The latest fortnightly result from Roy Morgan finds Labor improving from an unusually weak result last time, their primary vote up two points to 38% with the Coalition down two to 38.5%. The Greens and Palmer United are both down half a point, to 12% and a new low of 1% respectively. However, the respondent-allocated two-party result is steady at 53-47, the preference flow evidently being less favourable to Labor compared with a fortnight ago, and the shift on 2013 preference flows is also rather modest, from 53-47 to 54-46. As usual, the poll was conducted over two weekends by face-to-face and SMS, the sample on this occasion being 3314. I believe this and the regular Essential poll are the only federal polling we’ll be seeing this week.
UPDATE (Essential Research): The only change in Essential Research’s voting intention numbers this week are a one point gain for the Greens to 11% and a one point drop for Palmer United to 1%, leaving Labor on 39%, the Coalition on 41% and Labor’s two-party lead at 52-48. Further questions have been framed with the looming budget in mind, the most striking finding being that 56% believe the Coalition’s policies favour the rich over the “average Australian” (20%), with Labor scoring a fairly balanced response over the available options. Relatedly, it is anticipated that the budget will be good for the well off (49% good, 9% bad) and business (32% good, 17% bad), but very bad for everybody else and for the economy overall (19% good, 33% bad). Eighty-two per cent of respondents signed on to the proposition that “some companies” and “some wealthy people” didn’t pay their fair share of tax. Out of seven listed economic issues, the cost of living rated highest as an issue of concern (87%) with the national debt and budget deficit tied for last place (63%). Opinion on the latest Iraq commitment is fairly evenly balanced, with 40% approval and 44% disapproval.
ESJ,
A good dose of “Mother Courage” will not go astray for Labor.
WeWantPaul@896
I look forward to the day when any journalist with News Corp on their CV is regarded as unemployable.
[I look forward to the day when any journalist with News Corp on their CV is regarded as unemployable.]
If it were a rational world we would be there.
Why are Labor people like WWP and Bemused so nasty gg? Is it Labor values to wish unemployment on others GG?
Edwina StJohn@904
You find the truth nasty?
Doesn’t say much about your values.
http://kevinbonham.blogspot.com.au/2015/04/wonk-central-morgans-tasmanian-state.html
Wonk Central: Morgan’s Tasmanian State and Federal Sampling
Some numbery thing where I show that Morgan’s Tasmanian state polls purporting to show Labor in the lead are likely marred by a house effect in their Tasmanian SMS sampling, which also apparently affects their federal polling in the state.
ESJ,
If wishes were fishes, we’d all cast nets in the sea.
Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses GG!
ESJ,
The one you knock back is the one you never get.
A stich in time saves nine GG!
ESJ,
This reminds me of your common touch.
https://twitter.com/VeryOldPics/status/590845034024558592/photo/1
Apparently, Prince Phillip officially received his Australian Knighthood today from the Queen.
Kevvie has left the building!
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/kevin-rudd-and-therese-rein-sell-norman-park-home-20150422-1mqren.html
Why are Labor people like WWP and Bemused so nasty gg? Is it Labor values to wish unemployment on others GG?
Only on those who work for evil empires.
I can’t believe Kevvie Rudd is pining for a U.N gig.
Who… woulda… guessed… it.
you two should get a room
I look forward to the day when any journalist with News Corp on their CV is regarded as unemployable.
Aren’t they? anywhere else…. any evidence that one went on to a real job after?
Yes, it’s official, the Prince is now a Knight of Australia. Funny that neither Tony Abbott nor anyone else in the Federal Government saw fit to comment on the occasion or to congratulate His Royal Highness Prince Sir Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. Maybe there’s a question there for some intrepid journalist.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/queen-elizabeth-hands-the-duke-of-edinburgh-his-knighthood-of-australia-insignia-20150422-1mr65w.html
“Australia’s London High Commissioner Alexander Downer, who was present for the ceremony, declined through a spokesperson to comment on the Occasion.
A Buckingham Palace spokesperson told Fairfax the conversation between the Queen and her husband during the ceremony would not be made public. It is standard practice during royal audiences for no details to be given about what was said.
The photo speaks for itself”
Speaking if the photo, I wonder wher the Duke is going to pin his new medal?
Go to Iview NOW and watch this amazing documentary. Trust me.
[Bushfire
@BushfireBill
Simply brilliant Kate. You’ll go far in any direction you choose. Stunning. Pensive. Powerful documentary. The Truth. http://iview.abc.net.au/programs/lest-we-forget-what/DO1321H001S00 ]
This amazing woman says what has needed to be said since the jingoists, the lurk merchants, merchandisers, phoneys and the war spruikers grabbed Gallipoli and took it over for their own ends.
It is “Must-See” television. What the medium was invented for.
I don’t know how accurate much of this is, but even if only half right, its one hell of a story. UK political elites in a massive panic over Scotland. Again.
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/queen-palace-coup-miliband-snp-cameron-huitson-345
Darn – “Putting out such detailed policy so early in the electoral cycle”
Detailed ??? Just thought bubbles at this stage Darn, Bowen just trying to come up with something as has been getting a bit of stick about their lack of policies lately. Will be amazed if the negative gearing thought bubble makes it to the next election,is just asking for a scare campaign on a probable downturn in the housing industry.
Good sensible ALP policy on Super. Neuter the ‘aLP has no policies’ line, an easy policy to message and puts the pressure on the LNP as to what they’ll do instead.
Smart politics. The chorus of shrieks from the LNP PB mob confirms it.
[I don’t know how accurate much of this is, but even if only half right, its one hell of a story. UK political elites in a massive panic over Scotland. Again.]
His conclusion that “we are about to enter the realm of serious constitutional breakdown” isn’t based on anything.
[ The chorus of shrieks from the LNP PB mob confirms it. ]
Amusing isn’t it. 🙂
lefty e @ 920: You may recall that Robin Gray in Tasmania lost his majority at the 1989 state election but tried unsuccessfully to persuade the Governor to grant him a fresh election rather than commissioning the ALP to rule with Greens support. At the same time, Sir Edmund Rouse was running around trying to bribe an ALP member to cross the floor – which earned Rouse a prison sentence.
The Queen has far too much sense to go along with any shonky stuff: whichever of Cameron and Miliband can command majority support in the Commons will undoubtedly be commissioned to form a government. The UK also is bristling with constitutional scholars, all of whom will say that Tory arguments about the “illegitimacy” of a coalition government are bulldust.
This sort of thing can become a problem, however, if you have a written constitution which is sufficiently ambiguous to give the losers the basis of an argument. That happened in East Timor after the 2007 election. FRETILIN bitched and moaned for the next few years, and it helped their political standing not one jot. (Rather like Mr Whitlam, who spent the period from 1975 to 1977 complaining about the dismissal, and lost nearly as badly in 1977 as in 1975.)
William, 923, correct. The Conservatives losing power in the uk is always associated with some kind of apocalyptical event by the right wing fourth estate. Trouble is, the electorate isn’t listening. Hence the hyperbole.
923
If Labour get government without a plurality of seats, as it looks like they might, there will be a campaign styled on Abbott campaign against Gillard`s minority government but x10+.
Labour might now want to introduce proportional representation in Scotland, to reduce the effect of the SNP. It would also benefit the LibDems and hey would look massively hypocritical if they opposed it.
Tom @ 927: I often wonder whether the campaign to portray the Gillard minority government as illegitimate/unstable would have worked if Mr Abbott hadn’t been so successful in disrupting some of the prominent procedures of the House on a daily basis, in particular by moving suspensions of the standing orders during question time.
I seem to recall that the independents took the view that they didn’t want to help the government gag such debates, because that would somehow diminish the deliberative character of the House. On that, I think they made a really bad error. Mr Abbott was pushing the envelope and needed to be put in his place, and by not helping the government to do that, the independents ultimately helped to give legs to the perception that minority governments lead to instability.
The Gillard illegitimacy arguments of course were also pushed along by the proposition that the independents were going against the wishes of their voters in backing the ALP. It’s a bit hard to imagine an argument that the SNP, in backing Labour to rule rather the Conservatives, would be going against the wishes of the voters of Scotland.
928
I doubt that debating whether to suspend standing orders was even noticed as unusual by the majority of Australians. Did it even effect journalists reporting much? I think it was not a major issue. Politicians talking is Parliament hardly makes things unstable. If something had been done about suspending standing orders, Abbott would have found other ways to make it look like there was chaos.
Abbott drew a lot of his inspiration from the Tories in the late 70s in the UK as they sought to build chaos and uncertainty when Labour lost its parliamentary majority… Daily votes and other parliamentary nonsense happened daily.
Nothing new really.
For the tories losing government means
[serious constitutional breakdown]
pedant @925:
The UK Tories are quite well aware that their efforts are so much bulldust. They know that – but their objective is not to derail a hypothetical minority Labour Government, it is to delegitimize it.
Much as right-wingers did after Barack Obama’s election, as the Coalition did here after the 2010 election – the right wing’s natural response to the not-Right (it’s a stretch to call parties like the ALP “left-wing”) winning elections is to drum up the outrage.
Step 1: Make up a new rule, or come up with a scurrilous accusation about breaking established rules (see: Gillard’s “illegitimacy” as PM, Obama-related birtherism, etc.)
Step 2: Gin up outrage over the “broken rule”. Vilify and delegitimize your opponents. Undercut the processes of governance at every turn – use arcane legislative rules to frustrate, stall or block everything, including things you went to the last election on. Be sure to keep the Fourth Estate well-informed of what you’re doing – their support is crucial to making this work.
Step 3: Profit!
We’ve seen in play out in the USA, in France, in Australia…now it’s Britain’s turn. Every time the electorate fails to vote in their natural lords and masters of the Right, the Right alternates between undercutting their wishes and ignoring them.
New thread.