GhostWhoVotes tweets that the latest Nielsen poll, conducted for Fairfax from a sample of 1400, has the Coalition’s lead blowing out to 57-43 after a relatively mild 54-46 last month. The primary votes are 29% for Labor (down three) and 47% for the Coalition (up three). That becomes 50-50 under a Kevin Rudd leadership scenario, with primary votes of 40% for Labor and 42% for the Coalition. The poll also finds Julia Gillard crashing on preferred prime minister from 46-46 to 50-41 in Tony Abbott’s favour.
I don’t normally give too much coverage to the internals in these polls, but there is very interesting movement beyond the margin of error in the gender breakdowns. Whereas all voting intention figures and personal ratings are little changed on the last poll for women, Labor’s primary vote among men is down seven to 24%, with Gillard down eight on approval to 28% and up ten on disapproval to 69%, and Tony Abbott’s lead as preferred prime minister widening from 48-42 to 56-35. The other noteworthy feature of the breakdowns is a big movement away from Labor among respondents under 40, but little change in the older cohorts.
We also had a Galaxy poll of 996 respondents published in the Sunday News Limited papers, which had the Coalition’s lead up from 54-46 to 55-45, from primary votes of 32% for Labor (down two), 47% for the Coalition (up one) and 11% for the Greens (up one). With Kevin Rudd as leader, the primary votes became 38% for Labor, 43% for the Coalition and 11% for the Greens, with two-party preferred at 50-50. Nonetheless, only 34% said Gillard should make way for Rudd with 52% opposed (32-60 among Labor and 33-51 among Coalition supporters).
UPDATE (Essential Research): Essential Research has Labor down a point on the primary vote to 35%, but is otherwise unchanged on last week with the Coalition on 47%, the Greens on 8% and two-party preferred at 54-46. Respondents were also asked who they voted for in 2010, an exercise which is generally recognised as being blighted by the tendency of some to mis-remember having voted for the winning party. Sure enough, once “didn’t vote” and “don’t know” are excluded, the results are 44% for Labor, 42% for the Coalition and 8% for the Greens, compared with election results of 38.0%, 43.6% and 11.8%. Respondents saying they had changed their vote were given a list of choices for why, but the samples here are very small and no clear pattern emerges from the results.
The poll also inquires about importance of election issues and the best party to handle them, which for some reason has “management of the economy” declining in importance since February (47% nominated it as one of their three most important issues, compared with 62% in February), with “political leadership” increasing (from 14% to 22%). Labor has gone substantially backwards as the best party for political leadership, along with environmental and population issues. Further questions on asylum seekers have 38% rating the Coalition as having the best policy against 13% for Labor and 7% for the Greens. A five-point scale of the issue’s importance has 37% rating it in the middle, 34% as important, and 24% as less important or not important.
UPDATE 2 (Morgan): The weekly Morgan multi-mode poll defies Nielsen in recording a shift to Labor on last week’s result, their primary vote up two to 33% with the Coalition down 1.5% to 44.5% and the Greens down 0.5% to 9%. The Coalition two-party lead narrows from 56-44 to 54.5-45.5 on previous election preferences, and from 56-44 to 53.5-46.5 on respondent allocated preferences.
briefly @ 3293
Why do you put up posts on economic matters? I assume it is to inform people.
I put up the post you referred to because Boerwar was continually putting up misleading posts in relation to the current bushfires in Colorado. How did he reply to my challenge on the science? “Refer it to Abbott”. Sorry, that’s pathetic.
Don’t you think that in relation to “Climate Change’ we should be informed by science, not exaggerated, fear mongering propaganda?
Here is an AGW quizz question for youses:
Tropical fish used to swirl down in the great southwards eddies in summer and some of them would swirl right into Sydney Harbour and then die in the cold winter water.
Now some of them are surviving over winter and are breeding in Sydney Harbour because of (a) CFCs (b) Birthers (c) creationists (d) dinosaurs standing on babies’ heads (e) cosmic rays (f) variations in insolation (g) la ninas and el ninos or (h) fraudulent scientists rorting government money.
You really should learn to use Google before posting nonsense you obviously don’t even understand. The rest of us can.
Gauss
the authors aren’t discussing climate change and its impacts, hence there is little direct reference to it.
It is clear, however, that they have accepted that the world is warming and will continue to do so.
Read the quotes I selected – one demonstrates a clear acceptance that warming is happening, and the other the authors’ belief that the most likely scenario is continuation of the drought because they expect the present warming trend to be extended due to this.
Scientists in Australia faced the same dilemna during the last drought – they simply couldn’t tell whether it was part of the normal cycle or signified a permanent shift in the weather patterns.
These authors are playing it safe, of course, and looking at several likely scenarios. However, they make it clear that continued warming is the one they see as most likely.
WWP
The bizarre thing is that the Gillardistas don’t want their own policies enacted as Rudd and Gillard are basically identical on policy.
The whole thing is about personal and power politics, not policy.
Carey
I’ve got wary enough that if I’m posting more than a sentence I write it in notepad and then copy and paste it into PB.
Often you think it’s lost but it’s just slow to appear.
A couple of refreshes and it will generally turn up.
Gaffhook
I would have been a Barack barracker , not so sure now . Despite his sax playing Slick Willie introduced a raft of laws that the Repugs had dreamed of for years. Not so cute and cuddly as he was made out to be.
Dio
I wouldn’t get too excited. Australia cricket has long since left a place where what they did actually meant anything real.
It is now a nursery for the IPL and a machine for selling beer.
Dio
Murdoch is coming to take us away HaHa, HoHo HeHe.
@Dio/3350
Murdoch in control of Nine now?
Dio
Could you imagine Roo opening the batting.
If he gets to be a selector he will definitely pick himself.
She’s not. She may be talking to potential donors behind closed but she’s actually been lying low. Especially as there are some accusations being thrown at the State Department right now, so she doesn’t want that to explode outwards by being hugely visible.
She will announce her intent by the end of next year. If she decides to run, she’ll win the primaries easily. In the general, OTOH, it will entirely depend on her campaigning (obviously), her opponent, the state of the country and the attitude towards the Obama adminstration. One thing that might make her decide to decline is the bad track record of candidates who are nominated to succeed a retiring president of their party. Also, the sexist, hateful rancour thrown at her is going to be unbelievable! (Not a reason not to run – if anything, it’s a sign she should, so she can prove them wrong – but she may not be in the mood to subject herself to that.)
There will be a lot of pressure on her to announce as early as possible (i.e. immediately after the midterms), so that other candidates who think they may have a shot if she isn’t in the field but don’t if she is, can make their moves.
So on that logic replacing Gillard would be both acceptable and responsible … you don’t have a clue … i’ve heard of group think, but really this is group insanity.
And because of Gillards Carbon Tax, little fish like Nemo will be killed in Sydney again 🙁
I agree Diog and you know I’m not one to unnecessarily agree with your good self.
Gaffhook
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gbvcEkuFFI
CTar1, I made a post before, playfully stirring Diogenes for being superstitious. It never appeared.
While I have had the slow-to-appear posts, this is the third one that’s completely vanished (it wasn’t censored, as it wasn’t in any way bad and William tends to just snip bad posts, rather than delete them from existence)
I will take your Notepad advice! Good idea!
Interesting post on US politics Carey Moore.
They certainly do things differently. However, I remain fascinated the way that Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama have transformed their relationship since the stormy days of the primaries in the lead-up to the 2008 election.
Things got very tense between these two very talented people, as you no doubt recall. And yet they have managed to work together constructively and I have no doubt that Obama will campaign very effectively for Hilary should she win the Democratic nomination for 2016.
At the risk of causing your ire again, surely we can only shake our heads in sadness that two other talented leaders, Rudd and Gillard have been unable to resolve their differences and work together effectively.
Diog
Of course they are. Because with Labor, unlike the Liberals, the party determines the policy and it’s up to caucus to deliver it.
So change the leader and you don’t change the policies.
The test for the leader is whether or not they can deliver them.
Occasionally – very, very occasionally – the leader rams through a policy despite caucus, or announces one without consulting them — but even a leader as popular with everyone (caucus AND the populace) as Bracks faced severe criticism for doing so.
So policy content isn’t the test, delivery is.
Those 500 Coloradians who had their houses burned in a record fire with some record temperatures around and the other Coloradians who had their wheat crops smashed by drought and the other Coloradians who watched their conifers get munched by bark beetles probably mostly used to agree with the Gausses of the world. They were probably like the Liberals: 66% of them probably thought that 97% of the worlds client scientists were just plain stupid, if not corrupt.
The real beauty of it is that all the Coloradian human suffering is not in vain: For every $10 billion of climate-related damage 1% of Americans change their minds and get to thinking that AGW is real. Last year around 11% of Americans changed their mind about it. You can figure out the US climate bill for yourself.
I have updated:
Federal Labor Getting Smashed All Over Tasmania
http://kevinbonham.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/federal-labor-getting-smashed-all-over.html
Update covers the discrepancy between a ReachTEL showing Labor losing Lyons 59:41 and seat betting still showing Labor as $1.50 favourites. I also look at some general and specific seat betting statistics. It seems that punters just do not think Labor’s position is going to improve since projected seat tallies are about the same as what current polling is pointing to.
R
I already explained why that one is below you. That is like having fire trucks driven by L platers. They sort of get it but they can also sort of get you into deep water.
IT’s Freezing here in Queensland, can someone please turn on the Global Warming. Thanks
Where in Queensland are you Sean Tisme?
Boerwar
Meanwhile in Pomgolia….
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jun/12/farmers-fail-weather-wheat-crop
..and one of the things which finally put me off Rudd was the suggestion that he would overturn policy positions which had been through the process of debate within the party and within caucus.
For anyone with any understanding of the way the party operates, the idea that one person could dismiss party policy on a whim like that is totally abhorrent.
Dio
Bon voyage. I trust that we will be getting some good posts from o/s?
Boerwar
Meanwhile in Pomgolia
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jun/12/farmers-fail-weather-wheat-crop
So an MRRT that doesn’t deliver is good?
Pokies reform that wasn’t delivered is good?
A fixed period leading to the floating carbon price to encourage the carbon tax lie dishonest morons still repeat is good?
Half of gonski is good?
A promised and not delivered surplus is good?
All this is miles and miles and miles ahead of the pain and incompetence we will suffer under Abbott but really trying to define Rudd and evil and Gillard as a heroine is a fools errand.
Kinda illustrates my point about the fever and passion that Reality TV shows whip up, followed by the mass indifference just a little while later.
Life isn’t Reality TV.
It seems even Reality TV isn’t reality anymore.
Neither is Australian politics Reality TV.
You can’t just shift the Constitution off to one side, re-organize whole departments, become Prime Minister without Parliament sitting, and take over executive leadership of a country because Newspoll, and old man in New York, and a couple of obsessed journalists too lazy to do their real job say so.
A man who wrecks the prospects of his party, stalls the nation, corrupts the media with bullshit yarns simply in a vain eattempt at revenge, is a dangerous man.
We will find that out pretty soon for ourselves, I think, when caucus wakes up to itself and realizes nothing is going to save them except hard work.
No Messiah.
No miracles.
Some in Labor seem to have forgotten that you have to earn election, not just turn up for rehearsals.
I’m sorry about before. I shouldn’t have lashed out but you’re making a fair comparison here. There have been times though, when primaries have ended up in bad blood that have hurt the political party in the general.
One thing their system has over ours is the president is elected directly and there is no partyroom keeping them in power. Nominations are done by primaries and caucuses of party members too. Much more open.
Of course, there’s still a lot of backroom dealing going on and the issue of the influence of money is a problem but, in many ways, it does, at times, make our system look utterly barbaric.
(No, in no way am I saying the US political system is better than Australia’s or even saying it’s good, or even adequate – just one tiny element of it is comparably better in ways)
P
I think that GB grows enough food to feed itself until around September. In an average year.
My 3351
Prime example at 3370
Is it a law that Coalition hacks have to post that same dull line every time it’s cold or something? You lot really are a bunch of walking, breathing bumper stickers, aren’t you?
It’s cold because it’s Winter.
ST
‘IT’s Freezing here in Queensland, can someone please turn on the Global Warming. Thanks’
Furnace Creek for you. 52 degrees warm enough for you?
So Gillard has been fighting valiantly for SSM, oh wait no not really so much at all…
Labor leaders have always ignored policy when it suited them.
G
Don’t tell me. Tell the Coloradians. As you reactionary mob are wont to lecture us poor Lefties, it is the lived experience that counts.
You have no interest in science either from theoretical or an empirical standpoints. Your only purpose is to feign some knowledge – to give an appearance of curiosity for tactical reasons. But you are not curious about climate change. You have decided to deny it and seek only to confirm your own predicates while blurring the claims made by the serious and the genuine.
This is sophistry played for ideological and/or political purposes, and is a form of dishonesty.
Boarwar, Why dont you stick to climate events and not arson events. If i was to run around and light 500 fires in NSW over summer would that be a sign of climate change? If we let wild fire burn like they used to acros the country
But it is pretty bloody close … policy doesn’t win elections votes do, so the best voice may not have won the voice and it seems all but certain the best policy isn’t going to win the next general election, but you know what is funny the losers are still losers and the winners get the prize.
G
I hope you have been getting some fresh talking points from your Birther Nobel Laureate and curer of HIV. He has been doing some more math for you over at the the Wackaloon WUWTers.
I suppose the good news is that now Ruddstoration is over, the LNP supporters here are back to having to argue about issues and policy.
The bad news is that post like this are pretty indicative of the level of argument we are likely to see from LNP supporters … all the way to the election.
How do you know this?
If Gillard’s position is so strong, why did she have to be saved from a potentially embarrassing vote yesterday?
WeWantPaul
Up until national conference Gillard was actually supporting the party line as Rudd did before her.
After the conference Gillard opened up a conscience vote. I personally would have preferred her to embrace marriage equality as President Obama has. However given her views allowing a conscience vote means she was carrying out party wishes before she had to.
So I do not think you can make that conclusion of Gillard putting her personal views first and overturning party policy.
Nice line on Sky . “Tony Abbott is going to be the Stephen Bradbury of Australian politics”
Event like this Boerwar
http://news.sky.com/story/1105626/alaska-baking-in-unusually-strong-heat-wave
briefly
I’m a B.Sc, M.Sc & MBA. You don’t know me so please don’t throw me your ideologically driven clap trap.
rummel
And because you’re a firey you’re defiantly suspect on this.
r
‘Boarwar, Why dont you stick to climate events and not arson events. If i was to run around and light 500 fires in NSW over summer would that be a sign of climate change? If we let wild fire burn like they used to acros the country’
I do recall that we had a serious discussion on this very topic. I forget the details but the conclusion was that the US fire data is probably one of the more significant data sets showing clearly that fire behaviour is changing significantly. I have lost the links but seem to recall that they took into account trends in arson as well as trends in fire management behaviour. In relation to the Colorado fire, plenty of fires in the past and present have been started deliberately or accidentally by humans. Only one of them turned into a record fire.
Your 500 fires are impressive and I admire your dedication to duty, but 500 is not as impressive as the 19,000 wildfire events that were on the go at or near the time of the Colorado fire.
BTW, aren’t you supposed to be putting the fires out?
r
That link suprised me because I had been reading accounts that, inter alia, a cold spell in Northern Alaska was delaying Arctic sea-ice decline in that neck of the Arctic. I suppose that Alaska is big enough to be colder than average in one place and hotter than average in another place.