Essential Research: 53-47 to Labor

A slight move back to the Coalition in this week’s Essential Research poll, which also gauges support for Donald Trump’s “Muslim ban”.

Labor slips back a point in this week’s reading of the Essential Research fortnightly average, from 54-46 to 53-47, although this is to do with a particularly weak result for the Coalition a fortnight ago washing out of the result, rather than a turn in their favour this week. On the primary vote, the Coalition is up a point to 36%, Labor is steady on 37%, One Nation is steady on 10%, and the Greens are down one to 8%. Other findings are that 49% disapprove of Donald Trump’s self-styled Muslim ban, with only 36% in favour. At least some of this would appear to be down to questions of implementation, as the gap is narrower on the question of whether Australia should do something similar, with 41% in support and 46% opposed. Fifty-three per cent agree with the Prime Minister’s position that it is not his job to comment, versus 36% who disagree. Other questions relate to technology use, including a finding that 50% say technological change is making lives better, with 25% opting for worse.

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.

3,021 comments on “Essential Research: 53-47 to Labor”

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  3. I’m afraid as long as we got Turnbull as PM One Nation will continue to grow. Leadership vacuum and lack of authority gives room for fringe ideas to grow.

  4. bemused,

    I go with Plato.

    He’s more vibrant and representative of the younger generation.

    But, you go with the hemlock of your stupidity.

  6. Erasmus
    Thanks I try. Nice avatar 🙂
    I respect people here will have different opinions. But I don’t understand why some here can easily see how the NBN is being butchered in terms of costs and outcomes, with us sliding down international measures of internet performance, yet do not see the same thing happening in transport.

    We spend even more on road (mostly) and rail projects than on the NBN, at very high prices by OECD standards, with opaque or no post hoc reviews of performance, and many projects failing to meet promised performance targets. We are capable of doing things well, but we can also waste billions, especially on PPPs, which are persisted with, despite lousy returns. We build new train lines without training enough new drivers. Our city roads are congested, so we keep assuming more roads are the solution.

  7. To paraphrase. HL Mencken:

    For every complex problem there is an explanation that is clear, simple and gets at the larger truth you are trying to convey.

  8. don
    Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 3:17 pm

    frednk @ #2637 Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 2:54 pm

    John Reidy
    Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 2:47 pm
    Don,
    Your question at around 1:30 re data rates yes, 1 byte =8 bits and add a couple more for data integrity you get a 1:10 ratio.

    You have confused bytes and the unit unit for baud rate. A byte is always 8 bits

    The only main difference is use of compression – which was processor/CPU intensive and if implemented properly better error correction in case.

    Have no idea what this is about; compression is not used at the communication layer and does not give better communication error correction.

    I am well aware that 8 bits make a byte.

    What I am asking is how many bits it takes to send eight bits, on average, once you add on the checksum (e.g. 88 bits, including overhead, to send 80 bits with a fair expectation that there are no errors?)

    Pity.
    Unless you are being really tricky when you start talking about mbits/sec you are only talking about the data transferred; so it is Mbytes/sec by 8.
    If you want to be real tricky and start including the overhead you have to start talking in statistics because the amount of data can vary and the overhead depends on the communication layers and the important word is layers.
    A very brief introduction of the common.
    The internet is based on the TCP/IP protocol. There a packets flying around controlling the network layer (ICMP protocol) these don’t transfer data but they are part of the deal. The actual IP4 packet has a header and data portion. A header with no options is 20 bytes long. the data portion can be upto 65535 bytes (16 bit unsigned count). A packet that long has to be broken up to be transported by the physical layer. This is called fragmentation. The strength of an IP packet and why IP won is it can be transported across many physical layers.
    The TCP part of TCP/IP is data within the IP packet.
    A typical physical layer is IEEE802.3.
    The IEEE802.3 layer (I think it went through a few versions)
    7 bytes of preamble (1 and 0s to synce the clock)
    1 byte Start of frame
    6 bytes destination ( original protocol was by DEC it was a world address[history])
    6 bytes source address
    4 byte tag
    2 length
    46 to 1500 data ( there is a minimum packet length for the clash protocol to work on coax [history]
    4 byte CRC checksum
    12 byte gap.
    So the overhead is from 42/46 to 42/1500; a fixed answer is out the window.

    The TCP layer ( remember it is data in an IP packet) has a head of 20 bytes (without options) and there is reply packets; the replay can acknowledge many packets and can come out of sequence so the reply overhead is far from fixed.
    So the short answer is; it depends.

  11. For all electoral purposes, the WA Liberal Party and ON have amalgamated with each other. There’s no question, a vote for Pauline Hanson, Queensland Senator, is a vote for Colin Barnett; a vote for Colin Barnett is a vote for Pauline Hanson.

  12. Here is a Mencken quote that is germane to the current political climate …

    Civilization, in fact, grows more and more maudlin and hysterical; especially under democracy it tends to degenerate into a mere combat of crazes; the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.


  13. Socrates
    Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 9:29 pm
    ..
    We spend even more on road (mostly) and rail projects than on the NBN, at very high prices by OECD standards, with opaque or no post hoc reviews of performance, and many projects failing to meet promised performance targets. We are capable of doing things well, but we can also waste billions, especially on PPPs, which are persisted with, despite lousy returns. We build new train lines without training enough new drivers. Our city roads are congested, so we keep assuming more roads are the solution.

    Please add the electrical distribution to your list; if we have idiots showing up with lumps of coal it is not going to get better.

  18. el guapo @ #2868 #2868 Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 8:52 pm

    “Exactly. The biggest liars always win when it comes to slogan-based politics.”
    You’re completely missing the point. Pay less tax is a slogan that represents the view that we should pay less tax. If you believe that we should pay more tax then you need to be able to communicate that message in a concise and meaningful fashion. And if you can’t then maybe your idea is crap.

    No, it just means that you can’t communicate well. Lots of people with good ideas can’t communicate them well.

  21. If you believe that we should pay more tax then you need to be able to communicate that message in a concise and meaningful fashion. And if you can’t then maybe your idea is crap.

    The response should be what services are you going to cut.

    Smaller Government = cut services but which services is *never* asked.

  26. P1, I was in no way attempting to represent Mencken (the man was a dick) and in any event it is irrelevant to the fact that complex problems can and must be communicated simply and effectively.

  31. AC

    “Submarines are a very good defensive weapon and also assist in intelligence gathering.”

    They sometimes come in handy for attacking things as well.

  32. el guapo @ #2926 Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 9:54 pm

    P1, I was in no way attempting to represent Mencken (the man was a dick) …

    So why did you attribute your misquotation to him?

    … and in any event it is irrelevant to the fact that complex problems can and must be communicated simply and effectively.

    And my point remains … that trying to simplify complex ideas is sometimes not possible, at least not without leaving yourself open to those who are quite willing to misquote and misrepresent … oh, wait …

  34. complex problems can and must be communicated simply and effectively

    This works when there are commonly agreed principles underlying the simple, effective communication.

    What we have seen is a concerted attack to question the fundamental facts of, eg, climate change – when you have a section of the public that doesn’t even agree on the fundamentals, then you can’t make a ‘simple, effective’ communication strategy.

    FUD works and runs interference on anything except the most basic, primal messaging, which is why the reactionaries love using it.

  35. P1, “to paraphrase” meaning to reword something. You offered the original quote so i paraphrased it to state the message i was trying to convey. No misquote or misrepresentation.

    And yes there are some complex ideas that are difficult to simplify, no doubt, theoretical physics comes to mind, but i cant think of one in politics. Its about connecting emotionally to voters. My paraphrase is bang on the money.

  37. The Liberals and the Nationals or their respective forebears in WA have been in coalition for the better part of a century. This relationship is disintegrating. The conservatives can no longer offer themselves as a stable alternative to Labor. We will see how this translates electorally in the regional WA seats in 4 weeks time.

  38. [ We build new train lines without training enough new drivers.]

    Newman was stuck with completing the Redcliffe line but they were setting up QR for sell off (reducing overhead costs such as recruitment and training to get a better price) for after the election which they didn’t expect to lose. Unfortunately ALP put too much faith in the board running QR to alert their new government to problems. Notably the chairman of the board and CEO abandoned ship when the disasters hit and before their culpability was exposed.

  42. el guapo @ #2935 Sunday, February 12, 2017 at 10:12 pm

    P1, “to paraphrase” meaning to reword something. You offered the original quote so i paraphrased it to state the message i was trying to convey. No misquote or misrepresentation.

    No, “to paraphrase” means to reword without changing the original meaning. You did, and should therefore not have attributed it.

    And yes there are some complex ideas that are difficult to simplify, no doubt, theoretical physics comes to mind, but i cant think of one in politics.

    Climate Change? Economics? Human Rights? Refugee policy? Freedom of Speech?The list of political issues that are difficult to simplify is just about endless …

    Its about connecting emotionally to voters. My paraphrase is bang on the money.

    That you think so means you will inevitably lose to those better at lying and misrepresenting than you are. You have identified the problem, but not the solution.

  43. Now that the WA Liberals have opened the for for One Nation to win Upper House seats all eyes will be on the nominations for the regions where they might succeed.

    One Nation has already had some issues with lower house candidates not standing much scrutiny so it will be interesting to see the background of the people who want a gig in the Legislative Council.

    this is after all the party that gave us Rod Culletton and I reckon there are more than a few of his ilk out there itching to have a go, particularly as the preference deal increases their chances.

  44. What we have seen is a concerted attack to question the fundamental facts of, eg, climate change – when you have a section of the public that doesn’t even agree on the fundamentals, then you can’t make a ‘simple, effective’ communication strategy.

    FUD works and runs interference on anything except the most basic, primal messaging, which is why the reactionaries love using it.

    Sadly the mob as might be said of ‘parts’ of WA & Qld and elsewhere lap it up – and have been waiting to lap it up for years.

    The tories are test running this to get out of their polling hole and for the next election.

  45. One Nation has already had some issues with lower house candidates not standing much scrutiny so it will be interesting to see the background of the people who want a gig in the Legislative Council.

    The candidate for the seat of Albany is so much of a throwback to the old days that his Facebook cover page is black and white!

  46. FUD works and runs interference on anything except the most basic, primal messaging, which is why the reactionaries love using it.

    It ‘explains’ more of the approach of abbott as well.

    Drag it all down and destroy it to get what you want.

    If you have been left behind economically – why not ?

  47. And their upper house candidate for the area that takes in Katanning is the deputy president of the Katanning shire. He’s already gotten himself on the front page of the local paper last week banging on about halal food. Assuming he does not win, he will return to the local govt and have to deal with Katanning constituents, a large proportion of whom are muslim.

  50. Vogon Poet,
    You’re wearing one of those knitted pussy hats ?

    No. However my son will be wearing a Poor Boy cap. Which is also apt. 🙂

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