Of swings and misses: episode three

From my paywalled article in Crikey yesterday:

In the wake of its most unambiguous failure at a federal election since at least 1980, Australia’s polling industry is licking its wounds.

The Nine/Fairfax papers have announced the Ipsos poll series will be put on ice, and those pollsters who do return to the field shortly will face catcalls whether they persist in recording a Labor lead we now know doesn’t exist, or only now start detecting a Coalition lead that eluded them through the entirety of the past parliamentary term.

Despite it all though, the pollsters’ performance hasn’t been without its defenders.

Spoiler alert: the latter refers to David Briggs and Nate Silver. But Peter Brent can now be added to the list, up to a point, following a review of the issues raised by the polling failure in Inside Story. Specifically, Brent observes that the primary vote miss was less severe than the two-party preferred; that the difference arose from a stronger-than-anticipated flow of minor party and independent preferences to the Coalition; that herding was less apparent on the primary vote (most markedly in the case of Ipsos’s reading of the balance of support between Labor and the Greens); and that the result was, if nothing else, no worse than the Victorian state election.

Another point noted is the strange consistency with which polls have pointed to extravagant gains for Labor in Queensland before and during election campaigns, only for them to fall away at the end. On this occasion, the falling away as recorded by pollsters wasn’t remotely on the scale needed to predict the result, with statewide polling published towards the end of the campaign landing at least 7% shy of what looks like being the Coalition two-party vote in the state.

The question of geographic variability in the pollster failure seemed worth exploring, so I have put together a table of state and electorate level polling published in the last fortnight or so of the campaign, available below the fold at the bottom of the post. Almost all of this polling was conducted by YouGov Galaxy, whether under its own name or as Newspoll. The only exception was a set of state-level two-party preferred totals from Ipsos, published at the tail end of the campaign by the Age-Herald (which performed rather poorly).

Below all this is a list of “average bias” figures, consisting of straight averages of the observed errors, be they positive or negative, rather than the absolute errors. This means combinations of positive and negative results will have the fact of cancelling out — although there were actually very few of those, as the errors tended to be consistently in the one direction. The national and state-level two-party results are estimates provided to me by Nine’s election systems consultant David Quin. With no Coalition-versus-Labor figures available from 15 electorates, this inevitably involves a fair bit of guess work.

A few points should be observed. Given that poll trends pointed to a clear long-term trend to the Coalition, pollsters may be excused a certain amount of Labor bias when evaluating polling that was in many cases conducted over a week before the election. This is particularly true of the Newspoll state aggregates, which cover the full length of the campaign.

Another issue with the Newspoll state aggregates is that One Nation was a response option for all respondents in the early part of the campaign, despite their contesting only 59 out of 151 seats. Their vote here accordingly comes in too high, and as Peter Brent notes, at least part of their failure could be explained by stranded One Nation supporters breaking in unexpectedly large quantities to the Coalition, rather than other minor party targets of opportunity like Clive Palmer.

In seat polling though, where the issue did not arise, the polls were remarkable in having understated support for One Nation, and overstated it for the United Australia Party. This was one face of a two-sided polling failure in Queensland, of which the other was a serious imbalance towards Labor in support recorded for the major parties. While Queensland has caught most of the attention on this score, the polls were just as far out in measuring the primary votes of the major parties in Western Australia. Things were less bad in Victoria, but Coalition support was still significantly underestimated.

The only bright spots in the picture are New South Wales and South Australia, where Newspoll just about nailed the Coalition, Labor and Greens primary votes, and got the big things right in four seat polls. While Labor’s strength was overstated in Macquarie, it does now appear Labor will pull through there – for more on that front, stay tuned to the late counting thread.

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.

1,256 comments on “Of swings and misses: episode three”

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  1. Andrew_Earlwood @ #945 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 10:55 am

    “I agree. It’s issue by issue done the best way according to the scientific/economic evidence to benefit society as a whole.”

    Where you seem to fall down is on the issue of political evidence: I reckon that the ‘pure’ left in Australia only equate to about 15% of the population. The right equate to about 40%, the rest are in the middle – your despised ‘centrists’: most of these 45% of folk in the middle give zero fucks about politics on a day to day basis. About 20% of the 45% have an inbuild bias towards Labor. About 15% have an inbuilt lean to conservatism, leaving about 10% of the population as low information swingers blowing in the wind. Regional dynamics also play a powerful role.

    The political calculus for a progressive movement dedicated to reform through the levers of government is how to stack those various demographics together in a way that allows for long term governments to be formed to implement long term, structural, enduring change all the while being mindful of the scientific/economic/social evidence as to what is required. Tricky that.

    I’d describe Australian voters as a whole as wary.

    ‘Authenticity’ is the key to winning a majority.

    Unfortunately, Liberal and Labor are largely sponsored by donors demanding their niche issues be addressed, which more often than don’t appeal to the majority, leaving voters, wait for it… wary. They then stick with the devil they know.

    This isn’t a left vs right thing.

    Authentic, evidence based policy sold properly with simple, cut through messaging will succeed, in my opinion.

  2. Rolled out of bed after listening to the first bit of Insiders on the radio with Albo’s two word slogan ‘hasten slowly’ ringing in my ears.
    I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.

  3. “‘Authenticity’ is the key to winning a majority.”…

    No, Queensland is the key to winning a majority… There was very little authenticity in Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison…. but they managed to get massive swings in Queensland where they gained the vast majority of seats. That alone determined their wins in 2013, 2016 and 2019.

  4. “I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.”…

    Quite on the contrary… But Albo must solve the ALP “Queensland Problem”. If he does, the ALP will win.

  5. While things are bad here look at the UK.
    Two recent polls (for what they’re worth) suggest Nigil Farage as Prime Minister is not out of the question!!

    YouGov had:
    LibDems on 24%,
    Brexit on 22%,
    Tories and Labour both on 19%.

    More recently, Opinium had:
    Brexit on 26%
    Labour on 22%
    Tories on 17%
    LibDems on 16%

  6. “Cassidy getting frustrated with Motormouth Cormann who says a lot without saying anything at all.”

    Winning in spite of lies, stupidity, incompetence, nonsense, cluelessness, bankrupt policies, and a political program that makes a majority of Australians worse off….. Sends the WRONG message to politicians!

    We have got a voters’ problem and, within that, we have got a very specific Queensland voters’ problem!!

  7. mundo

    I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.

    You showed early good form but you’ll need to gloom it up a bit more if you want to beat Briefly for the 2019 Private Frazer Award.

  8. Alpo @ #954 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 11:13 am

    “I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.”…

    Quite on the contrary… But Albo must solve the ALP “Queensland Problem”. If he does, the ALP will win.

    Sweet baby Jesus here we go again.
    Put me down for two tickets and the popcorn shiraz combo pack.
    Antony Green to call it by 7:15…..

  9. poroti @ #957 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 11:17 am

    mundo

    I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.

    You showed early good form but you’ll need to gloom it up a bit more if you want to beat Briefly for the 2019 Private Frazer Award.

    Briefo, get off my patch…

  10. “While things are bad here look at the UK.”…

    The lesson coming from the UK is simply that it’s unlikely that any single party will win the next general election. But, overall, the combined Remain parties are more likely to form a coalition government. The turning point is going to be bloody Corbyn finally supporting a second Brexit referendum.

  11. Alpo @ #953 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 11:11 am

    “‘Authenticity’ is the key to winning a majority.”…

    No, Queensland is the key to winning a majority… There was very little authenticity in Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison…. but they managed to get massive swings in Queensland where they gained the vast majority of seats. That alone determined their wins in 2013, 2016 and 2019.

    I think you’re wrong about Morrison.
    He is an authentic guileless bogan with the gift of the gab and enough feel fell for it or felt comfortable with it.

  12. “Alpo says:
    Sunday, June 2, 2019 at 11:13 am
    “I couldn’t help thinking to myself, we don’t have a fcking hope in hell of winning in 2022.”…

    Quite on the contrary… But Albo must solve the ALP “Queensland Problem”. If he does, the ALP will win.”

    Qld has a few marginal seats, but if Labor focuses on just these, they won’t maximise their potential anywhere else.

    Queensland is not Australia. It is a part, but only a minority thereof.
    If the rest of Australia gets it’s act together, Qld will just have to take a less dominant position.

  13. Queensland’s economy is dense with fossil fuels. The status quo there depends on the fossil fuel extraction industries to a significant degree. This is not going to change. Queensland will continue to vote to defend their economic interests. The same is true in WA, though to a less visible extent.

    However, climate change will increasingly damage the rest of the economy. It will also eventually force irrevocable changes in the fossil fuel sectors too.

    The question is how we can respond to this damage. It is not a question of whether climate-change-driven damage will occur. It is already upon us. It will only get worse. The Greens make no appeal with respect to jobs and the economy. They are not the answer.

  14. Briefly

    All second preferences have to go somewhere, mostly eventually to Labor or the Coalies.

    In 2022, as always the election will be decided by the 2% or 3% or 4% or 5% of swinging voters.

    The ridiculously pessimistic posts you write assume that (a) the current win by the Coalies was a landslide and not the mere scrape-in it was, (b) Laborwere wiped out, (c) all the indies and small parties are 100% Coalies in disguise, and (d) the Coalies will in this term be a quality government.

    None of these is true.

  15. “Antony Green to call it by 7:15…..”…. Until he does, and then you may spit your popcorn mixed with shiraz… (have some cleaning product handy, with shiraz you can get some nasty stains in your carpet)… 🙂

    Politics is a long-term game, played over many “quarters”… Once a “quarter” ends, the next one starts… and so on and so forth… It’s never ending….

  16. I’m not a ‘pessimist’. I’m reflecting on the reality. Labor have won just one election in 23 years. We have lost three in a row, mainly on the tensions between the labour market and the environment. The Right is ascendant and increasingly powerful. The opposition to the Right is weak, divided, self-cannibalising and self-defeating. The tensions in the material world that drive this division are getting worse, not better.

    We are fucked. Get used to it.

  17. I have found over many years that when rock bottom is reached, that is the perfect time to reassess the situation, straighten your back, and fight with renewed strength. It doesn’t work if you’re only halfway down. Things have to be desperate.

  18. I’m not sure that saying “Don’t worry, we’ll win next time” (Albo) indicates the right amount of desperation.

  19. It’s also reasonable to assert that Rudd fell because of his failures with respect to climate change. So we can say that Labor has lost 4 elections on the trot because of the dilemmas posed by the politics of climate change.

    The most recent result is by far the worst. Queensland now believes that Labor is hostile to their economic interests.

    These dynamics are getting worse all the time. Both in the economy and in the environment, the trends are very poor. Voters are well aware of this. It accounts for their remarkably sullen sentiments. The
    Liberals are very good at exploiting these sentiments. This is simply to state the obvious.

  20. briefly
    We all called the election wrong the day before it and even on the day we got it wrong. There’s no way you can call one three years out. Anything can happen.

  21. briefly

    Voters are also convinced that Labor stands for ‘higher taxes’ as well as being unable to ‘manage the budget’. These beliefs seem almost impossible to shake. I suggest a large injection of pork next time.

  22. the current win by the Coalies was a landslide and not the mere scrape-in it was

    The Coalition will end up north of 52% 2PP from this election. That may not be a landslide, but in Australian electoral terms it is a very solid win. The seat count is peculiarly close, but don’t be deceived. As pointed out previously a simple pendulum analysis suggests that Labor need to get a swing to them of 4%+ to win majority government … they have had bigger swings to them, but it is still a challenge. Perhaps getting their targeted seat strategy right will make for an easier win, but you’d have to say that the Libs have shown themselves to be much better at that game than Labor of late.

    Labor were wiped out

    Labor’s PV from this election is terrible. There’s no sugar coating that.

    the Coalies will in this term be a quality government.

    They were very far from a quality government last time, and yet they won. The old adage about governments losing elections needs some qualification at the very least. Labor and co can definitely prevent the government from losing, as we have just seen. Perhaps just a change of leader and a refocusing of their policies will be all that is needed – we’ll see in 3 years I guess.

    I don’t entirely share Briefly’s current pessimism, but I don’t think it’s at all useful to paint the election just past as anything but a disaster for non-right-wing Australia.

  23. “If the rest of Australia gets it’s act together, Qld will just have to take a less dominant position.”… That has been the assumption so far, but I have some sobering news that the ALP must take very seriously.

    The Federal ALP Queensland problem: The 2PP for the Qld vote at federal elections has consistently favoured the LNP by a monstrous margin.
    Year of Federal election……. 2PP LNP (%)….. 2PP ALP (%)…….. Leader of winning party
    2004…………………………………….57.09……………..42.91…………….. John Howard (NSW)
    2007…………………………………….49.56……………..50.47…………….. Kevin Rudd (a Queenslander)
    2010…………………………………….55.1……………….44.9……………….. Julia Gillard (Vic)
    2013…………………………………….57………………….43…………………….Tony Abbott (NSW)
    2016…………………………………….54.1………………45.9………………….Malcolm Turnbull (NSW)
    2019……………………………………..57.6……………..42.4………………… Scott Morrison (NSW)

    Therefore the ALP has a federal problem in Queensland, not only because the 2PP consistently favours the LNP but especially because the difference is such that it’s translated into a massive seats difference. At the recent federal election the difference was 17 seats in favour of the LNP in Qld. The positive difference for the ALP in all the other states and territories combined was: 2 (NSW) + 6 (VIC) + 1 (SA) + 3 (ACT) + 2 (NT) = 14; that is, the combined positive differential for the ALP in ALL other states and territories is unable to even compensate for the differential in Qld alone!… and then there is WA which usually tends to favour the Coalition.

    Whereas at the state level, Queensland is a LNP problem:
    Queensland state elections…..2PP LNP (%)……2PP ALP (%)
    2006……………………………………..45……………………..55
    2009……………………………………..49.1…………………..50.9
    2012……………………………………..62.8…………………..37.2
    2015……………………………………..48.9…………………..51.1
    2017…………………………………….48.8…………………….51.2

    Note how, at the Federal level, the ALP did better in Qld when the leader was a Queenslander (Kevin Rudd, in 2007). So, it looks like the ALP has real chances in Queensland and they have the ability to counteract the massive propaganda in favour of the LNP (based on the control of the local MSM) but provided that the team is made up of Queenslanders.

  24. Diogenes says:
    Sunday, June 2, 2019 at 11:41 am
    briefly
    We all called the election wrong the day before it and even on the day we got it wrong. There’s no way you can call one three years out. Anything can happen.

    Yes. Anything can happen. What is most likely to happen is that the climate will continue on its trajectory of profound change. At the same time, the economy in fossil-fuel dependant Queensland will continue to stagnate. The political contest will still be between those who want greater action with respect to the environment and those who want less (if that’s at all possible). Those who can best campaign around jobs, incomes, the economy and taxes will win. They always do.

    Queensland is a case study in the politics of climate change. This is a study in fear.

  25. Lizzie….the damning myths about Labor were seeded decades ago. They are very difficult to erase. There are now some new ones. First, there is the Lib-kin-inspired myth that Labor are not serious about Climate Change. Second, there is the Lib-Lib-inspired myth that Labor are so serious about Climate Change that they will destroy the economy.

    It is no wonder at all that voters are so perplexed, so alienated and so gloomy.

  26. “He is an authentic guileless bogan with the gift of the gab and enough feel fell for it or felt comfortable with it.”…

    I actually disagree. Morrison’s “professional” background makes him prone to think about what the “customers” think and how to make them buy the product he wants to sell. That requires an ability to engage in opportunistic shifting of everything: behaviour, tactics, …. principles. People like that find perfectly fine to reconcile a call to arms directed to Christians based on “love and freedom of thought”, with an agreement on preferences agreed with Racists.

    Nobody knows who Morrison is in reality… but we do know that he wanted to be PM and he is PM…. for as long as Murdoch wants him to be, of course.

  27. Please do not read if this upsets you. 😉

    @michellegrattan
    11m11 minutes ago

    Barnaby Joyce and VIkki Campion had their second son on Saturday night. He’s called Thomas Michael Timothy (family names). Barnaby reports baby Thomas weighed 8lb 10 oz and was 54 cms long.

  28. The Right sublimate all their unease when it comes to the bigotry of their bedmates, ON and the National Socialists. They care only about winning. Winning is enough for them, so long as they use their power to do next to nothing other than to satisfy the prejudices and the greed of their sponsors.

    Bludgers….we are fucked.

  29. Jackol @ #975 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 11:44 am

    The Coalition will end up north of 52% 2PP from this election.

    What count are you watching? The AEC tally looks like it’s going to settle closer to 51.5 than 52.0.

    As pointed out previously a simple pendulum analysis suggests that Labor need to get a swing to them of 4%+ to win majority government

    Yeah, but that’s assuming a uniform swing. Which isn’t realistic.

    Labor’s PV from this election is terrible. There’s no sugar coating that.

    Damn straight. Labor needs a Corbyn, or a Sanders. Someone who can say things that appeal to and energize young people. “Schools, roads, and hospitals” don’t cut it anymore.

    Or they need to leave the Greens to saying things that appeal to and energize young people, and work a whole hell of a lot harder to avoid antagonizing Greens voters to ensure their preferences keep flowing strongly back to Labor.

  30. ar…

    Morrison is Trumpy, tuned for a local market. They are both very likely to win again. Certainly, if Sanders runs, Trump will win with Reagan-like majority. Corbyn is the most abject failure in British politics since Michael Foot. No, since Ramsay MacDonald.

  31. The Libs worked things out a long time ago. They have known all along that it would be possible to wedge Labor on jobs/the climate. They have exploited this every day. The Greens have made the same deduction. It works for them every day too.

    I’m consoled by the (unconvincing) notion that in life things are never as good as we hope and never as bad as we fear. I’m hoping things do not get as bad as I fear they could.

    Australia is not the big cheese in the global environment. We are just an also-ran. The Liberals know this to be true. It excuses their every crime. This reduces politics to a game where nothing important is actually at stake. Let’s hope they’re right.

  32. lizzie says:
    Sunday, June 2, 2019 at 11:44 am

    briefly

    Voters are also convinced that Labor stands for ‘higher taxes’ as well as being unable to ‘manage the budget’. These beliefs seem almost impossible to shake. I suggest a large injection of pork next time.

    How effective is pork when dealing with Muslim and Jewish voters? 🙂

  33. Wow, Briefly is still carrying on… This is almost pathological…

    Oh well. Guess I won;t be reading any of this today…

    As you were.

  34. briefly @ #968 Sunday, June 2nd, 2019 – 11:30 am

    I’m not a ‘pessimist’. I’m reflecting on the reality. Labor have won just one election in 23 years. We have lost three in a row, mainly on the tensions between the labour market and the environment. The Right is ascendant and increasingly powerful. The opposition to the Right is weak, divided, self-cannibalising and self-defeating. The tensions in the material world that drive this division are getting worse, not better.

    We are fucked. Get used to it.

    What’s so magical about 23 years? What about in the last 30 years? Or last 50 years? Go fuck your cherry picking self.

  35. I don’t think pork works very well for Labor because the voters they are trying to appeal to simply discount any such promises from Labor.

    People who are willing to believe that Labor are taxing death and cars and all pensioners based on dodgy social media posts would be quite resistant to thinking that Labor are actually going to build that road or that sports facility.

    And loading on more and more pork just makes everyone uneasy and adds more gas to the whole winners and losers thing that I think Labor needs to stay away from.

  36. Jackol

    Re ‘Pork” . Labor ‘pork’ would also see wall to wall ‘Labor = debt’. ‘Where is the money coming from ?” etc etc from the LNP which will then be endlessly repeated by the employees of our media plutocrats.

  37. It’s Time…..1996-2019…23 years…

    Long time in the wilderness, a short spell in the oasis….cast into the wilderness again.

    The Liberals are winning…quite easily. Those who oppose them are weak, divided, self-cannibalising, self-defeating and irrelevant for the prospective future.

    2016 is looking like peak Labor for some time to come.

  38. Jackol

    ‘The Coalition will end up north of 52% 2PP from this election.’

    They’re on south of this atm (51.6), and it is likely that (once indie/Green seats are distributed) this will go back further.

  39. briefly says:
    Sunday, June 2, 2019 at 9:54 am

    …”There will be nothing but heartache”…

    …”We are fucked… Get used to it”…

    …”the LNP will be in office for decades”…

    …”We are all thoroughly fucked”…

    …”We will continue to lose”…

    …”Bludgers… we are fucked”…

    There’s more, but I thought these worthy of collation.

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