Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition

The fourth Newspoll since its wrong call at the election continues to credit the Coalition with only a modest lead on two-party preferred, with the minor parties continue to lift and Scott Morrison recording the opposite of a US visit bounce.

The fourth Newspoll since the federal election credits the Coalition with a 51-49 two-party lead, unchanged on the last poll three weeks ago, with both major parties down on the primary vote – the Coalition by one to 42%, and Labor by two to 33%. The Greens and One Nation are both up a point, the former to 13% – their best result from Newspoll since 2015 – and the latter to 6%.

Scott Morrison’s personal ratings have deteriorated, either despite or because of his activities in the United States last week, his approval down two to 47% and disapproval up four to 43%. Anthony Albanese has bounced back four on approval to 39% after a six-point drop last time, but the report in The Australian does not relate his disapproval rating (UPDATE: Steady at 40%). Morrison’s preferred prime minister reading goes from 48-28 to 50-31, as respondents apparently becoming more inclined to pick a side.

The poll was presumably conducted as usual from Thursday to Sunday – no sample size is provided, but the norm is around 1600. More to follow.

UPDATE: The sample was 1658, of which 900 came from online surveys and 758 from automated phone polling. Also featured is a question on which relationship Australia should prioritise out of the United States and China, who came in at 56% and 25% respectively. The split was 70-18 among Coalition supporters, 46-32 for Labor, 60-24 among men and 51-26 among women.

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.

1,439 comments on “Newspoll: 51-49 to Coalition”

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  1. Jolyon Wagg @ #235 Monday, September 30th, 2019 – 1:14 pm

    P1

    They voted for certainty, and for their hip pockets. Given the shambles on the other side of politics, who can blame them?

    So the electorate accepts that climate action is necessary but votes for the comforting certainty of inaction.

    I can and do blame them!

    You are forgetting that Labor had essentially dumped their own policy by that point and was proposing to adopt the same policy as the coalition.

    So why would anyone in favour of action vote Labor?

  3. “So the electorate accepts that climate action is necessary but votes for the comforting certainty of inaction. ”

    That can be fixed by committing to spending money on the alternatives, retraining and compensation for those who lose jobs. It has been done before – called restructuring – back when policy recognised human nature. Is that so hard?

    If only there was an Australian political party that was both committed to climate change action, and willing to propose policies that would give reassurance to those whose jobs are affected! Much like the platform of the kids striking for climate change. Imagine the popular support they would gain?

    There was a recent episode of Utopia where the work experience kid winds up writing a policy on Bitchain for the nation, because he was the only one there who understood it. I think we are at that point with climate change policy to. The kids have a better idea than the (unqualified) professionals.

  5. “Future campaigns can rest on the facts revealed. The Carbon Price worked. Given the short timeframe that was the “tax” fixed price period.

    Lower electricity prices and lower emissions.
    Fact Labor can campaign on.”

    ____________

    You honestly think that low interest, low information voters in the outer burbs and regions are motivated by your set of facts, don’t you … Despite all evidence to the contrary.

  6. Quoll says:
    Monday, September 30, 2019 at 1:24 pm
    Some need a Greens Helpline as much as some need a Greta Thunberg Helpline

    Meanwhile 57 local governments have passed Climate Emergency Declarations, which rounds up to ~5.7 million Australians within those council areas.

    Yes. But so what? Local authorities just do not have the budgets or the powers necessary to deal with climate change. The Commonwealth has the grunt, but it is in the hands of the Tories. The Tories profit politically from campaigns raised in relation to the environment. This is perverse. But it is nonetheless the political reality.

    The politics of environmental action in this country is almost entirely counter-intuitive. Those who campaign for change only serve the party of the status quo. This is not getting better. It’s getting worse.

  8. I hope with everything I have that Labor never enter another power-sharing deal with the Greens. This has been a disaster for the environment.

  10. Andrww_Earlwood @ #244 Monday, September 30th, 2019 – 1:33 pm

    Which leads me back to this question for all the climate change warriors out there: where is the political pathway in Australia to achieve your aims by your stated means?

    Sure. Let’s ignore for the time being the fact that 60% of the population – and rising – wants to see prompt action on climate change (with a further 28% wanting somewhat more gradual action). Let’s also ignore the fact that by the time the next election rolls around, a proportion of the cohort that is most opposed to prompt action on climate change will no longer be voting, and will have been replaced by a cohort 80% in favor of even more urgent action.

    Let’s ignore all that, and just consider the fact that Labor have changed their position with every leadership change – and also at every election – since the issue first became a political hot potato. Partly, because the Labor party is clearly divided on the issue along both State/Federal and Left/Right factional lines.

    Now, can you come up with a credible pathway back to government for the Labor party that does not involve them finally accepting – uniformly as a party – the need for prompt and significant action?

    Paradoxically, without this your best hope seems to be that climate change causes such economic chaos that the electorate turns to Labor in sheer desperation.

    Not much of a political strategy, is it? 🙁

  11. “So why would anyone in favour of action vote Labor?”

    Mate. Feel free to get your freak on and vote for whom ever floats your self righteous boat. At the end of the day, however the question for you is who you are going to allocate your preference vote to first: the LNP or Labor.

    Frankly, I am coming to despise your piety, but I hope I can count on your preference vote. In the meantime I – and Labor are now resolved: we will do whatever it takes to get back those missing voters.

    Once (if) Labor forms government, a set of environmental measures will be presented to parliament. These will no doubt be weaker than what you or the Greens demand: then the Greens will face the acid test in the senate: will they compromise, or do a 2009 all over again?

  12. Socrates says:
    Monday, September 30, 2019 at 1:54 pm

    “So the electorate accepts that climate action is necessary but votes for the comforting certainty of inaction. ”

    That can be fixed by committing to spending money on the alternatives, retraining and compensation for those who lose jobs. It has been done before – called restructuring – back when policy recognised human nature. Is that so hard?

    If only there was an Australian political party that was both committed to climate change action, and willing to propose policies that would give reassurance to those whose jobs are affected! Much like the platform of the kids striking for climate change. Imagine the popular support they would gain?

    This is very much the policy of WA Labor. Even so, it is an uphill run here. The Liberals outperformed in the Federal election. Their environmental policies are a void…a nullity….an emptiness….a silence…a graveyard….but they still win a majority of votes quite comfortably here.

    There is an absolutely remarkable lack of clarity and a surplus of wishful thinking in relation to all this. There is absolutely nothing in the expressions – really, the threats, the denunciations, the blaming – raised by the Greens to think this will change.

  13. Tricot, Quoll
    OK, OK, OK.
    Australia’s CO2 emissions are rising.
    Australia will NOT reach zero net emissions by 2030.
    If that is a Greens success after 30 years, what does Greens failure look like?

  14. Morrison today is spruiking his “strong economy” as the reason he can provide cancer-curing drugs.

    Is there no end to his marvellousness!

  15. Soc,

    That can be fixed by committing to spending money on the alternatives, retraining and compensation for those who lose jobs. It has been done before – called restructuring – back when policy recognised human nature. Is that so hard?

    If only there was an Australian political party that was both committed to climate change action, and willing to propose policies that would give reassurance to those whose jobs are affected! Much like the platform of the kids striking for climate change. Imagine the popular support they would gain?

    F’n aye!

    I blame Butler for cocking up the energy policy Labor took to the last election. I was at an industry event when the NEG-lite policy was announced – the deflation was palpable, even from the big gentailers and network companies.

  16. “Sure. Let’s ignore for the time being the fact that 60% of the population – and rising – wants to see prompt action on climate change (with a further 28% wanting somewhat more gradual action).”

    OK – right there. Voters are either lying (to make themselves feel good) or they are domiciled in seats that don’t matter. As to the former, it is simply staggering how someone can on the one hand say to a pollster ‘yes. Action of climate change’ whilst simultaneously voting against a party whose policies carry with it even the slightest hint that maybe, just maybe they personally will have to pay for some of that action. But that is where we are.

    As to the later: it doesn’t matter if the Greens will inner city seats with 90% of the vote, so long as those multitude of outer rim and regional seats keep falling to the LNP – even if it is by small margins. But that is where we are.

    Political reality. Its mugged me, but you and Guytaur and the Green squad are completely quixotic in the face of it.

  17. Firefox says:
    Monday, September 30, 2019 at 1:30 pm
    “Which she’ll have to stop wearing when her ineffectuality becomes apparent and the Adani mine goes ahead.”

    ***

    Which is clearly something you’re hoping happens. You are relentless in your attacks on the Stop Adani movement and environmental activists. You’d be happy to turn the entire planet into a coal mine if it was a Labor policy.

    Let me let you in on a little secret, Cat. The Stop Adani movement isn’t just going to quietly go away if the mine goes ahead. Quite the opposite in fact. The Stop Adani movement will only stop when the Adani mine has been stopped for good.

    This is plain as day. The Greens will campaign on Adani until the cows come home. Labor have no choice. They will permit the mine to go ahead. They absolutely cannot capitulate to the Greens. Under no circumstances can Labor dance to the tune of the Greens. Never again. Let the Greens campaign on Adani.

    Labor will try to build the bridge between action in relation to climate change and action to defend and create jobs. They will get no thanks for it. Rather they will be vilified for it.

  19. The law used to justify the raid on the home of Annika Smethurst is unconstitutional, the journalist’s lawyers have argued.

    In submissions to the high court challenging the validity of the search warrant, Smethurt’s legal team said the offence breaches the implied freedom of political communication because it criminalises publications that are merely embarrassing to the government.

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/sep/30/law-used-to-justify-annika-smethurst-raid-unconstitutional-her-lawyers-say

  21. AE

    It’s your cognitions dissonance that’s the problem.

    Labor and Greens very successful in elections and policy in the ACT.
    Labor and Greens successful in Victoria in working together resulting in a massive landslide swing gaining Labor majority in its own right.

    What do they have in common? Strong campaigning on strong policy.
    Of course in Victoria the LNP campaign on “African Gangs” was a gift.

  22. Actually P1 – Labor will be elected AND ONLY ELECTED on attractive economic policies. Briefly is right: thanks largely to the likes of you and the Greens environmental policies are completely toxic to those particular sector of voters that actually count. Sad but true.

    So, I don’t expect labor to win one vote over climate change. So its best if it stopped trying altogether.

  23. I’ve talked to quite a few people who profess to be fervently in favour of action on climate change but who voted against Labor because they thought they’d lose money if Labor was elected.

    According to just about every poll taken, the vast majority of voters say their top issues are health and education.

    If people voted accordingly, Labor would have been a shoe in for every election over the last half century.

    They haven’t been, because what people identify as their motivating issues when asked by a pollster and how they behave in a polling booth are different things.

  24. You are all flailing about to find the source of the political angst, but I think the truth is that Murdoch, the Climate Deniers and all the Right-wingers have won.

  26. Oh, FFS Greentaur. IF ONLY the rest of the country was like Canberra. Then I would be shoulder to shoulder with you.

    But it isn’t, and you are deserving of your own special entry in the DSM under the heading “cognitive dissonance” for keep banging on that in some way it is and that there are some actual lessons to be learnt from the ACT government that could be applied in places like … Aspley and Logan …

  27. P1

    ‘Why would anyone vote for a party that says “We will decide on our policies once you elect us”.

    Ask people who vote Liberal, not us.

  29. Three unhelpful frames that Labor reinforces:

    1. The costs of failing to drastically cut carbon emissions are manageable. The costs of making changes are too great.

    2. Changes to production, transportation, energy etc are financial challenges rather than real resource challenges.

    2. Carbon emission reduction is a feel good environmental niche issue separate from production, livelihoods, planetary survival etc. It is not an emergency. All the time in the world.

    Labor desperately needs to be AOCed or Thunberged on a large scale but its pre-selection processes rule out even a handful of AOCs entering the parliament. The party is run by people who in their heart of hearts do not believe that this is a true emergency. They have cushy seats in parliament to be followed by cushy sinecures. Most of them own a home in addition to one or more investment properties. They have no incentive to change their approach.

  32. He figures it’s worked for him in the past.

    ……
    Kurt Andersen
    @KBAndersen
    ·
    1h
    If a rat could tweet, and it was cornered, would it tweet 45 times in 15 hours? Because that’s what the president did today.

  33. If and when the Trump spell is broken, a semblance of accountability of our elected leaders should start to occur.

    Here is hoping anyway………..

  34. Nicholas….you are terribly deluded. Sad to say. Labor have to try to win elections. This is no small ask. Australians vote for the Liberals at federal elections far more often than not. They are the ruling party. Labor has become a party of Opposition – a minority party with a vote share that is far too small for it to expect to win elections.

    The Crazy Branch campaign against Labor as if Labor were in power. The facts of the situation seem to have entirely eluded them.

    We have won just one election in the last 9. Just once since the Great War has Labor won from Opposition and formed a successful multi-term Government. That was in 1983….nearly 40 years ago. The unreality that pervades reformist opinion in Australia is absolutely staggering to behold.

  35. Viewing Trump through the lense of him being a malignant narcissistic, sexual deviant mobster, was always going to make it easy to see how this story ends.

  36. lizzie says:
    Monday, September 30, 2019 at 2:25 pm
    The only thing left now is revolution.

    I wouldn’t count on that, lizzie. We are in very serious trouble and there’s nothing we can do about it. We sail aboard the Titanica Australis.

  37. UI

    Listen to Doug Cameron not KPMG.

    Noah Carroll going there should be a huge embarrassment to Labor.
    What values. Joining the elite accounting firm.

  39. P1

    You are forgetting that Labor had essentially dumped their own policy by that point…

    possibly because the electorate had already rejected it twice!

    and was proposing to adopt the same policy as the coalition.

    That is not true. There was a significant gap in climate action policies at the last election and the electorate voted for the weaker option.
    climate change election-where to the parties stand on the environment

    So why would anyone in favour of action vote Labor?

    Because they have the mental capacity to determine the better of two alternatives.

  41. UI

    Yes, we are in trouble because the utterly inept Morrison govt has no concept of planning for the future. All they ever do is react, and react with obfuscation, spin and lies. They don’t seem to have two brains to rub together, and this myth that Morrison is “clever” is nonsense. He’s just an artful dodger.

  43. guytaur,

    If Canberra was the representative template for the rest of Australia then federal labor would have won in landslide. However labor got a national PV of 33.34%.

    Is Queensland representive of the rest of Australia ? Or is it only the ACT that you are using to argue your case simply because it suits your greens fantasy ?

    You cannot pick out one territory or state and claim it represents the rest of the country. Your argument is total bollocks especially as the ACT has three federal seats. Not much chance of a landslide result based on what happens in the ACT.

    Very selective of you.

    BTW, Queensland is not on Mars the last time I checked.

  44. Victoria says: Monday, September 30, 2019 at 2:34 pm

    Viewing Trump through the lense of him being a malignant narcissistic, sexual deviant mobster, was always going to make it easy to see how this story ends.

    *****************************************************************

    I just have worrying thoughts that sensible onetime members of Trump’s administration such as —Jim Mattis, Rex Tillerson, H.R. McMaster etc were there but as of now with no one in any semblance of authority at the White House or anywhere in the administration, there is no one to check Trump…… or what nightmare scenario he might pull to save himself

  45. Hey Firefox. Finish the quote from Julia Gillard in the 2010 federal election campaign.
    “There will be no carbon tax under a government I lead; but there will be a price on carbon.”
    I thought only Coalition supporters indulged in that sneaky slight of hand by only quoting the first part of her statement.
    I thought better of most Greens, but it appears you are part of that Green element which wants to smear Labor almost as much as it attacks the Coalition.

  46. lizzie says:
    Monday, September 30, 2019 at 2:44 pm
    UI

    Yes, we are in trouble because the utterly inept Morrison govt has no concept of planning for the future. All they ever do is react, and react with obfuscation, spin and lies. They don’t seem to have two brains to rub together, and this myth that Morrison is “clever” is nonsense. He’s just an artful dodger.

    lizzie…..as my favourite Aunt used to say, life is 9/10s an act. The Liberals are very good at what they do. They have worked us out. We fight among ourselves. The Liberals rule.

  47. BW…………………. success/failure/glass half-full/half empty?
    One could make the point the Green vote has increased, but not the number of Green held seats in the HR . This PV of over a million is spread thin, while the National vote – lower than that of the Greens – harvests 10 seats or so to the Coalition.
    The real damage in 2019 was done by erstwhile Labor? voters who have shifted to the likes of ON/Liberal/NP/Palmer and/or left Labor out altogether.
    The gloat from the usual Jonahs here about Labor’s current 33% PV (if one can take the current poll with any kind of credence) is related the (still) poor vote for Labor in Queensland.
    It is the Deep North which is the challenge for Labor…………………… the Deep North – and those regional seats you have mentioned.

  48. It is also the case that voters want to affiliate with the symbols and examples of power and success. The Liberals represent these values. Voters will attach themselves to the Liberals because of this. They have a very significant starting advantage in this respect.

    The worst thing Labour could do would be to attach itself to the Crazy Branch. This would finish Labor forever.

  50. Vic:

    I’m really trying not to let my hopes get up that this could genuinely be the beginning of the end of Trump’s presidency!

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