Malcolm Turnbull form guide

On Malcolm Turnbull’s big day, a review of past polling for Turnbull specifically and the Liberal leadership in general.

To set the ball rolling on a new prime ministership, a walk through some highlights of Malcolm Turnbull’s polling record:

• On five occasions, pollsters asked how respondents would vote if Malcolm Turnbull were prime minister, by way of contrast with the headline results. On each occasion, the two-party vote for the Coalition under Turnbull was substantially higher – by 4% in an Essential Research poll in June 2011; by 7% and 8% in ReachTEL and AMR Research polls shortly after Kevin Rudd resumed the prime ministership in July 2013; and by 6% and 9% in Galaxy and ReachTEL polls immediately after the first Liberal Party spill vote in February (compared with 4% and 6% if Julie Bishop had been leader).

• The chart below shows trends in preferred Liberal leader polling during the period of Tony Abbott’s party leadership, encompassing 35 results from Morgan, Essential Research, ReachTEL, Ipsos and Nielsen. There has been some variability in the options available in these polls, but all featured Malcolm Turnbull, Tony Abbott, Julie Bishop and Joe Hockey, with the exception of the two most recent Morgan results, which dropped Joe Hockey. Scott Morrison only became a regular in the middle of last year.

• The next chart records Malcolm Turnbull’s approval and disapproval trends in Newspoll while he was Opposition Leader. Unfortunately, the trend smooths out the dislocation that occurred following “Utegate” in June 2009, which you can get a clear sense of if you view the individual poll results marked by the circles. More recently, there have been three occasions when pollsters have gauged personal ratings for Turnbull. In January 2014, UMR Research respectively had his approval at 42% and disapproval at 30%. Essential Research recorded 44% approval and 31% disapproval in June 2014, which improved to 47% and 24% last month.

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.

1,164 comments on “Malcolm Turnbull form guide”

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  1. I suspect many here don’t quite realise how very fundamentally the game has changed for Shorten.

    Abbott was Shorten’s dream opponent. Inarticulate, widely-despised, inept, an international embarrassment.

    Turnbull encountered big problems as Opposition leader, but he is smart – he will have learnt from those mistake, and he now of course has far more staffing and other resources behind him to ensure mis-steps like Godwin Grech never occur. In fact, as PM he doesn’t need the Godwin Grechs of this world. He’s where he always wanted to be – in command.

    In that regard, as in many others, Abbott and Turnbull are polar opposites. Abbott was a very strong wrecking Opposition leader and a woeful PM, probably Australia’s worst ever. Turnbull was a deeply flawed Opposition leader but I suspect he will prove to be a very stong PM, as he has many traits better suited to power than to seeking power.

  3. Guytaur

    I will wear the disagreement of the ALP and News 24. They spend a lot of time talking to each other, not out in the real world.

    Look, it is not as if the ME issue is a matter of life and death, or super entitlements or pensions or assets. It is about the right to hold a party. Sure I have no problems with it but it would not rate in my first 100 or even 1000 issues that matter.

  5. If you’re not interested in SSM you’ll be even more pissed off about having to give up part of your Saturday to go and vote!

  6. meher

    [All the Libs need to do to retain government is to hang on to all the votes they won in 2013. ]

    No, what they need to do is win them back. At this stage, they’ve already lost them.

  7. The $158m cost of a plebiscite is only an problem in so far as it wastes the time of AEC staff. It’s a waste of real resources. Financially it won’t be a problem for a currency-issuing government. It’s not as though the government has to scrounge the money from taxpayers and bondholders.

  10. [
    TrueBlueAussie
    Posted Tuesday, September 15, 2015 at 6:06 pm | Permalink

    We love you Tony Abbott
    ]
    I am not one to give grammar lessons TBA, but “we” is plural; that is more than you; the word you are looking for is “I”.

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