BludgerTrack: 53.5-46.5 to Labor

Two new polls this week bring very little change to the BludgerTrack poll aggregate.

First up, note new threads below on this weekend’s elections in New Zealand and Germany.

Now to the matter at hand: new polls this week from Essential Research and YouGov have done next to nothing to alter the BludgerTrack poll aggregate this week, the biggest change being a reversal of a Greens gain last week. The Coalition nonetheless makes a net gain of two on the seat projection, being up one apiece in Queensland and South Australia. No new results on leadership ratings.

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.

1,226 comments on “BludgerTrack: 53.5-46.5 to Labor”

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  1. ItzaDream

    Flowers at the altar of the Great Gough for our heath care system.

    Indeedy.

    Butterfly flowers – best I can manage on short notice. Ƹ̴Ӂ̴Ʒ Ƹ̴Ӂ̴Ʒ

  2. ItzaDream @ #50 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 9:40 am

    Flowers at the altar of the Great Gough for our heath care system.

    MOH had a pacemaker inserted on Thursday after a bit of drama. He went via ambulance through A&E and the cardiology floor with lots of machines that go Bing on to the lab and out calling himself Rocket Man.

    jenauthor @ #41 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 9:22 am

    BK – Had those injections (one on each side) about a month ago and it has been pain-free heaven since! I hope it works as well for you. Is it at L5S1 level by any chance?

    My Dr has a mate with a yacht named L5S1 (bought with the proceeds of all those surgeries – of which I’ve had 3)

    Ha. jen, I remember a New Yorker cartoon with a cigar smoking yachtie on his boat called “All My Years In Medical School”.

    Oh. Sorry. I’ve don’t again. If none of that makes sense, I was getting a post together about our amazing Public Health system as seen from the outside, and it got conflated with a short repost to jenauthor. Apologies, and I wont revisit it except to say we have much to be thankful for, and its all Labor’s fault. 😉

  3. KayJay @ #25 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 8:44 am

    BK (Block)
    Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 7:53 am
    Comment #11
    Good morning Dawn Patrollers. It seems I’m carrying a prolapsed L4-5 disc. No wonder it bloody hurts!

    No wonder indeed ❗

    I offer my sympathy and best wishes and as you would know, adding $10 dollars to those will get you a nice cup of coffee.

    Nevertheless we hope for less pain for you and some non surgical relief.

    ☮ ☕

    I had the same on lumbar joint between 2,3,4 after years of drugs, a fusion of the two joints fixed it. Out of hospital in three days and no pain in the three years since the op.

  4. lizzie (Block)
    Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 8:46 am
    Comment #26
    victoria

    This morning I added Vic Emergency to my top line of bookmarks. This is ridiculous. Around here. we never used to worry about fire until December (never being 20 years ago).

    Lizzie

    I hope you are not hinting that climate change might be causing that and that we might be causing climate change. Slap on the wrist for you. Naughty.

    After listening to Price and Bolt for the last few months I can now clearly see that there has been no warming at all over the last twenty years and that this climate change bunkum is just a clever conspiracy by ninety percent of the world’s scientists. If you doubt that, just ask Malcolm Roberts. You know him, he’s the guy who thoroughly researches everything, except his own citizenship status.

    Oh and another tip for you. The world is not really round but as flat as a tack. They haven’t actually said that yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time.

  5. citizen I read the Mark Kenny article and he hit the nail on the head.
    “Reactions on social media ignore the campaign implications ranging from outright denial, to moral equivalence, and unguarded schadenfreude. Essentially, he made it up, or if it did happen, it was piddling compared to an attack on an activist connected to Kevin Rudd in Brisbane recently, and besides, Tony Abbott had it coming anyway.

    What does this say? Love is love, until there’s someone who deserves a Liverpool kiss?”

    Kenny was basicall was writing about the many of the comments written on here.

    citizen your comment. Shelton, Abetz, Bernardi and Abbott himself thought it would kill the “yes” campaign stone dead.

    Really they thought that this incident would win the the No campaign. no one not even Abbott thinks the No vote is going to get up. Your exageration is typical of many loons from the left always going over the top maybe that is why the centre is called the sensible centre.

    When a journalist from faifax a strident yes advocate writes a piece about the reactions of many to violence and the case of the extreme side of the yes campaign shooting themselves in the foot maybe you should listen.

  6. lizzie @ #26 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 8:46 am

    victoria

    This morning I added Vic Emergency to my top line of bookmarks. This is ridiculous. Around here. we never used to worry about fire until December (never being 20 years ago).

    It’s scary. lizzie, I’ve installed a fire bunker, which I had transported up to NSW from Vic. We have only one road out, heavily wooded, and it’s the one you’d see burnt out cars surrounded by ash next morning on the front page of the morning papers.

  7. Barney in Go Dau

    This surprises me as a I would have thought a major earthquake would be more likely to force Everest higher, considering the Himalayas were formed by the movement together of the Indian sub-plate and the Asia plate.

    .http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-22/nepal-remeasuring-mount-everest-to-settle-mountain-height-debate/8976992

    Exactly, the Indian plate is crashing into the Eurasian plate, and has been doing so for some considerable time, which is how the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalayan mountains, including Mt Everest, were formed, as you state.

    The Indian Plate is currently moving north-east at 5 centimetres per year, while the Eurasian Plate is also moving north at only 2 centimetres per year, thus the Himalayas should be rising by a few cm every year.

    I have read that Mt Everest should be rising at about 3 cm per year, though it is rarely measured, as your article makes clear, because of technical difficulties.

  8. lizzie:

    We’ve had lots of rain here the past couple of days, with a cold wet weekend forecast. Hopefully that weather makes it to you, lowering the bushfire risk.

  9. ItzaDream

    I investigated fire bunkers some years ago, and finally came down on the ‘no’ side, for various reasons including topography and the likelihood that if large trees came down all around, we might be trapped inside. If I had me druthers, I’d replace my house with one under earthen dome, but it’s too late for that now.

  10. Abbott’s incident seems to be the result of years of divisive hate speech.

    This has caused much anger, on both sides of the political spectrum, and many people have probably thought about doing something similar or react in a way that supports Abbott’s views.

    We have right wing groups and individuals arrested for planning to act out the logical progression of Abbott’s words and now we have seen someone step over the line in reaction against those words.

    Right throughout his PM tenure he used very emotive language in “Terror” announcements and I find it surprising and to most Australians’ credit that it hasn’t happened sooner.

  11. Whisper – I also ended up with a fusion BUT it does mean that the disks above and below are more vulnerable because of the lessened mobility and that is my issue these days. The disk above herniates now.

  12. BK. I am sure all PBers thank you for your contribution to Dawn Patrol, delivered while in considerable discomfort.
    Best of luck for a non surgical solution.

  13. Murderers and the corrupt come to the door of Alan Jones. The insuperable Kate McClymont on Ian MacDonald

    “At the back of the journal were a number of loose pages including prep notes on the evils of ICAC, which Macdonald used in his December 2015 interview on 2GB with radio shock jock Alan Jones, who was another character referee for the now jailed former minister. At the bottom of one of the last pages, Macdonald scrawled and underlined a single word: “innocent”.”

  14. Clueless Paul Kelly.

    The essence of the “wicked” problem Australia faces is that Turnbull’s three goals — affordability, reliability and emissions reduction targets — are contradictory. Turnbull knows this.

    Sanjeev Gupta would beg to disagree, as would most of the big energy players who are familiar with this complex issue.

  15. Richard Denniss‏ @RDNS_TAI · 2h2 hours ago
    Imagine if Abbott fought as hard to save jobs in the car industry as he fights to save Liddell.

    In the next decade, hundreds of coal-power stations will shut down due to old age and high operating costs. While hundreds of power stations on the drawing board have been quietly dumped, it is true that a lot of stations are still being planned. Of course, it’s also true that millions of Australians “plan” to lose 10 kilograms, tidy the garage and consolidate their superannuation accounts.

    Turnbull loves a plan but Musk isn’t just “planning” to replace coal-fired power stations with batteries; he is betting billions of dollars that his battery factories will do so. Gupta just bought half of South-Australian-based battery company Zen Energy to help make his new steel plants even more heavily reliant on renewables.

    Conservative politicians have told Australians for decades that, despite being the world’s largest exporter of coal and iron ore, Australia is a terrible place to make steel. Yet a British steel maker just bet that those politicians were wrong. We were also told our wages and taxes are too high to make cars. Ever seen a Volvo? Let’s face it: much of what we are told about our economy is complete nonsense.

    But as new entrepreneurs, technologies and ideas bust up the complacency of much of our political debate, there is no doubt the old guard will fight till the end. Abbott told us the carbon price would wipe out Whyalla. It didn’t. He told us that scrapping the carbon price would give us cheap energy. It didn’t. And while Abbott tells us that you can’t run an industrial economy on renewable energy, Gupta is betting you can.

    Just as facts don’t get in the way of Malcolm Roberts’ beliefs about his citizenship (or anything else), facts won’t slow down Abbott and the coal industry’s political war against renewable energy. The problem is that, even if Abbott wins, the Australian economy loses. Again.

    http://www.canberratimes.com.au/comment/tony-abbotts-gut-v-elon-musks-brain-and-billions-which-would-you-follow-20170922-gymn0s.html

  16. Steelydan

    I have perhaps directed some unkind comments to you in the past, but after reading the bile posted here by some of the more rabid ‘Yes’ campaigners yesterday, basically accusing anyone who disagreed with them of being bigoted, intolerant protectors of pedophiles just for daring to express a different opinion, I would like to acknowledge that your contributions on this subject are among the more balanced that I have read here recently.

    I find the depths to which PB has sunk on this particular issue to be quite disturbing. No dissent is tolerated … instead, it is met with the most vile and seemingly coordinated campaign of ridicule and abuse. This is the main reason I have chosen no longer to engage here on the issue itself, instead limiting myself to comments about the flaws inherent in determining the rights of a minority via a flawed opinion survey.

    I realize that shutting down debate on the issue is exactly what some ‘Yes’ campaigners are trying to achieve, but this is one fight I simply do not have the stomach for. However, I am pleased to see that some others here still do.

    An honorable mention also to Boerwar, and of course to GG.

  17. jenauthor @ #65 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 10:09 am

    Whisper – I also ended up with a fusion BUT it does mean that the disks above and below are more vulnerable because of the lessened mobility and that is my issue these days. The disk above herniates now.

    You must not have amended your lifestyle as well as I did 🙂 It was recommended that I walk for exercise so I do, between 5-10K a day. I am in my late seventies, the walks have so far seemed to have helped. Weight was another thing I had to keep off. Life is not easy at times!

  18. lizzie @ #62 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 10:04 am

    ItzaDream

    I investigated fire bunkers some years ago, and finally came down on the ‘no’ side, for various reasons including topography and the likelihood that if large trees came down all around, we might be trapped inside. If I had me druthers, I’d replace my house with one under earthen dome, but it’s too late for that now.

    I looked hard at earth covered (we built) but a lack of courage and support saw the idea flounder. I’d not it next time, though there wont be one I don’t think. We built an very enviro friendly Hebel house, low slung into a hill side, so maybe a part way there.

  19. Barney and Don, re Everest: As I understand it, if the Indian plate moved smoothly under the Eurasian one, it would push the Himalayas upwards smoothly and gradually. But it’s not smooth – it sticks, until the continental drift forces overcome the friction, and then it jerks. While the friction is holding them together, the uplift is exaggerated, and when there’s a quake, the Indian plate jerks a bit under the Himalayas and they come down a bit. (I could mime it all with hand gestures but we’d need a Skype connection.) So the pattern is: exaggerated uplift for a while, then a falling back, but on average a continuing uplift. As I understand it, as a non-expert, but one who has read a bit.

  20. Abbott is an avatar of North Shore Entitlement. To know him while he was at Sydney Uni was to detest him. An over-indulged only son of a craven post-war hierarchophile, he was set up in the escalator to privilege that was Riverview in the 60’s to become an entitled third-rater who craved the extreme anti-meritocratic privilege (like an “arranged” Rhodes scholarship) he was given by tribal patrons like Emmet Costello and George Pell for being a vicious thug in defense of their hierarchy. Too stupid to work in the money scams, He went into “journalism” – and so became the obvious pawn to kiss Rupert’s ring. He became PM by accident of hate, but, even with the nanny Rupert’s minions installed to manage his extreme stupidity, he was deposed by another second rate spiv who knew how to take orders. Abbott couldn’t even pull off the one thing Rupert wanted: to be made a Knight of the Order of Australia (’cause Betty Windsor couldn’t block it, like she has for all the other desperate attempts Rupert has made to match his father), so Abbott had to go and become Gollum into the Dead Marches of Warringah, eternally in search of his preciousssss. Even the recent building of the great, ugly fence around Mt Doom Parliament House won’t stop Abbott from biting Frodo’s fingers off.

    Abbott is beneath contempt. That he is still in public life is an irrevocable stain on the Bunyip Aristocracy and porcine pirates (like Gina the Hutt) who own the LNP spivs and all that steal with them. Everything Abbott touches turns to shit – including the no “case” for the defense of homophobia.

  21. Yeah Whisper – the movement thing has always been an issue. I spend half my life sitting to write – and the other half very active … so once I was no longer feeling pain I generally forgot caution (though I never lift anything over 5 kgs). Pain is like a censor for me.

    Like you I walk about 8-10ks a day … it is just the bending thing that I forget. But I also have the bonus of very narrow discs to begin with (a hereditary condition that makes one prone to degeneration/herniation)

    I seem to go down every 5 years or so … just something I have to be mindful of.

  22. Sorry if my point was too subtle Player One.

    Because you are opposed to marriage equality you don’t notice the unpleasant side of the “no” campaign until one of its comments is redirected at you.

  23. And I mastered the weight issue a couple of years ago (after an entire adult life of yo-yo dieting) by adopting a strict ketogenic diet with intermittent fasting. Has lots of age related benefits apart from weight control. My entire family have gradually adopted the practice because it’s been so beneficial.

  24. Depends Vogon – the remainder of the disc can collapse completely … which happened to me. Bone grinds on bone, putting fragments in the spinal canal to torture the nerves. Side effects can be dire!

  25. It’s interesting how common are low back problems, the price for leaving the trees and going upright and weight bearing. The ideal exercise IMO for those who can access it is swimming. In fact the return to the water is healing in more ways than one I reckon.

  26. Jen , that’s no longer just a herniation though. Have to say that with all this talk, the parathesia and pain in my left leg has increased the last couple of days.
    Thanks BK

  27. BK @ #28 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 8:21 am

    Kay Jay
    I’m having a CT guided steroid injection on Wednesday. If that doesn’t do the trick I suppose surgical removal of the herniated section will be on the cards.

    I had that done in 2002. Worked a treat for ages until the next time I did something I shouldn’t have and stuffed my back again.

    Incidentally, my problem disk is the same as yours.

  28. It’s interesting how common are low back problems, the price for leaving the trees and going upright and weight bearing. The ideal exercise IMO for those who can access it is swimming. In fact the return to the water is healing in more ways than one I reckon.

    Good advice IMO. Pity Tony Abbott is still swinging from those trees. Australia has lost so much because of him. Player one is a Liberal voter who supports him.

  29. “The essence of the “wicked” problem Australia faces is that Turnbull’s three goals — affordability, reliability and emissions reduction targets — are contradictory. Turnbull knows this.”

    These types dilemmas (and trilemmas) happen all the time in business, Government and life generally. Leaders (e.g. someone who aspires to be Prime Minister) are supposed to address them, knowing that someone will be unhappy with whatever they decide. Malcolm is a triple failure, making a meal of all three.

  30. rhwombat What are you saying though Abbott deserved to be head butted? you incaptulate the left going the full loon beautifully, your comment is full of gross exagerationt, conspiracy therories and hatred so intense you lose the ability to use logic or are you just venting?
    The majority of liberal voters want Abbott to bugger off we understand what he is doing to the party and our chances of re-election.

  31. On the height of the Himalayas, I recently re-read “The Great Arc” about the triangulation of India, back in colonial days (we’ve just moved and the book is in a box, so I can’t check details). One of the bosses of the triangulation was George Everest, after whom the mountain is named, even though he didn’t discover it nor measure it.

    Apparently, Everest’s name was pronounced Eve-rest, and not Ever-est. According to the book, some staff at the Indian Survey Office(?) still use the Eve-rest pronunciation. (Just some useless trivia, to lighten up your days.)

  32. Trump Goes Completely Psycho And Threatens To Throw Hillary Clinton In Prison

    While campaigning for Alabama Senate candidate Sen. Luther Strange, Donald Trump suggested that he would throw Hillary Clinton in prison, but Attorney General Jeff Sessions is stopping him.

    The crowd began to chant lock her up. Trump basked in the chants and then said, “You gotta speak to Jeff Sessions about that.”

    Trump was implying that if it were up to him, Hillary Clinton would be in prison.

    It is completely insane on many levels for a president to suggest that he would jail his political opponents. Unlike Trump, there is no evidence that Hillary Clinton committed a crime. There is no reason for Clinton to be prosecuted for anything. All she did was win the popular vote over Donald Trump. The President has reached a dangerous level of crazy where he and his rabid cult are demanding the imprisonment of those who oppose them.

    This is not democracy. This is not the United States of America.

    Trump is off his rocker, and the people all political beliefs who love their country must come together to stop this mentally unstable threat to the nation.

    http://www.politicususa.com/2017/09/22/trump-completely-psycho-threatens-throw-hillary-clinton-prison.html

  33. Tony Abbott was assaulted and suffered minor pain, very light and quickly healed injury and an affront to his dignity. The villain who (allegedly) perpetrate Headbutt most Foul in the guise of a proffered handshake has been apprehended by Police and will face the force of the law if Tony Abbott chooses, as is his right, to press charges.

    End of story. It had nothing to do with the merits or otherwise of the issues raised by the Marriage Equality survey.

  34. Steelydan @ #90 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 11:18 am

    rhwombat What are you saying though Abbott deserved to be head butted? you incaptulate the left going the full loon beautifully, your comment is full of gross exagerationt, conspiracy therories and hatred so intense you lose the ability to use logic or are you just venting?
    The majority of liberal voters want Abbott to bugger off we understand what he is doing to the party and our chances of re-election.

    He’s yours. You own him. Deal with it.

    It really says something for the Liberal Party that they can pre-select such an individual and elevate him to the Prime Ministership.

  35. adrian @ #76 Saturday, September 23rd, 2017 – 10:48 am

    Problem is you don’t really have one.

    Unless you count scattergun insults as having a point. Seems to be your stock in trade these days.

    There are perhaps two ‘No’ voters here (I don’t count myself – I am a boycotter). Don’t you ever wonder why the ‘No’ side is so under-represented? Well, if you go back and re-read yesterday’s thread you might begin to understand it.

  36. Steelydan

    The majority of liberal voters want Abbott to bugger off we understand what he is doing to the party and our chances of re-election.

    Then please can’t you (Libs) do something to get rid of him? He’s doing harm in every area he touches.

  37. Steelydan

    …..violence and the case of the extreme side of the yes campaign shooting themselves in the foot….

    1. There is no such thing as an extreme side to the yes case. There is simply the case itself. We all should enjoy equal protection under the law. That’s not an extreme position. It’s a commonplace.

    2. The No campaign try to make their response about anything but equality. This is a tacit admission their case is fundamentally without merit.

    3. The bloke who wanted to clock Abbott was not a campaigner for the Yes case but he does resent Abbott. He’s not alone in that. Millions of Australians thoroughly despise Abbott. Fortunately, very few will act on a wish to assault him. If any among us have special reasons to reject violence, it is the LGBTIQ community, who continue to be exposed to violence or the threat of violence to varying degrees and who face opponents who seek their continued repression.

    4. Abbott and his thugs have used the assault to attempt to undermine LGBTIQ people and their causes. Abbott could have used it to express solidarity with them. But no! He used it to promote himself.

    5. The No campaign has tried to link the Yes campaign with the use of violence. This is disingenuous. But it’s no more disingenuous than the rest of their campaign – a campaign that is aimed at perpetuating the legal and social oppression of LGBTIQ people.

    6. The No campaign is all about repression, malice and deceit. It is intended to validate one falsehood after another. This is as sinister as any homophobic beating meted out by physical means.

  38. Player One

    There’s no coordination. It just happens that within the PB crowd there are groups of posters who feel the same about something. Examples are catholic priests, religion in general, LGBTI concerns, Tony Abbott, Turnbull, coal mines, etc.

    Those of us who don’t agree with the majority tend to keep quiet until the fight is over, whatever the subject.

  39. steely

    The majority of liberal voters want Abbott to bugger off we understand what he is doing to the party and our chances of re-election.

    But he’s still there and enjoying himself immensely at the Liberal Parties expense. It’s fun to watch and wonder what he’ll come out with next.

    Often his venting is so outrageous it can’t do anything other highlight how crazy a large minority of the parliamentary representatives of the ‘broad church’ are with clowns like Abetz and Andrews nodding sagely at his every utterance and the Nationals (whoevers ‘nationals’ they actually are), one and all, taking time out from pork packing their electorates, to applaud.

    It’s riveting. Some one should make a TV series.

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