ReachTEL: 53-47 to Coalition

This morning brings a ReachTEL national automated poll consistent with the result of the last such poll a fortnight ago, and also with the overall polling trend.

A ReachTEL automated phone poll of 3500 respondents, conducted on Monday and released today by Channel Seven, has the Coalition leading 53-47, unchanged from the last national ReachTEL poll on August 10. The only primary vote provided at this stage is that Labor is down 1.2% to 35.7%. The poll also finds the Coalition paid parental leave scheme supported by 30% and opposed by 48.4%, Tony Abbott leading Kevin Rudd on ReachTEL’s idiosyncratic preferred prime minister measure by 53.6-46.4, 41.9% believing Labor made the right choice in replacing Julia Gillard with Kevin Rudd against 40.5% for the wrong choice and 74% expecting the Coalition to win the election.

We also had yesterday a Galaxy automated phone poll of 575 respondents from the northern Adelaide fringe seat of Wakefield courtesy of The Advertiser, which is presumably treating us progressively to polling from South Australia’s most marginal seats. This one showed Labor’s Nick Champion leading his Liberal challenger Tom Zorich 55-45, suggesting a swing to the Liberals of between 5% and 6%. The primary votes were 45% for Champion and 35% for Zorich.

Further raw material for tea-leaf reading from The Australian, whose lead story yesterday essentially consisted of an account of where its reporters believe things to stand. This was consolidated into a “call of the card” laying out which seats might change hands and with what likelihood. Those of you who might wish to write this off as a contrivance of Murdoch propagandists can feel free, but since the aggregate findings sit pretty well with BludgerTrack, I’m inclined to regard it as welcome intelligence as to how the campaigns are seeing things.

UPDATE: BludgerTrack has since been updated with big-sample state breakdowns provided to me by ReachTEL, so some of the numbers cited below have changed quite a bit.

Where BludgerTrack presently counts eight losses for Labor in New South Wales, The Australian’s list sees six as likely if you include Dobell (which I do) plus one strong chance and two possibles. Aside from Dobell (margin 5.2%), the seats listed as likely losses are Labor’s five most marginal: Greenway (0.9%), Robertson (1.1%), Lindsay (1.2%), Banks (1.5%) and Reid (2.7%). However, the picture of a uniform swing breaks down with Werriwa (6.8%) being rated a strong chance and Kingsford Smith (5.2%) and McMahon (7.9%) as possibilities. So while Labor has fires to fight all over Sydney and the central coast, it appears set to be spared in its seats further afield, namely Eden-Monaro (4.2%), Page (4.2%) and Richmond (7.0%). There also appears to be inconsistency in Sydney to the extent that Parramatta (4.4%) and Barton (6.9%) are not listed.

In Victoria, The Australian’s assessment is well in line with BludgerTrack’s call of three Liberal gains in having two listed as likely (Corangamite on 0.3% and La Trobe on 1.7%) and another as a strong chance (Deakin on 0.9%). Labor’s next most marginal seat in Victoria, Chisholm (5.8%), is evidently considered a bridge too far. The only seat featured from South Australia is the “strong chance” of Hindmarsh (6.1%), but BludgerTrack is not quite seeing it that way, the swing currently recorded there being lower than what most observers expect.

Redressing all that slightly is a list of seats which Labor might gain, albeit that it is very short. Brisbane (1.2%) is rated a “likely Coalition loss”, and despite what published polls might say Peter Beattie is rated a strong chance in Forde (1.7%). The Western Australian seat of Hasluck (0.6%) is also listed as a possible Labor gain. However, a report elsewhere in the paper cites Labor MPs saying hopes there have faded, while Andrew Probyn of The West Australian today relates that Liberal polling has them leading 53-47 from 46% of the primary vote against 36% for Labor and 9% for the Greens.

Queensland and Western Australia also have seats listed on the other side of the ledger, especially Queensland. With Queensland we find the one serious breakdown with a BludgerTrack projection, one which in this case I have long been noting as problematic. The Australian lists Moreton (1.2%), Petrie (2.6%) and Capricornia (3.7%) as likely Labor losses, to which are added the strong chance of Blair (4.3%) and the possibility of Kevin Rudd indeed losing Griffith (8.5%). However, the latter seems a bit hard to credit if neighbouring Brisbane is to be deemed a likely Labor gain, and Lilley (3.2%), Rankin (5.4%) and Oxley (5.8%) left off the chopping block.

In Western Australia, Labor’s possible gain of Hasluck is balanced by a possible loss of Brand (3.4%). This tends to confirm my suspicion that BludgerTrack, on which Labor’s numbers in WA have soured considerably recently, is erring slightly on the harsh side with respect to Labor. Bass and Braddon are listed as likely Labor losses for Tasmania, with Lyons (12.3%) only rated a possibility and Franklin (10.8%) not in play. Powered by what may have been an exaggerated result from ReachTEL on the weekend, BludgerTrack is calling it three losses for Labor in Tasmania with only one seat spared. The Northern Territory seat of Lingiari (3.8%) is rated by The Australian as a possible loss, while BludgerTrack has it as likely.

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.

1,413 comments on “ReachTEL: 53-47 to Coalition”

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  1. WILLIAM – Now you’re using Denis Shanahan as “welcome intelligence”e to confirm your poll-tracker. Now I’m really getting worried about it’s veracity. Sorry, but how scientific is that? I just spoke to someone on the bus who says his whole family are going to vote labor after 50 years of voting liberal. I hope you’ll put that in your poll tracker as well.

  2. Morning all.

    [Libs bewail the “cash splashes” of Labor, yet many of their decisions are no better – just targeted differently.]

    Today’s Liberal party’s solution to everything is to open the government chequebook and start scribbling furiously. We’ve seen with their announcements and signature policies over the years that there is no fiscal restraint whatsoever.

    They belly-ache about ideological obsessions such as cutting the public service and stopping funding to public schools, but this is a fig leaf to cover their rapacious spending in the main.

    Does anyone in today’s Liberal party have a semblance of economic responsibility?

  6. GROSS COST of the leave scheme——————-$9.8B
    Removing existing Labor scheme——————-$3.7B
    Removing existing commonwealth/state schemes—–$1.2B
    Other adjustments to government spending/revenue-$1.6B

    NET COST of the leave scheme———————$3.3B
    PLUS
    Income from 1.5% company tax levy—————-$4.4B

    IMPACT ON BUDGET BOTTOM LINE——————–+$1.1B
    —————————————————–

    Income from 1.5% on 3000 companies = $4.4b

    Loss of income from 3000 companies 1.5% tax cut = $4.4b+
    Plus because the 1.5% tax cut is on ALL companies

    Budget overall has a negative income

  7. [The militant Maritime Union of Australia will plunge more than $250,000 into Labor’s campaign for the Perth seat of Hasluck over the next 10 days despite the Liberal Party being increasingly confident it will retain the marginal seat.

    The MUA, which wants greater influence in the ALP, has already invested a small fortune in the election campaign of Adrian Evans, a union official.

    But internal polling by the Liberal Party in the past week has found Mr Evans will struggle to unseat the incumbent, Liberal Ken Wyatt.

    The West Australian understands the Liberal polling has Mr Wyatt ahead of the MUA candidate 53 per cent to 47 per cent on a two-party preferred basis.

    Polling found the Liberals on a 46 per cent primary vote, up four points from the 2010 election, with the ALP on 36 per cent (down 1.5) and the Greens on 9 per cent (down 3.8). ALP polling in Hasluck from mid-last month had the two parties split 50-50 after Kevin Rudd’s return]
    http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/18682479/maritime-union-cash-splash-to-win-seat/

    I am very ambivalent about the MUA’s attempts to take over the WA ALP, and for this reason, and only this reason, hope Evans falls short in Hasluck.

  8. WILLIAM – I’m a bit puzzled how you can take some unsourced information from a journalist who probably has less than zero contacts in the labor party writing for a paper that is trying to destroy the labor party and see that as “welcome intelligence” that your poll tracker is right. I mean, how scientific is that?

  13. victoria

    [Hockey will apparently outline today where the money for the PPL is coming from.]

    Yep. The only place it can come from is you and me (or sales of second-hand fishing boats).

  15. I’m more concerned about the quality control of polling being used in the tracker… I mean, I know there’s a dearth of information beyond ReachTel for Tassie … but seriously.

  16. 48% oppose Abbott’s PPL. It’s terrible policy. Imagine if Labor had proposed it- budget emergency, more deficit, unfair etc etc.

    Now, when are we going to get the full assault on Abbott the mad nodder? All voters should see that video before casting their vote. There are plenty of undecideds to pick up

  19. We’re not.
    Labor just aren’t up to it.
    It’s almost like they’re worried that if they try too hard they might, well,…you know, win?

  22. and the average voter just doesn’t have the faintest idea.
    And into the vacuum that is the ALPs PR strategy rode Monkey announcing ‘I will be the infrastructure Prime minister’

    And the punters cheered!! Saying ‘We want Monkey! We want Monkey!

    And so it was.

  27. Gauss are you actually Joe Hockey? The plan is NOT funded by the 1.5% levy because it is offset by the 1.5% tax cut. Grade 1 mathematics

  28. ‘I too think the mad nodder vid would pretty much end Abbotts career.’

    That’s what I thought about the interview where he says that you shouldn’t accept as gospel what he says rather that which is carefully scripted, written down and signed by him.

    Still when the campaign gets under way I’m sure the ALP will know how to use this stuff..

    oh,

    wait

  33. [The plan is NOT funded by the 1.5% levy because it is offset by the 1.5% tax cut. Grade 1 mathematics]

    Yes, even when the Liberals set out to tax business for a social spending initiative, they still balls it up and it winds up a cost to the budget and to taxpayers!

    Hopeless!!

  35. Morning all. Regardless of frustrations about the seeming public tolerance of Hockeynomics in management and Abbottology as a philosophy, I hope Rudd does NOT raise too many ideas out of left field. They raise as many doubts as the hopes they may create.

    The attacks on Abbott and cut-cut -cut have bite, and need ot be repeated. Rudd should then focus on selling Labor’s economic management, and the coalitions MPL (Millionaires Paid Leave) scheme. Too many messages just confuse people.

    Keep it simple because many have stopped listening. Labor do not want to go hbackwards and lose the Senate too.

  39. Q to you William…

    Why doesn’t Essential polling ever get a headline in your esteemed blog?

    They’ve had ALP/LNP at 50/50 last couple of weeks …is it bullshit …or what?

  40. andrew

    the only thing about the noddy vid thatbothers me is the context.

    It’s a bit awkward because of the dead digger thing…
    Abbott’s people would just carry on about how tasteless the ALP are….what about the poor widow etc etc…our boys and girls on the front….and so on.

    The Libs would turn it to their favour.
    They’re that good. They’d just run a series of ear wax eating vids ….

  43. I think a lot of those predictions in The Australian look credible, although my suspicion is Labor will lose a few more than listed above.

  44. Rosemour of course the Libs and OM would bleat about it, but if its out there voters will actually watch it. The context is a leader being asked a difficult question for which he was prewarned, going into meltdown.

    Think of how disgraceful the attacks on Gillards and Rudds character have been. This would just be showing a video interview

  46. As for the AFL – finally! I would say the penalties were at the low end of the range, compared to what Adelaide got for one player contract breach. Why the guilty parties agreement to the punishment was required I will never understand. Cowards

    If it had dragged on much longer I was about to suggest a viewre boycott of Essendon games, including finals. That sort of thing might have pushed the lumbering AFL bureaucracy to action.

    Have a good day all.

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