Newspoll quarterly aggregate: January-March

The latest Newspoll quarterly aggregates have Labor down three points in Victoria, two in New South Wales and Western Australia, and one in Queensland and South Australia.

Tomorrow’s Australian will bring Newspoll’s quarterly aggregate of its polling from January to March, with breakdowns by state, age and metropolitan/country. GhostWhoVotes has thus far provided us with the national aggregates plus two-party results for each state, which suggest the swing against Labor has been spread fairly evenly:

Two Party Preferred: ALP 46 (-2) L/NP 54 (+2)
Primary Votes: ALP 33 (-2) L/NP 46 (+3) GRN 10 (-1)
Gillard: Approve 32 (-5) Disapprove 56 (+5)
Abbott: Approve 34 (+4) Disapprove 55 (-4)
Preferred PM: Gillard 40 (-5) Abbott 39 (+6)

Federal 2PP in NSW: ALP 46 (-2) L/NP 54 (+2)
Federal 2PP in VIC: ALP 51 (-3) L/NP 49 (+3)
Federal 2PP in QLD: ALP 41 (-1) L/NP 59 (+1)
Federal 2PP in WA: ALP 43 (-2) L/NP 57 (+2)
Federal 2PP in SA: ALP 49 (-1) L/NP 51 (+1)

More to follow.

UPDATE: Full tables here.

UPDATE 2 (2/4/2013): Essential Research has Labor dropping two points on the primary vote for the second week in a row, and this time it’s taken two-party preferred with it, the Coalition’s lead blowing out from 54-46 to 56-44. The Coalition is up two to 49% with the Greens steady on 11%. Also covered are the attributes of the major parties and leaders, with Labor’s and Julia Gillard’s ratings bad and getting worse across the board, most notably with a nine point increase to 82% in the number thinking Labor “divided”, while the Liberal Party records much the same results as a year ago, but with divided down five to 32%. Readers may be shocked to learn that more think Julia Gillard “aggressive&#148: (up nine to 55%) than Tony Abbott (down six to 49%). Enthusiasm for an early election has increased, with an eight-point increase since the end of January to 43% and a four-point drop in those thinking the government should run a full term to 47%. There’s also some interesting material on social class and where the parties fit in.

UPDATE 3 (2/4/2013): The fifth Morgan multi-mode poll offers more evidence that Labor’s position has further deteriorated in the wake of last fortnight’s abortive leadership ructions, with Labor down half a point on the primary vote to 30%, the Coalition up 2.5% to and the Greens up half a point to 11%. The Coalition’s two-party lead is out from 57-43 to 59-41 on respondent-allocated preferences and from 56-44 to 57.5-42.5 on previous election preferences.

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.

940 comments on “Newspoll quarterly aggregate: January-March”

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  1. GP

    Actually if the NDIS is implemented as the productivity commission recommended then it is very affordable.

    The current welfare sector is the problem and just focusing on pensions is not going to fix the problem.

  2. [though I don’t think it’s in any way healthy to think about a war’s effect on election outcomes in countries it doesn’t directly relate to.]

    It certainly isn’t healthy, I agree.

    Not only do you wind up scaring the less sophisticated among us into thinking our nation will end up in yet another pointless war not of our making, but you end up sounding deranged.

    Who can forget the bellicose News ltd commentators who locked and loaded themselves behind the Howard govt as it forged ahead with a war with Iraq based on false premises?

    Australia can’t make those mistakes again.

  3. A reverse mortgage is a good idea to fund a nursing home bed as the owner is unlikely to need the home again. In practice it would be for a year maybe two until a decision can be made about long term residence. If the owner is going to stay in the nursing home then the property can be sold, pay out the mortgage and give some cash to the owner. Everyone wins.

    The only people who don’t like the idea are the ones inline to inherit. They are the ones who vote which is why nothing will ever happen about reverse mortgages.

  4. I have been expecting, and then hoping, for an Abbott meltdown. A few minor ones have happened but the reaction of the general public to them highlights the fact that people have made up their minds and they do not want Gillard.

    As Essential showed today, Abbott beats Gillard on every quality except intelligence, where he is not far behind. This is a death knell for Gillard. If she was popular or respected, there is an outside chance of winding back the 2 million vote lead Abbott currently has.

    With the Essential findings she has no hope of winding back anything much. This is perfectly in keeping with my “real world” experience too (having had solid lefties / unionists tell me what they think of Gillard).

    So, I cannot say that I expect Abbott to implode (thereby providing a path for a moderate). I guess, you would have to assume that if Abbott can manage the difficult terrain of LOTO for 4 years, he will absolutely revel in the Prime Ministership….so a quick dumping probably not a massive chance either.

    One can always live in hope though 🙂

  5. confessions

    “Who can forget the bellicose News ltd commentators who locked and loaded themselves behind the Howard govt as it forged ahead with a war with Iraq based on false premises?”

    Full disclosure, I supported and continue to support the intervention in Iraq. War, if you will. I recognize I’m outnumbered on this but don’t really care.

    That said, any premise “made up” about North Korea is likely to be true (or understated) so long as it’s negative.

    For instance: we should invade North Korea because uh… they sew duck’s beaks into the mouths of dissidents. Who among us would be surprised if that actually happens?

  6. social disasters:
    [Eurostat said Greece had the euro zone’s highest unemployment rate: 26.4 percent unemployment in December, the latest month for which data are available. A sovereign debt crisis, and the tax increases and spending cuts that followed it, have wrecked the Greek economy. An astonishing 58.4 percent of Greek youth were classified as unemployed, Eurostat reported.

    Spain, where the economy has also contracted sharply following the collapse of the global credit bubble, posted the second-highest unemployment rate in the euro zone: 26.3 percent in February.]

  7. No 807

    People have been saying for years that Abbott is like Latham, that’ll he’ll implode. Hasn’t happened. What has happened is the implosion of Labor instead.

  8. Mod Lib

    Yes, hope is another word for faith but you appear to recognize your faith in a Turnbull turnover is not founded in any basis of fact or even likelihood. If Abbott gets in, I think he’s there to stay until turfed out by a myopic and inward-looking voting public.

    So we’ll both have to wait a while. 😉

  9. Mod Lib 807 Entertaining to see the reality finally dawning on a crusty old fashioned Liberal of an Abbott led LNP. Kinda like, oh my Giddy God, what have I done….?

    Many other Australians will be considering the same in the coming months. Hence my cautious optimism.

  10. The Catholic Church is even less willing or capable of reform than the Labor Right (connection?). Let them collapse and see where their god is then.

  11. absolutetwaddle:

    Not sure what your point is. You supported a war with Iraq on spurious grounds, therefore would support another with North Korea on similar grounds?

    I say again: calm down.

  12. [jaundiced view
    Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2013 at 9:55 pm | PERMALINK
    This from QandA on Monday. Where do these catholic creeps get off? (no, no need to answer that):
    http://atheistfoundation.org.au/media-release/1854/%5D

    Actually, Josh whatsisname had the best reaction to this. He is a gay comedian and when Tony asked him for his reaction to the Catholic chap’s comments about homosexuality being “a warp in creation” (as opposed to God’s will), Josh laughed and said “Well, I don’t think I am a warp in God’s creation if that is what you are asking me Tony” to rapturous laughter!

    To mock the Catholic Church’s 18th century views on these issues (also womens rights for example) is the best approach. Indignation gets you nowhere. Laughter gets the public on your side in a big way.

  13. [One can always live in hope though]

    A better than fair chance of being a one termer, I think. The Libs should have really taken the axe to the roster after losing in 2007.

    Old ideas will be soon exposed as they try to turn back the tide of time.

  14. No 819

    I don’t think anyone can credibly accept anything Margo Kingston says or anyone who thinks Abbott is a hater of women.

  15. 822 – wrong, it wasnt Margo Kingston that said Abbott’s women hater, it was Susan Mitchell.

    That is just one of his many “sins”

    Abbott has gotten away with his “sins” as a LOTO. He wont get away as PM. It will come back and haunt him big time.

  16. confessions

    “Not sure what your point is. You supported a war with Iraq on spurious grounds, therefore would support another with North Korea on similar grounds?

    I say again: calm down.”

    A war on North Korea would be just on pretty much every conceivable count. The only problem is the practicalities involved, namely seeing the entirety of South Korea and Japan shelled and/or nuked to oblivion.

    So yeah the sovereign nation of North Koea is safe from my evil imperialist designs because they’ve successfully held those two peace-loving nations to ransom. Rest assured, Kim Jong Un is safe.

  17. [The Finnigans
    Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2013 at 10:06 pm | PERMALINK
    People have been saying for years that Abbott is like Latham, that’ll he’ll implode. Hasn’t happened. What has happened is the implosion of Labor instead.

    812 – it’s a time bomb, it’s just a matter of time- here]

    Finns:

    At some stage over the course of this year, perhaps it will be Sep 14th @ 8pm or so, but perhaps sooner, you will come to the realisation that the Tony bomb has already gone off and blown up the ALP’s chances, half its seats, and many if not most of its up and comers.

  18. Mod Lib,

    I agree. I also don’t think it helps to alienate people who believe in other aspects of Catholicism, but not necessarily some of the more… outdated ones today.

  19. Our next PM is an old DLP man. I think he might actually believe that Workchoices was unfair. I also believe that Tony Abbott genuinely wants to improve the lot of indigenous Australians, although the Coalition’s core constituency couldn’t give a rat’s on that issue. Tony Abbott is more populist than dry in economic matters. In fact, for the latter, you could probably say the same about John Howard. As for privatisation, the NBN, the environment – well Tony just goes with the flow.

    Now Big Business are probably not too fussed about spending on middle class welfare. That’s just for the most part churning PAYE taxpayers’ earnings and directing some of it to the benefit of some vested interests inside the tent – the superannuation industry, medical specialists and private schools, for example. But if Tony Abbott does not do the bidding of big business on industrial relations, the NBN, privatisations, winding back public health and education then he’ll be replaced by someone who will. Come on down, Malcolm Turnbull, Australia’s answer to Mitt Romney. And there will be no call from the Murdochracy or the rest of the media for Tony Abbott’s reinstatement.

  20. [Rest assured, Kim Jong Un is safe.]

    Until China stops subsidising his delusional lifestyle. I don’t know how likely that is, though.

  21. Bugler

    “I also don’t think it helps to alienate people who believe in other aspects of Catholicism, but not necessarily some of the more… outdated ones today.”

    It’s all outdated.

    As for the belief in the Trinity (three things that are one thing but really three things… but really one thing… three things NO WAIT ONE THING) and virgin births and transubstantiation and saints and demons and heaven and hell and Popes and miracles and funny hats etc etc it’s all so OBVIOUSLY fucking ridiculous they SHOULD feel ‘alienated’ for believing it.

    Ahem. Sorry.

  22. [So, I cannot say that I expect Abbott to implode (thereby providing a path for a moderate). I guess, you would have to assume that if Abbott can manage the difficult terrain of LOTO for 4 years, he will absolutely revel in the Prime Ministership….so a quick dumping probably not a massive chance either.]

    He won’t be doing too much revelling if he is unable to fulfil the promises he has made and if the economy turns to crap, with interest rates, inflation and unemployment all rising as a result of his policies.

    And just because he is more popular than Gillard – after the hatchet job done on her by his mates at News Limited – does not mean he will be a popular PM. If things turn sour he could go down like a shower of shit much faster than you think.

  23. No 830

    They are some truly awful numbers for Labor and Gillard. They even went backwards on ‘looking after concerns of working people’ – their core flapping constituency! 😀

    I am going to enjoy Election Night 🙂

  24. No 832

    You are still blaming News Ltd for Labor’s woes? Puh-lease. Three spills in as many years, you can’t blame News Ltd for that serial incompetence and penchant for self-immolation.

  25. absolutetwaddle quoted Rossmore:

    [Rossmore: “Australians have far more sense.” {than to vote for Abbott}

    then continued:

    They really don’t. Accept this and things start making sense.

    ]

    If Australians did have more sense, it would be pretty interesting. It would be worth finding out how, despite the many hostile constraints, Australians had by and large developed a majority of people with sufficient sense to see the Libs as the venal, shifty, lying crackpots and doctrinaire misanthropes they are. All the evidence suggests that only a minority have picked this up and the rest are either tribally committed to said venal, shifty, lying crackpots and doctrinaire misanthropes or currently befuddled by the Murdoch-led spin and don’t quite know what to think.

    If the ALP begins to come to its sense and speak insistently to the needs of working people and the clear and present danger of selecting a bunch of venal, shifty, lying crackpots and doctrinaire misanthropes for executive government, perhaps they will win, or not do as badly.

    But simply waving one’s hands and appealing to Australians’ good sense is simply vacuous patriotism. P T Barnam’s comment of Americans, that nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the public is being used by the Libs and Murdoch with devastating effect.

  26. absolutetwaddle:

    As many here know, I am not a Catholic. However, I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with Catholic (or Christian) philosophy per se. It is a view that the Universe was created by an all powerful God, you have to worship him, and the Catholic Church is the tradition which dates back to the disciples (thats what they think anyway) and Jesus himself. They say there is a spirit realm (we all have spirits apparently) and so that is the third element of God.

    I am not saying that I believe any of it, I don’t (although Jesus may have been a God, may have died and come back in another form, and may have performed what were considered miracles….I don’t know, but it doesn’t make any difference anyway).

    Catholicism COULD be right though. You cannot say that it is completely impossible.

  27. Speaking of the catholic cult, have people seen that the NSW police have refused whistleblower status to Peter Fox, serving member and key witness at the Royal Commission? He knows heaps. Questions for O’Farrell to answer tomorrow.

  28. No 837

    Fran, with all due respect, the argument since as far back as 2009 from the left has been that the government needs to communicate better.

    It has consistently failed, first because people got sick of Rudd talking absolute crap and second because people simply lost faith and stopped believing Labor. Further, Labor stopped believing in itself so much so that it now likes trying to top leaders once a year.

  29. Mod Lib

    “Catholicism COULD be right though. You cannot say that it is completely impossible.”

    So could Julia Gillard. Convinced yet or are you just going to continue being a sarky git about her?

    If it’s the latter you’ll see where I’m coming from.:p

  30. Flipper Boy

    [Abbott has gotten away with his “sins” as a LOTO. He wont get away as PM. It will come back and haunt him big time.]

    Have you given up on Gillard?

  31. Essential on Gillard:

    Arrogant: 55% (up 8%)
    Superficial: 55% (up 9%)
    Narrow-minded: 55% (up 10%)
    Aggressive: 55% (up 9%)
    Erratic: 55% (up 15%)
    A capable leader: 37% (down 13%)
    Understands the problems facing Australia: 37% (down 10%)

  32. [Generic Person
    Posted Tuesday, April 2, 2013 at 10:25 pm | Permalink
    No 832

    You are still blaming News Ltd for Labor’s woes? Puh-lease. Three spills in as many years, you can’t blame News Ltd for that serial incompetence and penchant for self-immolation.]

    If you truly believe News Ltd hasn’t been gunning for Gillard at every opportunity while at the same time helping to polish the Abbott turd you haven’t been paying attention.

  33. Yes, clearly the answer to the government’s electoral funk is the invasion of North Korea after a belligerent tirade from PM Gillard as to the rights of the families of Korean 457 workers in western Sydney.

    She will call on, and get, the co-operation of Niugini and Samoa. The “Coalition of the Pacific” will invade. Many canoes will be lost. When the last test tube containing sulphur dioxide is destroyed, the forces will paddle back home to rapturous welcomes and victory at forthcoming elections will be assured.

  34. My read on the Essential attributes result is that there are a lot of voters who are now so anti-Gillard that they will attribute negatives to her without rationally thinking through whether they are fair calls or not.

    daretotread@707

    Kevin B

    Yes I know theoretically the essential poll could be in a very wide range but if you make the assumption that the results from week one are the ACTUAL for that week, then the rolling average thereafter you could come up with an answer.

    I wouldn’t make that assumption. When dealing with a single result in isolation it’s more likely false than true. Even when dealing with the same fortnightly result twice in a row it’s tempting to assume the middle reading matched that result but I doubt the chance it does is better than 50%.

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