Newspoll: 50-50

After four successive results showing Labor with its nose in front, Newspoll nudges back to level pegging.

Better late than never, and with apologies for last night’s technical issues, the latest Newspoll result in The Australian overnight recorded a tie on two-party preferred, a slight improvement for the Coalition after Labor’s 51-49 lead in the four previous polls. However, both major parties are down a point on the primary vote, the Coalition to 40% and Labor to 35%, with the Greens also down one to 10%. The combined 15% others vote prompts The Australian to delve into some of what constitutes it: 3% apiece for the Nick Xenophon Team and Family First, 1% each for Palmer United and One Nation. Malcolm Turnbull’s personal ratings are little changed, down one on approval to 37% and up one on disapproval to 51%, but Bill Shorten loses last fortnight’s gains with a four point drop on approval to 33% and a three-point increase in disapproval to 52%. Turnbull’s lead as preferred prime minister nudges from 45-30. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1867.

UPDATE: Here’s BludgerTrack updated with the latest Newspoll, which hasn’t made much difference to it:

bludgertrack-2016-06-06

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.

1,333 comments on “Newspoll: 50-50”

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  3. Andrew Bolt is partly miffed because Turnball won’t appear on his TV show, that explains some of the animosity.
    Bolt and Price are arch conservatives, but they’re not 100% total cheerleaders for Malcolm, they even have Ed Husic on their show once a week for a Labor perspective.

  4. Shorten’s visit to Coogee today – zero coverage on ABC news, he got a better run on SBS, which overall is covering the election in a far more extensive and non-partisan way than Aunty.

  5. [Bemused
    Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 10:10 pm
    I can’t really envisage how a debate could take place on Facebook. Can anyone enlighten me?]

    I’ve just become an instant expert on Facebook. A Business Insider article today said they would use something called Facebook Live which is fairly new. Facebook has a website for this – https://live.fb.com/about/

    It seems to be made for individuals to take videos with their smart phones and let other Facebook users see them live and comment on them. Great for show-offs but for a political debate – who knows?

  7. c@tmomma @ #1229 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 9:49 pm

    I’ve been asking people over the last 4 weeks, ‘What is the issue that is most important to you for this election?’ The two that are coming up repeatedly are
    * Jobs
    * Medicare.
    A job is the financial lifeline the family clings on to. This feeds into the education issue as well. Medicare is the other lifeline people care about and rely upon when and if they need it. They’ve seen what the American health system looks like and it scares them as much as any invasion by furriners in leaky boats.

    And much the same tonight in Cowan. We could mention traffic congestion and education costs as well; and we could add an overt desire to change the Government! You Bet!!

    The calls keep getting made…every day, every night….the volunteers keep enlisting….and now the unions are running their campaign on penalty rates and calling on voters to “Put the Liberals Last!”

  9. http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2016/jun/07/australian-election-2016-turnbull-shorten-coalition-greens-labor-politics-live?page=with:block-57563218e4b0422307027525#block-57563218e4b0422307027525

    Labor’s deputy senate leader Stephen Conroy is on Sky News at the moment and he’s being pursued about Labor’s decision to not means test the childcare package. How on earth did the shadow cabinet think that was a good idea, giving money to wealthy people who don’t need it?

    Conroy says the rationale was there is “real pressure” on every single family taking care of kids. But there’s not real pressure on a family comprised of a law partner and a medical specialist, host Peter Van-Onselen points out to his guest, entirely reasonably. Conroy admits the proposal was “kicked around” in the shadow cabinet (read, contested in the shadow cabinet) – but in the end “we came down on the side of leaving the structure as it was”.

    Labor’s child care policy has more to do with a political strategy in an election campaign rather than than good long term policy to provide an affordable and sustainable child care sector.

    Rob Burgess: http://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2016/06/06/labors-childcare-plan-wrong-policy-right-time/?utm_source=Responsys&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20160607_TND2

  10. Just chiming in to echo K17’s comments re complaints about ALP is handling the campaign.

    1. They set a schedule and have by and large appeared to have stuck to that to get the maximum exposure both on the ground and in media

    2. I see a distinct pattern to it. There’s no scattergun rubbish like we’re seeing from the govt. There is a clear narrative that is becoming clearer as time passes.

    3. The NBN is and will be a hot issue. Shorten has mentioned it several times in pressers this week as he tallies up ALP’s policy strategy. The first week he spoke about only a couple of areas and at the end of each presser managed to list things. Each week that has been added to … giving both media and the public time to digest, so when he calls the growing tally, listeners/viewers think “oh yeah, he explained that last week (or the week before). CLARITY.

    4. expect hospitals, nbn and a few other measures … then in the 2nd last week ALL the costings, independently audited.

    Thus there will be no excuse for the electorate or the media to say ‘we didn’t understand that’ or ‘I can’t remember you saying that’. Shorten has left no room for confusion or gotcha misinterpretations.

  11. A KEY insight into one of Australia’s biggest national security leaks will be given when police release the notorious “Page 5” of their investigation into the breach.
    The Administrative Appeals Tribunal has ordered the Australia Federal Police to make public its report on the affair at 9am, June 17.
    It is expected to reveal what police knew and suspected about the leaking, 13 years ago, of a top-secret intelligence paper written for the Office of National Assessment by Andrew Wilkie, now an MP.

    http://www.news.com.au/national/politics/australian-federal-police-ordered-to-release-report-into-one-of-our-biggest-intelligence-leaks/news-story/a172218b82a4e20ea532b2a327c729bb

  12. citizen @ #1255 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 10:27 pm

    Bemused
    Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 10:10 pm
    I can’t really envisage how a debate could take place on Facebook. Can anyone enlighten me?

    I’ve just become an instant expert on Facebook. A Business Insider article today said they would use something called Facebook Live which is fairly new. Facebook has a website for this – https://live.fb.com/about/
    It seems to be made for individuals to take videos with their smart phones and let other Facebook users see them live and comment on them. Great for show-offs but for a political debate – who knows?

    WOW! Thanks for that. Hadn’t heard of it.
    I can’t see it working too well and I guess it is Mal’s baby so he will wear it.

  13. Carmen Lawrence: https://newmatilda.com/2016/06/07/australia-using-refugees-human-shields-says-former-labor-minister-carmen-lawrence/

    A new report, which Carmen Lawrence helped launch today, draws attention to the abuses of women perpetrated as a result of Australia’s current policies. Max Chalmers reports.

    A former Labor Premier who went on to serve as a minister in the Keating government says “real and serious” harm is being done to the men and women held on Nauru and Manus Island, as a result of the bipartisan policy of offshore detention.

    Carmen Lawrence, the country’s first female Premier, has criticised both of the major parties for failing to take a lead on the issue, saying the community must push back to put pressure on both sides to find “smart” alternative policies.

  14. On the NBN and the ALP’s approach – I would suspect (based on what Clare has said previously etc) that the ALP won’t make any grandiose promises. They’ll probably say something along the lines that they won’t rip everything up (like the LNP did, delaying it all even more), but will shift the prioritization of FTTP to ensure there is more, sooner.

    It may well be taken as being a bit insipid, but I don’t really see what else they can do.

  15. It’s not only the polls that make me feel optimistic, it’s that the Turnbull team seem to be a bunch of block heads.

  16. And on costings, “how are you paying for that” etc. I would hazard a guess that the ALP will aim to have the final figures tally up (via the PBO) at a modest amount less than the Libs.

    I’d also assume they are balancing the timing very carefully with a view to getting all their policies out in a well planned manner.

    There are very tricky things to consider with respect to timing, like the large pre-poll and when to massage the messaging.

    If I were planning it I would be looking to have all the policies out and the final budget tally released with about 2 weeks left to go before July 2.

    That means no “announceables” in the last 2 weeks, but they can hammer away at the stuff that has been announced, and more importantly they should hopefully have a concrete answer to the inane “where’s the money coming from”.

    And, provided they can project that the budgetary position will be ‘better’ than the Libs, they can hammer that to death in the last 2 weeks too.

    I kind of wonder if the ALP have made a strategic decision to let the LNP (and their numerous agents in the media) run with the “where’s the money coming from” deliberately to get them to overreach just so they can be smacked down at the end of the campaign. Provided the ALP can finesse having the PBO numbers looking better than Treasury’s to give them equal cred that can be a powerful thing to neutralize that attack, and it could leave the LNP/media looking like geese. Dunno. We’ll see I guess.

  17. Helicopter was on Sky arguing with Bolt. Bolt still in love with Abbott, Helicopter wouldnt engage.Good to see these nutjobs fighting amongst themselves.

  20. mal’s baby — what a joke the man is – he ran a bankrupt telco and everything he knows something – i think the FB debate will be his last stand (= cablewreck)

  21. Victoria
    Bottom line from your link
    “The Liberal government then dropped the issue, but the Labor opposition targeted Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who denied being behind any security breach.
    There is no statute of limitations on leaking intelligence secrets.”

    Another Royal Commision for Labor to hold, maybe Howard will flee the country after this election

  23. Having had a look at Facebook Live, I imagine the debate will be conducted by Turnbull and Shorten doing video ‘selfies’ with their iPhones or Androids. But how will it be moderated? How can there possibly be any audience or panel interaction?

    Mal is simply killing the debate.

  25. If Mal thinks he will connect with young with his face book debate he won’t. If he thinks he will connect with anyone else he is kidding himself. All I can see is more people laughing at him.

  27. pegasus @ #1259 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 10:34 pm

    And yet again..two out of two to the G…another attack on Labor for providing childcare support to….wait for it…people (that is, especially women) in the workplace who have children and use childcare! What an outrage that is (if you’re a G). Earlier on the specious complaint was that subsides were necessary. Now the complaint is they’re not necessary.

    The double standards applied to this are breathtaking. Women work. They have to meet childcare costs, without which they would not be able to work. Not only they but their families and the economy as a whole benefit from their participation in the economy. There is no better thing we can do to support socio-economic equality, opportunity and mobility than to support women at work and in education. To withdraw support from women when their incomes rise is to subject them to a kind of double taxation. First, they will pay higher personal income tax. And, if the G’s had their way, they will also lose a social transfer benefit. These effects would be referred to as poverty traps at the low end of the income scale. It is a reproductive trap for women at the top end.

    If we want women to have opportunities that compare equally with the opportunities available to their husbands and brothers, we have to support them. The protests of the G’s reveal a politically-motivated sexism. They should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

  30. Turnbull was only put there as the Libs thought he would win a popularity contest easily without any policies.There is no one else after Turnbull that would be the remotest bit popular.

  32. It would not surprise me if in the next few days we get, due to technical problems the online debate has been cancelled.

  34. Briefly @ 1277,
    Yes, it’s kind of weird and creepy that Pegasus appears to live for finding articles she can rush here to cut and paste that diss Labor.

  35. A B,

    I thought the issue with ALP going hard on the NBN was twofold. Firstly, people still believe the government line that the ALP botched it initially and secondly, the LNP have already blown billions on FTTN that cannot be recovered. The ALP will been seen as wasting billions by abandoning FTTN and reverting back to FTTP. I don’t know what the figures are but I think it may cost tens of billions to abandon what the LNP have already wasted. A similar scenario to the Vic ALP abandoning the East West Link but on a much bigger scale. The reasons why these are necessary costs to incur are probably too difficult to explain to voters.

    Sorry, but your facts aren’t straight. There are potentially several billions at stake if Labor were to cancel FTTN, but Labor has already said that much of the current FTTN build will remain. Fortunately it hasn’t gone so far as tens of billions.
    The real question is the time scale over which FTTN areas will be replaced with FTTH. In any case, Labour can’t be blamed for this.
    The real concern for voters should be the tens of billions of wasted money that will occur if the Liberals are allowed in for another term.

  36. 1. Is FTTH the same as running your internet from a Foxtel cable?
    2. How come Abbott has been so well behaved this campaign? Has he been sent overseas?

  38. Jackol,
    The thing that a lot of people don’t understand is that the structures created for a FTTH rollout took years to set up, but they are still in place. New FTTH contracts could be issued next week. Labor could turn up on July 3, and after sacking Turnbull’s cronies, NBNco could move to commence new fibre build within weeks. They would still be stuck with much of the present FTTN build, but like I said, fortunately that hasn’t progressed too far.
    The other thing worth mentioning is that for a lot of these companies its possible to rengeotiate FTTN work back to FTTH work. FTTN need only be continued where there is a lot of actual plant and equipment already deployed (Nodes etc) even then it will make sense to write some of it off in order to have more optimal fibre build.

  39. pegasus @ #1263 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 10:40 pm

    I have nothing but admiration for Carmen Lawrence. She is correct in her summary. The pressure for change to policy has to come from the community and must be directed at both major parties. She has lost none of her intellectual vitality, capacity for observation or talent as a speaker.

  40. Another reason to care for the environment, it’s a video link so I’ll wait till BK posts link.
    The Nepean River bubbles as CSG wells at Menangle Park, 60km out of Sydney, are submerged by floodwaters.

  45. cud chewer – re: NBN that’s all fine, and aligns with much of what I had heard/assumed. I don’t see how it changes my assessment of a potential pre-election ALP announcement. Condense it down to a sound bite for the evening news.

    Basically the ALP are only going to be able to say “we won’t scrap work under way and we’ll try to rejig things to get more fibre happening faster”, and that’s about it.

    Anyone expecting a grandiose “we’ll fix everything tomorrow” promise is going to be disappointed I imagine.

  47. c@tmomma @ #1284 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 11:39 pm

    Briefly @ 1277,
    Yes, it’s kind of weird and creepy that Pegasus appears to live for finding articles she can rush here to cut and paste that diss Labor.

    Yup. It is a feeble way to campaign. The gist is always that Labor and the LNP are near mirror-images…but somehow Labor attracts extra criticism on some wholly irrelevant grounds. Once again, they’ve gone too far, invoking a Lib for a critique of social policy and gender equity. Lib-G-sexism….totally weird.

  48. Jackol @ 1295,

    Anyone expecting a grandiose “we’ll fix everything tomorrow” promise is going to be disappointed I imagine.

    It would just attract a ‘Where’s the money coming from!?!’ taunt.

  49. c@tmomma @ #1296 Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at 11:54 pm

    Another good policy from Labor which appears to have gone under the radar:
    http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jun/07/labor-pledges-to-review-trade-deals-that-let-companies-sue-australia

    Labor will revisit these so-called FTA’s. They are most inaptly named. They are RTA’s – Restraint of Trade Agreements. The first CHAFTA labour scams were reported today, manifesting exactly in the way they were forecast here at PB last year. We will re-negotiate this too.

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