total s spent on education. Then you can actually work out the per capita spending.

    Second priority is to look at why Public schools have mediocre facilites and Public Schools have first class facilities.

    I suspect that the answer is how much parents are prepared to pay for a “quality” education in the Private system compared to the Public System.

    The Public system parents still refuse to pay annual feess of approximately $500 per year. I know some Private schools are levying fes of $25,000 per year, plus books, plus uniform plus excursions and school trips.

    If you’re looking for the real reason for the discrepancy then you don’t have to look much passed the parents ability/capacity/preparedness to pay extra.

    I should say I don’t think that everyone should pay $25k a year. However, I reckon $1000 might be a bit light on.

  22. [ShowsOn, see your 2418 and my 2242.]
    Those are the posts that simply pointed out that you can’t tell when one number is bigger or smaller than another number.

  23. [Ah no, the Constitution allows the feds to attach strings to the grants they give to the states. The feds can and do this regularly, Labor or Liberal.]
    And state governments are always getting legal advice to find the best ways around the strings.

    That’s how the Victorian government cut funding for TAFEs for example.

  24. [2488
    Henry
    Posted Wednesday, March 27, 2013 at 9:59 pm | PERMALINK
    No Rummel, Baird through his incompetence misplaced, mislaid and then found 1 billion. If it was Swanny it would be a sackable offence apparently.]

    I don’t think swan will ever get sacked if has not been sacked by now. MRRT ….. 🙂

  25. I remember in the Kennett years a union rep coming to our school and trying to get teachers worked up about threats to their super. No takers.

    Most people have very little real understanding about super and don’t care much about it (there may be an upspark in interest as they near retirement).

    Certainly true of our household, where my OH is the one who reads my super correspondence – I just chuck it in the drawer.

    I don’t think posters here are (by and large) representative of the ‘ordinary worker’ when it comes to this issue.

  26. GG yes agree but why should the govt top up schools which have ample to fund their needs? Indefensible.

    After all the money these schools make is tax free too

  27. No 2494

    That will always happen, but the point is that the feds impose strings for the obvious reason that they want the states to be accountable.

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