The first pollster to put its head above the parapet post-election has been Essential Research, though it’s sensibly refraining from treating us to voting intention results for the time being. As reported in The Guardian yesterday, the pollster’s fortnightly survey focused on what respondents did do rather than what they would do, finding 48% saying their decision was made well in advance of the election, 26% saying they made up their mind in the weeks before the election, and 11% saying they made up their mind on polling day. Lest this seemingly high rate of indecision be cited as an alibi for pollster failure, the historical results of the Australian National University’s Australian Election Study – which you can find displayed on page 18 here – suggest these numbers to be in no way out of the ordinary.
The poll also found those who decided in the final weeks came down 40% for the Coalition and 31% for Labor. However, assuming the sample for this poll was as per the Essential norm of between 1000 and 1100 (which I hope to be able to verify later today), the margin of error on this subset of the total sample would have been over 5%, making these numbers statistically indistinguishable from the almost-final national primary vote totals of 41.4% for the Coalition and 33.3% for Labor. This goes double for the finding that those who decided on election day went Coalition 38% and Labor 27%, remembering this counted for only 11% of the sample.
Perhaps notable is a finding that only 22% of respondents said they had played “close attention” to the election campaign, which compares with results of between 30% and 40% for the Australian Election Study’s almost equivalent response for “a good deal of interest in the election” between 1996 and 2016. Forty-four per cent said they had paid little or no attention, and 34% some attention. These findings may be relevant to the notion that the pollsters failed because they had too many politically engaged respondents in their sample. The Guardian reports breakdowns were provided on this question for voters at different levels of education – perhaps the fact that this question was asked signifies that they will seek to redress the problem by weighting for this in future.
Also featured are unsurprising findings on issue salience, with those more concerned with economic management tending to favour the Coalition, and those prioritising education and climate change favouring Labor and the Greens.
In other post-election analysis news, the Grattan Institute offers further data illustrating some now familiar themes: the high-income areas swung against the Coalition, whereas low-to-middle income ones went solidly the other way; areas with low tertiary education swung to the Coalition, although less so in Victoria than New South Wales and Queensland.
Another popular notion is that Labor owes its defeat to a loss of support among religious voters, as a hangover from the same-sex marriage referendum and, in what may have been a sleeper issue at the cultural level, the Israel Folau controversy. Chris Bowen said in the wake of the defeat that he had encountered a view that “people of faith no longer feel that progressive politics cares about them”, and The Australian reported on Saturday that Labor MPs believed Bill Shorten blundered in castigating Scott Morrison for declining to affirm that he did not believe gay people would go to hell.
In reviewing Labor’s apparent under-performance among ethnic communities in Sydney and Melbourne, Andrew Jakubowicz and Christina Ho in The Conversation downplay the impact of religious factors, pointing to a precipitous decline in support for Christian minor parties, and propose that Labor’s promised expansion of parental reunion visas backfired on them. Intended to capture the Chinese vote in Chisholm, Banks and Reid, the actual effect was to encourage notions of an imminent influx of Muslim immigrants, “scaring both non-Muslim ethnic and non-ethnic voters”.
However, I’m not clear what this is based on, beyond the fact that the Liberals did a lot better in Banks than they did in neighbouring Barton, home to “very much higher numbers of South Asian and Muslim residents”. Two things may be said in response to this. One is that the nation’s most Islamic electorate, Watson and Blaxland, recorded swings of 4% to 5% to the Liberals, no different from Banks. The other is that the boundary between Banks and Barton runs right through the Chinese enclave of Hurstville, but voters on either side of the line behaved very differently. The Hurstville pre-poll voting centre, which serviced both electorates, recorded a 4.8% swing to Labor for Barton, and a 5.7% swing to Liberal for Banks. This may suggest that sitting member factors played an important role, and are perhaps of particular significance for Chinese voters.
“Who is ‘wayne’?”
I am Wayne
You are Wayne
We all are Wayne
Confessions @ #1099 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 7:20 pm
You’re joking, aren’t you!?!
C@t:
Of course. 😀
C@tmomma:
[‘The Sydney Morning Herald journalist reporting the Appeal, Adam Cooper, seems to think Chris Boyce SC has done a good job today, except for a slight misstep’]
I viewed the proceeding in its entirety (save for technical glitches) and it may’ve started well, but it was all downhill thereafter.
The senior Dr William McBride was a scientific fraudster who was struck off the Medical Register. He is credited with drawing world attention to the birth defect effects of Thalidomide after he raised the possibility of same in a letter to the Lancet.
Whether he was in fact the first to notice the association, between birth defects and the anti-nauseant, has been questioned, with the astute observations of a nurse at Crown Street Women’s Hospital overlooked.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2018-06-29/thalidomide-william-mcbride-flawed-character-norman-swan/9920608
It’s good to see Mutter Merkel at D Day commemoration. She’s my favourite tory 🙂
David McBride’s sister is a tax barrister
I met once a good looking young women with a PHD, and the she opened her mouth. The racist crap. Youth and education does not solve the problem.
Stephen Colbert has fun with Trump’s visit to the UK.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBh3V-6P3kE
ID
It was Debendox he got caught faking his results on. As you know, thalidomide is being used again I believe for nausea in chemotherapy.
Diogenes @ #1110 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 7:55 pm
I’m not up to date with chemo Dio; that’s interesting. A strange phenomenon, nausea.
McBride feel a long way – from society doctor to shunned cheat.
Ordinary start to the cricket.
wides are near top score
Sandpapered ball?
Confessions @ #1097 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 7:20 pm
Are you serious?
Sanders might have been competitive against Trump in 2016 because his argument made sense in an economy still recovering from the GFC but if things are as good as the economic data would suggest then Trump would beat Sanders easily in 2020.
I’m not sure who would be the best Democrat but I’m lending towards Kamala Harris or Amy Klobucher.
Tristo,
A few weeks after the Australian and EU elections, I am calming down a bit, and I agree with you. I am noticing a small change in commentary, and I think that a focus is coming off things like immigration, and back onto the economy – as in how badly it is doing.
Also, like Victoria, I keep believing there ALP would win, because they needed to few seats – I predicted 89 for the ALP :(.
However, I help saying to OH and others that I refused to think any further ahead than Sat 18th May until Antony Green called the election.
Cricket is fun when Windies are making trouble
The US economy is not strong. There is a lot of underemployment and precarious employment. Sanders’ message will resonate powerfully with voters.
Nicholas
The U.S has an unemployment rate under 4% with wage growth above 3% and GDP growth above 3%, these are the kind of numbers Frydenberg can only dream about along with Carlton premierships.
Itza,
That was the version I heard from a paediatrician relative when I was concerned about taking Debendox during pregnancy – McBride was at that time being used as an expert witness in the US, saying he has evidence that it caused birth defects. I happily took Debendox, and no statistically significant adverse effect has ever been found.
@nicholas careful saying such negative things. The president may hear and tweet nasty things about you.
brett @ #1122 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 6:34 pm
It’s a good thing he can’t sick the AFP onto him.
Hmm. Why is there a black van parked outside? Who is this knocking at my door? I better go and answer it. I’m sure I’ll be back in a few minutes.
I think you’re right that times no longer suit Sanders’ message.
I also think it’s too soon to lean towards any candidate. I’ll check back in next year wrt the 2020 campaign. I personally like Klobuchar and Buttigieg. But it’s still very early days in the primary.
I’m not going to google whether or not they are right, assuming they are the distribution and inter-generational poverty and insanely increasing inequality makes the numbers almost meaningless.
I’m not sure there is a huge problem with Sanders message, but it is 2000% clear he is 100% the wrong messenger on about 100 different levels. The only thing he has going for him is name recognition, and the crazy insane Bernie Bros who are so stupid they probably will vote Trump unless the dems are stupid enough to give Bernie the gig.
Who would have thought Maxwell would fail when he was neeeded to shine. Besides everyone. About what you’d expect from the great Australian team destroyer, the ego maniac cheating scum Warner who should never have been allowed to play for his country again. Any team with him in it deserves to lose.
WeWantPaul
They are the official numbers
The issue of inequality is a separate issue because my comment is only focused on the headline numbers and when it comes to social welfare the Americans are on a different plant altogether, one thing they have reported for sometime is the workforce participation rate remains in the low 60’s compared to Australia’s workforce participation rate is in the mid-60s.
WeWantPaul @ #1126 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 6:40 pm
Can’t argue with that.
I had the great treat last night of an amazing thunderstorm in Bonn, just near the Drachenfels – where a lot of the mythology Wagner used in his music originated. It was aq really amazing spectacle, and it called to mind the music of Wagner – no doubt mostly because I know the music and legends, but it was awesome.
Sydney has awesome thunderstorms as well, but this was something special.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drachenfels_(Siebengebirge)
Are they considered at all reliable or are they produced by some underfunded body and as unreliable as the ABS, or knowing the US even worse?
Herbertians saw it as Bill trying to run with Thurston.
How is Maxwell even in the squad, let alone sent out to bat, that had to be a lock for the stupidest most inept shot of the tournament on day 20 of 700.
There are 5.8 million official unemployed and 9.8 million hidden unemployed in the United States.
There are 2.1 job-wanters for each available job.
That is terrible. There is an immense amount of precariousness in the US labour market. Sanders’ economic message is not out of date.
https://njfac.org/
WeWantPaul
Whether they are reliable or not is sometimes debated and they are regularly revised. One thing the Americas do which helps add to the worth of the non-farm payrolls is the new claims which tells how many new unemployed claim were made.
If he does the right thing and gets out of the race pretty soon, he’d make a reasonable VP running mate for some of the candidates. Harris / Saunders might work, Gellibrand / Saunders, Abrams / Saunders, might all work if he gets out of the way soon, and swings his entire force behind them.
Sanders as VP could work both for getting the base out to vote and playing the attack dog on Trump helping to free up the Presidential candidate to focus on winning over the mainstream. One thing I will say about the U.S economy, if Trump doesn’t find a way to end his trade wars he might have a recession, the midterms saw swings against the Republicans across the rust belt and that was with the economic wind.
Has Abrams even decided to run?
The US Greens will knock Sanders off.
Bernie Sanders has the precious attribute that cannot be taught: authenticity. People like the guy and they believe that he cares about their lives.
The Democrats would be very foolish to throw that advantage away.
Furthermore, Democrats need to position themselves on the egalitarian left wing side of economic issues if they are to have any hope of winning national elections. They will lose if they shackle themselves to unpopular neoliberal economic positions such as those espoused by Biden, Harris, Booker, or Buttigieg.
I didn’t think so, but it might appeal more to Saunders uncontrollable ego to be able to entice her in and support her, he would be able to take a lot of credit for getting her into the race.
Just found out legendary Perth entertainer, Max Kaye has died. So sad.
What a champ, still remember as a callow 16 year old taking my then hot date to one of his shows at the Civic in Perth.
She couldn’t work out why I was giggling to his frequent references to French letters.
Well done Max. Legend.
I’m not sure that is a very well compiled list, nor that besides Biden they are close to your characterisation of them. Frankly looks a lot like the kind of dishonest smear you’d expect from the Bernie Bros, the ones who like Trump who are all about wrecking the place and have no concern to actually improve things. The ones who said there was no difference between Hillary and Trump and haven’t ever reflected on how evil and stupid that was.
Simon² Katich® @ #1132 Thursday, June 6th, 2019 – 8:48 pm
Oh. Obviously I don’t think like a Queenslander. 😀
Henry
Max’s schtick pretty much didn’t change over his long career. On the other hand he employed a huge number of people including most of the actors over a certain age at various times and a vast number of back stage people who went on to long careers themselves.
We are all struggling to think like a Queenslander.
Although I suspect ‘think’ is too strong a word for it.
Ash Barty into French Open semis where she will play a 17 year old ranked 51 in the world.
Voting day in some demographics has taken on more of an impulse buy than a though out decision.
…and she is a Queenslander
D&M, don’t start me on dragons.
Donner, God of Thunder, come on down.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvEyeuHAVBE
(you can hear the Ride of the Valkyries motif already)