The latest fortnightly Newspoll has Labor leading 51-49, which is down a point on last time and equal with the time before (and also the same as the ReachTEL poll conducted on Thursday). Primary votes are 41% for the Coalition (up two), 34% for Labor (down one) and 11% for the Greens (down three on last time, back to where they were the time before). Tony Abbott has enjoyed a big hike in his personal ratings, up six on approval to 41% and down two on disapproval to 52%, and he has gained a 41-37 lead on preferred prime minister after being level at 37-37 last time. Bill Shorten is up one on approval to 38% and steady on disapproval 43%. Hat-tip to GhostWhoVotes, and of course The Australian.
Also out today was the regularly fortnightly Morgan poll, covering a sample of 2922 respondents from two weekends of face-to-face and SMS polling. This recorded next to no change for the major parties on the primary vote – the Coalition on 38.5% and Labor on 37.5%, both up half a point on last fortnight – but has the minor parties moving in accordance with recent trends, the Greens being up 1.5% to 12% and Palmer United being down half a point to 4%. The previous poll was the only one recently published which failed to record a lift for the Greens, no doubt because half the survey period predated the bipartisan commitment to send military forces to Iraq. Labor gains half a point on both the respondent-allocated and previous election measures of two-party preferred, respectively leading 54.5-45.5 and 53.5-46.5.
UPDATE (Essential Research): Essential Research is steady at 53-47 to Labor, with Labor up a point on the primary vote to 39%, the Coalition steady on 39%, the Greens down one to 10% and Palmer United steady on 4%. Also featured is a biannual gauge of attributes of the various parties, recording little change for Labor since March apart from a six point drop on “clear about what they stand for”, while the Liberal Party has weakened across the board, particularly with respect to “keeps its promises” (down nine points), “divided” (up eight points) and “looks after the interests of working people” (down six points). The poll adds further to a somewhat confusing picture on the public attitudes to the Iraq commitment, with 52% expressing approval for sending military personnel versus 34% disapproval. However, 51% say doing so will make Australia less safe from terrorism, versus only 15% for more safe. Questions on industrial relations laws indicate broad satisfaction with the status quo, 30% saying current laws balance the interests of employers and workers, and a fairly even 23% and 17% believing they favour employers and workers respectively.
Conservatives lose provincial government after just one term in New Brunswick. One Term Tories
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Brunswick_general_election,_2014
GG:
Penalty might well be a crock, but imagine how much time and effort and money would’ve been saved if he’d simply been tapped on the shoulder at the time, alerted to the error and told he needed to repay the $950 odd dollars wrongly claimed.
And you make a good point about fixed entitlements. It would certainly cut down the administrative costs.
The slight problem that many of you Gillardistas have, is the slow drip of admissions of failures she is providing….
not as perfect as you all had us believe these last few years, unfortunately for you all !
Steve777@1048
Any PM in Gillard’s tenuous position with Abbott as LOTO would have copped much the same.
In fact a male might have copped even more.
[1049
Greensborough Growler
The whole Slipper episode only shows that he has to pay the money (which was about $900) back (which he offered to do at the time).
He’s been ordered to do 300 hours of community work which is one day a week for 9 months. You might also argue that being a politician might hasve served as community service.
So, the penalty is a crock.
I reckon pay them all a fixed amount and get rid of the accountability.
It’s a waste of time and money trying to keep them honest.]
I disagree. Plenty of others – others of more humble standing – behave dishonestly and have to perform community service. So it should be for Slipper. He is to be afforded the same justice as his past constituents might face in the same circumstances. Good. Justice is a leveller here. Very Good.
briefly:
Scroll back and you’ll see at least two commenters here care a great deal about the man and his tantrums.
bemused@1054
Sadly, the evidence is in on that one, bemused.
But don’t let facts get in your way.
fess,
They are either honest or they are not. Making rules just leads to more creative rorting. Slipper was a notorious rorter of his expenses over decades. The Libs knew it and did nothing.
Imagine if pollies used this vast creative reservoir of talent to improve the country instead of just themselves?
Rudd was graceless in defeat and remains disloyal and graceless in retirement.
His trashing of Labor both in office and now from retirement is simply unprecedented in Australian political history.
The sooner he is forgotten and assigned to the trash heap of failed narrisictic leaders the better for Labor and Australia more broadly.
Hasn’t he a Ukrainian crisis to solve? Or a UN agency to wreck?
What a sad demented figure he now casts across a baren Australian political landscape.
All PMs and senior politicians have been subject to criticism and sometimes vilification, much of it unfair. McMahon was ridiculed mercilessly. Fraser was hated by a significant minority of the population. Keating was hated by traditional conservatives. Rudd has his critics and suffered from a fraudulent attempt to drive him from office. But what Ms Gillard had to put up with was in a whole different category. The closest I can remember would have been Whitlam’s last year as PM, although at least in that case there were real concerns regarding economic management.
GG
[ Slipper was a notorious rorter of his expenses over decades. The Libs knew it and did nothing. ]
Exactly the same could be said of Abbott. What penalties is he facing?
P1,
Living with his bad decisions.
Greensborough Growler@1062
His family is paying that penalty, not him.
Just a quick word on the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd saga.
I was in Parliament House the afternoon of the coup against Rudd in 2010. I was speaking with an exceptionally well placed “Rudd” journo at 5.30pm that afternoon & asked whether Gillard had ever spoken poorly about Rudd. This journo told me that there was never any instance, she was a very loyal deputy. This was a very common view.
This journo also told me (and I had heard this from many) that Gillard worked very hard behind the scenes to hold the Govt together. Public servants would wait until Rudd went overseas to send items to her so that she would action them immediately as acting PM.
There was no hint from anyone that something was about to happen. Most everyone had left the building.
The fact that it happened so quickly, and the fact that so many of the caucus were happy to cast their lot against Rudd tells you all you need to know.
Most of them hated Rudd. There was no agonising over getting rid of him like there was for Hawke.
Rudd has never answered why the caucus was so keen to move against him.
Rudd was a shocking people manager & an obnoxious character.
Alan Ramsey put it correctly in 2007 when he said our next PM will a “prissy, pretentious, prick”
Bemused,
[And as usual you start bloviating.]
Bloviating may be my problem, but yours is that you inevitably get banned from the site when discussions like this reach their inevitable conclusion: with you going extremely personal and nasty.
You pick on people, mate. You’re just a crass bully. Posters here don’t always go the whole way with you because being on top is just not that important to them. With you, dominating and holding court is of prime significance. It’s also your greatest flaw. You just cannot shut the fuck up.
[Slipper was a notorious rorter of his expenses over decades. ]
Well this kind of comes back to my point. He isn’t/wasn’t alone, yet unlike his peers faced a years-long legal process, had his name dragged into the public sphere, and so on. Many of his colleagues behaved exactly the same way with their entitlements yet were allowed to repay the money falsely claimed, in their case thousands of dollars.
P1,
I think that’s a shift of the goal posts. I really don’t want to go to the PM’s family.
[But what Ms Gillard had to put up with was in a whole different category. ]
Yeah, she faced a gendered campaign against her, which elevated the personal to a never before seen level simply because Australia had never had a woman PM before.
1052
confessions
When it cones to Slipper, I think we can spare the pity. In his time he showed an almost unsurpassed talent for milking the system. It takes a certain vanity to bludge so conspicuously.
Greensborough Growler@1067
Neither does the PM, by all accounts.
Rudd’s reply to Gillard speaks for itself. Any doubts I harboured as to his character have been completely erased – he’s a vindictive, spiteful little brat, no more and no less. It looks to have been written by an angry teenager. I was actually very surprised to see the emotive language used, I couldn’t believe it had actually been put out to the press.
William says he’s never seen a ex-PM speak that way and that is of course true. The closest analogue I can think of in the political arena is how segments of the Tea Party right speak about Obama. Truly disgraceful, Rudd has no class.
If his reply had been as measured and self-aware as Gillard’s original remarks I would have given him full marks. But it appears he’s simply incapable of thinking about anyone but himself.
[
Yeah, she faced a gendered campaign against her, which elevated the personal to a never before seen level simply because Australia had never had a woman PM before.]
Coupled with a former party leader willing to leak and damage her leadership and the party through the press. No other PM has had their predecessor behave in such a way — treachery unprecedented in Australian political history.
[1056
confessions]
We’d all be better served if ex-politicians kept their own counsel. Raking of over the ashes of a cold fire…dead horses…do they have no dignity?
Aristotle
Your observations accord with those of others as well
Aristotle:
Interesting insights and thanks for sharing. 🙂
briefly,
They may not have dignity. But, they do have book deals.
briefly:
I don’t think we’ll see an end to that any time soon.
[Darren Laver
….treachery unprecedented in Australian political history.]
Are you talking about Gillard backstabbing her leader 10 minutes after telling him he was safe, or the Prime Minister who was backstabbed being angry about it?
BB
[The impression (and it’s just an impression) that I got was that one of the coppers went to shake the young bloke’s hand ]
Since when do coppers shake the hand of someone they’ve asked to come in for questioning?
Why don’t we all (some of us, anyway) chill out a little. Focus on the things that unite us rather than the things which divide us, type of thing.
Player One@1057
Sadly, the evidence is in on that one, bemused.
But don’t let facts get in your way.
===============
There is no evidence and there never will be as the situation will not repeat with anyone in Gillard’s place.
It can only ever be a matter of opinion and mine is that Abbott would have gone in even harder against a male opponent.
If you have a different opinion, that is fine, but it is only an opinion.
Tonight’s episode of The Roast beautifully skewers Ray Martin’s interviewing skills.
[1080
William Bowe
Posted Wednesday, September 24, 2014 at 9:46 pm | PERMALINK
Why don’t we all (some of us, anyway) chill out a little. Focus on the things that unite us rather than the things which divide us, type of thing.]
We are united by a love for polls and polling, right?
So let’s us talk about that.
What happened to Dr Adam “Psephos” Carr? I miss his insights, even if I found him objectionable on occasion.
hey bemused
refer BB@1065
[1082
caf
Posted Wednesday, September 24, 2014 at 9:48 pm | PERMALINK
Tonight’s episode of The Roast beautifully skewers Ray Martin’s interviewing skills.]
Who or what is the Roast? I thought it was an NRL show so it is most curious they would be discussing Ray Martin.
And as opposed to whose skills? Leigh Sales or Chris Uhlmann? Spare me.
He tweets a bit, DL. He’s always come and gone from PB. I’m quite emphatically in the hope-he-comes-back-one-day camp, but opinion is of course divided (on this as so much else).
Er, Abbott did have a male opponent. Twice. And he didn’t.
Bushfire Bill@1065
Your projection is noted.
William,
Just chilling.
Summer breeze, makes me feel fine
Going through the Jasmine of my mind……….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsW8rXPcnM0
1083
I think Psephos is busy or travelling or something. I think he will return to coming here at some point.
[
He tweets a bit, DL. He’s always come and gone from PB. I’m quite emphatically in the hope-he-comes-back-one-day camp, but opinion is of course divided (on this as so much else).]
Ok thanks William.
I hope he does return to the PB lounge in the not too distant future!
Darren Laver:
[Who or what is the Roast? I thought it was an NRL show so it is most curious they would be discussing Ray Martin.]
Satirical news show, somewhat in the style of The Daily Show, that airs on ABC2.
http://iview.abc.net.au/programs/roast/LE1359H113S00
Player One@1084
Refer to my 1088.
[Player One@1084
hey bemused
refer BB@1065
Refer to my 1088.]
And they say rhetoric is dead.
Thanks caf.
I must have been thinking of this:
[The Sunday Roast is an Australian sports talk show that deals with the issues in the National Rugby League. It airs on the Nine Network, and first aired in 2005, beginning at 11:00 am and leading into The Sunday Footy Show. In 2006, with the axing of Boots N’ All, The Sunday Footy Show moved to 11:00 am, with The Sunday Roast moving to midday.]
caf@1094
🙂
[
1093
bemused
Posted Wednesday, September 24, 2014 at 9:57 pm | PERMALINK
Player One@1084
hey bemused
refer BB@1065
Refer to my 1088.]
Jesus wept!
I think only Tom could follow this numbered flame war!
[What happened to Dr Adam “Psephos” Carr? I miss his insights, even if I found him objectionable on occasion.]
Yeah, what happened to Psephos?
I rarely found him objectionable – yes sometimes he was a bit staid and set in his ways, but with this whole ISIS stuff I’ve really missed his viewpoint.
caf,
In theory, PB is a jibe for a jibe and a truth for a truth.
Unfortunately, it’s all make believe.
I hope Eddie Ward posts on the NSW election next year.