Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition

The second federal poll since the election finds the Coalition back where it started after an apparent post-election bounce in the previous poll three weeks ago.

Newspoll’s first result in three weeks, and second since the election, turns up a surprise in recording a shrinking in the Coalition’s lead from 53-47 to 51-49 – which, if meaningful, would mean an end to the honeymoon period and a return to where things stood at election time. On the primary vote, the Coalition is on 42%, down two points on the last poll and up 0.6% on the election result; Labor is on 34%, up one point and 0.7%; the Greens are on 11%, steady and up 0.6%; and One Nation are on 4%, up one point and 0.9%.

Leadership ratings are likewise consistent with the fading of a post-election sugar hit, with Scott Morrison down three on approval to 48% and up six on disapproval to 42%. Anthony Albanese’s ratings also seem to be trending from mediocre to respectable, with his approval up two to 41% and disapproval down to 34%, leaving him shading Morrison by a point on net approval. However, this hasn’t translated to preferred prime minister for some reason, on which Morrison holds a healthy lead of 48-30, out from 48-31 last time.

The poll was conducted by online and automated phone surveying from a sample of 1623, from Thursday to Sunday. Full report from The Australian here. As before, we remain in the dark as to how the pollster’s methods have been adjusted since the election failure, if at all. However, the size of the movements, and the lack of anything obvious to explain them, suggests the poll has not been subjected to the smoothing method that Newspoll must have been using before the election to give it its uncanny and, as it turned out, misleading consistency.

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.

1,157 comments on “Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition”

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  1. @doyley

    You make a good argument, given I believe we going into a severe recession if not depression. Labor’s should have a message of economic stimulus and jobs. Shelving the negative gearing and franking dividend changes until a second term is also a good idea as well. Reaching out the business community who are starting to get sick of the government’s inaction on climate change, is a good idea as well.

    Also it needs to prove to people in Queensland they are not associated with the Greens in anyway. Not to mention reassuring conservative religious voters in the Western Suburbs of Sydney and the Eastern Suburbs of Melbourne. Since the scare campaigns on LGBT issues, cost Labor votes in those areas. At least when it comes to voters who decide elections, they are notably more Conservative (especially on social issues) as a whole.

  2. My last post on the subject.

    Cardinal George Pell is likely to serve his prison sentence in the specialised “protection” prison for sex offenders in the Victorian town of Ararat, which already houses a number of fellow members of the cloth also convicted of paedophilia, including his old housemate Gerald Ridsdale.

    In the wake of his conviction being upheld by the Court of Appeal, Pell will now undergo an intensive review by Correction Victoria’s Sentence Management Unit, which will include an interview where he will be able to express a preference for where he serves his six year sentence.

    As both a high-profile figure and child sex offender, Pell is at serious risk of violence from other inmates because in the prison hierarchy, paedophiles are regarded as “the lowest of the low” and are routinely threatened with beatings and stabbings.

    https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/pell-likely-to-spend-prison-sentence-in-protection-prison-for-paedophiles-20190821-p52j9r.html

  3. The hatred expressed above (and elsewhere) is as revolting as the crime.
    One of the most ridiculous things I have ever read too.

    Being gay and aboriginal, when I think of all the evil, hateful things the church and Pell have said and done to me and my family…especially Pell from the pulpit, on TV and radio, in Sunday columns etc all my adult life, I cannot but feel anger and hatred. It is not edifying, but its real.
    Funny how he is allowed to vilify, condemn me to hell, campaign against my love and even financial rights, but when he gets caught we should be reflective and polite.

    Screw that.

  4. Remember its being billed as Trump’s recession.

    Morrison and Trump have tax cuts in common. Its not very hard for Labor to link the two on a number of fronts and point to the extremism. That includes the economics

    The difference with the LNP is they argue for free markets not tariffs

    Edit: The neo liberal label applies to both. Lots of advertising on this front from Democrat campaigns

  6. No revisit Simon.

    Wishing people dead in the most painful manner possible, fully awake and suffering every minute, because they are sub-human pieces of shit, is pretty a dreadful attitude in any kind of civilized society, and rather reminiscent of the attitudes entertained by some of history’s greatest monsters.

    Hatred poisons the world and poisons the hater and all they associate with. It goes from being a mere opinion to becoming a way of life. I’m frankly surprised you would defend it.

    Yabba is currently in the process of transferring his hatred to almost anyone who doesn’t hate along with him.

    Sound familiar?

  7. lizzie @ #886 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 12:04 pm

    Tim Minchin @timminchin
    ·
    7m
    A little project for Australians: in the coming days, when the same old disingenuous conservative columnists come to defend Pell, let’s NOT boost their signal. We’ll all feel the same anger so you don’t need to signal yours. Just ignore them. It’s the only thing that hurts them.

    Exactly what I have decided to do about Scott Morrison photos etc (except where it’s a meme that hits him between the eyes with satire).

  8. [Bushfire Bill says:
    Wednesday, August 21, 2019 at 12:14 pm

    The case may not be over yet. Pell may appeal. It would be instructive, even if from just a societal point of view, to see the matter taken to a full and final legal consideration, as far as it can go, simply because hatred such as Yabba’s is so poisonous.]

    Sure, Pell may appeal. Two questions. First, how do you think an appeal would be instructive from a societal pov? The High Court would need to consider the law, not societal pov.

    Secondly, what is the logic behind the assertion that the appeal go ahead BECAUSE hatred such as Yabba’s is so poisonous? I do not follow the reasoning here at all

  9. torchbearer @ #903 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 12:23 pm

    The hatred expressed above (and elsewhere) is as revolting as the crime.
    One of the most ridiculous things I have ever read too.

    Being gay and aboriginal, when I think of all the evil, hateful things the church and Pell have said and done to me and my family…especially Pell from the pulpit, on TV and radio, in Sunday columns etc all my adult life, I cannot but feel anger and hatred. It is not edifying, but its real.
    Funny how he is allowed to vilify, condemn me to hell, campaign against my love and even financial rights, but when he gets caught we should be reflective and polite.

    Screw that.

    I’m hearing you. Bushfire Bill has already started his campaign to make us silent until Pell’s Appeal to the High Court is run. If indeed they decide to hear it, but we should just stfu until then. Well, fuck that. Pell is not only a perpetrator but an enabler of other heinous perpetrators who have hidden like little spiders in the crevasses of the rocks in the Catholic Church. They need to be vilified. Publicly, stridently and often.

  10. BB

    I can say this. Cardinal Pell Convicted Child Abuser.

    No need to moderate my comments about Pell because any appeal will be up to judges not a jury. No defamation either.

    This only changes if and when an appeal succeeds which is less likely than before.

    Thats the facts.

  11. Windhover @ #908 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 12:30 pm

    Secondly, what is the logic behind the assertion that the appeal go ahead BECAUSE hatred such as Yabba’s is so poisonous? I do not follow the reasoning here at all

    It’s to inflict maximum psychological torment upon people who have good reason to be angry with the church and the convicted pedophiles within its ranks. There’s no reasoning behind it, just thinly veiled hatred of exactly the same kind as is being denounced.

    C@tmomma @ #909 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 12:34 pm

    Pell is not only a perpetrator but an enabler of other heinous perpetrators who have hidden like little spiders in the crevasses of the rocks in the Catholic Church. They need to be vilified. Publicly, stridently and often.

    It’s not vilification when it’s true. 🙂

  12. BB

    Your expected holier than thou expostulations are a reflection on yourself, not me. You are the one who has to live with the knowledge that you say you observed and knew about abuse going on, and did nothing about it.

    My family and friends, and all of the people who I voluntarily help on a daily basis, would refute your preposterous suggestion that I am incapable of love.

    As an old white male, I truly despise the Pells, Murdochs, Trumps, et al, of this world.
    I regard your ramblings as the compulsive drivelling of a self important old fart.

  14. BB
    I am not defending the malice. I am differentiating it from the crime Pell has committed.
    Pells crimes were committed against the innocent where-as the hatred expressed here is against the guilty.
    The hatred expressed here is wishing harm to someone. Wishing, not perpetrating. Poisonous, yes. But it doesnt equate to Pells crime IMO.

  15. [Simon Katich says:
    Wednesday, August 21, 2019 at 12:13 pm
    However, were Bolt to allege corruption without any basis in fact, other than the decision of the court, this might amount to contempt of court as the attack would seek to diminish public confidence in the judicial system.

    Isnt that exactly what Bongiorno is suggesting with Bolt inferring 2 judges are part of a conspiracy to vilify Pell?]
    ………………………………………………………………
    I haven’t heard Bolt’s comments to know. But merely inferring judges are part of a conspiracy to vilify Pell is not a contempt of court. If that is all he did it is robust, typically ignorant, criticism by Bolt.

    Criticism of court decisions is entitled to query, based on the supposed irrationality of the exposed reasons, the honesty, or the capacity, or the political motivations, etc of the judges involved. That criticism may lead others on a path of discovery in which a judge’s bias (and hence competency to be a judge) is able to be exposed. Such criticism is a good thing.

    It is a big step from inferring that because a decision is so illogical (whether it is or not being beside the point) the judge must be biased in some way AND stating that the illogicality of the decision is proof of the supposed bias.

  16. Funny how he is allowed to vilify, condemn me to hell, campaign against my love and even financial rights, but when he gets caught we should be reflective and polite.

    I didn’t say that. I suggested tempering the hatred, and the judgementalism too (which produces the hatred in the first place). It won’t do you any good at all.

    As a general comment, I’m surprised at how such supposedly broad-minded, free-thinking, compassionate people as inhabit this place, become slathering hate machines so easily, given the right trigger. It’s just as incoherent, ugly and irrational as a lot of the behaviour that is condemned.

    Not only that. They actually argue in favour of the right to hate. Add hypocrisy to the list.

    A society ruled and guided by hatred is one step away from mob rule. It diminishes everyone and everything. It reduces all issues and problems to the darker side of human nature. From a practical viewpoint, it gives permission to others to hate you, whether for no reason or for a reason that makes sense only to them.

    This applies to blogs too.

  18. Laborites rationalising do nothing mediocrity in the face of repressive measures against public campaigning about GHG emisisons and destroyed planet. So what’s new on PB?

    As others have said, rolling out the RWNJ arguments on behalf of the fossil industry and their backers the LNP.

    Just what the Koala, and numerous other unique native animals, need.

    Nothing must make the Labor partisans here quite as sanctimonious as the joy they apparently see at the demise of our ecological systems and their additional opportunity to make puerile and facile jokes and ad hominen quips, apparently to justify their own inactivity, their own role in being part of the problem. Because they are useless at being any part of the solution it seems.

    What toll do bushfires have on native wildlife in an increasingly urbanised landscape?
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-21/what-toll-do-bushfires-have-on-our-native-wildlife/11418226

    (graphic warning from the ABC here for anyone who actually really gives a shit about native animals and ecosystems. Probably doesn’t apply to suckholes who really consider their party political partisanship is more important than anything else and who can only jump at any opportunity to use the crimbling of ecological systems as an opportunity for puerile and pointless crap)

  19. Simon Katich @ #914 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 12:41 pm

    BB
    I am not defending the malice. I am differentiating it from the crime Pell has committed.
    Pells crimes were committed against the innocent where-as the hatred expressed here is against the guilty.
    The hatred expressed here is wishing harm to someone. Wishing, not perpetrating. Poisonous, yes. But it doesnt equate to Pells crime IMO.

    Well put, SK. Conflation doesn’t work as an argument for me either.

  21. @anusha_srini tweets

    So I guess little Johnny Howard’s character references will now be made available from a kinder surprise?
    #GeorgePell

    BB

    As you can see from this on twitter we on this blog are being restrained.

  22. Weinberg over 700 paragraphs on the dissent on ground 1 finishing with:

    1111 …there is, to my mind, a ‘significant possibility’ that the applicant in this case may not have committed these offences. That means that, in my respectful opinion, these convictions cannot be permitted to stand. The only order that can properly be made is that the applicant be acquitted on each charge.
    1112 Mine is, of course, a minority view in relation to Ground 1. I am troubled by the fact that I find myself constrained to differ from two of my colleagues whose opinions I always respect greatly. That has caused me to reflect even more carefully upon the proper outcome of this application. Having done so, however, I cannot, in good conscience, do other than to maintain my dissent.

  24. BB

    I think Yabba is your unicorn.

    As to “old white men”, yes, it is a stereotype. Nevertheless as our society evolves from its powerful patriarchal nature to a gender egalitarian society, it is a fact that the demography that drags the chain tend to be older (set in their ways) and reluctant men who do not want to cede the patriarchal power.

    Right or wrong, it is widely viewed that old white men certainly drag the chain in accepting a more mature, sensitive, just and fair view of all aspects of sexual assault.

    They write stuff such as you have numerous times over the past year or more which appears to set the bar higher for sexual assault convictions than the legal system itself does.

  25. @scottbix tweets

    Senior administration officials had discussed the possibility of offering Denmark a deal in which the United States would take over its annual $600 million subsidy to Greenland, plus “a large one-time payment” as well. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-postpones-denmark-trip-after-prime-minister-declines-to-sell-him-greenland/2019/08/20/ef900924-c3a8-11e9-9986-1fb3e4397be4_story.html

    Are we going to sell Tasmania to Trump Mr Morrison?

  26. Pete Souza‏Verified account @PeteSouza

    During his entire Presidency, Barack Obama sent out 352 tweets.

    Trump is now at 43,600.

  27. Simon Katich:

    [‘…Hard to see them being asked for anymore court character references.’]

    Yep. And, character references in these type of offences mean almost zilch, many offenders having lived outwardly exemplary lives save for their proclivity to sexually abuse the young.

  31. Bolt didn’t say the judges were corrupt etc. He basically laid out all the doubts about the case the defense raised which I gather were all systematically dealt with and dismissed by the Chief Justice.

  33. Re PhoenixRED @12:14
    “Trump cancelled his trip to Denmark — because they won’t sell him Greenland”

    In other news, Trump has moved Denmark into the column headed “shithole countries”.

  34. @DonnieMountjoy tweets

    @mark_travers @latikambourke @RealRonHoward Australia’s PM needs you to come and direct a movie Down Under. It’s a tragi-comedy about a clueless advertising exec who accidentally becomes Prime Minister and bullshits his way thru policy, as the wheels fall off. The working title is Morrison Government. RU in?

  36. I am not easily turned into a hate machine- it takes a pedophile spewing judgement at me from a great height, a pedophile mixing it with PMs, a pedophile creating the redress scheme for pedophile victims, treating victims of pedophilia like shit etc etc etc over 30 years to make me a hate machine in this very specific instance.
    That is hardly easily turned.

  37. Archbishop Mark Coleridge, the president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, has released a statement.
    _____
    The beginning of the retreat?

  38. Torchbearer @ #936 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 1:18 pm

    I am not easily turned into a hate machine- it takes a pedophile spewing judgement at me from a great height, a pedophile mixing it with PMs, a pedophile creating the redress scheme for pedophile victims, treating victims of pedophilia like shit etc etc etc over 30 years to make me a hate machine in this very specific instance.
    That is hardly easily turned.

    Yes, sometimes when confronted by such extreme evil, hypocrisy and self-serving privilege, hate is a normal human reaction.

  39. BK

    Its going to be a long retreat. Its going to be interesting how much Morrison wants to hug his religious side with child abuse and religion becoming synonymous as suspicious for at least a little while.

  42. “I hope he dies slowly and painfully, in full possession of his faculties…
    The hatred expressed above (and elsewhere) is as revolting as the crime”.

    Really!!?? I hate the Nazis who committed mass murder and torture during WWII. I guess I’ll be losing sleep at night now that I’m just as revolting as those Nazis. Not.

    That statement is more symptomatic of Attention Seeking Disorder or just Trolling.

    I hope Tim Minchin rewrites his George Pell song lyrics…Pedo Pell you gonna burn in hell…
    Yeah I know what a terrible thing to say but hey I’m just so revolting anyway.

  43. If Pell does seek leave and it’s granted, Weinberg’s dissenting judgment as regards ground 1 will save the prisoner’s counsel a hell of a lot of work.

  47. adrian @ #938 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 1:22 pm

    Torchbearer @ #936 Wednesday, August 21st, 2019 – 1:18 pm

    I am not easily turned into a hate machine- it takes a pedophile spewing judgement at me from a great height, a pedophile mixing it with PMs, a pedophile creating the redress scheme for pedophile victims, treating victims of pedophilia like shit etc etc etc over 30 years to make me a hate machine in this very specific instance.
    That is hardly easily turned.

    Yes, sometimes when confronted by such extreme evil, hypocrisy and self-serving privilege, hate is a normal human reaction.

    Plainly, I agree with you both. My sincere thanks for your support against BB’s vicious attacks on my character

    My deceased friend’s wife has touched base today. Funnily enough, she detests Pell too.

    Obviously warped, eh, BB. She should forgive and forget. Just get on with life. Nil bastardum carborundum. Easier said than done. All platitudes are platitudinous. All generalisations are false. Your superior wisdom is required here, BB, to simplify and clarify, so that we can be perfect founts of tolerance and lurve, like you. Perhaps you could become a stand in cardinal.

  50. Peter van Onselen @vanOnselenP
    1h
    Yep sure, juries and judges make mistakes. But it’s the certainty of some of Pell’s supporters that he didn’t do it that gets me. They weren’t there, they didn’t see the whole trial or appeal process. Yet they are certain. It’s just so unintellectual and pig headed ignorant…

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