BludgerTrack: 52.1-47.9 to Labor

A slight gain for Labor on the BludgerTrack poll aggregate for the second week in a row, with four pollsters this week producing highly varied results.

It’s been a big week for federal opinion polling, with Ipsos adding its voice to the regular fortnightly Newspoll and Morgan and the weekly Essential Research. The results are sharply polarised, with Ipsos and Morgan coming in weak for the government and Newspoll and Essential being fairly strong. The BludgerTrack aggregate reads this a slight move to Labor, which consolidates a shift in their favour last week. However, there has been no change on the seat projection this time around, with gains for Labor in New South Wales and Victoria counterbalanced by losses in Queensland and Western Australia. Newspoll and Ipsos both provide new numbers for leadership approval, on which both Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten record substantial downturns for net approval. However, since this was driven by somewhat peculiar numbers from Newspoll’s swansong, I’d reserve my judgement on that for the time being.

BludgerTrack’s current two-party preferred reading of 52.1% for Labor is a bit lower than the other players in the poll aggregation game just at the moment, with Kevin Bonham and Phantom Trend both having it at 52.4%, and Mark the Ballot being even further out at 52.7%. Our relative weightings for Newspoll and Ipsos may have had something to do with this, but another factor will have been that only BludgerTrack has Essential Research’s weekly samples as separate data points, since Bonham and Phantom Trend have only the published fortnightly rolling average, and Mark the Ballot drops the pollster altogether. You may infer from that that this week’s result was on the strong side for the Coalition.

Also of note:

• Draft boundaries of a redistribution for the Northern Territory parliament have been published, which Antony Green considers in detail. The big change is the effective abolition of the Alice Springs seat of Araluen to make way for the new seat of Spillett in the north of Darwin’s growing satellite city of Palmerston. This has already had political ramifications, as Araluen MP Robyn Lambley cited it as one of her reasons for quitting the Country Liberal Party yesterday to sit as an independent, having intimated that the redistribution has singled her out for special treatment.

• The Lowy Institute has published its annual poll encompassing attitudes towards a wide range of foreign policy issues, which was conducted between February and May from a combined sample of around 6000 respondents by Newspoll and I-view, the latter being a part of Ipsos. Among many other things, respondents were asked to give the government marks out of ten across eight issues, producing a strong 7.1 average for “maintaining a strong alliance with the United States” (if that be deemed a good thing), a fairly healthy 5.9 for “responding to the threat of terrorism”, a perhaps surprisingly soft 4.9 for “handling the arrival of asylum seekers by boat”, another 4.9 for “managing Australia’s economy”, and a low 4.0 for “managing the issue of climate change”.

• The Lowy poll also found concern over climate change at its highest level of 2008, the potential electoral ramifications of which I considered in an article for Crikey yesterday. I had another subscriber-only Crikey piece on Friday which took a careful look at Essential Research data concerning perceptions of Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten.

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.

3,875 comments on “BludgerTrack: 52.1-47.9 to Labor”

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  2. Frankly I am feeling quite down today with the slamming of Shorten.

    It is strange that with a government fundamentally lying about what was said by a Senior Counsel in order to institute a Nazi style power grab for our democratic rights, the Fairfax media should be more concerned by a Union Leader negotiating a good agreement for his members.

    The mainstream media really stinks. I am seriously thinking of cancelling my Fairfax subscription. I’ve already reduced to web only – but this is just going too far. It’s gone cheap and nasty and it cannot even give the excuse that it’s being kept afloat by Rupert Murdoch.

  3. Would have loved to have observed the politicians at the ball last night. Perhaps the demeanour of some could give us some clues as to the state of play

  4. From Peters Martin – astounding –

    [ The agreement also appears to allow Australian firms to bring in an unlimited number of temporary workers from China, a provision attacked by the Australian Council of Trades Unions.

    Labor’s trade spokeswoman Penny Wong said the clause should not “be used as a mechanism to bypass local workers”.

    The agreement will be examined by the parliament’s joint standing committee on treaties which will report within 20 days.]

    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australiachina-free-trade-agreement-good-for-exports-less-good-for-national-sovereignty-20150617-ghqk5n.html

  6. Hmmm…

    Boerwar did say a while ago that a fed MP will be forced to resign when something gets exposed to wider public

  7. Great to see message on fb from Daniel Andrews, acknowledging the start of Ramadan Mubarak and referring to
    the Muslim faith in these terms —

    [It is a time to reflect on the universal themes of charity, empathy, selflessness and compassion.

    Ramadan reaffirms the commitment to the Muslim message of self-sacrifice for the benefit of others, a message that resonates for Muslims and non-Muslims alike..]

  8. victoria

    Interesting that the media were banned from reporting on the goings-on. Perhaps Peta was afraid that the grog-monster would make an appearance.

  9. Steve777

    [ That SMH editorial calling for Bill Shorten to “consider his future” is bizarre. ]

    Not really. Just another newspaper with a failing business model trying to grab a few more gullible readers. The fact that they are so shrill about it before they have actually bothered to presented any evidence tells you it is probably a beat-up.

    I notice even a few here on PB are already falling for the “surely there must be something in it?” trick.

  13. [100
    Trog Sorrenson

    briefly @70

    None of your options.

    Long term strategic advantage.]

    lol

    They’re not my options, they’re posited by you.

    Trouble is, division among those who oppose the LNP can have just one beneficiary – the LNP. There is no “long term strategic advantage” to be had from dividing the ranks.

    Hardly a day passes without some Green-Labor squabbling. You’ve already joined this game. Nothing good can come from it. Nothing.

  14. It’s more than obvious that fairfax are playing politics in order to try change Labor to a Labor that suits their political agenda. They have criticised this government, but they obviously figure this government is much harder to crack than the opposition.

  16. TS @77..

    “There is very rapid change occurring in technology, society, and the environment. We need to be ahead of the game, not playing silly political games for incremental tactical benefits.”

    You mean like: a 97% Fibre Optic NBN? ..or a National Disability Insurance Scheme? ..or, maybe a needs based education funding model such as, say, Gonski? ..possibly infrastructure spending on Public Transport? ..or even a Clean Energy Future suite of legislation underpinned by a market based mechanism for putting a price on carbon? What about support for marriage equality ..addressing the inequities in the superannuation system ..maintaining the integrity of Medicare …etc, etc, etc..

    Is that the sort of policy platform you’re yearning for?

  18. [“Mr Shorten could shrug some of this off if voters had warmed to him. While the Labor leader in person is a smart and charismatic man with good ideas, he remains approved by only 41 per cent of voters, the Fairfax-Ipsos poll says. The latest revelations over his AWU past also came a day after he had been caught out playing bad politics, as the Greens and the government compromised on pension reform.”]

    Hartcher wrote the editorial. The give away is the crap about the Greens pension deal. Made the same point in the Talking Politics video that appears with a few of BKs links. Pushed the pretty tendentious few that Labor voting against the pension changes was equally as irresponsible as the government seeking to set the Minister of Immigration and judge and jury for citizenship.

    Typical Hartcher getting close to getting it right and then making a twit of himself.

  20. TPOF @ 102, and others…

    Fairfax better deliver solid evidence justifying their smear of Shorten and demand for his resignation, and they had better do so pronto, or my subscription gets cancelled.

    For what that is worth to them.

  21. 113 briefly

    There is a “long term strategic advantage” in growing a political party that has policies capable of staying ahead of the accelerating changes I referred to.

    There is absolutely no strategic advantage in being half-arsed.

  23. Think metadata, whistleblower legislation, etc.

    Fairfax are agitating for change and aiming directly at the point they think will most effectively bring it about.

  25. markjs @116

    These policy initiatives are worthy – but they must be defended.

    Where is Shorten on the NBN, carbon pricing, defending research funding?

    He is happy to advocate SSM because it involves no political risk – a political no-brainer.

    Why can’t he just say that the carbon price was actually a good idea and that using old copper for the NBN is actually a bad idea, and that setting up a medical research slush fund is a stupid idea when real medical researchers are being defunded?

  26. Doyley

    I have tried but been unable to find the Awards covering 2004/2006.

    Victoria went Federal with its Award process in the 1990’s.

    And Fair Work Aust only has records back to 2010.

    But I will persist later…off the work

  27. The old media are like Myer or Harvey Norman, selling a bit of everything but now suffering from a failing business model. The customers are heading to stores which specialise more (or to websites catering for particular interests).

    As a result, companies like Fairfax or Harvey Norman need to scream louder to attract the customers’ attention. In the case of Fairfax, mere factual news doesn’t matter anymore – they desperately want to be seen as relevant in shaping public opinion.

  30. [104
    dave]

    This is taking the country back to the 19th century…to the days of Master-Servant laws…back to when workers were shipped into the country as “cargo with working rights attached”.

    We are looking at the repeal of a hundred years of progress for workers.

  31. I do not know how far down into the muck Fairfax intends to go but they talk of “explosive ” revelations over the next four days leading from their look into the life of Bill Shorten.

    I really hope they do not go anywhere near the issue that surfaced for Bill Shorten late last year after allegations against him were investigated by the police and dismissed.

    I really hope they stay away from that but the editorial call this morning was so strident that sadly I fear that they may no longer care how far into the shit they go to justify their amazing attack on Bill Shorten.

    I really really hope they do stay away from that.

    Time will tell.

    Cheers.

  35. ratsak@118: I had been wondering if Hartcher had written the article. But you found the proof. Well done.

    It’s Hartcher banging on again with his ludicrous view that the best thing that could happen in Australian politics is for there to be bipartisanship on just about every issue.

    He’s unworthy to follow in the footsteps of the likes of Alan Ramsey. I notice that Hartcher hardly ever gets much praise from his colleagues in the Gallery. Even his massive scoop of the leaked Cabinet discussions received relatively faint praise from his colleagues.

  36. victoria

    [ Not so much as falling for a trick. Today’s editorial is quite extraordinary ]

    If it is not merely for circulation purposes, then the other possibility is that they want to try and get Shorten to resign before he is able to front the Royal Commission – which would most likely find he has no case to answer.

    However, I would still opt for the simpler explanation – i.e. that the SMH is just looking to sell some papers.

  37. Many people here talk as if the strategy of mirroring the Coalition comes free. It doesn’t. It has a cost.

    Also, it’s only small target relative to the Coalition. The policies being proposed are not necessarily small target. Actual small target is not saying anything at all.

  41. Doyley@131: If they have genuine and convincing new evidence, then it would be reasonable for them to present it. Otherwise, journalistic standards would require them to stay well away.

  42. “@MayneReport: Why on earth is Tony Abbott pumping billions into infrastructure where there is spartan population whilst shunning urban public transport?”

  43. Trog it sounds to me that you are saying the Greens will go in hard against Labor, doing whatever it takes to knock off Labor MPs in vulnerable seats such as Sydney. I am guessing that this will include preference deals with the LNP, Di Natale is making noises about moving in this direction. The effect of this direction for the Greens will deliver many years of LNP government, and will destroy Australia.

  44. dave
    My response to the Report would be, ‘Fair enough. We will write off the three hundred billion euros of our money that you have already spent in violation of your precious human rights. Now f*ck off. And do not come back.’

  45. Anyone paying for Fairfax subscription is a mug and after their performance of the past few days, and today’s SMH editorial in particular, they deserve to go broke.

    Feel free to re-post and share this information anywhere you like.

    You can read Fairfax for free (yes, FREE) by using the Private browsing option available in every browser. You may need to occasionally refresh, reboot, reset your device but it will continue to work.

    On your iPhone, just use Safari in Private mode. Likewise you can use other browsers (eg Firefox, Chrome) on your smartphone in Private mode.

    You will never need to pay these dirtbags ever again.

    PS: NOT written, spoken or authorised by Bill Shorten or the ALP or Kevin Rudd or Julia Gillard. And it’s way too complicated for it to ever be understood by Tony Abbott so I’m not him, either. 🙂

  48. Andrew @egadheg
    Here’s why there isn’t much clamoring from AWU members about Bill Shorten this morning. #winwinwin:”

    The alleged transgression was that the agreement cut the number of FIXED rostered days off from 26 to 13 a year. The workers, who were paid on average more than $150,000 each, still received another 13 FLOATING RDOs

  49. [ Seriously? Seven flags for the Northern Australia delusion? Desperation levels would appear to be very high. ]

    Perhaps they are going to propose building a wall across northern Australia to protect us from the Boat People?

  50. 125
    Trog Sorrenson

    Not a minute passes and you are making a case against Labor rather than the LNP. This may relieve your own feelings of indignation, but, repeated by sufficient numbers, will only help sustain the LNP in office.

    I regard this as a tragic mistake. The LNP have embarked on a program of wholesale destruction. Rather than finding ways to contest the issue with the LNP, we seem to prefer to turn against ourselves.

    What I am about to say I will say just once.

    Abbott has made an art-form out of finding scapegoats – people he can blame, however wrongly, and then attack – in order to procure an advantage. He relentlessly and dishonestly scapegoats Labor, the Greens, refugees, so-called terrorists and voices from civil society. In your rebukes of Labor, you are falling into the same ways as Abbott. The result will be the same. Abbott will be the beneficiary of this conduct.

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