Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor

Newspoll records the same two-party preferred result for the sixth poll in a row.

Yet another 53-47 result from Newspoll, from primary votes of Coalition 36% (unchanged), Labor 36% (down one), Greens 11% (up two) and One Nation 8% (down one). Both leaders recorded better personal ratings, with Malcolm Turnbull up four on approval to 38% and down four on disapproval to 50%, and Bill Shorten up three on approval to 36% and down two on disapproval to 51%. Turnbull’s lead on preferred prime minister has widened from 43-32 to 46-31. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1639.

Stay tuned for federal voting intention results from the Queensland-only poll conducted for the Courier-Mail, from which state results were published yesterday.

UPDATE: The numbers from the Courier-Mail’s Galaxy poll from Queensland, conducted Wednesday and Thursday from a sample of 902, are Coalition 37% (up two since April), Labor 32% (down one), One Nation 12% (down three) and Greens 7%, with Australian Conservatives recording a fairly impressive 6%. On two-party preferred, the Coalition records a lead of 51-49, which compares with 50-50 in April and 54.1-45.9 at last year’s election.

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.

747 comments on “Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor”

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  1. Bemused, corporations have a legal existence that exposes them to the criminal law as well as the civil law. But such provisions are archaic, seldom applied, and, in the case of banks, are completely irrelevant.

    We need swingeing reform of the law. We…we citizens, humans, small businesses, farmers, workers…need the institutions we have created to better serve us in relation to the disembodied giants that populate our economy and our socio-political order.

  4. If shareholders are the beneficiaries of the theft then it follows the officers are too, as the increase in shareholder return will be used as a basis for compensation increase. There’s no real clear line there.

  5. Can we just have a banking royal commission to get to the bottom on exactly what in blazes is going on with our banking sector? Seems most Bludgers are trying to put the cart before the horse without having a sense of the full picture in this area.

  6. briefly we did it to ourselves on the back of promises if we did so it would all turn out really well, and in some ways some things have gone very well, but many others haven’t, and if your average Trump voter, and your average brexit voter can spot that things aren’t what they were supposed to be then it is pretty obvious because they are dumb as buckets.

  7. I made them jump….I got my money and fulsome attention.

    But even so, they should not have behaved dishonestly. It’s important to understand this is institutionalised dishonesty. It’s structured.

  8. Briefly
    Do you have any reactions that aren’t absurdist reductions (that often directly contradict previously stated positions of the person you are reducing) ?

  9. “Ides of March Briefly I think going after the head honchos” if directors were personally liable for the kind of fines they give workers for unlawful strikes there would be no deaths on work sites.

  10. Ctari

    I know right. It was such a radical idea. While we are at it, allowing ST George bank to be swallowed up was a terrible decision.

  11. On the Newspoll (Yep, them things boring polls) “Greens 11% (up two)”.

    Is the ‘up’ just a reaction by voters who have put Greens first previously when voting rallying a bit in a hope the don’t just fade away?

    Losing two of their major people while questions over de Natale’s leadership are out there and the goings on in NSW where it looks like Rhiannon is going to be challenged is not a great look for a small party.

  12. The point is that corporates have a life of their own, in every sense. Corporates cannot be imagined out of existence. They command resources, they draw from us all in very substantial depth through our entire lives. It is true to say that we serve them as much as they serve us.

    We need to find better ways to bring them within the law. We have legal arrangements that in many cases were written in the 19th century. They are completely archaic and practically inapplicable in the 21st century. We have to amend this.

  13. briefly @ #700 Monday, August 7th, 2017 – 10:25 pm

    Bemused, corporations have a legal existence that exposes them to the criminal law as well as the civil law. But such provisions are archaic, seldom applied, and, in the case of banks, are completely irrelevant.

    We need swingeing reform of the law. We…we citizens, humans, small businesses, farmers, workers…need the institutions we have created to better serve us in relation to the disembodied giants that populate our economy and our socio-political order.

    The Corporations Act is dated 2001. If that is archaic then I don’t know what you and I are!
    It imposes duties on Directors and others.

    The rest is just the grandiose fluffy statements to which you are prone, but which don’t mean much.

  16. Elaugaufein
    Briefly
    Do you have any reactions that aren’t absurdist reductions?

    There is nothing absurd about wanting to bring corporates within the law. It is not enough to deal only with their officers. The entities themselves need to be subject to the same prohibitions as the rest of us. Because they are intangible and have very great scale, the kind of penalties to which they should be subject will have to be adapted. We can impose the equivalent of a prison term on a corporate by taking it into custodial administration. Owners and executives will hate that. But others, like me, may welcome it.

    This is not hard to grasp.

  18. The Greens’ 11% is, BTW, their best result in Newspoll since May last year. I wouldn’t go reading too much into it, but there it is.

  21. Your absurdist reduction is suggesting I want corporations to be immune to the law not the suggestion they should be beholden to it (even Anarcho-Capitalists want corporations beholden to the law they just vastly reduce the scope of the law).

  22. Ides:

    I wasn’t aware of that. Not that I studiously keep tabs on how Australia’s banking industry is travelling but still, that one flew under radar for me.

  23. bemused, the criminal codes of the various states were not written with huge corporates in mind. Yet corporates are notionally subject to these laws.

    This is no small thing. The banks literally – not figuratively or rhetorically, but literally – steal from each others’ clients in a very large-scale organised racket thousands of times every day. The monies involved are very substantial. They are immune from sanction. This should not be. But it will remain the case until the laws are reformed.

    I am an advocate for law reform in the interests of the millions of small-time users of the banking system, in the interests of the law more widely and of the better, safer workings of the financial system. You can sneer if you like….you have my permission.

  26. Elaugaufein

    Then stop trying to conflate a corporation with its officers. They are thoroughly separate, but the former are not subject to the law in the same way as the latter.

  27. bemused
    Money Laundering penalties are quite considerable. The Kouk provided this link.

    And yet….the law was broken tens of thousands of times. No director will likely be charged. And nor will the bank likely be charged and convicted….because if it were it would almost certainly be ineligible to hold a banking licence, would become insolvent in an instant…and all hell would ensue in the financial system and economy.

    The structure of the laws is entirely ineffective. They are literally unenforceable.

  28. briefly @ #722 Monday, August 7th, 2017 – 10:46 pm

    bemused, the criminal codes of the various states were not written with huge corporates in mind. Yet corporates are notionally subject to these laws.

    This is no small thing. The banks literally – not figuratively or rhetorically, but literally – steal from each others’ clients in a very large-scale organised racket thousands of times every day. The monies involved are very substantial. They are immune from sanction. This should not be. But it will remain the case until the laws are reformed.

    I am an advocate for law reform in the interests of the millions of small-time users of the banking system, in the interests of the law more widely and of the better, safer workings of the financial system. You can sneer if you like….you have my permission.

    Corporations ceased being under state decades ago and were brought under Commonwealth law. The Corporations Act 2001. Here http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca2001172/

    Have a look at CHAPTER 2D–Officers and employees for a start and inform yourself as to the duties of Directors and others and penalties that apply.

    And of course if individuals within a corporation commit a criminal offence they should be prosecuted under state or federal laws as appropriate.

  29. CNN Politics
    57 mins ·
    Vice President Mike Pence slams a report from The New York Times that says Pence would plan to run for president should President Donald J. Trump not seek a second term: “Today’s article in The New York Times is disgraceful and offensive to me, my family, and our entire team,” Pence says in a statement. http://cnn.it/2uyMzdP

    Something about protesting too much….

  30. briefly @ #725 Monday, August 7th, 2017 – 10:48 pm

    Elaugaufein

    Then stop trying to conflate a corporation with its officers. They are thoroughly separate, but the former are not subject to the law in the same way as the latter.

    Brilliant! Sheer Brilliance!!
    Yes, you can’t gaol a corporation. Of course they are treated differently.

    But if the mis-deeds of a corporation are as a result of directors or managers not performing their duties then those individuals can be prosecuted and if convicted penalised.

  34. Oh well…no surprises here tonight. For whatever reasons might exist, not a lot of bludgers want to trouble themselves with law reform the effect of which would be to subject the great powers to the same laws as the humble and the poor.

    The current laws are to almost all purposes unenforceable and unenforced with respect to corporates. They are dead letters. So much for equality before the law. There are hundreds of aboriginal boys and men in prison in Western Australia for the non-payment of fines and the subsequent application of 3-strikes laws. Yet banks can and do steal millions from small-time users of the financial transactions machinery and they entirely escape attention, let alone conviction and punishment.

  35. bemused
    Yes, you can’t gaol a corporation.

    I’m going to try to change that in a certain sense. A corporate entity cannot be imprisoned but its assets can certainly be detained, its income requisitioned and the freedom to trade its securities can be suspended. That is a financial equivalent to imprisonment. I think it might catch on.

  38. Of course when the greens do well in the polls it’s has nothing to do with anything they’ve done well, when they stay consistent however it’s because they are a disaster. Sorry William, but I think the release of the Greens extremely populist and popular Housing policy plan might have something to do with their recent minor change of fortunes.

  39. briefly
    Oh well…no surprises here tonight. For whatever reasons might exist, not a lot of bludgers want to trouble themselves with law reform the effect of which would be to subject the great powers to the same laws as the humble and the poor.

    The current laws are to almost all purposes unenforceable and unenforced with respect to corporates. They are dead letters. So much for equality before the law. There are hundreds of aboriginal boys and men in prison in Western Australia for the non-payment of fines and the subsequent application of 3-strikes laws. Yet banks can and do steal millions from small-time users of the financial transactions machinery and they entirely escape attention, let alone conviction and punishment.
    ********************************************************************************************************

    Not at all, I believe in a Royal Commission into banking and penalties for breaches of the law should be in the terms of reference.

    I think you raise some interesting points with regard to ‘corporate imprisonment’.

  40. bemused

    Corporations ceased being under state decades ago and were brought under Commonwealth law. The Corporations Act 2001. Here http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca2001172/

    This Act is very extensive and mainly relates to the administration of companies and the operation of markets. It does not exempt corporations from State laws. Corporations have the status of legal persons and are subject to State laws like anyone else. So, for example, when Grocon was fined in relation to the deaths caused by the collapse of a wall in Melbourne, the law that applied was a Victorian law, and the court was a Victorian court:

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-21/grocon-fined-250000-over-fatal-wall-collapse/5908292

    Have a look at CHAPTER 2D–Officers and employees for a start and inform yourself as to the duties of Directors and others and penalties that apply.

    And of course if individuals within a corporation commit a criminal offence they should be prosecuted under state or federal laws as appropriate.

    The trouble is that very few such charges are ever laid because of the evidentiary standards in criminal trials. This means, in fact, the laws are frequently without any practical effect in the case of corporations.

    I think this should be changed. To do so will require reform of a range of laws. The Law Reform Commission should be tasked with proposing reforms that will deliver effective equality before the law with respect to corporations and other legal persons.

  42. Imagine what Grocon’s approach to public and worker safety would have been had the penalty for injuries or deaths on their sites included a term of “custodial administration”. Grocon’s shareholders and lenders would be vitally interested in their compliance with the safety laws.

  44. Blanket Criticism
    That seems unlikely. I’m a Greens member and even I haven’t heard a recent housing announcement by the Greens, so either it was a while ago (I do remember a previous housing policy announcement) or they’ve done a much worse job than usual getting it out to members at least.

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