Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor

Malcolm Turnbull’s personal rating takes a tumble, but otherwise little change in the latest Newspoll.

The latest Newspoll has Labor’s two-party lead unchanged on last fortnight at 53-47, from primary votes of Coalition 37% (up one), Labor 38% (up one), Greens 9% (down one) and One Nation 7% (down one). Despite the stability on voting intention, Malcolm Turnbull’s lead on preferred prime minister has been slashed from 40-33 to 37-35. The Australian’s report relates that Turnbull is down two points on approval to 32%, and Shorten is down one to 33%, but the only hint we get about disapproval is that Turnbull’s result is worse than Shorten’s. More on that shortly. (UPDATE: Turnbull’s disapproval is up three to 57%, Shorten’s is up two to 56%). The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1657.

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.

2,078 comments on “Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor”

Comments Page 38 of 42
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  2. Di Natale is a useless leader of the Greens.
    He does not have the standing to quell the internal rebellions.
    His posturing on Changing the Date is embarrassing.
    He should start writing letters to Turnbull.
    See how that works out for him.

  3. Have the Greens changed their National Conference Resolution from freeing Suu Kyi to putting her back in jail for genocide?

  4. Barney in Go Dau @ #1850 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:13 pm

    briefly @ #1836 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 1:01 pm

    I would like to thank dtt for her contributions today. Comic relief is very welcome at any time.

    I don’t agree.

    PollBludger is an escape into another world where you are exposed to a variety of views.

    However many of dtt’s posts remind of that pile of writing assignments that are awaiting correction.

    🙂

    Shit, you have my deepest sympathies.

  5. Boerwar @ #521 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:22 pm

    Di Natale is a useless leader of the Greens.
    He does not have the standing to quell the internal rebellions.
    His posturing on Changing the Date is embarrassing.
    He should start writing letters to Turnbull.
    See how that works out for him.

    It’s the decent thing to do to change the date.

    Resistance in any form speaks volumes.

  7. I’ve got to agree that Private Health Insurance is a farce. The industry needs a good Royal Commission to fix it up. Selling MBP has made things even worse. It’s a race to the bottom to bring in US-style managed care.

  8. Rex Douglas @ #1855 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 1:28 pm

    Boerwar @ #521 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:22 pm

    Di Natale is a useless leader of the Greens.
    He does not have the standing to quell the internal rebellions.
    His posturing on Changing the Date is embarrassing.
    He should start writing letters to Turnbull.
    See how that works out for him.

    It’s the decent thing to do to change the date.

    Resistance in any form speaks volumes.

    Rex, it’s like wanking,

    it deals with a personal need without addressing the cause of the overall problem. 🙂

  11. kevjohnno @ #1841 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 4:03 pm

    ajm with the Gateway they actually built it in a place that saved drivers a lot of time & distance. Something they haven’t managed to achieve with any other tollway in Brisbane.

    Agree with that. I actually got interrupted and was going to add that to my post. The critical thing with toll roads is to make the cost worth paying for the savings in time and fuel. With most of the toll roads in Brisbane that’s rarely the case for me and probably most people. Only occasionally when I’ve been in a hurry and the traffic is very congested.

    From what others have said it looks like the West Gate tunnel might be a “good” toll road in terms of getting trucks off other roads. Why the Greens wouldn’t support that is A bit beyond me.

  12. BiDG

    Acknowledging that this particular date is not suitable for celebration, but rather commemoration, I think is pretty important.

  15. ajm

    Re West Gate Tunnel:

    http://thetollroadwontwork.org.au/

    The West Gate Tunnel is a $6.7 billion toll road designed by Transurban, and approved by the Andrews Labor Government.

    Transurban is set to make $15 billion in revenue from this deal with the Labor Government, and Victorians will have to contribute $2.6 billion to the construction costs.

    :::
    Instead, after the 2014 election, Labor dumped this plan in favour of Transurban’s West Gate Tunnel – a plan pitched to them by former Labor staffers who now work for Transurban.

  18. Barney in Go Dau @ #1864 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:48 pm

    How does this impact on Labor’s ability to win Government in Tasmania?

    Tasmanian election: how the Greens helped dash Labor’s hopes of victory
    Many swing voters will only vote for Labor if they believe the party will govern alone

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/05/tasmanian-election-how-the-greens-helped-dash-labors-hopes-of-victory

    The collapse of the Greens vote this time will assist such people to decide to vote Labor next time around.

  19. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-13/melbournes-west-gate-tunnel-cooked-up-with-transurban/9251712

    Melbourne’s West Gate Tunnel, cooked up by Labor with Transurban, deserves scrutiny

    ::
    How the State Government got to the point of signing a contract — dreamt up by Transurban not state planners — deserves scrutiny and makes Labor vulnerable to the accusation of sweetheart deals with private business.

    :::
    The $6.7 billion contract signed this week is a far cry from Labor’s 2014 election pitch.

    At the most recent state poll Labor told voters it would build a $500 million West Gate Distributor, promising the shovel-ready project could be built quickly and take trucks off streets of the inner-west.

    At the same time, it was railing against the Napthine Government’s East West Link, arguing it was a waste of money and did not stack up — something critics of this new project argue.

    It also argued the Coalition were not transparent about the project and that it had no mandate to sign contracts for East West. Sound familiar?
    :::
    Less than six months into its term of government, Labor received an “unsolicited” proposal from Transurban to build a much grander road project to the west to ease congestion.

    At the cost of $5.5 billion the company was going to fund most of it through a proposal to extend tolls on CityLink.

  20. “”I’ve got to agree that Private Health Insurance is a farce.””

    Your mugs for buying it!, put the $6 Billion into Medicare, your just paying shareholders!.

  21. bemused @ #1868 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 1:55 pm

    Barney in Go Dau @ #1864 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:48 pm

    How does this impact on Labor’s ability to win Government in Tasmania?

    Tasmanian election: how the Greens helped dash Labor’s hopes of victory
    Many swing voters will only vote for Labor if they believe the party will govern alone

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/05/tasmanian-election-how-the-greens-helped-dash-labors-hopes-of-victory

    The collapse of the Greens vote this time will assist such people to decide to vote Labor next time around.

    The problem still exists that Labor need to get up to near 50% before these people will see the likelihood of Labor being able to Govern in their own right.

  22. Barney in Go Dau @ #1867 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:52 pm

    Rex Douglas @ #1862 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 1:46 pm

    BiGD

    Acknowledging that this particular date is not suitable for celebration, but rather commemoration, I think is pretty important.

    Acknowledging something is very different to wasting time and effort on it to the detriment of things of real importance and substance.

    I don’t think creating discussion, debate and drawing attention to the issue is ‘wasting time’ as you put it.
    If anyone has wasted time, it’s the Liberal and Labor Govts of the past who’ve failed so catastrophically re indigenous affairs.

    Btw, very generous of you to fight Boerwars battles for him. 🙂

  23. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/07/tanya-plibersek-calls-for-repeal-of-dumb-tampon-tax

    Tanya Plibersek has suggested Labor should repeal the “tampon tax”, the application of the goods and services tax to menstrual products.
    ::::
    The Greens immediately welcomed Plibersek’s comments, with women’s spokeswoman Janet Rice calling for support for a Greens bill to “fix this unfair and discriminatory tax”.

    “Tampons, pads and sanitary items aren’t an optional luxury, so they shouldn’t attract GST,” she said.

    “The Greens sought to fix this issue last year by moving amendments to a GST bill before the Senate, but Labor and the Coalition voted it down.

    “If they are serious about fixing this issue they should support our bill to get the job done.”

  24. 1934pc @ #1870 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:58 pm

    “”I’ve got to agree that Private Health Insurance is a farce.””

    Your mugs for buying it!, put the $6 Billion into Medicare, your just paying shareholders!.

    Not entirely true. Some are not for profits. e.g. HCF.
    However, I wish the whole industry could be done away with and the money put into the Public System.

  25. Barney in Go Dau @ #1871 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:59 pm

    bemused @ #1868 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 1:55 pm

    Barney in Go Dau @ #1864 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:48 pm

    How does this impact on Labor’s ability to win Government in Tasmania?

    Tasmanian election: how the Greens helped dash Labor’s hopes of victory
    Many swing voters will only vote for Labor if they believe the party will govern alone

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/05/tasmanian-election-how-the-greens-helped-dash-labors-hopes-of-victory

    The collapse of the Greens vote this time will assist such people to decide to vote Labor next time around.

    The problem still exists that Labor need to get up to near 50% before these people will see the likelihood of Labor being able to Govern in their own right.

    You set the bar too high IMHO.

  26. Of course it’s the Oz but it certainly gives the impression of a Liberal – Greens alliance against Labor:

    Libs, Greens revoke tunnel work
    4:46PMPIA AKERMAN
    The $6.7bn Melbourne West Gate Tunnel project has been suspended as the two parties united to block planning approvals.

  27. WeWantPaul @ #1492 Tuesday, March 6th, 2018 – 8:29 pm

    You guys who are such coal experts, how long do you think before the last coal fired power station is closed in Australia?

    If the thermal solar project in SA works I’d love the WA Govt to follow suit and convert Muja coal generation units into renewable solar units, in the second term (so within 7 years).

    I have some experience with maintenance services at Muja. The only thing the WA government will be doing with it is converting it to scrap metal.

  30. You took the words right out of my keyboard Bemused. HCF … not for profit. I’d likely have suicided if not for my health fund and the ability to have surgery within a week or two instead of months for ruptured spinal discs. Yeah – the pain WAS THAT BAD.

  31. 1934pc @ #1878 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 6:07 pm

    “” Some are not for profits. e.g. HCF.””
    So are they cheaper by any chance?.

    You actually identify a major problem there in that all the funds have different plans that are difficult to compare. I believe they are among the cheapest comparing like for like. They are also venturing into trying to help people maintain their health which will contain their costs and keep premiums lower than otherwise. Also, it is better to stay well than need health care to get fixed up, so a win for the consumer.

  32. Rumours around that Catherine Marriott – Barnaby’s accuser, who grew up in this area – may run in Indi for the Nats.

  34. Pegasus @ #1835 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 5:55 pm

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-13/melbournes-west-gate-tunnel-cooked-up-with-transurban/9251712

    Melbourne’s West Gate Tunnel, cooked up by Labor with Transurban, deserves scrutiny

    ::
    How the State Government got to the point of signing a contract — dreamt up by Transurban not state planners — deserves scrutiny and makes Labor vulnerable to the accusation of sweetheart deals with private business.

    :::
    The $6.7 billion contract signed this week is a far cry from Labor’s 2014 election pitch.

    At the most recent state poll Labor told voters it would build a $500 million West Gate Distributor, promising the shovel-ready project could be built quickly and take trucks off streets of the inner-west.

    At the same time, it was railing against the Napthine Government’s East West Link, arguing it was a waste of money and did not stack up — something critics of this new project argue.

    It also argued the Coalition were not transparent about the project and that it had no mandate to sign contracts for East West. Sound familiar?
    :::
    Less than six months into its term of government, Labor received an “unsolicited” proposal from Transurban to build a much grander road project to the west to ease congestion.

    At the cost of $5.5 billion the company was going to fund most of it through a proposal to extend tolls on CityLink.

    Yeah, don’t focus on the benefits, just cook up a negative campaign against it. Because, Tolls! Boo! Don’t think about solving a problem for the long term, hark back to a more modest plan proposed when Labor were in Opposition.

  35. jenauthor @ #1880 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 6:09 pm

    You took the words right out of my keyboard Bemused. HCF … not for profit. I’d likely have suicided if not for my health fund and the ability to have surgery within a week or two instead of months for ruptured spinal discs. Yeah – the pain WAS THAT BAD.

    I am sorry to hear of your suffering. I have never had anything like that although a kidney stone did cause a bit of pain.
    I would rank HCF as probably the best of a bad lot.
    When I had a heart problem requiring prompt attention, I did ask my GP about getting it done in the Public system and her response was that the only way she would permit that was if she called an ambulance to take me to hospital immediately. Your GP maybe should have tried the same trick with you.
    For anyone unaware, if you do have health insurance and are treated in the public system, if you declare your health insurance, the insurer will be billed so you help fund the public system. If you have a medical emergency requiring an ambulance, you will almost certainly be treated, at least in the first instance, at a public hospital.

  36. Apparently the attraction of the Liddell powerstation in NSW for AGL was the land and proximity to the grid, I didn’t see any mention of the existing plant.

  38. By all accounts the ‘Tampon Tax’ is part of the GST regime, and so any change would require all the states to come to the party as well as the Feds.
    Not so easy.

  41. I have to say that the impression I have of Transurban is that they own state governments.

    Whenever the guts get ripped out of a city – Melbourne and especially Sydney come to mind – you can bet Transurban is there with their snouts ready at the trough.

    Packer’s Barangaroo project – the first mega construction scam to get around the tender process by simply reversing the process (the constructor proposed the deal – and the inevitable payoff) – set the scene. Constructor-proposed projects are a massive, indeed cavernous loophole that spivs and shonks like Transurban can and do drive trucks, bulldozers, tunnel-borers and front-end loafers right through without coming near touching the sides.

    They create incalculable misery, congestion and angst during construction (which takes years and years) and then they gouge a river of gold in toll charges for decades more.

    The politicians who co-operate receive large party donations, and even larger personal rewards (paid over quietly in the years after they quit politics). Meanwhile the public pays through the nose for the privilege of just getting to work.

    The roadways are nearly always inadequate, requiring expensive upgrades from 2 to 3 lanes each way a few years down the track, for which Joe Punter forks out a premium on penalty tolls. Funny, isn’t it, though? The motorways remain gridlocked, no matter how many extra lanes are added and tolling years are tacked onto the end.

    Recently the NSW government paid $60 million – SIXTY MILLION! – to one of their construction mates to knock down a few old coin toll kiosks at the southern end of the Harbour Bridge. This means the the motorist now arrives at the intractable CBD gridlock 5 seconds earlier. What joy!

    $60 million is chump change nowadays, pin money, mere make-work to tide over a few spivs and construction industry lurk merchants until they can get their hands on yet another juicy tender-free rort in the form of the latest motorway from nowhere to nowhere.

    People are leaving Sydney in droves, and can you blame us?

    Melbourne’s next.

  42. The first thing I wanted to do was to write to all those workers, and say this:We'll be fighting to get you back to work as soon as possible. We'll reissue planning approval for the West Gate Tunnel by tomorrow. We won't let you down. We will get this done. pic.twitter.com/fWTe4CINmH— Daniel Andrews (@DanielAndrewsMP) March 7, 2018

  43. I’m convinced that Lucy is the brains behind Malcolm’s wealth. Just to pick one of his bright remarks today:

    “As far as wages are concerned, he wants to support the ACTU in creating dramatic increases in the minimum wage – which we all know would have the result of less employment.”

    In its 2017 minimum wage decision, the FWC said that “modest and regular wage increases” do not increase unemployment.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/mar/07/shorten-a-craven-populist-for-pushing-minimum-wage-rise-turnbull-says?CMP=share_btn_tw

  44. Ah the old myth of needing State approval to change the GST. Some of Howard’s lies were just amazingly effective weren’t they.

    A simple piece of legislation passed by the Parliament is all that is or was ever required.

  45. Last year we dumped Medibank (a sort of ‘stuff you’ move) and joined HCF. On similar plans the cost is about the same and but we’ll need to test them if making a hospital claim.

    Last month Medibank sent a letter offering incentives for us to return but I tore up the latter. Maybe not rational thing to do , however…

  46. Zoomster

    Marriott would be an interesting candidate in Indi … she is a Broome Shire Councillor and her job may well be an office of profit under the crown.

    “Her new position as WA project manager with the Cooperative Research Centre for Developing Northern Australia has the capacity to help bankroll a number of multimillion-dollar projects across the Kimberley region.

    The Federal Government body she has joined is primed to pump $75 million of Commonwealth money over the next 10 years to support industry-led research collaborations. “

  47. she is a Broome Shire Councillor and her job may well be an office of profit under the crown.

    Sen Martin’s case has put that to bed hasn’t it?

    Ah, maybe read on old rodent…

    All she would have to do is resign her project management job before noms.

  48. citizen @ #1895 Wednesday, March 7th, 2018 – 6:31 pm

    Last year we dumped Medibank (a sort of ‘stuff you’ move) and joined HCF. On similar plans the cost is about the same and but we’ll need to test them if making a hospital claim.

    Last month Medibank sent a letter offering incentives for us to return but I tore up the latter. Maybe not rational thing to do , however…

    I had a pretty serious procedure covered by HCF. I was out of pocket $450 excess as I had elected not to pay the higher premium to eliminate it. The total cost paid by HCF was close to $15,000.

    I was a happy customer.

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