BludgerTrack: 53.1-46.9 to Labor

With only one new poll this week, the latest BludgerTrack update yields little to report.

Here’s BludgerTrack, updated with all of one data point from Essential Research. Labor is down a bit on two-party preferred but unchanged on the seat projection, with a loss in New South Wales balanced by a gain in Victoria. And that’s yer lot.

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.

1,698 comments on “BludgerTrack: 53.1-46.9 to Labor”

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  1. Morning all.

    I can’t remember who it was recently concerned about their medi-alert thingy come the loss of their landline. But yesterday we had Telstra reps come to visit at work because the NBN rollout is imminent here. I put that question to them. Answer: they will still work with VOIP phones but the issue may be that sometimes there can be a wait of up to months between the switch off of you landline and the re-connection to NBN.

  3. Lizzie – I bet the libs were absolutely desperate to get the Media Law changes through the Senate before NashGate blew up.

  4. It’s reflective of their born to rule mentality. Why should they have to worry about inconsequential matters like some arcane section of the Australian Constitution?

    They’ve had a charmed life thus far, so why shouldn’t it continue?

  6. I read the article – and if you were an adoptive parent you’d be outraged by some of the arguments!

    Yar, zoomster but he didn’t just take aim at adoptive parents, it was also single parents, surrogate parents, gay parents and lesbian parents, which I suppose shows he wasn’t being discriminatory.

  7. You gotta laugh.

    John Dunmore Lang‏ @JohnDunmoreLang · 49m49 minutes ago

    Malcolm Turnbull has more members before the Courts than the #CMFEU

  8. Boris @ #99 Friday, August 18th, 2017 – 9:25 am

    Likely the lnp had jitters over nash and joyce well before this which would explain their refusal to resign.

    Barnaby becomes acting pm next month, if barnabay had to step aside it would then fall to nash, if nash steps aside then who is acting pm. Would have been a comedy show as lnp ran around trying to find a acting pm.

    John ‘Wacka’ Williams!?!

  9. Phoenix

    The problem that the opponents of Trump have is that despite all his stuff ups he still has a stubborn 37-40% approval rating while Congress approval rate is in the pits at between 8-21% depending on the poll.

    That 37% seems entrenched and probably every action of Congress, big business, media personalities etc will only harden their support.

    When the congressional approval is so very low, there seems to be a much more fundamental problem than just Trump and more importantly NO respected voice of reason that could navigate the USA out of its current morass.

    When Trump is removed or forced out, the scary thing is what will be the reaction of that entrenched 37%. With no respected alternative voice, chaos is going to be the probable outcome.

    In times of chaos tyrants usually emerge and I suspect we will see the rise of a far more efficient but much, much more dangerous populist, possibly even a “military” man which will have the democratic trappings of the old USA but will really be as much a democratically elected president as Sisi of Egypt.

  11. Fess

    That happened to someone in Healesville and I think a separate line was eventually installed.
    I don’t know much on VOIP. Does it work without elec? Useless if not.

  12. zoomster @ #93 Friday, August 18th, 2017 – 9:15 am

    I read the article – and if you were an adoptive parent you’d be outraged by some of the arguments!

    Not to mention this denial of the well established aetiology of sexuality, and the cruel refusal to concede even the slightest gesture of generosity on difference ~

    To put it bluntly, gays and lesbians are physically incapable of procreation and having their own children. For them to believe otherwise is to deny the life choice they have made and to believe they should be entitled to something normally associated with biological parents

    .

  13. dtt

    Actually, not challenging Trump makes it more likely that a worse alternative will arise.

    If you let one person get away with unacceptable behaviour, you normalise it. The next person will then push the envelope further.

  14. ItzaDream

    I’ve always liked the suggestion that those who believe homosexuality is a lifestyle choice should try it themselves for a few days…after all, if it’s a matter of choice, that shouldn’t be hard to do.

  15. Republicans line up to assail Trump after he defends Nazis fighting to keep Confederate monuments

    “Because of the manner in which you have handled the Charlottesville tragedy you are now receiving praise from some of the most racist and hate-filled individuals and groups in our country. For the sake of our Nation – as our President – please fix this,” Graham said. “History is watching us all.”

    Another Republican senator, Dan Sullivan, added on Twitter, “Anything less than complete & unambiguous condemnation of white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and the KKK by (Trump) is unacceptable. Period.”

    http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/republicans-line-up-to-assail-trump-after-he-defends-nazis-fighting-to-keep-confederate-monuments/

  20. The solicitor general must be absolutely squirming about the way they are obviously misrepresenting his advice (which must be full of caveats). Gleeson would not have stood for it.

  21. Gareth
    Julie Bishop is the deputy leader of the Libs, so I assume she would take the helm.

    I thought the deputy pm had to be a Nat. So if Barnaby had to step down then it would go to nash, if nash had to step down then the Nats would have to urgently appoint an acting leader who would be acting PM.

    Canavan did the right thing in stepping down as minister as it would call into question any decision he made whilst his status was under doubt. In practice where a minister has a conflict or a perceived conflict of interest he delegates the decision making to another minister.

    Turnbull, Barnaby and Nash have disregarded this basic principle. If they have decided that decision making by nash and barnaby has been delegated to others until the doubt is resolved then they should advise parliament and barnaby and nash should step down as they cannot fulfill their ministerial responsibilities.

  22. I have Dutch citizenship via my parents as does my daughter. I have a passport, which I thought might be useful if travelling in Europe but used it only once on 3 trips because the Aust passport allowed Smart Traveller to track me in case of situations like in Barcelona today.

    My daughter had the opportunity to attend a Dutch university because of hers.

    My son, however, turned 18 before we applied for our passports so he does NOT have the right to Dutch citizenship.

    Now that would really be interesting if he was to try and stand for parliament.

  23. In any debate it’s interesting to look at who you are standing with.

    This is often a very good indication of how valid your position is.

    Charlottesville and ME, I think highlight this perfectly.

  25. I always read BK’s Dawn Patrol over at the Woprdpress ‘The Pub’ blog. It is so much easier than here even with c+ installed. If I click on a link without ‘open in a new tab’ at least the Back button takes me to the previous page. Here I go back to page 1.
    https: // pbxmastragics dot com

    I am posting less here because even with c+, the navigation is crap.

    C+ would be better if it could have a ‘first page, previous, next, last page’ buttons, pretty (please. whomever wrote it).

    Then posting would be easier and more efficient.

    C@tmomma @ #22 Friday, August 18th, 2017 – 7:09 am

    Good Morning Bludgers : )


    This may have been pointed out; what I read on pollbludger is now a lucky dip.

    I tend to agree with frednk. For those of us who are time poor, and I know I am since I became a candidate, it has become headache-inducing trying to keep up to speed with the new layout of PB. It’s like you have to develop a new form of speed-reading and speed-scrolling. BK’s links go up and they don’t remain on page 1, for example, in perpetuity, so that you can keep going back to pick out things that you want to read, they just disappear into the distance very rapidly after they are put up, and so I am finding that what I have to do now is quickly read through the precis and open new tabs for all the ones I am interested in and then try and get them read asap so I can get back to the conversation about the issues with others.

    Nevertheless these conversations also seem to disappear into the ether very quickly, and, as I said, it is all becoming very headache-inducing.

    Rant over. Not that anyone will have time to read it and reflect upon it because it will just disappear quickly like everything else!

  27. I asked a question last week as to the likely replacement for Barnaby as leader of the Nats. I asked could Nash have it. I now have my answer.

  28. [triton
    They can, lizzie, just not 100% their own.    ]

    Which is exactly the same as a hetro couple where one is infertile. 🙂

  29. [Ides of March
    I asked a question last week as to the likely replacement for Barnaby as leader of the Nats. I asked could Nash have it. I now have my answer.    ]

    George Christensen, his only question is, is he in the Party?

  31. I left out this bit on Senator X. He is now checking his citizenship.

    Sabra Lane‏Verified account
    @SabraLane

    The Senator’s father is from Cyprus which was a British colony until 1960 + records show he traveled to Aust. in 1951 as a British citizen.

  32. Maybe the reason no one on his side of politics applauded Brandis was …

    1. because they didn’t want to alienate an important part of their constituency, who might otherwise vote according to their economic interests
    2. because some were applauding her on the inside
    3. waiting for someone to give guidance regarding the party line

  33. Senator Murray Watt‏Verified account @MurrayWatt · 55m55 minutes ago

    Brandis admits he got expert advice that Nash was UK citizen at 5.40am Thurs. Could have revealed then, but waited till Senate nearly over.

  34. “zoomster

    Boris

    It’s even easier if you DO google – the UK website has an ‘Are you a UK citizen?” questionnaire which is very efficient…

    Googling now: Am I a UK citizen?

    3rd item on search list:

    https://www.gov.uk/check-british-citizen

    3 steps to determine that I’m not a British citizen…”
    .
    .
    .
    The trouble for Nash and others in her situation is that likely after answering “Born before 1983” and no to question 2 “Were you born in the UK or a qualifying territory?” she likely also answered no to the third question-
    “3 Were you a UK and Colonies citizen on 31 December 1982 with right of abode in the UK?

    You may have been a UK and Colonies citizen if you were born before 1983 in a country that was a UK colony at the time, or if you had a connection with a colony through your father. You may have lost that status if the country later became independent.

    Right of abode means you have the right to live and work in the UK without any immigration restrictions.

    This information should be shown in your passport.”

    If so it would have informed her she was not a UK citizen.

    Even with a father born in Scotland, if you were born in Australia in 1965 would you answer yes to that question?

  36. Zoomster
    It’s even easier if you DO google – the UK website has an ‘Are you a UK citizen?” questionnaire which is very efficient…
    Googling now: Am I a UK citizen?
    3rd item on search list:
    https://www.gov.uk/check-british-citizen
    3 steps to determine that I’m not a British citizen…

    You could quote the 3rd step as not clear and easily misunderstood, but if you did then it would throw in doubt any decisions made as minister, which are usually more complex.
    Being minister involves more than being a signature block.

  37. Zoomster

    Yes and no.

    It probably depends on who leads the challenge. If the challenge is led by the usual troop of DC insiders it possibly does more harm than good. What the election should have told people in DC is that the old orthodoxies no longer can be assumed.

    15 years ago media personalities and Hollywood stars coming out in opposition to Trump would have guaranteed a victory for Hillary, as would 95% of the media giving support and large slabs of industry. The fact that it did NOT happen indicated that there is a much more fundamental shift in the mood of the people and especially in the trust given to leaders and traditional sources of information.

    If the average person no longer trusts the media, congress persons, religious leaders (eg priests), movie stars, professors, teachers, rich businessmen, or police as would seem to be the case, there is a vacuum emerging which is certain to be filled by someone or some group. In a country like the USA where red necks and gun toting individualists dominate the national psyche I pessimistically predict that this vacuum will be filled by a nasty – a fascist of some variety. I have said all along that trump is a symptom not a cause.

    The progressive left is failing in that rather than carrying on like pork chops re nasty Trump, they should be getting down to the much, much harder task of sorting out WHY there I such anger in the USA, why racism has re-emerged and how they can restore at least a semblance of racial harmony.

    As with most things it is the economy that is the issue, and while the Democrats and anti Trumpists carry on about a variety of civil rights issues while ignoring the economic issues, they will get no traction. You cannot EVER expect to have racial harmony in times of economic insecurity. This has been a law of human society since Grogia and Ugga led different tribes in along the banks of the river Dana.

    As I asked yesterday, the key issue is to understand who the racists are, how many of them and also why they are racists. If the crazies are a set of fringe dwellers it does not matter, but if in fact they are 30% of the population then it does matter and the only way to solve the issue is to address the cause of their disaffection.

  40. Maybe Brandis will say that the Senate had a plate full of important work to get through and that Nash made her announcement at the first opportunity after that was complete.

  42. lizzie:

    “Turnbull again making the point that the HC will support his view. Presumably using that as an excuse for the Nats leaders remaining in HoR.”

    The point is, he doesn’t *know* how the High Court will rule. It makes a mockery of the system that both are allowed to ‘serve’ the parliament while this cloud hangs over their head, just because the Prime Minister claims they are eligible to do so; especially when it’s not so clear-cut (though I’d argue it is, that they’re both ineligible).

    zoomster:

    “It’s even easier if you DO google – the UK website has an ‘Are you a UK citizen?” questionnaire which is very efficient…”

    This reveals that I’m a UK citizen (UK-born father, emigrated here in the early 50s, didn’t become Aus citizen until ’94). There goes my non-existent parliamentary ambitions.

  44. [Jaeger
    kevjohnno,
    “This information should be shown in your passport.”

    I assume they’re referring to a British passport?]

    This would relate to citizens of places like Gibraltar, Channel Islands and the Falklands.

  45. What a godawful mess this citizenship thing is! I assume that Abbott and the right-wing might considering using it as the pretext for launching a campaign to unseat Turnbull, although it’s difficult to see how Turnbull can be considered personally to blame for this.

    At the end of the day, anyone serving on the executives of either the Libs or the Nats, or who has been employed by the national office of either party, should be feeling a strong sense of shame. The issue of dual citizenship has been around for decades: it dates back to the Nuclear Disarmament Party Senator Robert Wood in 1987 and, subsequently, Liberal Jackie Kelly when she was first elected in the seat of Lindsay in 1996.

    I could instantly be proved wrong about this, but I’m forming the impression It appears that the Labor Party has established a fail-safe mechanism for checking prospective candidates for s44 issues, but the Libs, Nats and the Greens have been completely caught out. I think the word “unprofessional” is the one that immediately comes to mind. It’s no good going for the big political prizes if you can’t get the small things right.

  46. PS: Funny tweet from Mark Latham this morning, if someone hasn’t already posted it.

    “For years the Nationals said they were agrarian souls of the earth, dinky-di Aussies. Now it turns out they are all bloody foreigners!!”

  49. daretotread @ #137 Friday, August 18th, 2017 – 10:07 am

    The progressive left is failing in that rather than carrying on like pork chops re nasty Trump, they should be getting down to the much, much harder task of sorting out WHY there I such anger in the USA, why racism has re-emerged and how they can restore at least a semblance of racial harmony.

    Re-emerged is giving credit to the belief that it was anything else other than always there.

    The events in Charlottesville illustrated a problem with that idea: only by the most specific, immediate definition can we consider the Confederacy to have lost the Civil War, and its legacy has defined a great deal of our history since then.

    https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/charlottesville-and-the-trouble-with-civil-war-hypotheticals?mbid=nl_TNY%20Template%20-%20With%20Photo%20(41)&CNDID=50169544&spMailingID=11719292&spUserID=MjAyNDE1NzYxMDQ4S0&spJobID=1221564894&spReportId=MTIyMTU2NDg5NAS2

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