BludgerTrack: 52.5-47.5 to Labor

Public relaxation over summer, the quirks of a shallow pool of poll results, actual improvement in the government’s standing – whatever the cause, the BludgerTrack poll aggregate has again recorded movement in favour of the Coalition.

Week two of BludgerTrack for 2015 adds only the latest Essential Research result to last week’s numbers from Essential and Roy Morgan. This is pretty thin gruel so far as poll aggregation goes, but nonetheless, let it be noted that BludgerTrack finds the latest result to be a lot more like the Morgan poll than Essential’s strong result for Labor last week, and thus shifts a little further the Coalition’s way. The 0.4% move on two-party preferred translates into three gains for the Coalition on the seat projection, namely one seat each in New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia. Nothing new this week on leadership ratings.

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.

2,676 comments on “BludgerTrack: 52.5-47.5 to Labor”

Comments Page 11 of 54
1 … 10 11 12 … 54

  2. rossmcg:

    Yes, as I understand it the surcharge in hospitality outlets is supposed to cover the additional costs of opening on a Sunday or public holiday.

  3. A range of businesses also charge a loading during peak times such as major holidays etc. Anything from Pizza delivery to hotels and other holiday accommodation.

    Are they saying they will cease doing this? Of course not.

    In the US some years ago during Christmas and New Years Eve, hotels were not only charging a loading – at times double normal rates, but requiring a minimum stay or 3 , 4 or more nights.

  4. lizzie and victoria – when in Darwin we had 3 kids at govt primary school. We paid $100 total (for all 3) for the year which included stationery, excursions and a few books I think. The land of government funding! Possibly another reason people voted against Statehood!

  5. I think just as the Tory leadership favours the US model in health and education many of their supporters like the US way of hospitality: low paid workers who rely on tips to give them a decent income.

    I hate the expression, but that IS un-Australian.

  7. [In the US some years ago during Christmas and New Years Eve, hotels were not only charging a loading – at times double normal rates, but requiring a minimum stay or 3 , 4 or more nights.]

    The same thing happens every New Years Eve in Sydney (presumably because of the fireworks).

    It’s a good thing TA has Kirribilli House to see the fireworks close up for free. Otherwise he would be blaming penalty rates for what the hotels do every NYE.

  8. Abbott will remain PM till the election.

    We still remember the chaos of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd years and the Coalition won’t be going down that path much to the chagrin of the media.

    After Rudd was rolled… despite his short comings we were all egging for his return after we saw what a disaster Gillard was.

    The coalition won’t make the same mistake. The only chance of a leadership change is if Tony Abbott gracefully resigns to hand over the tiller to some new talent. There will be no night of the long Labor shank knives

  9. Victoria @ 435

    [Does he in any way realise that the sharp deterioration of our politics can be traced back to when Abbott took over as OL.]

    You are certainly correct. There has not been an Opposition leader in Australian history, I think, who has been as blindly driven to be negative as Abbott. Certainly not in my lifetime.

  10. BK @ 501

    Seems this poll is not as significant as it appears. A visit to PB’s Qld link displays the following comments:

    From Davidwh
    [All those seats have been short priced to move back to Labor for a while. Not really sure what the point of this is.]

    And from William

    [The rationale behind polling these seats is clearly to get a sense of how things are looking in seats in the 6-9% range, but since similar margins is all these seats have in common, I’m not sure how illuminating it is.]

  12. @newellchook52
    @randlight Wonder if rAbbott will get his mum to ring Peta to tell her she’s dumped?

    Love this tweet I wonder too :devil:

  14. TrueBlueAussie

    I tend to agree with your estimation what could be gained by the Libs if they did roll him?

    Along with loathing of Abbott the whole Government seems to not have a clue.

  16. The coalition won’t make the same mistake. The only chance of a leadership change is if Tony Abbott gracefully resigns to hand over the tiller to some new talent. There will be no night of the long Labor shank knives

    That’ll be the official line. It all depends on whether the media go along with it. I think they might, I see them as still desperate to justify Abbott, even his assassination, & in so doing justify themselves.

  18. Ross,

    It is a falacy to assume that the rate a business charges for any product or service is determined by the cost of the inputs.

    Essentially prices are set by the market. If the market will pay more then any business person worth the name will charge more. All good businesses at all times will look at costs and the quality of their offerings to find ways of optimising this for the market in order to increase profits.

    The ‘market price’ is obviously pretty complex and includes branding and marketing, advertising, competing offers, personal preferrences etc etc, but in the end a business person will set their offer at the highest price they believe the market will pay to sell enough of their product to make the profit they are aiming for. The only exception to this is if a business is looking to use discounting to increase market share or drive a competitor out, but this really only can work in the short term and the long term aim of this is just to reach a position of market power in order to maximise profit.

    The idea that there is some direct cause/response relationship between the amount paid for staff at any time let alone weekends and how many jobs are available is bunkum. What drives employment is a strong market for the products/services produced by that employment.

    In the example of a restaurant a quality establishment that hires the best staff at over award rates will charge premium prices, a cheap eats place trying to cut costs with the lowest staff costs they can get away with will need to lower their prices to compete. Both can prosper in a strong market where people have plenty of discretionary cash to spend on a meal out. Both will suffer in a tight market where people are watching their pennies.

    But the low cost joint will be competing against home cooking, take away and home delivery. If their low cost staff are delivering a poor dining experience through poor cooking and service then paying peanuts won’t save the staff’s job nor the owner’s business.

    As for charging more to cover the extra staff costs on the weekends for most restaurants (unless they do a roaring mid week lunch trade) the costs as a percentage of takings will probably be less simply because more people want to eat out on the weekends. A waiter and a couple of kitchen staff twiddling their thumbs for two covers on a Tuesday night are far more expensive than half a dozen staff worked off their feet with a full house on Saturday. What is more likely to happen is for the business to set their prices to be profitable even when their staff are earning the most in overtime, and then offer discounts in low turnover periods (kids eat free on Tuesday!) in order to increase turnover then.

    So basically it’s all bullshit. More of the same shit thinking that says CEO’s should be paid millions and rising at double digits every year and the rest of us should cop a pay freeze and lose our conditions. It doesn’t make for a stronger economy or a fairer society but those who have the power to do so will always distort the rules to their benefit.

  19. TBA,

    If Newman goes down next weekend then Abbott will be in serious trouble. NSW are going to the polls in March and, unfortunately for the NSW Libs “Toxic Tony” lives there and so cannot be exiled to another province for the duration.

    If Abbott is seen as the cause of the loss of two State Governments, I doubt Baird and co will be satisfied with finding out if 2 out of 3 ain’t bad.

    It’s all speculation of course. But, today you have the content of private conversations with back benchers appearing on the front pages of the major newspapers. That only adds more pressure.

    The situation is volatile within Fortress Liberal and if you know anything about explosions in confined spaces, they tend to create a lot of damage when they occur.

  22. Re Citizen @496: most Sydney pubs are open on Sunday and most will serve dinner. Tony Abbott’s must be one of the rare exceptions. Or he’s just making up stuff again.

  23. ratsak 518 – there is some good research from the USA demonstrating that higher wages do not make higher unemployment. I will try and find it.

    And I think in the USA they are now finding that if companies don’t pay people very much, then those same companies have trouble selling their own goods to a poorer populace.

    Which reminds me of an apocryphal story of a car manufacturing CEO proudly showing a union boss his new robots on the assembly line.

    CEO – “How many of them do you think you’ll be able to get to join your union to campaign for better wages and conditions?”

    Union Boss – “I don’t know. But how many of them do you think will buy any of the cars you produce?”

  24. TBA is either a

    • C-grade performance artiste with delusions about being edgy and subversive,

    • a Labor stooge,

    • a paid mercenary troll mindlessly regurgitating dumbshit propaganda talking points,

    • or just a batshit insane Lib desperately trying to convince him/her self that it will all magically work out for them, if only they can just get the skite right.

  27. Re Ratsak @518: good post.

    Reducing penalty rates simply means transferring money from employees to proprietors. Prices will not come down – why would they? The market hadn’t changed, except that low paid people will be less able to afford to eat out. At best, it might encourage a few marginal operators to open longer. The few benefit and the many suffer.

  28. I don’t think all this “whodathunkit???” stuff from the media, as evidenced this morning by the Wallace “bumpf” is necessarily worth as much as an Abbott promise. They still want to believe the persona they created. Plus they’ve yet to fall back to their rediscovery of the idea that the alternative government & Opposition leader should face scrutiny. Shorten or any Labor figure won’t get the ride Abbott had.

  30. If Abbott gets dumped no matter the face saving measure I am not worried.

    Its the policies that count. So only going to Malcolm Turnbull and doing a reverse on all the policies in the last budget will make a difference.

    Abbott has done that much damage and the LNP has to not only dump the leader damaging them but the perception of unfair that he has brought about.

  31. Ratsac
    Totally agree with your post. Another factor for restaurants and cafes which I believe will impact is availability of diners. If penalty rates across the board are scrapped some businesses and services that currently close will have to embrace a seven day week (if they don’t how will employment grow) it therefore stands to reason that the current number of diners will decrease. Small businesses need to do some analysis of their customers, who is going to go out for Sunday brunch if their partner is working, who is going to spend a weekend getaway in Margaret river if their partner has to work. I have children who work in jobs with unsociable hours and it’s very difficult arranging get togethers, so I know it will be an issue
    IMO all this will do is decrease business over the weekends and destroy our society

  33. [ Just Me
    Posted Saturday, January 24, 2015 at 12:11 pm | Permalink

    TBA is either etc etc ]

    I’m more inclined to say truthie has returned.

    With Qld election it was on the cards and TBA has had a focus on boats.

    Not that it matters – its the same tosh.

  34. I guess dennis Atkins didnt see this liberal supporter on the Project last night, who confirmed he has been a Lib member for 11 years and a lifelong liberal voter. He said that he would still vote for them if Abbott remained leader, but pleaded with Abbott to resign for the good of the party.

    [The source of the frustration among Liberal voters – and despite conjecture about whether Andrew was a real “life long Liberal”, it’s easy to find true conservative voters who are deeply disappointed and angry about the Abbott Government – is policy uncertainty, mixed messaging and changes of direction while saying everything is going to plan.]

  35. Atkins:

    [Abbott is addressing the National Press Club two days after the Queensland election and he’s being urged to outline his core, unshakable principles which guide his approach to governing.

    “He needs to talk about what he believes not what policy he’s pursuing,” said one Liberal strategist.]

    I don’t see how that will make his policies more acceptable. Abbott can say he believes in motherhood and apple pie, but that won’t stop him introducing legislation that suits Big Mining, Big Business and Big Gina.

  36. Abbott is going to be the loser of the Queensland election.

    The swing is so big if Newman wins he is just going to fall over the line.

    Mr Abbott has still not set foot in Queensland

  38. Abbott’s core, unshakeable principles appear to be:
    – wind back and dismantle the social security safety net to the greatest extent possible
    – wind back employee wages, conditions and bargaining power
    – dismantle medicare
    – to the greatest extent possible, privatise the provision and cost of health care and education
    – transfer wealth and income up the socioeconomic scale
    – unconditional support for big business, especially miners and fossil fuel interests
    – wind back environmental regulation and support
    – culturally, as far as possible, shift back towards a traditional, 1950s Anglo Australia. Wind back multiculturalism

    Socially, Abbott wants to take us back to the 1950s. Economically, he pines for the 1930s.

  39. victoria:

    Our local Lib MP appeared in the local papers during the week saying things hadn’t exactly gone to plan for the govt, but telling us he expected they’d get better and the govt had promised to improve.

    Gotta laugh. This from the mob that told us they’d be a grown up, functional government.

  41. Wisdom from the suppository of knowledge.

    [Tony Abbott tells Sydney Islamic protesters to ‘lighten up’ ]

    This is on a par with dismissing a women’s opinion with “there’s no need to get hysterical”.

  42. http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/jan/24/voters-dont-trust-politicians-to-plan-for-ageing-population-survey-shows

    [“The idea that health has to be cut to support the ageing population frightens people because they think the system is under immense pressure already and they can’t see how more can be taken away, and in regional Australia they feel especially under-serviced,” said Dorothy Dudley, director of the Mind and Mood report.

    And while some respondents were prepared to accept the Abbott government’s $7 Medicare copayment (the policy that was on the table at the time of the surveys) they were suspicious that it would lead to even higher payments and a “US-style system” where healthcare became unaffordable.

    . . .
    Respondents were equally anxious about the plan to raise the pension eligibility age to 70 – a policy that applies to those born after 1965 – and generally worried at the prospect that the pension would become less generous but that they would be unable to continue to work.]

  45. lizzie @ 542

    I am still gobsmacked that nobody is asking Abbott and co how actually discouraging people to go to the doctor is going to address the serious health care challenges in 20 years time – like hospitalisation and intensive aged care. These are not Medicare issues, but separately funded.

    We need a serious conversation about alternatives for intensive health care – for example looking at remote monitoring through a first class internet system – but instead we get doctrinaire ideology where the solution comes first and then is attached to an inappropriate problem.

  47. MTBW@489

    Thanks for the link to Amnesty. I have signed the petition. Indonesia restarting executions is a seriously retrograde step that flies in the face of much of the rest of the world.

  48. Re Dennis Atkins’s article in the CM where he says that Abbott has to reframe his mission statement.

    Abbott’s mission statement is to implement the IPA agenda. He can’t say that in a public speech because he will be howled down. That’s why anything else he says comes across as insincere and dishonest. Because it is and he doesn’t believe it himself.

  49. lizzie

    As per your link. From my own personal observations, i would say 55

    [“The 70 age limit is problematic. Not everyone can do that, not if they have a really physical job. It’s got to be flexible. If you’re a tiler or a bricklayer, your body can’t just keep doing that. You’re lucky if you last to 65.”]

  50. One person’s spending is another person’s income. Business owners who push for lower wages and reduced penalty rates don’t understand that very well. They see their business in isolation. If a large number of people have their incomes cut, there will be less spending on hospitality, retail and other businesses. Everybody benefits from high levels of discretionary household income.

Comments Page 11 of 54
1 … 10 11 12 … 54

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *