Essential Research: 54-46 to Labor; Newspoll: 50-50 in Bennelong

Labor records an unexpectedly strong showing in a Newspoll from Bennelong, and maintains a big national lead from Essential – although the latter also records a lift in Malcolm Turnbull’s personal ratings.

The Australian has a Newspoll survey of Bennelong ahead of this Saturday’s by-election, and while the sample is a very modest 529, the results area a turn-up: a 50-50 tie on two-party preferred and a 39% tie on the primary vote, with the Greens on 9%, Australian Conservatives on 7%, the Christian Democratic Party on 2% and others on 4%. The two-party total would appear to be based on an allocation of at least 80% of Australian Conservatives and Christian Democratic Party preferences to the Liberals, presumably based on the latter’s preference flow in 2016. By contrast, The Australian reported last week that Liberal internal polling had them with a 54-46 lead.

Courtesy of The Guardian, the latest reading of the Essential Research fortnight rolling average has Labor’s national two-party lead at 54-46, down from 55-45. However, the monthly leadership ratings record a substantial improvement for Malcolm Turnbull, who is up four on approval to 41% and down five on disapproval to 44%, while Bill Shorten is up a point to 36% and down there to 45%. Turnbull’s lead as preferred prime minister increases from 40-28 to 42-28. Other questions related in The Guardian involve sexual harassment and energy policy. More on this, along with primary vote numbers, when Essential publishes its report later today.

YouGov-Forty Acres: 50-50

The relatively volatile YouGov series for Fifty Acres is at 50-50 this fortnight, after Labor recorded a rare 53-47 lead last time. As usual though, this is based on very strong respondent-allocated preferences to the Coalition. The primary votes look relatively normal this time, with Labor up three on the primary vote to 35%, the Coalition up two to 34%, the Greens up one to 11%, One Nation down three to 8% and the rest down three to 13%. Other questions include a finding that 40% think Malcolm Turnbull should “stand down and let someone else take over”, compared with 39% who say he should remain.

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.

1,497 comments on “Essential Research: 54-46 to Labor; Newspoll: 50-50 in Bennelong”

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  4. I think the human interactive polls predicting 9-10% lead for Jones will prove more accurate than the robopolls. Some of the big numbers for Jones coming from strong GOP infestations.

  5. 538 is saying its too early to predict as the results coming in are all over the state with no County yet recording a higher number of votes yet. Their progressive count shows Jones margin shrinking as more results come in.

  8. SKY said they were crossing to it then put others on. I don’t know whether they’re waiting for KK & Bill to speak and they are going through local preliminaries.

  9. In Limestone County, on the outskirts of Huntsville, Trump won by 49 points. With half the county vote counted, Moore is leading by only 18 points.

    As I write, Jones racks another big (albeit early) lead in Madison County.

    Next to watch is Shelby County – suburban Birmingham.

    If Jones can win that county, this election could be over.

  13. The local Chinese media have turned, and not in a nice way for Turnbull.

    The article linked below implies (but does not state) that the local rags are following dictates from back-home Chinese newspapers in their escalation of criticism of Turnbull’s stanceon China v. Australia.

    Ironically, this goes towards proving Turnbull’s point: that there really is influence between here and there.

    But in typical fashion, the articles in the local Chinese media will probably only do him harm, as they have an avid readership among local Chinese.

    Isn’t this just typical of our wonderful Prime Minister? He is gifted with a kind of proof that he has been right all along, but has put himself in the position of not being able to profit from it politically.

    It seems that if you really want a fuck-up, hand a winning situation over to Malcolm and he’ll turn it into a train wreck as a bonus extra.

    His mistake in Bennelong? Fighting it as if it was a general election (where lots of Anglos and other ethic groups might have agreed with him), instead of as what it is: a finely focused by-election in a specific area of Sydney that is seething with the very ethnic group Turnbull has picked to slag off to the rest of the country.

    Ray Hadley and his ilk at the Tele and Fairfax, even in the wider hinterlands might well agree with Turnbull (for once), but Chinese people in Bennelong don’t listen to Ray Hadley. They have their own not very inscrutable ways of coming to conclusions, and being insulted by the leader of their adopted country, and his minions, might be a prime determinant of their vote, in a negative sense of the word.

    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/bennelong-byelection-tone-of-sydneys-chinese-media-shifts-amid-foreign-interference-furore-20171212-h03i8e.html

  20. C@Tmomma
    Interesting that in Roy Moore’s Home County, Etowah County, the votes are running 9 to 1 for Doug Jones so far.

    The people that know him best, love him least?

  22. Sprocket, Jenauthor – that means nothing at this stage – a number of very strong Republican counties have counted very quickly and uploaded their numbers, while the populous counties have reported very little.

    EDIT: What AR said.

  24. JimmyD

    Yep, Mobile, Jefferson, Madison yet to come. I still have little pity for our US friends, they have brought this on themselves.

    Lets see the turnout % in Alabama when complete.

  25. ForecasterEnten: It may be happening folks. It may be happening. Still very early.

    ForecasterEnten: One thing to keep in mind again is that these counties have swayed as more precincts come in. Limestone has moved considerably right as more votes have been counted.

  26. Those are not saddles on those horses. They are sofas from the lounge room.
    It reminds me of a story that my Mum told me about a champion rodeo rider many years ago in the USA. He was an Aussie who was a top rodeo rider here, going about all the country rodeos. He rode in the normal Aussie bushman’s saddle.

    He went to the USA and saw the great big contraptions they put on the horses and rightly predicted he could never fall out of one of those saddles no matter what the horse did.

    As it looks to me. Those guys are not riding those horses, they are sitting in armchairs, like a sack of spuds, all the weight plonked on the back instead of balanced with the stirrups. Lazy arskes.

  27. sprocket – I suspect that turn-out for the Dems in places like Birmingham may make present prognostications irrelevant. We ain’t got there yet.

  30. From 538

    DAVID WASSERMAN 8:52 PM
    The first few minutes of results looked good for Jones, but the past few minutes’ results have shown positive signs for Moore. To me, it looks like we’re in for a rollercoaster ride tonight.

  31. Hey that’s a bit harsh, as we’ve got a few first class honours graduates of boredom college around here.

    Names please. I dare you.

  33. Cormann in donation pooh.

    “Finance Minister @MathiasCormann confirms he’s met Huang Xiangmo – last year the Chinese billionaire donated $20,000 to the Senator just before the election. “All of those donations are lawful and declared”.

  35. Moore might be reaching or beating his benchmarks from the previous election, but if Democrat turn-out jumps, surely that won’t matter much

  36. Chrissie in management fairyland. What tree has he dropped from?

    Henry Belot‏Verified account @Henry_Belot · 40m40 minutes ago

    Christopher Pyne says cuts to the public service at Defence has “empowered” the workforce. He says there is stress on the department and that while 4000 jobs have gone, there is more output and people are more likely to make decisions and take responsibility.

  38. HARRY ENTEN 9:07 PM
    Folks, anyone who says they know how this is going to end is a liar. That, or you should ask them what the lottery numbers will be tomorrow.

  39. TPOF @ #982 Wednesday, December 13th, 2017 – 1:03 pm

    Greensborough Growler @ #981 Wednesday, December 13th, 2017 – 1:02 pm

    Cormann in donation pooh.

    “Finance Minister @MathiasCormann confirms he’s met Huang Xiangmo – last year the Chinese billionaire donated $20,000 to the Senator just before the election. “All of those donations are lawful and declared”.

    As with Sam Dastyari.

    Looking forward to this being the lead item on ABC news/PM this evening.

  40. Folks, anyone who says they know how this is going to end is a liar. That, or you should ask them what the lottery numbers will be tomorrow.

    Jones will win.
    4 14 24 34 41 44

  41. And I notice that pedo sits while the horse trots instead of doing the Rising Trot, lazy fat bastard. But I suppose that is why they breed those horses like that, to carry these fat pigs around with no help from the rider. They just sit there and the horse moves under them.

  44. Well we were complaining about New England voters a week ago. Looking at Alabama results I’m thankful at least they are not at Alabama levels.

  49. BuzzFeedNews: 3 things to know about where the #AlabamaSenateRace stands as of 9pm-ish ET:

    1) Democrat Doug Jones is winning 3 clutch counties he needs
    2) BUT he’s not doing as well as he would want to in the suburbs
    3) Red districts are looking like you’d expect – pretty red pic.twitter.com/VeiTPorsLg

  50. Nate_Cohn: And in terms of turnout, both white, rural, GOP counties fell *short* of our estimates, with Randolph–the least educated–falling well short. For now, our model assumes these turnout errors are uniform. But if they’re not, this could be an ominous sign for Moore.

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