Galaxy: 52-48 to federal Labor in WA

As cabinet assembles in Western Australia, more evidence that the state looms as a big problem for the Turnbull government.

A quiet week looms on the opinion poll front, but Perth’s Sunday Times newspaper entered the breach yesterday with a WA-only poll of federal voting intention conducted by Galaxy, tailored to coincide with cabinet’s visit to the state this week. The results delivered the paper the hard-hitting headline it was presumably angling for, recording Labor with a 52-48 two-party lead that amounts to a 6% swing compared with last year’s election. The primary vote results were Coalition 39% (down from 48.7%), Labor 37% (up from 32.4%) and Greens 11% (down from 12.1%), with One Nation on 5%. Malcolm Turnbull nonetheless recorded a 43-33 lead over Bill Shorten as preferred prime minister. The poll also found 59% saying they would vote yes at a same-sex marrige plebiscite, compared with 32% for no; and 61% saying they did not trust the government to “change the distribution of GST revenue to ensure WA receives a fairer share”, with 21% saying they did. It was conducted Wednesday and Thursday from a sample of 850.

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.

714 comments on “Galaxy: 52-48 to federal Labor in WA”

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  1. One thing, or another thing if that’s your thing, going for Foley* is that Gladys hasn’t fought a campaign as Premier, and she doesn’t look good under pressure.

    *aside the schooling which produced such luminaries as Mel Gibson. And moi!

  2. Gorkay King @ #641 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 10:30 pm

    I think Foley is in a competitive position and have a real chance of winning the next state election. NSW Labor’s recent electoral performance has been good and party leadership seems to be switched on.

    Glady’s seems to be a weak leader with questionable authority within her party, evidenced by numerous public spats, public policy failures, and leaks. The timing of the next election will either be with an unpopular federal Liberal government or Labor government that is still mostly in the honeymoon period.

    I reckon NSW Labor is on the right track.

    Sad to say, in a way, but the next leader of the Liberal Party, for mine, is the Conservative charismatic Catholic, Dominic Perrottet. The man who is now the Treasurer. The Catholic force is still strong in the NSW Liberal Party, led by Tony Abbott and others fighting the rearguard action on his behalf to take it back from the Moderates.

    What is really interesting is the fact that the next State election (I am predicting that Gladys will be gone by 2019), will be a proxy war between the Catholic Church factions, fighting for control of Church and State.

    Luke Foley, even though he comes from the Left of the ALP, is also a committed Catholic, however, he is from the non Opus Dei, more moderate Vatican 2 wing of the Holy Roman Church; whereas Perrottet, the Tudehopes and others are from the Opus Dei/Pell ultramontaine wing.

    I really hope Luke wins, if only for that reason alone. God knows what an Opus Dei run State would look like! God help us all!

  4. China / Russia / NK

    The Chinese may well be discussing the NK situation with the Russians, but

    – The Chinese would not want Russians in NK;

    – The Chinese themselves do not want their military directly facing the SKs and US military over the existing ‘Demilitarised Zone’ (to much risk of escalating incidents).

    What the Chinese want is what they had 20 years ago – a nutty state with a big conventional army and lots of old fashioned artillery aimed at South Korea i.e. the classic ‘buffer state’.

    For NK to have managed to build a nearly working nuclear ballistic missile, no matter how ramshackle and unreliable, is very ‘inconvenient’ for the Chinese.

    Of course Trumps belligerence is not helping here.

  5. ItzaDream @ #652 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 10:49 pm

    One thing, or another thing if that’s your thing, going for Foley* is that Gladys hasn’t fought a campaign as Premier, and she doesn’t look good under pressure.

    *aside the schooling which produced such luminaries as Mel Gibson. And moi!

    If you remember back to the Triple By-elections that Gladys fought recently, she had no stomach for the fight. She splashed money around to win heartland seats-why, I wonder? Was she aware of polling which already had her on the nose? Plus she promised things to the seat of Gosford before the election, which she immediately reneged on post-election when the Liberals didn’t win the seat. Electors remember that sort of thing.

    1. Throwing money at your homies, and delivering to them.
    2. Promising the moon and sixpence to everyone else, but turning out to be an Indian Giver.

    It’s not a strategy that will work in a State election.

  6. Ctari:

    Apologies its from Greg Sheridan (who imho is actually interesting on foreign affairs) but he states he believes that China sold Pakistan nuclear technology (to settle issues with India). Pakinstan then sold it on to N Korea.

  7. CTar1 @ #653 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 10:53 pm

    China / Russia / NK

    The Chinese may well be discussing the NK situation with the Russians, but

    – The Chinese would not want Russians in NK;

    – The Chinese themselves do not want their military directly facing the SKs and US military over the existing ‘Demilitarised Zone’ (to much risk of escalating incidents).

    What the Chinese want is what they had 20 years ago – a nutty state with a big conventional army and lots of old fashioned artillery aimed at South Korea i.e. the classic ‘buffer state’.

    For NK to have managed to build a nearly working nuclear ballistic missile, no matter how ramshackle and unreliable, is very ‘inconvenient’ for the Chinese.

    Of course Trumps belligerence is not helping here.

    Do you think the Chinese might be attracted by a largely de-militarised united Korea whose security was jointly guaranteed by them and the US?

  8. IoM

    [ he states he believes that China sold Pakistan nuclear technology (to settle issues with India). Pakinstan then sold it on to N Korea.]

    Yes, I’ve read this theory from better than Sheridan.

    The idea has legs.

  9. Their patience with being told that their struggles are all their own fault is getting thin, and the old trick of deflecting the blame onto the dole bludgers or the immigrants is losing it’s potency.

    Especially when they see Grand Theft Water, and no one getting their collar felt by the coppers for it. Plus the Deputy Prime Minister of Australia telling them to go harder, boys!

    But the little guy can go to jail for defrauding the Commonwealth of a helluva lot less than that.

  10. Ides of March @ #655 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 10:59 pm

    Ctari:

    Apologies its from Greg Sheridan (who imho is actually interesting on foreign affairs) but he states he believes that China sold Pakistan nuclear technology (to settle issues with India). Pakinstan then sold it on to N Korea.

    And the North Koreans sold their missile technology to Pakistan in return.
    The North Korean missile technology is reportedly based on Russian designs.

  11. Player One,
    (>‿◠)✌

    I just have this amazing image in my head of dtt, the only one who thinks, apparently, talking to the cockroaches as the only other survivors on Earth of WW3 and the ‘Nuclear Winter’!

  12. bemused,

    Hard to say if this would be able to be negotiated. To the Chinese something they can depend on so their troops don’t end up directly facing the Sth Korean Army (with their fairly implicit guarantee from the US) would have some attractiveness to them.

    But hard to imagine it being able to negotiated and who would be able to guarantee it.

  13. Luke Foley is doing a good job. He’s not the Messiah, he’s not as good at his job as Bill Shorten is at his, but he is a quiet achiever, an effective opposition leader. Further, he is up against one of the Liberals’ second string leaders since Mike Baird resigned. He’s a real chance for 2019.

  14. CTar1 @ #661 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:09 pm

    bemused,

    Hard to say if this would be able to be negotiated. To the Chinese something they can depend on so their troops don’t end up directly facing the Sth Korean Army (with their fairly implicit guarantee from the US) would have some attractiveness to them.

    But hard to imagine it being able to negotiated and who would be able to guarantee it.

    Yes, the biggest difficulty I can see is that the US appeared to renege on an agreement the Russians thought they had that Nato would not be rolled up to their borders. Hence the unpleasantness in Ukraine.

  15. C@, P1, bemused

    Just think of the bottled water and baked bean supplies DTT must have to hand.

    Very sustaining as she composes her next 6 month homily to us declaring that PB’ers are solely responsible for WW3 because we won’t listen to her.

    I can just see the initial move being a Russian plan to close the Dardanelles as a diversion as reported by an unknown Ukrainian blogger who heard the story from another unknown blogger (not able to be traced) from Mongolia.

  16. Judging by the numbers given by a poster below, Cootamundra looks like pretty solid Nationals territory apart from the apparent hotbed of socialism that is Gundagai. Not knowing the situation on the ground, on the face of it it looks like one Labor should sit out and save its funds, unless there are local factors at play which make the attempt worthwhile. I wouldn’t worry about Shooters and odds and sods taking the seat. That would weaken the Government, which is all to the good.

  17. bemused

    [US appeared to renege on an agreement the Russians thought they had that Nato would not be rolled up to their borders.]

    I think the Russians have a legitimate grievance on that and also the agreement between them and the US on active missile numbers.

    The Americans honoured both these technically but certainly not in the spirit they were negotiated.

  19. CTar1,
    So I made the wrong decision by trying to corner the market in popcorn, when I should have been trying to corner the market in Baked Beans and Prepper supplies!?!

  20. I think South Korea would be very reluctant to demilitarise, especially given the aggressive stance that both Russia and China have taken with some of their neighbours. I do think that smaller nations have a right to take out insurance against larger neighbours with larger nations from further away. It seems that some of the support for Russia and China not wanting US allies on their borders out of some outdated reflexive pro-Communism for states that no longer run Communist economies.

  21. ItzaDream @ #669 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:26 pm

    And good luck Gladys going into a campaign with projects and promises funded by more power privatisation.

    Itza,
    Did you hear that the ACCC have launched an investigation into the whys and wherefores of the power companies recent massive price increases to consumers? I think that my popcorn futures are on solid ground!

  22. Steve777 @ #665 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:22 pm

    Judging by the numbers given by a poster below, Cootamundra looks like pretty solid Nationals territory apart from the apparent hotbed of socialism that is Gundagai. Not knowing the situation on the ground, on the face of it it looks like one Labor should sit out and save its funds, unless there are local factors at play which make the attempt worthwhile. I wouldn’t worry about Shooters and odds and sods taking the seat. That would weaken the Government, which is all to the good.

    Obviously the effect of Ben Chifley calling in to the Niagara Cafe en route between Canberra and Bathurst has not worn off.
    http://www.smh.com.au/news/obituaries/the-culture-behind-a-cafe-affair/2007/05/27/1180205067524.html

  23. As an observer from another place Foley will need to make a very good effort against Gladys for him to survive to have a second go.

    But, I agree, it’s not impossible.

  24. Ratsak: “On Abbott’s dopey tweet… Every single member of the misgovernment from Trumble down believes and will openly say exactly the same nonsense. They will be joined by a chorus of nitwits in the media.”

    They don’t believe it – they don’t believe in equality in any case – but they will say it and will go largely unchallenged by the media.

  25. C@tmomma @ #670 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:29 pm

    ItzaDream @ #669 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:26 pm

    And good luck Gladys going into a campaign with projects and promises funded by more power privatisation.

    Itza,
    Did you hear that the ACCC have launched an investigation into the whys and wherefores of the power companies recent massive price increases to consumers? I think that my popcorn futures are on solid ground!

    Yes, and the weekend debate and resolution on Labor’s position into the campaign which as I understand it was to pull Foley back from ‘the power battle has been lost’ to ‘no further and an attempt to increase govt shareholding’. Anything to report there?

  26. Gundagai is on the old Hume Highway, roughly half way to Melbourne from Sydney (actually about 3/7 of the way). It used to be a major stopping point but is now bypassed. It’s been in decline for a while now, population about 1,900.

  27. Speaking of wars and stocking up, I just went googling ‘spam’ and the Hormel fortune (backstory there for another time), and was, though probably shouldn’t have been, a bit alarmed to read that during WW2 spam wasn’t only eaten, but used to grease guns. Just sayin’.

  28. Keenan dropped the ball on 7:30.

    He goes on about the sharing and evaluation of intelligence, etc, but left it totally open that our agencies only raided because the British were going to issue a public warning on travel to and from Australia.

    If that is true the British must have very strongly believed that we were seriously putting people at risk by ignoring their intelligence.

  29. Steve777 @ #675 Monday, July 31st, 2017 – 11:40 pm

    Gundagai is on the old Hume Highway, roughly half way to Melbourne from Sydney (actually about 3/7 of the way). It used to be a major stopping point but is now bypassed. It’s been in decline for a while now, population about 1,900.

    But wait, there’s more. There’s the Dog on the Tuckerbox. And now a Tesla supercharger. It’s all blue sky for Gundagai.

  31. On arbitrary opportunity there is an American quote I heard a while ago that I really like:
    “Some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple”

  37. I just accessed the entirety of BK’s dawn patrol this morning inside of ten seconds. Granted that that’s only the case when I do a new post overnight, but my heart isn’t bleeding with sympathy for those of you who think it’s some great trauma to click “read more” a couple of times.

  39. It would be good to not get 80 plus emails a day telling me about posts. I have tried to unsubscribe and it does not work

  40. It appears that “feature” has been removed, Walter, so the emails should desist after I do a new post, which will happen overnight. Also, I don’t think BK has got the memo yet, but short of having 100 links in a single post, he no longer has to break dawn patrol down into multiple comments.

  41. Actually, accessing BK’s posts is even easier than I thought, since it appears people had already worked out what had just occurred to me — if a bunch of community-spirited commenters give his posts the appropriate number of thumbs-ups (a feature that is, happily, otherwise going unused), they will appear if you click “most voted”. Which will become very easy to manage if he can, indeed, do it all as one post.

  48. Because some halfwit who keeps breaking his promises to stop posting here thinks it’s a “useless feature for a modern site/blog/etc.”, notwithstanding that modern site/blog/etc. are the only types of site/blog/etc. that include such a feature, and we’ve just established that it might come in handy?

  49. I got about 6 ‘notification’ emails in the last couple of days all with a date of the 26th.

    I used the ‘unsubscribe’ button at the foot of each of them.

    Cross fingers they seem to have stopped.

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