As the many polls published before this week’s parliamentary sitting showed no let-up in the Coalition’s deteriorating standing in the polls, the BludgerTrack poll aggregate has come as close as close can be to tipping over in Labor’s favour. However, it continues to credit them with a bare parliamentary majority (which can probably be bumped up another notch with the near certainty that Clive Palmer’s seat of Fairfax will revert to type), owing to the advantage it attributes to sitting members. The boost to Labor adds five to their projected seat total, including three gains in Queensland, two in Western Australia and one in New South Wales, balanced by the loss of one in Tasmania. Note that the Nick Xenophon Team now gets its own entry on the vote totals (although not yet on the graphs), since its primary vote is now being tracked by ReachTEL as well as Roy Morgan. ReachTEL is no longer recording the Palmer United Party, whose support is now statistically insignificant.
Newspoll and Ipsos both provided new numbers on leadership ratings this week, the effect of which has been to throw things a little out of whack, owing to the gaping difference in the numbers for Malcolm Turnbull. Where Ipsos recorded Turnbull with a diminishing but still positive net approval rating of 13%, Newspoll recorded the reverse (i.e. minus 13%), despite their similar results on voting intention. Since BludgerTrack uses bias adjustments based on each pollsters’ performance relative to all the others, this result alone has shaken up the entire model. With all that said though, all the movements on the leadership ratings were fairly modest.
The familiar BludgerTrack graphs on the sidebar are a casualty of the Crikey redesign that was launched this week, but stay tuned, because there will soon be a module to accommodate them. Here’s a make-do for the time being, below which you can find the latest round of preselection news and what have you.
• The Greens are hawking a ReachTEL poll of 800 respondents in the seat of Melbourne Ports which finds 60% of Labor voters oppose the party directing preferences to the Liberals ahead of the Greens, as Labor member Michael Danby has threatened to do (albeit that he exceeded his brief in doing so). Danby’s threat came amid an increasingly complex situation with respect to preferences in Victoria, as Liberal Party state president Michael Kroger says the party is open to a “loose arrangement” with the Greens, who are “not the nutters they used to be”, which he puts down to the leadership of Victorian Senator Richard di Natale. Kroger’s hope is presumably to lure the Greens into running open tickets in Victorian marginal seats, in return for the Liberals directing preferences to the Greens ahead of Labor in the inner-city seats of Melbourne, Wills and Batman, contrary to their position in 2013.
• After 22 years as local member, and 29 in parliament altogether when her time as a Senator is taken into account, former Speaker Bronwyn Bishop was defeated in Saturday’s preselection vote in her northern beaches Sydney electorate of Mackellar. The seat will now be contested for the Liberal Party by factional moderate Jason Falinski, owner of a health care equipment business, former adviser to John Hewson and Barry O’Farrell and campaign manager to Malcolm Turnbull in Wentworth in 2004. Falinski prevailed over Bishop in the final round by 51 votes to 39, following the exclusion of Walter Villatora – a party activist who has spearheaded a campaign for preselection reforms that are principally favoured by the hard Right, and a close ally of Tony Abbott’s as the president of the Liberal Party’s Warringah branch. The score in the previous round had been Falinski 40, Bishop 37 and Villatora 12, with Villatora’s supporters breaking overwhelmingly in favour of Falinksi in the final round. This reflected the hostility of conservatives towards Bishop over her support for Malcolm Turnbull in the September leadership challenge vote. The currently unpaywalled Crikey has a thorough account of Saturday’s proceedings from a source familiar with the matter.
• Another safe seat Liberal preselection on the weekend, in Philip Ruddock’s seat of Berowra, resulted in an easy victory for Julian Leeser, a former executive director of Liberal-aligned think tank the Menzies Research Centre, and current director of government policy and strategy at the Australian Catholic University. Leeser is of Jewish background, and is said to be aligned with the Centre Right. He won 97 votes in the ballot against 10 for Robert Armitage, a local barrister; four for John Bathgate, a staffer to Christoper Pyne; and three for Nick McGowan, a one-time adviser to former Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett.
• Bob Baldwin, the Liberal member for the regional New South Wales seat of Paterson, has announced he will not contest the next election. Baldwin suffered a heavy blow in the redistribution as the seat exchanged conservative rural territory for more populous areas of the Hunter region, turning Baldwin’s 9.8% margin from 2013 into a notional Labor margin of 1.3%. The Michael McGowan of the Maitland Mercury reports preselection nominees are likely to include Newcastle businesswoman Karen Howard and Port Stephens councillor Ken Jordan. Howard performed well as an independent candidate in the Newcastle state by-election of October 2015, and ran for the Liberals in the seat at the state election the following March. However, her tone-deaf attack on a local high school student over his geography project in November might cause some to doubt her judgement.
• After a bumpy ride, Liberal MP Craig Kelly has been confirmed in his preselection for the southern Sydney seat of Macarthur. The conservative Tony Abbott backer had earlier appeared to be under threat from Kent Johns, a powerbroker of the increasingly dominant moderate faction, but Malcolm Turnbull persuaded him to withdraw in February. He remained under challenge from Michael Medway, who ran in Werriwa in 2004 and appears to work in financial services, but Murray Trembath of the St George & Sutherland Shire Leader reports he has now withdrawn.
• The article mentioned in the previous item also relates that Nick Varvaris, who won Barton for the Liberals in 2013 but has now been poleaxed by the redistribution, was “still in discussions with the Liberal Party” as to whether he will recontest the seat, after earlier indications he would spare himself the effort.
• Barrister Andrew Wallace has won the Liberal National Party preselection to succeed Mal Brough in the Sunshine Coast seat of Fisher. As the ABC reports it, Wallace “won the preselection ballot convincingly in the first round of voting ahead of five other candidates”.
• The West Australian reports on the headache facing the WA Liberals as they prepare to defend six Senate seats at a double dissolution election that is likely to net them fewer than that, with none of the incumbents intending to retire. It had been hoped that David Johnston, who was dumped as Defence Minister in December 2014, might lighten the load by accepting a diplomatic posting, but he has now confirmed he will run again. The report says the state branch’s protocol should see ministers Mathias Cormann and Michaelia Cash take the top two positions and Johnston take third owing to “seniority”, but that Johnston might be bumped to fourth to make way for Dean Smith, with Linda Reynolds and Chris Back in fourth and fifth.
• The West’s report likewise says that Louise Pratt, who lost her seat from the second position at the state’s 2014 Senate election re-run, is well placed to take the fourth position on the Labor ticket with help from affirmative action, and is even hopeful of bumping Glenn Sterle for a place in the top three. Earlier indications had been that the order of the top end of the ticket would run Sue Lines, Glenn Sterle and Pat Dodson, with the fourth up in the air.
• Duncan McGauchie, a former policy adviser to the then Victorian premier, Ted Baillieu, has prevailed in a field of five to win Liberals preselection to succeed Sharman Stone as the Liberal candidate in the rural Victorian seat of Murray. He faces significant opposition at the election from Damian Drum, Nationals candidate and state upper house member.
• Labor’s candidate for Christopher Pyne’s loseable Adelaide seat of Sturt is Matt Loader, a gay rights activist and (I think) manager at South Australia’s Department of Planning, Transport and Infrastructure. Hat tip to Chinda in comments.
I can’t see the AEC is going to cop the flak for saying it was not ready.
Gecko @ Wednesday, April 27, 2016 at 6:34 pm
Sorry, I cocked up that response to gecko when using the quote bubble. But you get my drift. 😳
Gotta go to a meeting now. Phew!
7:30 w good coverage on ALP climate policy
What’s the betting if he doesn’t go DD he’ll be replaced?
If he doesn’t, he probably would be replaced. It would seem very unlikely though, who would replace him? It would have to be someone on the right, acceptable to the party and the base, who is proven in ministerial experience and is attractive to about 55% (ideally more) of the general public. It doesn’t matter if he/she is loathed by people who would never vote Liberal – that might even be an advantage.
There’s certainly bo one obvious – no far right messiah in the wings.
jen,
After 6 changes of PMs since 2007, maybe the 8th will settle everything down.
If Mal does renege on DD, Julie Bishop has been awfully quiet … a sure sign she is mustering her forces
WarrenPeace
Well we were the buggers who were THERE in the 60s and 70s. ! 🙂 A time that saw a big kick along for women’s rights, black rights and anti war movements etc. Shed loads of non conservatives. Apologies though for letting our generation’s ‘s teachers’ pets and snitches grab the political reins.
I’ve just been ReachTel polled in Brisbane re Federal voting intentions, and most important issues etc.
We might see a poll on the weekend.
I’m feeling REALLY left out. Nobody ever polls me!
Who would replace Turnbull? Er…Kevin Andrews?
I think a big part of the coalition mindset will dismiss the poll and other events as ‘messy’ and point to the ‘triumphal’ announcement of the subs.
They look forward to the budget and then the formal start to the election campaign with a suitable flag laden launch by Turnbull all about ‘trust’.
A DD so a forgone conclusion.
And I assume as parliament is sitting next week we will see at least a newspoll.
Just positing this – not an expectation
But what if next Newspoll was something like 55/45 to ALP … what would MT do then with regards to DD? What would the party do? Would Kevin Andrews step in to save the party like a former Labor leader did to Gillard last time around?
Alright Jen, I’ll poll you.
What’s your name?
What’s your address.?
Do you work during the day?
What times?
Where do you leave your spare house key?
Who do you vote for?
Really?
I’ve just been robo-called by Malcolm Turnbull in SA. He lasted 10 seconds.
Is there anything worth watching on Channels 10, 7 or 9 in prime time?
ANYTHING?
Bludgers, let’s give @MalcolmTurnbull a headache by sending him a Tweet demanding a further two years of #Gonski shool funding. Tweetathon between 6.30pm and 9pm tonight.
Re Senator Sinodinos and his attendance before a Senate committee: It was always going to be touch and go as to whether he would attend, and whether much could be done about it if he didn’t.
Much more interesting is the situation of the other witnesses who were invited to attend, but declined. It would now be open to the Senate Committee to subpoena them, and if they didn’t attend, they would be in contempt of the Senate, and potentially subject to penalties under the Parliamentary Privileges Act, like fines and gaol – with the penalties continuing to apply even if the Parliament is dissolved.
Of course, if the Senate does subpoena them, that will be a big story in itself, and will give the hearing even more salience and publicity. I wonder if the witnesses have thought about what they will do if that happens?
Just caught up with Turnbull on last night’s 7.30
Didn’t really see it as the train wreck I was given to expect from tweets etc, though it was not overly confident.
But I was gobsmacked that they are still clinging onto that discredited BIS Shrapnel report on negative gearing. They must think everyone is stupid!
Pedant @ 6.18
I’ve heard of political parties seeking an electoral mandate to stare down opposition to its policies from other political parties. I have never heard of a political leader seeking an electoral mandate to stare down opposition to his or her purported policies from within their own party.
Hmmm, GG
Not sure your questions would be quite legal from a polling company
Mark David can be most incisive!
I think we are going to be flooded with polls this weekend – all released before Parliament reassembles to hear Mal and Scott’s remarkable solution to the political and economic woes of the government.
TPOF every “internal opponent” could equally claim a mandate from his own electorate to oppose the policies of the political leader in question!
Re BK @7:57PM: No.
I am wondering who is paying for the Turnbull robo-call I received.
Steve777
Thought so.
It really is an indictment on those viewing the rubbish.
[Of course, if the Senate does subpoena them, that will be a big story in itself, and will give the hearing even more salience and publicity. I wonder if the witnesses have thought about what they will do if that happens?]
I have often wondered why the Senate and even Reps don’t use their powers consistently and strongly and properly.
I have always assumed the apparent cowardice is essentially to protect the main parties, or power / the executive which both sides hope to hold.
It is quite the failure of the senate IMHO. The senate committees are jokes full of political stunts but meaning nothing and that is quite unfortunate.
More excellent work from Mark David.
shiftaling
“They must think everyone is stupid!”
.
Well to be fair “everyone” elected Abbott
This Moir is very good:
So is this David Pope:
Today’s Essential makes it into the Guardian. Any other MSM reports?
http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/apr/27/australian-election-labor-pulls-ahead-of-coalition-in-new-poll
C@tmomma @ Wednesday, April 27, 2016 at 7:35 pm
Jesus wept.
It has been my dream for years that Julie takes over as PM then loses the election and her seat. Don’t think it is likely, but the chances have gone up a bit this week.
This tweet from Christine Milne makes me very angry. What an utterly negative, nasty and slanderous thing to say about what is a really good policy that Labor has committed to.
Christine Milne @ChristineMilne
BCA backs Labor’s climate plan.Tells you all you need to know about lack of ambition,refusal to end new coal, CSG and fossil fuel subsidies.
It looks like Defence Department is not happy with Pyne and talks to the media:
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/submarine-deal-christopher-pyne-wrongly-claims-defence-made-call-on-allaustralian-build-20160427-goghiq.html
I’ve just been on the phone a few times with 2 different sets of people who are both politically involved, very heavily in fact, but who also have what passes for a normal life. You know, jobs, kids, that sort of thing.
Neither knew about the Essential result. Neither knew about Newspoll or Morgan giving the 2PP lead to Labor.
They had missed it in the hurley-burley of life.
I mention this cos I reckon we at this site get a distorted view of what is going down out there in voter land.
I think that if Julie Bishop was ever going to lead the Liberal Party, she’d have got the gig by now. Like her senior namesake, I’m sure she has the vaulting ambition, she’s nasty enough to lead the Liberals, but she’s also, like her namesake, a lightweight. She’s was a dud shadow Treasurer and now a so-so Foreign Minister who looks better compared to a very mediocre ministry. Another promotion and we’ll see the Peter Principle in operation among Liberal leaders again.
Oh dear
MARK COLVIN: The Cabinet Secretary, Senator Arthur Sinodinos, has been told he is not welcome to visit the Newcastle primary school which he attended as a child after he was accused of planning a media ‘stunt’.
The school cancelled plans instigated by the Senator to bring a photographer and News Limited reporter along when he addressed 12-year-old students on ‘the process of democracy’ this Friday.
It happened to coincide with the second day of the Senate inquiry into his involvement in the Liberal Party’s political donations machinery.
Five Liberal Party officials have already refused to give evidence.
Senator Sinodinos was meant to confirm attendance six days ago, but still hasn’t, and Peter Lloyd is here to tell me that he has now made an announcement about whether he will or won’t be there.
PETER LLOYD: That’s right. The speculation ended tonight when Arthur Sinodinos told the Senate that he won’t be fronting for the parliamentary inquiry into entities donating to political parties, despite the Senate directing him to do so.
And that will perhaps be the point at which we would regard the process of a contempt of Senate proceedings to begin against him.
MARK COLVIN: Yeah, what is the status of a Senate inquiry directing a Senator to attend something?
PETER LLOYD: Well it will play out like this from tomorrow. The inquiry will begin, he will be reinvited by the references committee to attend.
The anticipated refusal will then be documented in the final report to the Parliament that goes to Parliament next week. This is, we should remind listeners, a ‘quickie’ inquiry instigated by the Opposition.
MARK COLVIN: Does the inquiry have subpoena powers like a judge?
PETER LLOYD: No it doesn’t, but what it does do is have the compelling force to make it an issue before the privileges committee of the Senate, which then can take action under the rules of Parliament – under Odger’s rules, version 13, chapter two – is the arcane world of what happens to senators who misbehave.
And potentially, and this is highly theoretical, potentially a six month jail term applies to someone in this situation.
Now no-one on the committee is saying that. What they are saying though is they are bothered by the strange optics of Arthur Sinodinos staking his reputation, but perhaps that also of the Coalition in election mode, on the optics of a contempt of the process.
MARK COLVIN: Who are these other five who have already refused to attend?
PETER LLOYD: These are the key people who were in the background in New South Wales at the time of these donations being shipped out of New South Wales by construction and property developers to the Free Enterprise Foundation, a Liberal Party-controlled entity in Canberra run by a guy called Tony Bandle.
Bandle is one of five other people from the party who have been invited and decided not to go. They include the party’s fundraiser, Paul Nicolaou, the New South Wales party director Mark Needham, the former federal director Brian Loughnane, and the New South Wales finance director Simon McInnes.
All of them, as well as Tony Bandle, who runs, as I said, the Free Enterprise Foundation, won’t be going, so it’s a total…
MARK COLVIN: Are there any penalties against them, potentially?
PETER LLOYD: No, they can’t be compelled to attend.
MARK COLVIN: So it’s only because Senator Sinodinos is a Senator…
PETER LLOYD: That’s right.
MARK COLVIN:…that he faces any possible penalties.
So what’s the story with this school? He was going back to his school on Friday, this… How did this unravel itself?
PETER LLOYD: Well this morning I learned that there was a planned visit on Friday, which was one of the two days set down for this Senate inquiry.
On Friday, instead of being in Canberra on standby potentially go to that inquiry again on day two, Arthur Sinodinos had planned for himself a media visit to his old primary school in Newcastle.
It’s no ordinary place, it’s a centenary of Newcastle East’s existence. Two hundred years of education – Australia’s oldest school. They’ve been having a real marquee year with lots of visitors and guests, and Arthur Sinodinos invited himself, I’m told last night, to attend the school on Friday and give 12-year-old boys and girls a lecture on the processes of democracy. That is the quote I was given.
MARK COLVIN: Maybe they should just travel up to Canberra and watch the inquiry.
(Laughter)
That’s the process of democracy.
PETER LLOYD: Well unfortunately, the processes of democracy hit a train wreck this afternoon for Arthur Sinodinos, because when the school found out that we were doing the story, alarm bells went off at headquarters in Sydney.
Arthur Sinodinos had a phone call, it was made very clear that the school no longer wanted to be part of what they saw was a politicisation of their golden anniversary, and they felt that they’d been involved in what they called a ‘stunt’.
That trip has now been called off, Arthur’s not going back to his old primary school, and he has got a date with a committee that he won’t be attending tomorrow.
MARK COLVIN: And very briefly, what’s this committee going to achieve in two days with so many people not attending?
PETER LLOYD: Well that’s interesting, and in all of this today it’s been lost that tomorrow there will be three things happening. There’ll be submissions from the Australian Electoral Commission, which is basically going to tell the senators there’s a lot of work being done on this before, go and read it.
And they’re also hearing from an academic in Melbourne who says, as we’ve heard before, the AEC needs teeth and punishing powers to make any of this work properly.
MARK COLVIN: Peter Lloyd, thank you very much.
Re Shea @8:45PM …I mention this cos I reckon we at this site get a distorted view of what is going down out there in voter land.
I’m sure you’re right.
Who would the Illiberals turn to if they dumped Malcum? Well, the only one who seems to be regarded with affection among Liberal or sometime-Liberal voters would be J Winston Howard. He’s only 76.
Labor has established a four point lead over the Coalition in two party preferred terms, leading 52% to 48% in the latest Essential poll.
The lead is a 2% jump for Labor and 2% decline for the Coalition since a 50-50 tied result two weeks earlier in Essential.
In that time Labor’s primary vote leapt three percentage points to 39%, with the Coalition on 40%.
Labor also won support for some of its proposed budget policies with voters favouring tightening capital gains tax exemptions (52% in favour to 19% opposed) and limiting negative gearing (48% to 24%).
I recall a few years ago that the Greens and cross benchers made the statement with words to the effect of “We won’t block supply except in cases of Government corruption.”. Could this contempt of the Senate by multiple Lib party member be the trigger and would the ALP support such a move? This is going to get very, very interesting in the next few days.
I want to buy shares in a popcorn factory…
Tom.
I’ll bet you all a dollar that if MT doesn’t do the DD they reinstate Abbott. For my money the proroguing was all about saving MT’s prime ministership in the first place – the only credible alternative is Abbott with his electioneering record – I submit as evidence for this outlandish theory his recent mea culpa reported in the following:
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/former-prime-minister-tony-abbott-admits-his-governments-mistakes-20160422-goddm8.html
He has not given up on returning, no matter how deluded and there’s no question the party would indeed be that stupid because they really are.
Just sayin’.
Very interesting re Sinodinos and his school
I can certainly understand people are not aware of some polls putting the ALP ahead
Wasn’t Shorten going to be called to this committee, if not should he volunteer?
@JimmyDoyle
Not surprised with Milne’s attack on Labor policy. Same thing was happening today in Victoria. Ellen Sandell and Greg Barber were attacking Labor’s budget despite solid funding for health, education and public transport, mental health and domestic violence services. I don’t know if its because I am getting older but I am starting to think Greens are just a joke.
“Shea MacDuff
Neither knew about the Essential result. Neither knew about Newspoll or Morgan giving the 2PP lead to Labor.”
This might also explain why so many say the expect the Libs to win
Or is that just being to clever?
What a crazy situation we find ourselves in? Wind back the clock 6 months and try and find anyone (apart from Tony) who thought he was a chance of returning as PM down the track. Now, not only is it fathomable, but arguably he’d have a better shot than the invincible Malcolm (albeit an extremely short stay). Quite the circus.