Two new poll results this week from Nielsen and Essential Research have contributed to a continuation of the moderating trend of Labor’s post-budget poll lead, which sees the two-party preferred result in BludgerTrack come in at 52.6-47.4, down from 53.5-46.5 last week. The peak reading of 55.0-45.0 was recorded four weeks ago, a fortnight after the May 13 budget. The Coalition also has the lead on the primary vote for the first time in six weeks. Labor retains a reasonably comfortable majority on the seat projection, although the numbers once again illustrate how difficult the model considers the electoral terrain to be for Labor, as the present projection of 79 seats is four fewer than Labor managed with an almost identical two-party preferred vote when Kevin Rudd led it to victory in 2007.
There were some striking results in the state breakdowns in Nielsen this week, and BludgerTrack reflects this in having the swing in New South Wales moderate considerably, cutting their projected seat gain from 11 to seven, while in Victoria the gain is up from four to seven. Further shifts beneath the surface find Labor up a seat in Queensland, but down one in both Western Australia and South Australia. The Nielsen poll also furnishes us with a new set of leadership ratings, which after accounting for the model’s standardisation procedure are almost identical to last week’s results from Newspoll. The movements on last week are accordingly very minor.
Last week I offered a closer look at Palmer United’s polling trend, so this week I thought we’d home in on the Greens. After watching their vote fall from 11.8% at the 2010 election to 8.6% in 2013, polling has shown the party on a steady upward trend, with a short-lived spike occurring in April. While this was partly driven by one outlier result from Nielsen, all of the other polling conducted at that time has them clustered around the high level of 12%. All of these results were conducted in the immediate aftermath of the Western Australian Senate election, at which the party’s vote was up from 9.5% to 15.6%. The party’s polling in Western Australia has remained strong, the present BludgerTrack reading of its primary vote being 15.8%. Coincidentally or otherwise, the downward trend that followed the WA election spike coincided exactly with the federal budget.
William,
Is it possible to get 698 deleted. It’s an old racist joke about African American women on welfare. LeRoy used to be an common African American name. I first heard it when I lived in the USA and it was typically used by southern males to make fun of blacks on welfare.
2 quick comments here.
1 – if the carbon price was such a defining factor in abbott’s election, we should see a significant bounce in his ratings once the repeal goes through the senate. Be interesting to watch this.
2 – like many, i’m wondering how hard abbott will push for subsequent climate legislation (i.e. ETS or regulatory measures) should direct action fail. Any chance that he’ll instead follow his mentor Stephen Harper and just remove Aus from its international climate obligations?
Older voters don’t appear to give a sh!t what happens amongst the their young.
That’s why the conservatives get so much support from the older population.
peppy@701
How about we simply change it from LeRoy to Jaydon?
Personally, I think it’s quite a funny joke. I also like the analogy “as confusing as Father’s Day in Green Valley (or Sunshine or Salisbury or Logan City or Bridgewater or wherever).”
Nice one, meher baba.
We might disagree on a few things, but I completely agree with your sentiments re the challenges facing Burkean conservatism.
zoidloid@703: in my observation, many (but not all) older people are not so much indifferent to the young as they are fearful and resentful of them.
The fear has some rational basis: if you are old and frail, healthy, loud and sometimes aggressive young people are pretty scary, especially in groups.
The resentment is because the old wish they were still young. This can easily be turned by shock jocks and others into a targeted resentment of the unemployed, sole parents, etc.
The irony here is that most of the old people who resent welfare recipients are themselves entirely dependent on the age pension. The same paradox can be witnessed in the US: Jon Stewart among others has pointed out that the people on Fox TV who endlessly attack subsidised health care are largely talking to an audience of old viewers who have all their health care costs covered by US Medicare.
@MB/706
Indeed.
Retweeted by Josh Taylor
Steve Dalby @Steve_Dalby 8m
“We lost [the iiNet case] on the basis that the judges actually agreed with us”… playing with a straight bat? http://zd.net/1o8rmjk @iinet
And Oh yeah, Netflix is apparently coming to Australia, finally!
Now we just need decent broadband.
[There was a heavy set chap on 24 earlier today who said that ASIC’s problems were laziness and incompetence rather than criminality.]
They are not lazy when it comes to collecting company registration fees. If you’re late it’s an automatic fine, no excuses. If you’re late a second time, it’s a whoppingly large fine, again no exuses.
You just about have to have been blown up in a terrorist incident to get off ASIC fines (unless they’re for millions and then you hire lawyers and almost *always* get off).
No wonder this part of ASIC is slated for selling-off by the Abbott government. It’s the easiest of easy money.
meher baba on conservatism – I agree. I would probably be happy to classify myself as a conservative now if there were a viable conservative movement.
What we have instead is a right wing reactionary political force that is deliberately eschewing rationality and winning elections based on fomenting mostly irrational fear, hate and greed.
Surely this can’t be a recipe for long term success here or the USA or anywhere else…
African Americans don’t have red necks though.
MB,
I’ve always classed what Latham calls “Downward Envy” as just another manifestation of “wowserism”.
People love to disapprove of those whom they see as lower in social station than they are. In fact, disapproving of someone, to the wowser, *automatically* puts them in a socially inferior position.
Hence the pogroms against dole and disability “bludgers”, students, teachers and the unemployed.
For the life of me I can’t figure out why Abbott has ANY support among the elderly poor, unless he’s relying on the dementia sufferers forgetting whatever it was he promised them!
[African Americans don’t have red necks though.]
Even *worse* than red necks. Automatically socially inferior.
And that curly hair. Yuck!
[William Bowe
Posted Friday, June 27, 2014 at 1:38 pm | Permalink
African Americans don’t have red necks though.
]
——————————————-
William – my apologies to peppy above ….joke was NOT intended to be a slight against African Americans …. I should have called the kids Tony or Bruce ( a la Monty Python )
Bludgers may have noticed that William’s Bludgertrack currently shows Labor winning seven seats in Victoria. The seven weakest Coalition seats in Victoria are: Deakin, Corangamite, La Trobe (the three lost in 2013), Dunkley (last won by Labor in 1993), Casey (1983), Aston (1987) and… Higgins, never won by Labor, held successively by Harold Holt, John Gorton and Peter Costello, now on a margin of 9.9%. I don’t believe for a minute that Labor is going to win Higgins, but the fact that current polling raises even the theoretically possibility shows how the Liberal position in Victoria, including in the upper-income suburbs of Melbourne, has declined. This is a long-term trend going back to the 1980s, but it has obviously accelerated over the past year.
I don’t either, but that’s what happens when Nielsen comes in at 65-35.
[William – my apologies to peppy above ….joke was NOT intended to be a slight against African Americans …. I should have called the kids Tony or Bruce ( a la Monty Python )]
Yes, but the punchline only makes sense because of the racial stereotype that African-Americam women have children by multiple fathers. If you change the name of the children to Bruce the point of the joke – which is a racial point – is lost.
The model is currently giving a Labor a 43% chance in Higgins, a 41% chance in Wannon, and a 30% chance in Goldstein and Kooyong – but, in another sign of the times, only a 22% chance in McMillan, which it used to hold not so long ago. There are only six seats where the Labor win probability is over 50%, but it gets to seven because of the high probability that any one of the aforementioned might come off.
Labor would win Melbourne back before Higgins.
Melbourne doesn’t have a two-party majority, so it doesn’t count. Yes Labor might regain it, but Bandt is well dug-in now and many Labor voters are happy to vote for him.
[ Psephos
Posted Friday, June 27, 2014 at 1:52 pm | Permalink
William – my apologies to peppy above ….joke was NOT intended to be a slight against African Americans …. I should have called the kids Tony or Bruce ( a la Monty Python )
Yes, but the punchline only makes sense because of the racial stereotype that African-Americam women have children by multiple fathers. If you change the name of the children to Bruce the point of the joke – which is a racial point – is lost.
]
—————————————————-
Psephos ….. I lived in the US for quite a spell and to be honest I never met one AA called Leroy ( and I have many AA friends – even was married to one ) so it was NOT my intention to slight AA’s…. but I guess whenever anyone makes a joke or some statement – it will offend *someone* in the universe – even all the Bruces that I have also now upset.
To peppy – again, I am sorry if you were offended ….
notice how Adam doesn’t allow those who elected Bandt to be Greens voters – no, to him they are really Labor voters.
Labor’s vote in the La Trobe Valley has declined sharply, partly due to deindustrialisation, partly due to local issues such as water, partly due to domination of the local ALP by the Dinosaur Left who pick lousy candidates like Brendan Jenkins. Also Russell Broadbent is a moderate Lib and very well-liked locally. McMillan might come back to Labor when he retires, but I doubt we will win it again. But Labor’s prospects in Dunkley, Aston and Casey (not to mention Deakin, La Trobe and Corangamite) must be quite good at present.
Psephos,
Labor would be better off focussing on regaining Melbourne rather than dreaming about Higgins regardless of what the current polls might report..
I meant that many people in Melbourne who consider themselves to be Labor voters are happy to vote for Bandt. If they were all committed Greens voters, the Greens would have won the by-election for the state seat of Melbourne – but they didn’t.
We have the same joke in Adelaide using various bogan names like Schapelle, Maverick and Awesome.
[Labor would be better off focussing on regaining Melbourne rather than dreaming about Higgins regardless of what the current polls might report..]
No, Labor should focus on winning the six marginals I mentioned above: Deakin, La Trobe, Corangamite, Dunkley, Aston and Casey.
Diogs,
What about Diogenes?
[I meant that many people in Melbourne who consider themselves to be Labor voters are happy to vote for Bandt. If they were all committed Greens voters, the Greens would have won the by-election for the state seat of Melbourne – but they didn’t.]
You could also argue that they are Greens voters who are happy to vote Labor in state politics…
GG
Haven’t seen Diogenes but I have seen Dijon.
[You could also argue that they are Greens voters who are happy to vote Labor in state politics…]
You could, but historically the trend is the other way.
There was an American theologian called Diogenes Allen.
Interesting article:
Safe seats are more likely to have a work for the dole pilot:
http://theconversation.com/safe-seats-are-more-likely-to-have-a-work-for-the-dole-pilot-27914?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+27+June+2014+-+1744&utm_content=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+27+June+2014+-+1744+CID_960f1df66226e80fe5225fe06b699e40&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=Safe%20seats%20are%20more%20likely%20to%20have%20a%20work%20for%20the%20dole%20pilot
newmatilda @newmatilda 2m
Govt Takes Fresh Steps To Block Release Of Free Speech Docs: Turns out freedom of speech is neither free nor a… http://bit.ly/1vbVI5o
Mocking those less powerful or privileged than you is funny?
So let me tell you a ripper of a joke about a teenage mum who was brought up in an abusive and dysfunctional household, who never knew her father, whose mother was on crack, who had no sense of stability or of how to organise her life, who had no role models or anyone who loved her or she could trust to guide her and help her rise above the squalid, welfare-supported circumstances of her upbringing, who was surrounded by examples of multiple-partner families, who thought having as many kids as possible to who-cares-which-men would guarantee her some kind of income security albeit state funded…
The punchline is that she’s a loser and I’m not.
Psephos,
I notice you excluded Higgins from your list. So, you actually agreed with me.
I don’t see why you would want to ignore Melbourne which would fall to Labor well before Dunkley, Aston or Casey and probably Corangamite.
It’s lucky our beloved Party can multi task on such matters.
Of course, the other point is that for all those Leroys to have different surnames, she must have been married to all of their fathers…which means that for every single mum there’s several deadbeat dads…
That “LeRoy” joke also buys into the old sexist double-standard: it’s the mother that is mocked for having children with multiple fathers (and implicitly, criticised for daring to have sex with different partners), and the fathers are let off.
Inner westie,
Sounds like the story of Princess Diana.
Prince Bill seems to have turned out alright though.
badcat
I didn’t think your joke was racist, I thought it was amusing.
Is it because I don’t automatically see racism everywhere, or because I have met an Australian named Leroy?
*Sigh* My first post stated that I don’t think Labor can win Higgins. I’ve also explained why I don’t think Labor will regain Melbourne, although it’s possible. Labor voters in areas like Melbourne defect to the Greens mainly because of symbolic issues like “asylum seekers” and same-sex marriage. It’s not in Labor’s interests to try to outbid the Greens on issues like that. Anyway as Cath Bowtell has proved, it doesn’t work. Labor could get a 20% two-party swing in Victoria and still not win Melbourne.
lizzie,
Leroy is a valued contributor to PB.
[Of course, the other point is that for all those Leroys to have different surnames, she must have been married to all of their fathers…]
I don’t think that follows. Quite often children take their father’s surname even if their parents aren’t married.
GG
I’d forgotten that. Good point.
Psephos,
“Labor could get a 20% two-party swing in Victoria and still not win Melbourne’.
Pure hyperbole.
In the US there is no doubt whatever that LeRoy is a stereotypical African-American name.
[ lizzie
Posted Friday, June 27, 2014 at 2:28 pm | Permalink
badcat
Is it because I don’t automatically see racism everywhere, or because I have met an Australian named Leroy?
]
———————————————-
Just out of interest Lizzie – as I was not aware of any significance of the name but I found this little bit on Wiki :
Leroy
Leroy (/ləˈrɔɪ/ lə-ROY), also Leeroy, LeeRoy, Lee Roy, LeRoy, (American spellings) or Le Roy, is a male given name in English-speaking countries. It is originally used as a surname. The name is from the French family name (surname) Leroy [lørwa], one of the most common surnames in Northern France.[1] or sometimes Le Roy, as a translation of Breton Ar Roue. It is the old spelling for le roi “the king”.
zoidlord
[Older voters don’t appear to give a sh!t what happens amongst the (their) young.]
I value your contribution here, but I think that that generalisation is a little too prejudiced.
There are all these places in the US too :
Places
Canada Leroy, Saskatchewan
United States
Leroy, Alabama
Leroy, California
Le Roy, Illinois
Le Roy, Iowa
Le Roy, Kansas
Le Roy, Michigan
Le Roy, Minnesota
Le Roy (town), New York Le Roy (village), New York
Leroy, Indiana
Leroy, Texas
LeRoy, Wisconsin, a town
LeRoy (community), Wisconsin, an unincorporated community
Leroy Township, Calhoun County, Michigan
Leroy Township, Ingham County, Michigan
Leroy Township, Pennsylvania
LeRoy, West Virginia (also spelled Le Roy or Leroy)
Anyone have more info on this stuff?
[Liberal Party state director Damien Mantach has barred offices for the federal seats of Kooyong, Menzies, Goldstein, Higgins and Melbourne Ports from accessing an online database containing Liberal membership details while the investigation is under way. It is understood it will be concluded in about a week.]
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/lib-adviser-probed-over-tape-leak-20140627-3awss.html#ixzz35oLEkBxu