Newspoll: 53-47 to Coalition

Turnbull’s stellar personal ratings take a hit in the latest Newspoll, but the two-party result remains unchanged despite the government’s bumpy ride last week.

The Newspoll result in tomorrow’s Australian, which is presumably the last for the year, has the Coalition’s two-party lead unchanged at 53-47, from primary votes of 45% for the Coalition (down one), 33% for Labor (steady) and 12% for the Greens (up one). However, Malcolm Turnbull’s personal ratings have taken a knock, with approval down eight to 52% and disapproval up eight to 30%. Bill Shorten’s ratings plumb new depths with a three-point drop in approval to 23%, while disapproval is up four to 61%. Turnbull’s lead over Shorten as preferred prime minister is down slightly, from 64-15 to 60-14.

UPDATE (Essential Research): The penultimate Essential Research fortnightly average for the year is unchanged at 51-49 to the Coalition, from primary votes of Coalition 44% (steady), Labor 36% (up one) and Greens 11% (steady). Also featured are the monthly leadership ratings, which fail to back up Newspoll’s reported slide for both Malcolm Turnbull, who is at 56% approval (steady) and 23% disapproval (up three), and Bill Shorten, who is unchanged at 27% approval and 47% disapproval. Turnbull’s preferred prime minister lead is at 55-15, barely changed from 55-14 a fortnight ago. There are also questions on preferred Liberal and Labor leader, of which the former finds Turnbull on 42%, up five since the immediate wake of the leadership change, with Julie Bishop down one to 13% and Tony Abbott steady on 9%. On the latter question, Bill Shorten is down three since August to 13%, putting him one point behind both Anthony Albanese (up two points) and Tanya Plibersek (up one). The poll also finds 30% saying Tony Abbott should resign from parliament now and 19% saying he should do so at the next election, compared with 14% who say he should stay as a back-bencher and 18% who say he should return to the ministry; and 44% approving of use of the foreign aid budget to help Pacific nations tackle climate change, versus 40% disapproval.

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.

1,069 comments on “Newspoll: 53-47 to Coalition”

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  9. JimmyDoyle

    From last thread …

    [ I do like that aspect of basic income, but what do you do with the exceptions who are looked after much better in the current system? ]

    Well, I would question how many would really consider themselves to be ‘looked after much better in the current system’, but I do agree that it is the handling of the exceptional cases that makes the ‘basic income’ idea complex to implement in reality.

    It comes down to how much of your GDP you want to preserve for ‘special cases’ rather than distributing it equally as part of the ‘basic income’. This is largely up to us to decide as a society – but it will always mean that a comparatively small number of people (i.e. however many we are willing to tolerate) are poorly served by the system, rather than having a much larger number of people living in silent misery (as is the case now).

  11. It is grim for Shorten. At least Turnbull has skin to lose but for Shorten to go backwards when Tunbull lost 16 points is a real worry.

  12. I don’t see the events of the past couple of weeks impacting on polling for some time. The impact is more internal – undermining the cohesion and confidence of the Coalition which, in turn, will lead to much poorer performances in coming months.

    That’s what will start to change the polls substantially. Impossible at this stage to tell whether it will be enough for Labor to win, but I have no doubt that by late February Labor and Shorten will have made up substantial ground.

  16. davidwh

    [ It is grim for Shorten. At least Turnbull has skin to lose but for Shorten to go backwards when Tunbull lost 16 points is a real worry. ]

    Turnbull is the main game at the moment. Much as it may annoy us here on PB, Shorten is still down in the noise. He will remain there as long as Turnbull – for good or ill – continues to mesmerize the media.

    Consequently, a move of 16 points for Turnbull is much, much more significant than a move of 7 points for Shorten.

  17. [I don’t see the events of the past couple of weeks impacting on polling for some time. ]

    Apparently that’s how it usually swings – takes time to wash through and turn up in polling.

  18. [ It is grim for Shorten. ]

    Not good fer sure. But….he is obviously considered the leader by his party who are sticking by him. He has also been able to exert some authority (like over W.A. preselections).

    While MaLPM is presiding over whats looking more and more like open civil war in his.

    And meanwhile, what did the US do to us lately that was so bad we are sending JoHo as ambassador??

    I think its actually a cunning plan by MalPM. Send JoHo over and he gives them economic advice so their economy REALLY tanks. Australia then looks good in comparison and MalPM takes credit.

  19. Victory is mine!(after the second arm drops to the ground) actually is very similar to all political leaders who go into an election behind in the polls.

  21. Very sad – Labor paying the price for failure to modernise. A terrible cost ( yet another election failure) for feeding all those vamvakinou style hacks in parliament.

  23. I think the electorate have fired a shot across Mal’s bow here. They still would prefer him to win the next election but they are ‘Not Happy Mal!’ about what has been going on of late on the good ship, SS Turnbull.

    Labor haven’t been dismissed out of hand and are still in the race.

    Bill Shorten just isn’t Malcolm Turnbull atm. 🙂

  26. It’s amazing how each poll is treated like it is going to be this way forever onward. We all know it doesn’t work that way, don’t we?

  27. [AnD in other news, Gillian Triggs named woman of the year. Love to have been a fly on the wall when Abbott, Dutton, Credlin and Brandis heard that news…]

    Not to mention Alan Jones and Ray Hadley. 😀

  28. You have to watch the trends Gary. At present we only have one negative data point for Turnbull however a Shorten has a number of data points heading in the same direction downwards.

    I can’t see any positive news for Shorten when he goes further back from an already low point.

  31. From the article posted by Rossmore at 20:

    [Professor Triggs has stood up for the most vulnerable members of our society and has done so with grace, leadership and dignity,” Chung said.

    “Her steadfast professionalism and refusal to be silenced by the bullying tactics of the Abbott government is truly admirable.”]

    +1

    mexicanbeemer should have a read of that article.

  33. [“I think the electorate have fired a shot across Mal’s bow here.”]

    Christ if this is a shot across Mal’s bow.. the HMAS Shorten must be graped shot, greek fired, the captain and crew, hung, drawn and quartered on the deck then fed to the sharks, and the the boat scuttled and sent to the bottom of the deep blue seas.

  34. Jimmy

    I will put this bluntly I respect the job Triggs does but I do not respect a wealthy mother who gives up on a disabled child.

    I find her morals questionable, I have little respect for her as a person, as a public servant, fine, she ticks her KPI’s

  35. Rossmore @ 20

    [AnD in other news, Gillian Triggs named woman of the year. Love to have been a fly on the wall when Abbott, Dutton, Credlin and Brandis heard that news…]

    You would have been poisoned by the outpouring of bile. Nice to see these comments by her:

    [“As you can imagine, underneath that, was a seething fury that they had such contempt for one of the sort of, in a sense, institutions of our democracy,” Professor Triggs says now.

    “That they could ride over it in such an obvious way, to breach all the most basic rules of good government, and do it in such a ham-fisted, naive [way]… the sloppiness of it was breathtaking.”]

    It was utterly sustained bullying. The opposition to her was not sexist, but the vicious, bullying way they attacked her and expected her to dissolve in a flood of tears was. Another woman who was not prepared to lie down and die because that’s what Abbott expected.

  36. davidwh,

    Abbott had negative net approval and still won an election. Turnbull is the one that has to watch out, not Shorten, as he cannot continue to be all things to all people. Moreover, he leads a disunited party, and it seems the Liberals have decided to learn nothing from Labor’s mistakes.

  37. “You have to watch the trends Gary. At present we only have one negative data point for Turnbull however a Shorten has a number of data points heading in the same direction downwards.”

    Presumably, the same could be said of Abbott early in his PMship?

  39. Edwina St John @ 25,
    A barely comprehensible and feeble attempted insult from a commenter whose contributions barely trouble the Richter Scale is hardly going to destabilise me. However, sadly, that’s the best Liberals can do – ad feminem, as in my case, or ad hominem. Their arguments on the substance give fairy floss a run for it’s money, that’s for sure, so I guess it’s all they got.

    I really shouldn’t have dignified your garbage with a reply. I won’t in future.

  40. Jimmy

    True which is why I support Triggs performance in her role and think that Abbott and co were inappropriate in how they behaved towards her.

  43. I accept being a carer is a challenge both time wise and mentally, I just have a default position that if you can afford to care for the child in some way then you ought to although being a carer is far more challenging than non carers often realise.

  44. [“mexicanbeemer – with the greatest of respect to you, I think Triggs’ private life is exactly that – private.”]

    So Triggs can cast judgement on others and pretend to be morally righteous, but criticising her… paid for with my taxpayer dollars for her own actions is off limit?

    Interesting!

    No.. she as the Human Rights Commissioner has questions to answer.

  45. Abbott had negative net approval and still won an election.

    That was because his party was way ahead on voting intention.

    The Coalition is sitting pretty on 45%. Labor is flailing about on 33%. Not good.

  49. mb @ 43

    Only comment I’ll make is that your assumption that Triggs made her decision for the sake of her career is not necessarily well founded. She said that she made the decision in order to put the time into her family – including her two older children. I have no reason to doubt that as the reason, given the immense investment in time and effort looking after a severely disabled child takes.

  50. It would be good to see Triggs argue for more support for parents of disabled children.

    If she has then I would be pleased to hear it.

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