After three new polls this week – from Newspoll, Morgan and Essential Research – the BludgerTrack poll aggregate comes in at 53.6-46.4 to Labor, with Labor picking up one each on the seat projection in Queensland, South Australia and Tasmania. However, the movement is partly down to a methodological tweak involving Morgan, for which bias adjustments are now based only on the pollster’s track record within a year of the poll in question, and not as before over the entirety of the term. The same change was made for ReachTEL a couple of weeks ago. Over the long term, the effect of these changes is neutral – but in the short term they’re favourable to Labor, as both these poll series appear to have leaned less to Labor lately than they did earlier in the term. Newspoll and Essential also reported leadership ratings this week, which have had the effect of furthering Tony Abbott’s decline, while also stymieing Bill Shorten’s gains over the previous fortnight.
Two further snippets of recent attitudinal polling:
• The Guardian relates a Lonergan Research poll had a 57-43 split in favour of taking in more refugees in response to the Syria crisis, although there was a 54-46 split in favour of “Operation Sovereign Borders”, namely boat tow-backs and related policies. The results suggest these were “forced choice” questions, in which the only alternative to jumping off the fence was to hang up on the call – which Kevin Bonham has his doubts about. The poll encompassed 1109 respondents and was conducted on Tuesday night.
• The Australia Institute has conducted online polling (note the self-selecting kind) on extra funding for ABC regional news services, which was found to have 59% nationally and 64% in rural and remote areas. Further polling on the same question specifically targeted the electorates of Eden-Monaro, New England, Wide Bay, Sturt, North Sydney and Wentworth.
Also:
• The loudest of hosannas are in order for David Barry’s election results resource, which features – in the most streamlined, intuitive and accessible fashion imaginable – aggregate and seat-level results for all House of Representatives elections since federation, including preference distributions and preference flow data; facilities to explore data as bar charts, line charts and scatterplots; and interactive results maps which, on top of anything else, mark the first time all historical federal electoral boundaries have been brought together in one place.
• A Liberal National Party preselection process is under way to choose a successor to Bruce Scott in the remote Queensland seat of Maranoa. The Chronicle reports that David Littleproud, a manager of a Suncorp bank branch in Warwick, and Cameron O’Neil, a Maranoa councillor who works for the Queensland Disaster Management Committee, are “joint favourites”, while the Warwick Daily News narrows it down to just Littleproud as favourite. Other nominees are Lachlan Douglas, southern Queensland regional manager for Rabobank; Alison Krieg, a grazier from Blackall; and Rick Gurnett, a grazier from Charleville. Maranoa mayor Robert Loughnan was named earlier, but would seem to have dropped out of contention. The preselection will be conducted by a postal ballot, with the winner to be announced on October 23.
• Liberal MP Andrew Southcott last week announced he would bow out at the next election, after 19 years as member for the Adelaide seat of Boothby. Labor came close to toppling Southcott at its high-water marks of 2007 and 2010, but the 2013 landslide boosted his margin from 0.6% to 7.1%. Southcott is 47 years old, and speculation about his motives in pulling the plug have rested on two factors: his recent failure to win the Speakership, and the threat posed to his seat by the Nick Xenophon Team, notwithstanding that it is yet to announce a candidate. It is expected that the Liberals will be keen to field a female candidate. Sources quoted by The Advertiser suggest potential contenders include Carolyn Habib, a youth worker and former Marion councillor who ran unsuccessfully in the marginal seat of Elder at the March 2014 state election; and Nicolle Flint, a columnist for The Advertiser; and Caitlin Keage, a staffer to Senator Simon Birmingham. Labor has already preselected Mark Ward, a teacher at Urrbrae Agricultural High School, Mitcham councillor and narrowly unsuccessful candidate at the Davenport state by-election in January.
• Mark Kenny of Fairfax reports numbers from the Tasmanian Labor Senate preselection that has seen incumbent Lisa Singh dumped from third position in favour of John Short, state secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union. Singh outpolled Short in the rank-and-file half of the vote, which respectively gave 221, 123 and 110 to the incumbents, Ann Urquhart, Helen Polley and Lisa Singh, with Short on 74 and another 14 voters scattered among various also-rans. However, Short closed the gap when the half of the vote determined by unions and conference delegates was added to the total, by 158 votes to 154.
meher baba
Why second week of October?
[ABC News 24
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Is Richard Marles Labors worst performing minister? Every time I see him he is waffling and seems way out of his depth.
Today when presented with the 12,000 places for Syrian refugees… 2,000 more than Labor, he waffled on about wanting to “see the details”
Remember this is the same opposition immigration minister that said turn backs were impossible… then said they were possible but only if Indonesian President Joko the Assasin gives Labor permission… then it changed it to.. oh yes we can turn back the boats… maybe.
This guy makes Peter Dutton look good and that’s saying something, I guess in that sense they are glad Morrison isn’t still Immigration Minister because he would wipe the floor of Marles, Again.
If Abbott took the 1500 refugees already on Manus & Nauru & emptied these camps, wouldn’t we be able to minimise infrastructure & staffing or even close down at least one camp saving hundreds of millions of dollars?
Just a thought or does that sound too much like commonsense?
lizzie@129: “How about they make Tony live in The Lodge and take away his travelling allowance? And Joe’s scam on rent?”
Might both be moot points fairly soon.
victoria@151: I think that might be first sitting week after the Canning by-election.
meher baba
I see. So depending how Canning goes?
Cahrlie
Ideology and stubbornness always wins over common sense – or even simple arithmetic!
[“If Abbott took the 1500 refugees already on Manus & Nauru & emptied these camps, wouldn’t we be able to minimise infrastructure & staffing or even close down at least one camp saving hundreds of millions of dollars?”]
No.. that’s leftwing logic.
Close the camps. Like Rudd did in 2008. Just let them all in, no problems. The boats won’t come. Pinky Promise.
Then 52,000 of them arrived and the rest is history.
Nauru and Manus are the only thing that stands between an orderly migration system and the open borders chaos we saw under Labor which resulted in 1200 deaths at sea.
Sometimes those on the left need to think through their “simple” solutions and the consequences.
[In 12 months we have gone from 58 to 84 and will top 100 early next year. ]
DavidWH – C’mon, admit it. It’s definitely due to Anna P’s great leadership in Qld. Confidence returning after Campbell Newman’s woeful reign and nothing to do with Joe & Tone
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victoria@157: yes, I think that there is an underlying assumption among the aforementioned rich and powerful types that Canning will go badly.
But these are people in Sydney and Melbourne who have no knowledge or understanding of the situation on the ground in WA.
If there’s only a small swing to Labor in Canning, Abbott’s position will be significantly bolstered. As we saw with Howard in 2006-07 and, for that matter, Turnbull in 2009, the Libs tend to botch the process of getting rid of leaders. The backbench becomes extremely hesitant and, in the absence of the factional discipline that rules within the ALP, they can stand on the edge of the cliff for a long time pondering whether or not they should jump.
Maybe Tony will drop all those Syrian refugees of in Cambodia on the way here – he has already paid a motza to the Govt. there to take a significant number (i.e. 4).
Lizzie at 158
“Ideology and stubbornness always wins over common sense – or even simple arithmetic!”
I didn’t bother mentioning that it would be the decent humanitarian thing to do too because that makes no sense when discussing Abbott & refugees.
Charlie
Very true!
meher baba
If i understood correctly, BCassidy said on ABC radio this morning that the libs are confident in Canning
The right to silence is valuable because it means the jury can never see you to form any adverse impression of how you look, dress, blink, shift around etc.
Should Spedding be charged and go to trial that right is lost such that one booboo, perceived or real, in his home movie might be used against him. Even the making of the movie may be considered self-serving and attract unhealthy suspicion.
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/william-tyrrell-investigation-bill-spedding-releases-video-denying-any-involvement-20150910-gjj8a2.html
BH the current improvement in the multi-residential construction sector has little to do with any of the politicians. Some could say it has happened despite the politicians.
Although Anastasia did get one key decision right in July 🙂
TotallyBiasedArsehat
[ Today when presented with the 12,000 places for Syrian refugees… 2,000 more than Labor, he waffled on about wanting to “see the details” ]
Given Abbott’s track record of lying, this seems eminently sensible.
TrueBlueArsie
[I run my own small business and am a lifter not a leaner on the Aussie economy.
I haven’t even seen the inside of a Centrelink office unlike others here]
Good for you. What do you want, a medal?
I think people are unkind to TBA 🙂
WWP – I’ll believe pigs can fly before I’ll believe that TBA runs his own business (unless it’s rorting centrelink)
David – I was teasing you but couldn’t find the right emoticon.
Good to see you’re firm is doing well tho. Our SIL’s small manufacturing business in Newcastle is hanging on, with reduced workforce, because most of the small factories in his field have folded and he has picked up the work. He voted against Labor for the first time in his life and is now regretting it.
We’ve held back with the gloating 🙂
shellbell
The disappearance of the little boy is a baffling case
TrueBlueArsedFly
[Sometimes those on the left need to think through their “simple” solutions and the consequences.]
That’s a bit rich, seeing that the current humanitarian disaster all started with the invasion of Iraq – an idea cooked up by the neo-Cons to bring democracy to the Middle East. And stop Saddam’s WMD program.
Ah, TBA, you’re good for a laugh.
If you run your business like you think detention centres should be run you’d be bankrupt and visiting centrelink within months!
BTW everyone, you do realise TBA cackles with glee every time he gets one of you to bite. I am allowing him a minor snigger here, but won’t engage further -my time is far too valuable to waste on his ‘baiting’ nonsense.
I knew that BH.
We are really only catching up on six really tough years following the GFC. There were plenty of projects held up at the Development Application stage because of project financing and general reluctance to commit to the next stage. The floodgates started opening in late 2013 and have become a flood in 2014/2015.
Chinese investment in multi-residential properties has helped a lot. I really hope the politicians don’t mess up the CFTA with their really stupid political games.
k17
Considering Newstart allowance is $230 per week, it is rorting on a very minor scale. 😀
jenauthor
Of course. He gets extremely excited. That is the funniest bit for me
Meanwhile Abbott concerns himself with the death cult overseas
[Lisa Wilkinson
3h3 hours ago
Lisa Wilkinson @Lisa_Wilkinson
This is the face of 24yo “smart, intelligent, beautiful” Gold Coast mum #TaraBrown. Tara died this… https://instagram.com/p/7biPfcu1bh/ ]
Hastie continues to dodge whether he is a creationist and say’s the voters aren’t entitled to know. I think the voters might take a different view, Andrew.
victoria@180: but, realistically, what can the Federal Government do about it? The inadequate sentencing and bail procedures that allow these things to happen are state government responsibilities.
I know that some people like to stir up the idea that “all men are responsible” for these things happening. But that’s really not right.
Victoria – Not if you can get together multiple identities.
If you look at TBA, you get the following:
1. He has all the classic indicia of a disgruntled welfare recipient;
2. Nobody with his outlook and intelligence could successfully run a small business; and
3. He’s a congenital liar.
Anyway, enough time wasted on him.
meher baba
What could Abbott and Co do? Stop funding cuts for services including legal aid
K17
🙂
Stay my beating heart! Truss is acting PM in QT.
TBA at 159
“No.. that’s leftwing logic.
Close the camps. Like Rudd did in 2008. Just let them all in, no problems. The boats won’t come. Pinky Promise.
Then 52,000 of them arrived and the rest is history.
Nauru and Manus are the only thing that stands between an orderly migration system and the open borders chaos we saw under Labor which resulted in 1200 deaths at sea.
Sometimes those on the left need to think through their “simple” solutions and the consequences.”
Have you ever tried to think things through in terms of straight commonsense rather than through a purely political prism or without using childish stupid perjoratives?
My response was not pinky nor left wing, in fact it allowed for the continuation of keeping one of the centres open.
Nauru & Manus Is are not the only thing standing between an orderly migration system & mass unwanted migration, geopolitics, reality, humankindness & commonsense will readily achieve orderly migration.
These solutions are not necessarily complex but the attempts by politicians to “politicise” this issue subsequently make it far more complex than it should be.
I try hard to give you the benefit of the doubt & to even learn from what you might have to say but you need to use a balance of intellect & reasoned emotion if you are to be taken seriously & if you wish your views to be genuinely considered.
If not, ignore what I have just written.
TBA at 101
“Hows Anna 2.0 going reigning in bikie violence?”
This is a clear case of domestic violence that happened to also include a bikie. If you don’t believe me then review a number of articles regarding this particular case.
Intentionally Misrepresenting the facts severely diminishes your credibility.
Refer to my previous post.
Davidwh – In the past 12 months we’ve also seen some new apartment blocks going up quickly in our area. A local builder said the interest rates had helped but I didn’t ask if there’d been any Chinese interest in the area.
A 40 hectare block close to us was sold to Hong Kong interests 2 years ago but subdivision is not gazetted so it’s been left vacant. Bushfire season is upon us and the derelict block is a worry.
Good for you. What do you want, a medal?
I think people are unkind to TBA 🙂
He deserves one for consistency in rhetoric, True Blueness and completely ignoring any question posed him regardless of how many times it’s asked by how many and replying with an Abbott line or something with zero relevance to the OP’s query..
like this from last thread
Oh, look – TBA’s around. Hey, TBA – I have a question for you.
To paraphrase Leigh Sales tonight: What would your response have been if the ABC had spent the term of the Gillard Government trying to “boost Australia”, as Tony Abbott has just asked them to do?
Not too sure what you are on about… BUT…
Refugees have always been welcome in Australia, with the prerequisite that they are invited here and aren’t self selecting via people smuggler and jumping the back fence.
So yes, the Golden Troll Award is achieved on merit for efforts above and beyond the call of logic
[But there is a new slogan, too: “Bankruptcies [are] at record lows.” This one has been used a few times in the last week as a measure of the Abbott government’s economic competence.
The only problem is it’s not true. Perhaps they were a couple of months ago, but way back in July the Australian Financial Security Authority announced that bankruptcies had surged more than 9% in the June quarter, which we now know was marked by very low economic growth. The rise comes after four successive and often sizeable falls, so the PM might have been right early in the year — but not now. In any event, it’s not much to boast about — bankruptcies were at record lows under Julia Gillard, too.
It might be time for the Prime Minister’s Office to workshop some new talking points.]
http://media.crikey.com.au/dm/newsletter/dailymail_e48e4674d5ceed936b75f68c8359e97a.html
Another slogan hits the dust but that won’t Tone from using it.
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This Viral Image Shows Violence Against Women Is A National Emergency. http://www.buzzfeed.com/bradesposito/aus-violence-women … ]
TBA @ 101 gloating over a tragic murder.
No wonder everyone thinks you’re scum.
BH
[ It might be time for the Prime Minister’s Office to workshop some new talking points. ]
Impossible. Abbott has only recently managed to memorize the previous lot correctly, and those were from the last election!
[I know that some people like to stir up the idea that “all men are responsible” for these things happening. But that’s really not right.]
Strawman much. Who are these ‘some people’, and since none of them populate this blog, what is the point of this construction?
Don’t bother replying. I know the reason.
OMG! Truss in the big chair for a whole hour, answering questions — well, I need a good afternoon nap…
“”In 12 months we have gone from 58 to 84 and will top 100 early next year.””
Where did they get sacked from?.
Are you into Solar panels?.
Did anyone else hear Robb say on Sky that it wouldn’t be difficult to change enabling legislation on the CHAFTA?
He seemed to say that if they did it would upset the Chinese so they won’t do it.
Truzz in charge.At least we won’t have to tolerate Abbott’s stupid laugh.
BH
That has been Robb’s reasoning re chfta. Wont add clauses re protection of Australian workers cos it will offend the Chinese