Morgan: 54.5-45.5 to Labor

Morgan offers the first federal poll since the Christmas/New Year break, and while the Coalition is up, it’s unclear if this marks an improvement in its position or a correction after a rogue result last time.

Roy Morgan breaks the New Year polling drought with its regular face-to-face plus SMS polling compiled from surveys over the two previous weekends, in this case with a sample of 2622 (Morgan typically gets about 3000, so this might be seen as an insight into the challenges of polling over the holiday period). It is a better result from the Coalition than the previous poll conducted in early December, which had a rogue-ish 57.5-42.5 headline lead to Labor, compared with 53.5-46.5 at the poll in late November. This time the Labor lead is 54.5-45.5, from primary votes of 38.5% for both the Coalition (up 3.5%) and Labor (down 2.5%), 9.5% for the Greens (down two) and 2% for Palmer United (steady). When preferences are applied according to the 2013 election result rather than respondent allocation, Labor’s lead is 53-47, down from 56.5-43.5 last time and back where it was in late November.

UPDATE (Essential Research): Certainly no sign of any Coalition recovery in the debut Essential Research poll for the year, which being the first deviates from normal form in not being a rolling average combined two weeks of results. The poll has Labor leading 54-46 on two-party preferred, compared with 52-48 in the last poll of last year, from primary votes of 40% for Labor (up two), 38% for the Coalition (down two), 10% for the Greens (steady) and 2% for Palmer United (steady). Also featured are Essential’s monthly personal ratings, and here at least there is better news for Tony Abbott who reverses a slump in December to be up five points on approval to 37%, with disapproval down two to 53%. However, Bill Shorten is up four on approval to 39% and down six on disapproval to 33%, so perhaps this is festive cheer talking. Shorten remains ahead on preferred prime minister, although his lead has narrowed from 36-31 to 37-35. Further questions relate to penalty rates, and bode ill for the cause of deregulation. Eighty-one per cent support penalty rates as a basic principle with 13% opposed, 68% would oppose cutting them with 23% supportive, and only 18% believe encouraging employment would be the more likely result of doing so, compared with 63% for business making bigger profits.

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.

1,970 comments on “Morgan: 54.5-45.5 to Labor”

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  1. [But his strategy of playing his Ministers off against each other gains him time, but guarantees that his government will look ever more chaotic.]

    OH please let it be so 🙂

    And the more they engage in internal disputes and backflips, the less chance there will be of them actually doing anything well thought out or productive. People aren’t just going to vote against them being mean, they’re going to vote against them being clueless. Bring it on… Bring it on.

  2. Anyone taking bets on who might be made an Abbott special knight or dame in a couple of weeks? Hard to imagine that anyone respectable would want one, but to appoint a Dame Bronwyn would attract universal derision, while to appoint none at all would be an admission that bringing them back was a damn fool idea in the first place.

  3. [Anyone taking bets on who might be made an Abbott special knight or dame in a couple of weeks? ]

    Tori Johnson?

    Yes, I am being mischievous 🙂

  4. 1952

    Abbott could go for senior judiciary. Retired senior judiciary would not look like seeking favours from the courts. To try and look less partisan, Kirby could be one of those offered a knighthood.

  5. Cud chewer: I heard a senior federal caucus member make a comment in about 2010 that the federal government felt to him like an old government; and he spoke sadly. The rare thing about the current government is that it’s displaying all the classic “it’s time” features, but only 15 months in. This has to be some sort of record. Their massive mistake was to misread the likely character of the Senate post 1 July 2013. Their second mistake has been taking such obvious petty delight in punishing people they don’t like, including large numbers of voters.

  6. Tom: An interesting thought. My guess, however, is that Justice Kirby would be well aware that being so honoured would bring all the primitives out of their caves: the Bill Heffernan types, and the sorts of trailer trash who couldn’t stand the idea of Adam Goodes being Australian of the Year.

  7. Incidentally, wasn’t there a suggestion at some point that the appointment of Mr Thawley as Secretary of PM&C should help stop machinery of government snafus of the type we’ve seen in the last few weejs?

  8. Pedant

    given that Abbott show every sign of being completely oblivious to public opinion I suspect Dame Bronwyn is a shoo-in.

  9. Pedant

    given that Abbott show every sign of being completely oblivious to public opinion I suspect Dame Bronwyn is a shoo-in.

  10. Pedant

    given that Abbott show every sign of being completely oblivious to public opinion I suspect Dame Bronwyn is a shoo-in.

  11. Silent majority

    I hope you are right. But I think that like his PPL scheme, knights and dames was all Abbott’s own work and he may be reluctant to let it fade away.,

  12. “I acknowledge that something needs to be done as Medicare in its current form is not sustainable, but there are other ways.” Warren Entsch.

    Many LNP politicians are making this claim.

    How is it not sustainable?

  13. Matt@1944

    Bemused @1908:

    It was something of a surprise to me to find out that Whitlam never identified with the Left, given the way he governed. But he wasn’t part of the Right either, although they did back him more than the Left.

    With the way that the definitions of “Right” and “Left” have changed since 1975, one thing I can be sure of: He’d have been appalled at the Gillard Government’s stripping of uni funding (in 2013) to fix a non-existent fiscal crisis. About as appalled as he’d have been by Rudd’s serial disloyalty to anyone but himself.

    Well then you don’t know much of events in the 1960s and ’70s.

    The ‘Left’ bitterly opposed Whitlam at times and were about to expel him at one point.

    Whitlam led the charge for Federal Intervention against the Victorian Left in 1970 as they posed an obstacle to ever winning Government.

    Your comments about Rudd are merely channelling confessions who, as you will come to discover, is usually wrong, particularly on issues of ALP leadership from 2010 – 2013.

  14. pedant@1952

    Anyone taking bets on who might be made an Abbott special knight or dame in a couple of weeks? Hard to imagine that anyone respectable would want one, but to appoint a Dame Bronwyn would attract universal derision, while to appoint none at all would be an admission that bringing them back was a damn fool idea in the first place.

    Pendant,
    The answer to that is blindingly obvious. Arise, DAME GINA.

  15. “”Dutton – gullible, unimaginative. Just how the hell did Tony think he’d make a good Health Minister? What does he owe him?””

    It’s all about Abbott trying to make everybody look worse than him!.

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