The Guardian reports the latest fortnightly Essential Research poll has Labor’s two-party lead unchanged at 53-47. The poll also includes the monthly leadership ratings, which show Scott Morrison leading Bill Shorten 42-27 as preferred prime minister, out from 39-27 a month ago. We will have to wait for the full report later today to see primary votes and approval ratings. The poll also finds 40% in favour of transferring families and children on Nauru to Australia, with 39% opposed; 37% supporting the closure of the Nauru detention centre and transferring those remaining to Australia, with 42% opposed; and 35% in support of keeping them there indefinitely, with 43% opposed. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1025.
UPDATE: Full report here. Both major parties are up a point on the primary vote, the Coalition to 38% and Labor to 37%, with the Greens reverting to 10% after a spike to 12% a fortnight ago, and One Nation up two to 7% after dropping three in the last poll. Scott Morrison is up six on approval to 43% and down three on disapproval to 28%, while Bill Shorten is respectively down three to 33% and down two to 45%.
The Guardian report focused on asylum seeker questions, but the other focus for the supplementary questions this week is the media. Thirty-six per cent offered that the government had too much influence on the ABC, 16% not enough, 17% about right and 31% don’t know, with Labor and Greens voters greatly more likely to offer the first response. Forty per cent felt ABC reporting was independent and unbiased and 34% the opposite – Labor and Greens supporters weighed more heavily towards the former, with Coalition supporters evenly split.
Also featured is an occasional “trust in media” question, along with a new question identifying specific news outlets. Despite all the fuss of late, results to both follow the usual patterns: public beats commercial, broadsheet beats tabloid, news beats tabloid, and there’s nothing lower than an “internet blog”. The Australian has a slight edge over the Fairfax papers, which I would hypothesise has something to do with the latter’s move to tabloid.
Labor can’t afford to scrap mandatory offshore detention of asylum seekers, they would lose a votes in marginal electorates (thereby losing those electorates) in the outer suburbs and provincial cities of people who support these policies. On the other hand The Liberals can afford to votes from middle class voters in their safe urban electorates.
Confessions @ #88 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 8:35 am
I can no longer muster any surprise at the fact that white men tend to disproportionately be assholes. I just hope a bunch of us are also too lazy to vote. Let women decide it, for once.
It’s a disaster for the Democrats if all they manage to do is narrowly retake the House. In the current political climate they should end up with a thumping majority there (they need it, because as we saw with Kavanaugh there will always be the occasional holdout too craven to even bother standing up to Trump), and at least evens in the Senate.
I agree, and furthermore the closeness reminds me of Democrats infamous ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
American politics is much more polarized than our own, with the different political camps ‘blue’ and ‘red’ concentrated in the two major political parties. People in America are now saying the country has entered a ‘Cold Civil War’.
It does look like Labor’s policies are going down quietly but well in the wider electorate.
Oh, and if you ask me what Labor should be framing Scott Morrison as, Tony Abbott 2.0 has the ring of truth to me. 🙂
Good luck to the punters involved in the badly named The Everest on Saturday.
The big race is actually on the following week, more prize money and significantly more important. The Wentworth.
The liberals have had an interrupted preparation for the big one, a change of jockey, a change of stables and a stewards report indicating the track is soft underfoot. The price is easing due to the shrill apology from the racecaller.
The spruiker may have achieved the free cheap advertising but the results will not be known until a week later.
Similar things could be said about many parts of the US system.
George Williams’ opening line as linked by BK.
But I disagree, as the US also appoints some judges by popular election. 🙂
https://outline.com/Mam4Mq
This ABC report shows how badly government departments, even in modern Western societies (like Queensland here), can treat financially vulnerable women who are trying to flee an abusive partner:
http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-09/ombudsman-berates-queensland-housing-department-domestic-violenc/10353022
I juxtapose this with the froth-at-the-mouth outrage that rich, old, white men have expressed over the possibility that another rich white man may have suffered a procedural injustice, on his God-given road to further power on the US Supreme Court.
These entitled rich white men are a disgrace: they move heaven and earth to shout down investigations into the suitability of an applicant for high public office, while ignoring the plight of financially vulnerable women whose life is at stake.
Rich white men need to be made to understand that they occupy a position of extreme privilege, in a society and in an era which has secured for them gobsmacking ease, security and enjoyment for them, unparalleled in human history.
It is people like the women in this report who are the ones who are truly oppressed and victimised in modern Western society, not rich white men like Brett Kavanaugh. (Alan Jones, Ray Hadley, Andrew Bolt, Mark Latham and the rest need to go back to school.)
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/alan-jones-apologises-to-opera-house-boss-over-the-everest-controversy-20181009-p508ir.html
Jones. A National Disgrace. 🙁
The Chaser. A National Treasure. 🙂
Outrage, Seattle style: “as of April 3, 2019, the LCB will prohibit the sales of cannabis gummy candies, lollipops, cotton candy, brightly colored products, or anything that may be appealing children. Cannabis drinks, chips, cookies without sprinkles or icing, and chocolate balls and bars are exempt because everyone knows kids just hate those.”
https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2018/10/05/33366315/the-nanny-state-is-banning-pot-candy-for-no-good-reason
“Scott Morrison leading Bill Shorten 42-27 as preferred prime minister, out from 39-27 a month ago”…. Great, Morrison is preferred PM… he is doing a fantastic job!
“Labor’s two-party lead unchanged at 53-47″…. Oops!… and up from 51% under Turnbull!
Oh, I see, the “fantastic job” Morrison is doing is to sink the Coalition down to electoral oblivion even further than what Turnbull was going to do…. Ah, smart respondents to the Essential poll… 🙂
alias says:
Tuesday, October 9, 2018 at 8:07 am
GG:
Propositions:
1. Morrison will seek lots of debates, including free-flowing ones.
2. Shorten may decide to resist this, and stick to fewer debates, in
more controlled environments.
3. A scenario where there are more debates, and some free-flowing ones (by that I mean that Rooty Hill, Town Hall type setting we saw at the last election) could spell danger for Shorten.
—————————————
What makes you think (3)? Bill Shorten has been doing lots of town hall style meetings with members of the public over the past five years he’s been leading the ALP. I don’t think Scott Morrison has done any, either as Treasurer or as PM. What form are you using to make your judgement that Shorten would struggle but Morrison wouldn’t?
My own view is that voters are getting tired of shouted outrage from political leaders, and are craving calm focus instead. I think Shorten will thrive better in this sort of debate than you think he will.
Golly says:
Tuesday, October 9, 2018 at 10:07 am
“Good luck to the punters involved in the badly named The Everest on Saturday.”…
Yep, from “Everest”…. to “Sinkhole”…. in the flick of an extremely bad decision…
Michael says:
Tuesday, October 9, 2018 at 10:26 am
“My own view is that voters are getting tired of shouted outrage from political leaders, and are craving calm focus instead. I think Shorten will thrive better in this sort of debate than you think he will.”
I fully agree with your views, Michael…. unbeknownst to many people, the Rules… are Changing….
Actually, I think I can translate alias’s reasoning about Bill Shorten for us all here:
“Propositions (sic):
1. I don’t like Bill Shorten.
2. I’m a typical Australian.
Therefore:
3. Typical Australians don’t like Bill Shorten.”
Make of this what you will.
Michael @ #119 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 6:33 am
Personally I think Morrison will agree to the first debate and then run away after as he discovers that vacuous non-responses don’t work well in them. 🙂
Astrologers, of course, have known this for quite a while.
Contrary to GG’s assertion that protests about misusing the SOH for commercialism at its most base are the follies of those virtue signallers with time on their hands, I think the way this is trending shows every skerrick of protest, including tonight’s proposed counter-light show, has compounded to frighten the bejeesus out of those on the receiving end, especially the piss weak Govt with Gladys holed up in her fortress while the 200,000+ signatures are paraded outside, where was I …. frightened the living daylights out of them such that this will never happen again. Good job done I say..
And for those who pizzle the SOH and the whole episode as trivial, my nasty streak emerges to say you simply don’t understand, mainly because you haven’t got one.
BK @ #86 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 8:33 am
My first thought on seeing the image was “dominatrix”.
ItzaDream @ #122 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 6:42 am
What? A nasty streak or an Opera House? 🙂
Barney in Go Dau @ #108 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 9:09 am
Part of my ballot from the weekend.
KayJay, I’ve always preferred this version of the Hokey Pokey:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuGWAsim9fQ
And here’s another one theirs that may come in handy you ever find yourself stuck in the vicinity of a young Liberal (mildly NSFW):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azvDVib3eyw
ItzaDream @ #119 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 10:42 am
It certainly ‘aint trivial, being symbolic of a whole range of problems in Australia and particularly Sydney, all rolled into one neat package.
And as for Morrison, it won’t be long before voters will tire of his vacuous Energiser Bunny act.
Morrison is so full of himself, he couldn’t hide it even if he wanted to.
A politician so obviously up themselves is not something that people warm to, and while he will be given a little leeway, I predict that it won’t last long.
Slower than a wet week, I’ve finally grasped that Labor are running dead in Wentworth cos Phelps has to get to second spot to leap frog Sharma on preferences, which Labor couldn’t manage if the reverse were the case. I will put my mind and pencil to that end.
I love how the media are describing the coalitions thing as encouraging migrants to settle in regional and rural areas.
It’s really not an option. Migrants aren’t going to move to areas where the unemployment rate is high, standard of living is poor, and the racist population hates them.
If you add more cities to the blacklist then migrants will go to Other countries.
I don’t care about seeing more detail about how it will be implemented. I want to know what the aim is.
Encourage growth is 3rd-10th largest cities?
Encourage growth in regional/rural?
Decrease population growth?
Decrease import of Natural labor voters?
Keep Australia white?
Unless the coalition tell us what their aim is, there’s no way to assess its success.
By early evening on the 20th, the Libs will be in state of near panic. The results in The Wentworth, whatever, is most unlikely to shore up(sure up) Morrison’s position as PM.
Morrison is so far out of his depth he no longer sees the shore and the Libs after the 20th will be even less sure.
The sooner The Wentworth is race and won, the sooner we can have an election and be rid of the deniers, extremists and flat earthers.
As a nation and when Shortens government has some clean air, all of us including the Greens, can start righting the wrongs and planning for a better future.
Scrott would greet this with a cry of “Heretics! Burn them !”
“Economics Nobel prize given for putting a price tag on climate change
……..Nordhaus at Yale University created the first model describing the interplay between the economy and the climate in the 1990s. His work is now used to study the consequences of climate policies, such as carbon taxes.”
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2181795-economics-nobel-prize-given-for-putting-a-price-tag-on-climate-change/
I try not to profile the posters here, but every time Alias pops up it’s like a scratched record. Fair enough, my reply will probably sound like a scratched record.
The idea that Morrison would beat Shorten in a Town Hall meeting shows little consideration of any evidence. The fact is that Shorten, perhaps recognising the need to hone his skills, has made a point of doing many Town Hall style engagements. As a result, such formats suit him.
The problem with Turnbull was that he treated difficult questions from punters in a hostile and arrogant way and was more concerned about winning the point than addressing the issue. His alleged urbane charm was never on display. He rarely exposed himself to questions from the public, but when confronted on the street, or one-on-one style Q&A, the result was not good, because he always had to “win”.
With Morrison we have no evidence, but his interview style is to motor-mouth over difficult questions and end every sentence with something about “Labor”. The idea such aggressive non-answers would translate well into a Town Hall style is fanciful. Shorten would be able to call out his crap and no doubt have multiple opportunities to say, “There he goes talking about Labor again, [insert zinger here]”.
I get it Alias, you don’t like Shorten, and in your imagination the more exposure he gets the worse it will be for him. I can’t blame you, because much of the CPG have done the same, and continuously underestimated him.
@alias
I am betting the Liberals will run a huge scare campaign on it, I predict it will make the election tighter than people are predicting now.
@confessions
The gender divide has more to do with Trump, which is not surprising given the things he has said and done. Americans I know are saying Ted Cruz could be defeated in his senate seat in Texas, Beto O’Rourke the Democratic challenger has really rallied young people. I saw a video of a whole bunch of young people with Beto for the Senate signs at a Texas University.
The Bank Of Sweden prize for economics is notorious for being awarded to politically correct results. For example, ‘proving’ that democracy encourages economic growth. It’s nothing like the real Nobel Prizes, which are awarded for finding the truth whether it’s fashionable or not (theoretically, anyway).
Robert Hall@7:46am
There is a dialogue in a movie
“You started it and I will end it”
No that dialogue is not directed at you.
ItzaDream says:
Tuesday, October 9, 2018 at 10:50 am
Slower than a wet week, I’ve finally grasped that Labor are running dead in Wentworth cos Phelps has to get to second spot to leap frog Sharma on preferences, which Labor couldn’t manage if the reverse were the case. I will put my mind and pencil to that end.
—————————————
If Labor actually thinks Tim Murray has no chance of beating Sharma in a final TCP in the coming by-election in Wentworth, then with all due respect to them, I think they are mistaken.
All the current seat level polling has ALP-Lib TPP at 50-50 or 49-51. If they are achieving this running dead, they would be right in this if they ran properly.
Basing on more fundamental measures of likely TPP support, with the current TPP picture across NSW, and in the absence of Turnbull as incumbent MP and PM as the Liberal candidate, the ALP-Lib TPP would be 47-53 in a general election. With a 3% depressed Government vote in a by election, this brings the contest to 50-50. And this doesn’t even factor any further anti-Lib backlash because of the manner and circumstances of MT’s departure.
If you are voting they way you are indicating you will, please be aware that you are trading away good chance you will get a Labor MP in Wentworth, in favour of a better chance you will get a “socially progressive but economically sensible” (read, “pro business and keep the workers at the back of the line”) Phelps. If that’s what you want, fine. But don’t vote for Phelps out of an unjustifiably certain pessimism about Tim Murray’s chances of winning.
Michael @ #134 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 10:08 am
The 50-50 result is based on unrealistically strong preference flows to Labor. I tend to assume that Labor has their own internal polling that they’d use for deciding whether or not to run dead. Probably it uses more realistic preference flows, and probably that’s why they’re running dead.
Itza,
If 200,000 whining culture warriors are all you’ve got, then it’s not much.
Voice endeavour @ #126 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 10:56 am
My understanding is that it isn’t going to be voluntary.
Integration is complex, and very background dependent. White South African adult doctors in Wagga slip right in. Immigrant children of different colour and language skills and unemployed are a different matter. One would hope they would be embraced because close contact can’t be diffused as it may be in larger city outer suburbs. But you never know; it could be a powder keg.
On a positive note, and not entirely unrelated, it was good to read that community can make a big difference, as shown in crime rates in Bourke:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/oct/09/unique-community-policing-sees-rates-plunge-in-bourke
Quick summary of today’s Essential
TPP: LNP 47% vs 53% ALP
—
Lib 34%
Nat 4%
Lab 37%
Grn 10%
NXT 1%
PHON 7%
Other 8%
—
Full report: http://www.essentialvision.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Essential-Report-091018.pdf
I believe WB opined that on the current single seat polling, if Labor finish second then Sharma probably wins. If Phelps comes second and Sharma polls below 40% then Phelps wins.
Greensborough Growler @ #136 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 10:14 am
Why? Surely 200,000 anything wins against one bloviating, self-interested radio host?
Antony Green’s thoughts
https://twitter.com/AntonyGreenABC/status/1048437776348147713
There’s certainly no sign of a well funded campaign or any Federal big hitters around Wentworth.
Ante Meridian
This gave the game away 😀
“2018 Sveriges Riksbank prize in economic sciences
BB@8:21am
Mellisa Price belonged to Coal industry. What better can you expect from her?
Ven @ #146 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 7:22 am
And a strong background in science, not!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melissa_Price_(politician)
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/we-can-still-do-a-lot-to-slow-climate-change-but-will-we/
We are experiencing the consequences of more than 100 years of willing disregard of the consequences of burning fossil fuels. We’ve known about this for more than a century and next to nothing has been done. We’ve been able to measure and calibrate the effects of climate change in detail for most of my adult life. Next to nothing has been done even though there is high quality information available and has been widely published.
Yet next to nothing has been done or is about to be done.
Why? Why are we so useless at this stuff? Why are we paralysed? Why are we incapable of action?
Is it because we just don’t believe in ourselves? Is it because we are all basically free-riders?
Barney in Go Dau @ #144 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 11:24 am
She’s an embarrassment. A joke. And the joke’s on us.
ItzaDream @ #149 Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 7:28 am
No more or no less than the previous Ministers in this portfolio in this Government. 🙁
Narns (AnonBlock)
Tuesday, October 9th, 2018 – 10:50 am
Comment #123
I think I am suffering from sensory overload.
I have had to use the STFU with my son-in-law when he starts on the no gravity flat earth stuff.
Good laugh, thanks. 💐 🌹
Melissa price worked for one of the smaller iron ore miners in WA, not coal.
Small point I know.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/some-fact-checks-on-the-new-minister-for-the-environment,11847
C@tmomma@9:24am
So SA and MP are partners in life. Now I get why Ayers behaves the way he behaves, makes policy decisions and gets away with it.
Is he heir apparent to Michael Photios?