Newspoll: 51-49 to Labor; Fairfax-Ipsos: 54-46

New federal polls from Newspoll and Ipsos land a fair distance apart – the former giving Bill Shorten his worst personal ratings to date, the latter giving Labor a strong result in what has hitherto been a Coalition-leaning series.

Two big new polls:

• In The Australian, Newspoll repeats its surprisingly strong result from the Coalition at its previous poll three weeks ago, with Labor’s two-party lead steady at 51-49. Primary votes are 41% for the Coalition (steady), 36% for Labor (down one) and 11% for the Greens (steady). Tony Abbott’s personal ratings continue to rise from their low base, with approval up four to 33% and disapproval down two to 59%, while Bill Shorten gets his worst figures to date with approval down three to 33% and disapproval up four to 54%. Abbott all but closes the gap on prime minister, now at 41-40 compared with 41-36 last time. The poll was as always conducted from Friday to Sunday, the sample being 1172.

• By stark contrast, the latest Ipsos poll for the Fairfax papers belies the pollster’s previous form as a leaner to the Coalition in giving Labor two-party leads of 54-46 on previous election preferences and 55-45 on respondent-allocated preferences. This represents a three-point shift to Labor from the previous Ipsos poll in late February on both measures. Labor’s primary vote is up two to 38%, the Coalition is down three to 39% and the Greens are up one to 13%. Reflecting the trend elsewhere, Tony Abbott’s approval rating is up two to 34% with disapproval down two to 60%, while Bill Shorten is down one to 42% and up one to 44%. Shorten’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened slightly from 44-39 to 46-38. The poll also finds 37% support for an increase in the goods and services tax with 59% opposed – a relatively favourable result. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1404.

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.

992 comments on “Newspoll: 51-49 to Labor; Fairfax-Ipsos: 54-46”

Comments Page 17 of 20
1 … 16 17 18 … 20

  1. ICAC and the New South Wales government vindicated by the High Court decision today agreeing in the cancellation of mining licenses given to Cascade Coal with its Obeid connections

  3. “@james_oaten: #BREAKING – it’s understood the vote was 5-3 in Gunner’s favour as predicted. Challengers unable to woo deputy leader McCarthy. @abcnewsNT”

  5. I agree with you BB. Dr Karl’s credibility is shot. He cannot back out of this. His initial reaction to criticism said it all
    [He agreed to do it to support long-term policy making and because he gets paid “bugger all” by his employers, the ABC and the University of Sydney, he said.]
    He cashed in his reputation for a lump sum and is now just a voice for hire and anything he spruikes should be taken with a grain of salt.

  6. WWP @ 796

    [Andrews should have known, much more so than Bowen and the tax thresholds and I’m pretty sure Bowen wasn’t given much slack here.]

    I hate all this gotcha stuff – but the Liberals and their fellow travellers have a bloody field day in drawing unsustainable conclusions about fitness for office when someone from Labor does it.

    But there are some points that make Kevin Andrews’ performance particularly egregious.

    First, he is the Minister, not the shadow. For some reason the media in Australia expect a greater level of knowledge and policy detail from Labor, even in opposition, than they do from the Coalition, even when in Government. This is absurd and part of press gallery groupthink.

    Secondly, as others have pointed out, the use of ‘operational matters’ as a reason not to disclose al-Baghdadi’s name is just absurd – but very typical of this government’s appallingly inept capacity to manage the politics of pretty much anything.

    This ‘gaffe’ is confirmation, rather than evidence, of Andrews’ unfitness for this or any other Ministerial role.

  8. Monetary Fund, the Howard/Costello government was the most profligate in Australia for the last 50 years. Indeed, while the mining boom was gathering pace they cut taxes so far and so fast that they forced the Reserve Bank of Australia to rapidly increase interest rates.

    While countries like Norway took the benefits of resource price booms and banked them in their sovereign wealth fund, Peter Costello chose to cut taxes for the wealthy instead. He knew at the time that his populist generosity to the highest income earners would force future treasurers to choose between budget deficits or cutting spending on the sick, the poor and elderly. No prizes for guessing which our former treasurer prefers.

    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/15/peter-costellos-five-most-profligate-decisions-as-treasurer-cost-the-budget-56bn-a-year?CMP=share_btn_tw

  9. Andrews: more troops going abroad.
    Media: who are they fighting?
    Andrews: That’s an operational secret matter. Tony hasn’t told me yet.
    Media: But you’re the Defence Minister.
    Andrews: Am I? Oh.

  10. lizzie @ 809

    Alternative transcript:

    Media: But you’re the Defence Minister.
    Andrews: What! How did you find out? That’s an operational matter!

  11. Dr Karl is an example of why I get so frustrated with scientists.

    There’s a deliberate distancing between research and involvement in public debate. For a scientist to involve themselves in politics at all is seen as a bit de classe.

    The scientific culture is that scientists do the research and analysis, provide the facts to the decision makers, and then move on. Arguing for issues in the public sphere, or even identifying courses of action, is not seen as their metier.

    What this means in practice is that debate about scientific issues in the public sphere is left to either non scientists (and often those anti action) or the handful of scientists who are willing to be populists as well.

    There simply isn’t enough of the latter, and many of those (if you can say that of a handful of people) aren’t generalist scientists – they have specialised in a particular field, and when they venture out of it (as they have to) are prone to mistakes (there are a few classics chalked up to Tim Flannery, for this reason).

    So important issues such as climate change, fluoridation of water, the management of the Murray Darling system, etc etc are left to non scientists to not only come up with solutions but to do the explaining and ‘selling’ as well.

    Coming from a culture where political engagement is frowned upon, it is not surprising that the scientists who do venture forth make naive and obvious mistakes.

    Perhaps all science courses should include subjects to do with public advocacy and policy development.

  13. It’s hard to know who to believe, sometimes.

    [Emissions of toxic pollution by EnergyAustralia and Origin Energy have increased by more than 500% in the past financial year, and AGL has become the country’s biggest carbon polluter, a new study claims.

    Together the trio account for 13% of Australia’s total carbon emissions, according to the report by the activist group GetUp. It claims the companies operate behind a “smokescreen of sustainability” that obscures their reliance on high-pollution power stations and lobbying to reduce the renewable energy target (RET).

    Origin described the report on Tuesday as “inaccurate and misleading” and said it did not reflect the company’s significant investments in renewable energy projects, or take into account its large share of the national energy market.]
    http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/apr/14/energy-australias-and-origin-energys-toxic-emissions-soared-by-500-getup

  14. Dr Karl says he was not given the full document to read before stupidly agreeing to promote the unknown from this mob of liars and shambolics. He regrets he didn’t demand a full read. Well that was his big mistake.

    He now has only one option to recover a modicum of his brand value, and if he doesn’t exercise it quick …… like this morning ….. it’ll be gone. He must (a) admit and widely publicise that he was conned, (b) condemn the document, and (c) demand (publicly) that the adverts be stopped.

    He can do all this in 30 seconds on the social media platforms.

    Easy, if he really wants to.

  15. It used to be said that the best chance of winning a case in the High Court was losing it in the New South Wales highest court, the Court of Appeal.

    Even with Cunneen, the High Court, while upholding the New South Wales Court of Appeal’s decision, rejected its reasoning completely, instead creating its own from scratch.

  16. [First, he is the Minister, not the shadow. For some reason the media in Australia expect a greater level of knowledge and policy detail from Labor, even in opposition, than they do from the Coalition, even when in Government. This is absurd and part of press gallery groupthink.]

    The Press Gallery doesn’t know, either. They look the fact up just before they ask the question. Then they have a quiet chuckle to themselves when the minister or shadow minister ties him or herself in knots.

    The trivialization of such things is appallingly pointless. It’s just click-bait, and has been going on swince Hewson tangled his tongue in response to a Mike Willissee question on Fightback! And who can forget Beazley’s “Karl Rove” moment?

    Newman would have been well within his rights to answer that no-one knows who’s really leading IS, and to leave it at that. Or just to tell the interviewer (was it Sales?) to bag her head (would have been an improvement in Sales’ case, that goes double if it was Uhlmann).

  18. BB @ 816

    To be fair to Leigh Sales in this instance, I read the transcript and in the context the question of who the leader of IS did not start out as an attempt at ‘gotcha’, although it turned to that once Andrews started to garble political flak in response. It’s more the subsequent reporting that gets to me.

    And yes – I’ll never forget the impact of the ‘Rove’ moment on Kim Beazley and how outrageous that was. The wedding cake thing by Hewson, however, was relevant because it went to the complexity of the plan for a GST that Hewson had ‘authored’. These days’ of course, it’s more likely that the media will beat up Bowen because he doesn’t know some faux statistic from the IGR.

  20. The head of ISIS is a foreigner with a non-European name. Mr Andrews is the sort of person who would always struggle with such a challenge. (Mind you, Bob Hawke notoriously once addressed the Japanese PM Yasuhiro Nakasone, to his face, as “Mr Knackers One”.)

  21. A scientist joining a debate probably needs to be careful that politics does not drive the science i e their mind is not open to all the facts. Too easy to become a paid hack and you only need to look at expert witnesses to see that. Dr Karl has been really fucking stupid for someone allegedly so smart. Maybe he could plead nutty professor

  22. zoomster

    To lump all the scientists as one assumes they all think as one.

    [Perhaps all science courses should include subjects to do with public advocacy and policy development.]

    I rather those who work in this field focus on what they do best and let their PR team handle it. They do well enough with their peer review publications.

    Dr Karl stands out because he chose to front the public, as with scientists like Hawking.

  26. From the ABC news report on the East West link contract:

    [Mr Andrews said the $339 million was paid out before the change of government.

    “These monies were spent by the previous government. They were out the door… before the government changed,” he said.

    “That is the fact of this.

    I think taxpayers would be right to question why the previous government in invested such significant amounts of money.
    Daniel Andrews, Victorian Premier
    “Then to make matters worse, the previous government not only signed a contract that was riddled with poisoned pills and trap doors and booby traps an other incendiary devices, they then provided a side letter, an unprecedented side letter that said no matter what the East West Consortium will be looked after.

    “So that is the context of this. They’re the realities. We didn’t sign those documents.

    “We warned against signing those documents but we have had no choice but to deal with those facts.

    “I think taxpayers would be right to question why the previous government invested such significant amounts of money.”]

    So basically the new Labor Government has agreed not to try and claw back from the consortium what had previously been paid to it under the previous government. On the face of it a huge win for Andrews.

  27. Nice to see that Woolworths is now in the firing line for illegally using the word ANZAC for commercial purposes. In the immediate aftermath of WWI there seemed to be a legislative enthusiasm for such prohibitions: the Scout Association Act 1924 is worth a read, not least because it seems to suggest that wearing a Scout uniform may be illegal if you aren’t a Scout.

    At the 1974 election, a candidate for one of the Victorian seats ran under the banner “RSL”, which, he said, stood for Republican Socialist Labour”. Caused a nice little kerfuffle at the time.

  28. pedant @ 820

    [(Mind you, Bob Hawke notoriously once addressed the Japanese PM Yasuhiro Nakasone, to his face, as “Mr Knackers One”.)]

    Ah…don’t we all yearn for a simpler time…….

  31. Andrews not knowing who Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was is a bit like John Howard’s defence minister (Robert Hill) getting confused about who Saddam Hussein or Osama Bin Laden were. Then he componds it by apparently insisting that the identity of the leader of Daesh is a secret. Not a big deal if that were the only problem with the deployment but not a good look either. Imagine if it were a Labor Defence Minister making that sort of gaffe.

  32. I can’t for the life of me understand why politicians stumped by a gotcha question don’t just say “Sorry, I’ve had a complete mental block on that”. Everyone old enough to vote would understand.

  33. Steve777 @ 831: I can’t agree with you on that. Mixing up Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden reflects serious strategic confusion. Not knowing the name of the head of ISIS reflects, well, not knowing his name. It’s not as if his name is actually all that important. I’d be much more worried if Mr Andrews couldn’t name the Defence Minister of, say, Singapore, since that’s someone he might actually be dealing with. (Personally I can’t stand Mr Andrews, but on this I think people are being a bit hard on him.)

  34. Raaraa

    Firstly, I made it clear in my post that some scientists do involve themselves in public debates, so I wasn’t generalisting.

    Secondly, my point is that this is a cultural thing – scientists are taught to think this way – so saying that scientists think this way isn’t a wild assumption (and is based, moreover, on conversations with actual scientists).

  35. [I’d be much more worried if Mr Andrews couldn’t name the Defence Minister of, say, Singapore, since that’s someone he might actually be dealing with.]

    I looked up the transcript to see if he was asked the name of the PM of Iraq, which was highly relevant. He wasn’t. It would have been interesting though.

  37. Pleased to see the Andrews government here in VIC has put the E-W business to bed. Goodnight to a terrible plan!

    Shame the Napthine government exposed all of us to $340m in costs for a project the electorate didn’t want, but it could have been worse. thats nothing like what the LNP was projecting.

  38. zoomster@834

    Raaraa

    Firstly, I made it clear in my post that some scientists do involve themselves in public debates, so I wasn’t generalisting.

    Secondly, my point is that this is a cultural thing – scientists are taught to think this way – so saying that scientists think this way isn’t a wild assumption (and is based, moreover, on conversations with actual scientists).

    I just think Dr Karl is a special case. He likes the limelight more (not that that is a criticism). I see him more as a celebrity first, and not so much a career scientist. He has a lot of enthusiasm for science, the same way Jeremy Clarkson is a celebrity who enjoys driving cars.

  39. An interesting and apolitical argument as to why Andrews should have known the name of the enemy:

    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/we-are-at-war-with-islamic-state-and-defence-minister-kevin-andrews-should-know-its-leader-20150415-1mlch4.html

    Personally, I’d love to see the end of the ‘gotcha’ journalism culture for good, but this is not likely to happen as long as it furnishes good click-bait for the lazy and shallow in the profession.

  40. Re TPOF @795: I agree regarding the ICAC investigation into Ms Cuneen. It is a relatively minor matter, while ICAC should be focusing on much more significant instances of possible official corruption or malfeasance. It looked and smelt like a ‘gotcha’ against a whistleblower, although there seems to be no evidence that this is the case. But surely it would have been more appropriate to refer these particular allegations to either the Police or the relevant Legal proffession organisation if there is a credible case for criminality or misconduct.

  41. [Then he componds it by apparently insisting that the identity of the leader of Daesh is a secret. Not a big deal if that were the only problem with the deployment but not a good look either.]

    Spot on Steve
    Shows they are prepared to hide anything for any reason

  42. Raaraa

    and I’m arguing that this is a problem – we don’t have enough scientists willing to engage in public debates, and thus the field is left to (at best) populists such as Flannery and (at worst) pseudo scientists such as Monckton.

    This is a direct result of the culture of science.

    Once upon a time, this lofty disengagement from public debate might have been acceptable, but it has serious downsides.

    Another flaw of this cultural attitude is that when scientists do engage, like Dr Karl, they do so without the background or training to avoid making silly mistakes.

  44. Abbott tells us that ISIS is the hugest threat to the free world. He makes exorbitant political mileage out of it.

    It is inconceivable that the donkey given the ministerial charge to defend us does not know the name of the ISIS leader.

    Bit like the British Ministers for defence in the late 1930’s and early 1940’s not knowing the name of the guy with the moustache leading the Nazis.

  45. This article perpetuates the mainstream myth that a government which issues a non-convertible fiat currency with a floating exchange rate needs to borrow its own currency. National governments which issue their own currencies have chosen to adopt a custom of accompanying deficit spending with debt issuance but this is not necessary. The reason they do this is to use government bonds as an instrument for managing the interbank lending rate. The Reserve Bank sets a target for this rate and either buys or sells Commonwealth Government Securities (Treasury bonds) to ensure that the target is met. If the interbank rate falls below the RBA’s target this means that reserves (money in the commercial banks’ Reserve Bank accounts) are too abundant. The RBA sells bonds to soak up the excess reserves and lift the rate. If the interbank rate rises above the RBA’s target this means that there is a shortage of reserves in the commercial banking system. The RBA buys bonds from commercial banks in order to inject reserves into the system.

    The RBA does not need to sell and buy bonds to manage the interbank lending rate. It could set a permanent interbank rate of zero. It could set a permanent rate above zero and pay that rate of interest on the commercial banks’ reserves. Bond issuance is popular with the business and financial sectors because it is a source of easy income for wealthy people. It is a form of corporate welfare. It would be better if the RBA didn’t use this mechanism.

    In any event, the government has no problem servicing debts in its own currency. The money required to redeem government bonds is created ex nihilo by the Reserve Bank. It doesn’t come from taxpayers. Taxpayers don’t “fund” anything at the national level; tax obligations enforced by a sovereign currency issuer destroy money. The dollars that households and firms pay to the ATO simply cease to exist. Taxation is an instrument the federal government uses to manage the aggregate demand of the private sector. If nominal demand rises faster than the real economy’s capacity to increase output, inflation occurs. High inflation destablises the economy and is a major problem. In that situation the government can increase taxation in order to remove more spending power from the private sector and cool an overheating economy. If, on the other hand, nominal demand is too low to buy all of the economy’s real output, the government can cut taxation in order to leave more money in the hands of households and firms and thereby stimulate sales, output, and job creation. Of course, increasing or cutting government spending is another tool the government can use to influence aggregate demand.

    State and local governments are revenue-constrained. There is a financial limit on their spending. Our national government, as a sovereign currency issuer, is not revenue-constrained. The limit on federal spending is not financial. The federal government’s spending is limited by inflation risk – that is, the government should not spend more than the real economy’s capacity to meet nominal demand. Today we are in no danger of demand-pull inflation (nominal demand exceeding real output). Today we have an output gap, which means there is not enough spending to consume all that the economy is able to produce. There are 1.8 million Australians who are either unemployed and under-employed. These people are an immense real resource which is not being used. The Australian economy is currently far below full employment and full capacity. There is ample room for non-inflationary extra spending.

    http://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2015/04/14/rob-burgess-budget-households-meltdown/

  46. Media gotcha is very poor journalism and poor journalism should, as it is, suffer reducing audiences and significance in society.

    However a ministers knowledge of a situation in relation to a decision of the minister, even if entirely gleaned from briefing material prepared for the decision, is extremely relevant to an evaluation of the ministers decision.

  47. Injustice US style

    ATLANTA — In an unexpectedly harsh sentence after a polarizing six-year ordeal, eight of the 10 educators convicted of racketeering in one of the nation’s largest public school cheating scandals were sentenced to prison terms of up to seven years Tuesday after they refused to take sentencing deals that were predicated on their acceptance of responsibility and a waiver of their right to appeal.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/15/us/atlanta-school-workers-sentenced-in-test-score-cheating-case.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

    One can hope the Judge gets the boot or a prison sentence himself when this goes to appeal.
    Surley it’s illegal to force or blackmail someone into giving up their rights to appeal his judgment.

  48. Zoomster who actually needs training in not taking money for putting your name & reputation to a product you haven’t seen.

    This case has nothing to do with the way scientists think or policy debate, just what anyone is prepared to do for a quick buck.

  49. How about if Dr Karl was sold the line that this was a Treasury report on the statistics? Who approached him? Who does he support politically? Just because we at PB are aware of how shifty and consistently unbelievable are the Coalition, it doesn’t mean everyone is.

  50. kevjohnnno

    As one of my bosses (an ethical man) taught me years ago, when you put your signature at the bottom of a document, you put your reputation on the line for all to see …… so only endorse documents/reports etc when you really, knowingly mean it.

    He used also say that if you haven’t got your reputation, you’ve got nothing.

    Dr Karl is apparently naive or gullible regarding such matters ….. it’s actually not rocket science!

Comments Page 17 of 20
1 … 16 17 18 … 20

Leave a Reply

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