Essential Research: that was the year that was

One last hurrah for 2019 from Essential Research finds an improvement in Anthony Albanese’s ratings, but little change for Scott Morrison.

The fortnightly Essential Research poll is out and, perhaps unsurprisingly for what will surely be its last survey for the year, it does not break its post-election habit of not publishing numbers on voting intention. What it does have is the monthly leadership ratings, which record little change for Scott Morrison (approval steady at 45%, disappoval up two to 43%) and favourable movement for Anthony Albanese (up two on approval to 39%, down six on disapproval to 28%). There is no preferred prime minister rating, but we do get evaluations on how the leaders have performed since the election: 11% say Scott Morrison has exceeded expectations, 41% that he has met them and 47% that he has fallen short of them, with Albanese’s respective ratings being 8%, 48% and 44%.

Also:

• The regular end-of-year question on for whom this has and hasn’t been a good year suggests people leaned positive about their own circumstances, albeit less so than last year; that it was a much better year for the government, which is hard to argue with on a purely political level; that it was a bad yet still much better year for “Australian politics in general”, the improvement presumably relating to the lack of a prime ministerial leadership coup; and that things were unambiguously positive only for large companies and the Australian cricket team.

• After two years of legalised same-sex marriage, 47% say it has had a positive impact, 15% negative and 38% neither.

• There remains negative sentiment towards unions, whom 49% say have too much power compared with 37% who disagreed. Fully 68% thought union officials should be disqualified merely for breaching administrative laws, with only 18% in disagreement, while 51% thought unions should be disqualified for taking unprotected industrial election, with 32% disagreeing. However, 62% agreed the government was “more concerned about the actions of union officials than the CEO’s of banks and other corporations”.

• Thirty-five per cent thought Scott Morrison should have stood Angus Taylor down from cabinet with 17% supporting his position, while 48% conceded they had not been following the issue.

• There was overwhelming support for the establishment of a federal ICAC, at 75% with only 8% opposed.

The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1035 respondents drawn from an online panel.

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.

1,940 comments on “Essential Research: that was the year that was”

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  1. Nicola Gobbo was a party to a long interview last night on “7.30”. I watched it on YouTube later. McMurdo’s RC is now asking why did she do the interview when claiming to be too sick to appear before the RC? A reasonable question.

  2. “Has Firefox responded to Cud Chewer’s expert historical analysis of Greens’ political mistakes, which he posted yesterday? Or has Firefox just started the day with a new box of rants?”

    ***

    Dispatched with him yesterday, Cat. Read back through the old thread if you are so inclined.

  3. The reality – Voter volatility is increasing. Political partisanship is on the decline for the major parties. Political partisanship is rising for the Greens and Others.

    Have a gander at page 28 Direction of political partisanship in Trends in Australian Political Opinion Results from the Australian Election Study 1987–2019 / ANU

    https://australianelectionstudy.org/wp-content/uploads/Trends-in-Australian-Political-Opinion-1987-2019.pdf

    ——–
    The 2019 Australian Federal Election Results from the Australian Election Study:

    https://australianelectionstudy.org/wp-content/uploads/The-2019-Australian-Federal-Election-Results-from-the-Australian-Election-Study.pdf

    A rise in support for minor parties contributed to the election result. This trend is associated with record low political partisnship. 21% of voters do not align with any political party.

  4. Mavis,
    As Nicola Gobbo clearly explained in the interview last night, which I intently watched, she is fearful of coming back to Australia with her children to testify at the RC as she has been informed that her children would be removed from her care. They are everything to her and she doesn’t want to lose them.

    Also, as a result of a stroke she had in 2004 she has severe Trigeminal Neuralgia and could not stand the long hours required to give evidence. Also, it looked to me like the interview was conducted in fits and starts and edited together, suggesting she needed breaks.

  5. Of course I support the Lib Dems.

    Brexit is THE European tragedy of the century and perhaps beyond.

    It will lead to a Britain become an isolated middle power which will project less power and which will get screwed in the inevitable FTAs.

    The Tories have been quite open that two of the things they are looking forward to is screwing workers and the environment.

    Corbyn’s approach of two bob each way has been a leadership disaster and a policy miasma. His gutlessness in falling prey to the englishness of it all is disgraceful. ‘Workers of the world unite’ has been transmuted into lets, de facto, tell the Pakis and the Poles what is what. Pathetic Little Englandism.

    But, but, but… given the electoral circumstances I would NOT do what the British Greens are doing. Neither would I vote for the Lib Dems.

    I would vote for Corbyn. ugggghhh. What a choice!

  6. Michael McCormack says that although CC is a factor, most of the fires are caused by Little Lucifers running around with matches, and meanwhile the gov is doing all that is necessary by meeting Paris targets.
    _________
    It gives one such satisfaction to know that our country is in the hands of such informed, intelligent people!

  7. Other findings from the 2019 AES:

    A divided electorate?

    > Men were much more likely to vote for the Coalition than
    women (men: 48%; women: 38%). Women were more likely
    than men to vote for the Greens (men: 9%; women: 15%).

    > Gender differences in voting have changed over time. In
    the 1990s men were slightly more likely to vote Labor than
    women, in recent elections women have become more likely
    to vote Labor.

    > There is evidence of a growing divide between the voting
    behavior of younger and older generations. The 2019
    election represented the lowest Liberal party vote on record
    for those under 35 (23%), and the highest ever vote for the
    Greens (28%).

    > Working class voters are much more likely to vote Labor
    than middle class voters (working class: 41%; middle class:
    29%). Long-term trends show an erosion of Labor’s working
    class base.

    > Asset ownership, including property and shares, was strongly
    associated with a higher vote for the Coalition.

  8. BK

    I have noticed that there is far more “Of course climate change is happening” from the MPs, but still they don’t like to rebel too much, so they dare not make any useful suggestions on what should be done.

    They’re sort of sidling towards reality.

  9. BW says:
    “Corbyn’s approach of two bob each way has been a leadership disaster and a policy miasma.”

    Do we recognize any other parties that have been trying to walk both sides of the street on other issues?

    There are times where it is beneficial to do so, to sit and wait. There are other times where it looks 2-faced and stupid.

  10. Time for reality checks.

    The long term trend in Australian manufacturing is down hill.

    The notion that killing off $65 billion in exports will reverse the trend is… ludicrous.

    But wait there is more.

    Rural and regional workers who will be displaced by the wholesale Greens destruction of their jobs are not necessarily the kind of workers who will move easily into other work.

    Unemployment in rural and regional areas is already much higher than in the Inner Urbs.

    Education and health levels are already lower.

    There are already around three quarters of a million people who are unemployed and another 2 million who are underemployed who are ready to soak up an extra hours. Many of those will already have the skill sets to move into any new employment created.

    The real world experiences of people who lost their jobs in the GFC, the workers who lost their jobs in the automotive industries, and the workers who were displaced from the timber industry SHOULD be instructive. Except that the Inner Urbs urgers do not have a skerrick of a notion of what all that means. Many of them have not worked again. At all.

    After all, they are agile, competitive knowledge industry hipsters.

  11. AZ
    My views on Corbyn are based/biased by my being a europhile.
    Against that measure he has been an ignoble, supine, vacillating, leadership failure, regardless of whether he wins the prime ministership this week.

  12. Firefox says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 10:10 am

    Labor’s attempt to win over the rabid far-right isn’t working at all

    Labor aim to re-connect with mining communities. The readership of the Australian would not include too many miners. It’s just facile to describe mining employees as ‘far right’. They’re working people. They very correctly conclude that the Greens despise them, have insulted them and have sought to exploit them politically. The Greens are Thatcherite in this respect. They deserve undying rejection by these communities.

    This is another example of the path Labor will have to follow if they are to rebuild their plurality. They must differentiate themselves from the Greens, disavow Green Herrings and put the Greens next-to-last on their HTVs.

  13. BW,

    No argument from me on the issue of the EU and the UK.
    However the whole policy suite that he proposing would be a well needed anti-dote to the likes of Trump, Johnson, Morrison.

  14. BK

    ‘Little Lucifers’ is, presumably, not an accident.

    It is a religious reference. Devils v the Angels.

    It personalizes the science into a focus on the human hate figures.

    And it matches neatly Faruqi’s ‘Fuck off!’

    ‘Rational’ Greens and Nationals debate has descended into ‘Kill the Pig’.

  15. So Borewar where is the comparable figure for the CO2 emissions and nutrients imported by Australia to make an apple’s for apple’s comparison?

  16. State government funding of independent and Catholic schools in Victoria

    https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/elite-schools-need-not-apply-to-402m-private-school-building-fund-20191210-p53img.html

    Independent and Catholic schools will share more than $73 million in public funds to build and expand their facilities, in the first stage of a bumper $402 million state government investment in non-government schools over the next four years.
    :::
    “These are for low-fee Catholic and independent schools – it’s not for the elite, Scotch College, Xavier and the like – these are for the local parish schools,” Victorian Education Minister James Merlino said of the grants.
    :::
    Among the biggest recipients were Bacchus Marsh Grammar with $4.82 million, St Anthony’s School in Melton South with $4.74 million and St Catherine of Siena Catholic Primary School in Armstrong Creek with $4.95 million.

    The Age revealed on Tuesday that those schools will not have to jump through the usual planning hoops to gain approval for constructing new buildings or expanding in size, with residents set to lose their right to object at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

    Schools will also be exempted from the requirement to give notice of their development plans, bypassing council approval processes.
    :::
    “If all of those kids were presenting to government schools we simply wouldn’t be able to cope, so it’s always been best when it’s been a true partnership,” Mr Andrews said.
    :::
    The Australian Education Union said it did not support the Andrews government’s decision to “almost quadruple capital funding for private schools”.

    “The government has a primary obligation to fund public schools, especially those that are currently experiencing unprecedented enrolment growth,” AEU Victoria deputy president Justin Mullaly said.

  17. ‘Alpha Zero says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 10:48 am

    BW,

    No argument from me on the issue of the EU and the UK.
    However the whole policy suite that he proposing would be a well needed anti-dote to the likes of Trump, Johnson, Morrison.’

    Yep. Which is why I would vote for Johnson. He is not certifiably insane. The Greens are, as usual, spoilers and destroyers. What a waste. The Lib Dems will probably not form a BOP do their remainiac intentions won’t count. I don’t live in Scotland. Johnson is a scoundrel. That would leave Johnson as, quite clearly, the lesser of two rather rank evils.

  18. ‘it’s time says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 10:51 am

    So Borewar where is the comparable figure for the CO2 emissions and nutrients imported by Australia to make an apple’s for apple’s comparison?’

    That is an excellent question. I am sure that the Greens Inner Urban consumers, who would top the pile of CO2 consumers per capita in Australia, have the answer to that.

  19. RI says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 10:48 am
    Labor aim to re-connect with mining communities.
    This is another example of the path Labor will have to follow if they are to rebuild their plurality. They must differentiate themselves from the Greens, disavow Green Herrings and put the Greens next-to-last on their HTVs.
    ________________
    And the more you say that Labor is different than the Greens the more the mining communities won’t believe you. Face it, the Greens have snookered Labor good and proper. Everything is proceeding as Bob Brown has foreseen.

  20. Firefox

    I assume that you are more or less totally ignorant of the importance of, and the relative benefits of, the Europe project. You would have voted for Nader, got Bush and not noticed that you cost Gore the POTUS job. Right now you would be dicking around with a Greens vote in the UK, increasing the risk that Johnson will trounce Corbyn. In between you would be ranting about fuck off and kill the pig. Juvie stuff.

    The EU project has lifted hundreds of millions of Europeans from poverty. It has ensured that Europe has never been more democratic. It has kept Putin’s Russian Bear at bay. It has kept a pan-European peace at levels never before seen in the entire history of Europe. It has been very, very active in promoting peace keeping efforts around the globe. Its aid budget is massive.

    The Little Englanders, the Empire Nostalgics, the Eton bovver boys, the Xenophobes, the far Left extremists, and the racists are in the process of wrecking Britain’s involvement in, and support for, this magnificent achievement.

  21. And the more you say that Labor is different than the Greens the more the mining communities won’t believe you.

    Yes. He doth protest too much.

    Labor would do best to ignore the Greens and never let the word pass its lips. Sssshhhh.

  22. BW,

    Time for reality checks…

    You’ve not unpacked the drivers of those trends at all.

    One immutable comparative advantage Australia has, over pretty much anywhere else in the world, is access to the best wind and solar resources there are. We need to harness this to drive our future prosperity.

    None of it is in the inner urbs.

    *Off to work now*

  23. C@tmomma:

    [‘As Nicola Gobbo clearly explained in the interview last night, which I intently watched, she is fearful of coming back to Australia with her children to testify at the RC as she has been informed that her children would be removed from her care.’]

    Yes, I realise that, and her fears are well-founded. It was a fascinating interview, telling the interviewer that she was more fearful of VicPol than underworld figures, having been groomed as a law student.
    But McMurdo, C says that the reason she gave for not fronting the RC was/is based on her health status, not on the fears she revealed last night. The Royal Commission is well-resourced; it could easily manage her safety, and her children could remain in the secret overseas location, where she has some assistance.

    I have a good deal of empathy for her. She was out of her depth by representing some of the worst types.
    Very little training is provided as to how deal with clients who commit murder and other serious crimes at the drop of a hat. Perhaps the RC will make recommendations thereof. Certainly, she should not have socialised with them – that’s a no, no. But I can see how it could happen. Anyway, some of the big guns are due to give evidence, and that could result in charges being laid against them.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-11/nicola-gobbo-interview-prompts-questions-at-royal-commission/11787748

  24. Righto Boer. Why don’t you explain to us “why [you] would vote for Johnson” again. Or is it Swinson? Johnson? Swinson? Let me know when you decide which right winger you like best.

  25. People in the bush know that the Greens want them to live in caves. They don’t have to go through the following list to figure that out:

    Close down:
    Beef feedlots
    Piggeries
    Poultry sheds
    Biofuel operations
    Native forestry industry
    Rodeos
    Camp drafts
    Dog racing
    Trots racing
    Jumps racing
    Live exports of beef
    Live exports of sheep
    Live exports of goats
    Circus animals
    Duck hunting
    Kennel breeding of dogs
    Rabbit hunting
    Kangaroo hunting
    Buffalo hunting
    Deer hunting
    Pig hunting
    Muttonbird harvesting
    Theme park animals
    Live exports of greyhounds
    All uranium mines
    Lucas Heights reactor/radiation medical production
    All uranium exports
    All coal mines
    All conventional gas production facilities
    All coal seam gas production facilities
    Deep sea bottom trawling
    All oil production facilities
    Beef farming
    Sheep farming
    Cotton industry
    Warship manufacturing
    Fighter component manufacturing
    Infantry fighting vehicle manufacturing
    The Singapore Air training facility in Queensland
    The three joint spy bases
    Around a dozen major fleet, air and army bases
    All facilities that enable the deployment of nuclear weapons – whatever that means.

    These are all definites and flow directly from stated policies on the Australian Greens policy site.
    There is reason to believe that the following would be added to the bans list:
    Recreational angling
    Thoroughbred racing

    On current indications, we might as well add the irrigated almond industry because the Greens have a gut hate for this sort of industry. Wine grape industry? Not so much. Might interrupt the flow of Chardonney?

    Farmers contemplating voting for the Greens know they face dozens of bans and prohibitions. It is all there in the Greens policies. Everything from live exports trhough rodeos and shooting bunnies will be banned.

    But there is more to it than that. Just read the Greens policies. It is all there in black and white. Hidden in plain sight. All sorts of decisions that farmers currently make will be regulated, overseen and hijacked. Under Greens policies, farmers:

    1. Will be expected to work to a National Strategic Plan. Gosplan?
    2. Will be saddled with ‘community decision making’ about farming. Citizens committees?
    3. Will be saddled with Indigenous involvement in farm decisions.
    4. Will be regulated to force them to provide ecosystem services.
    5. Will be regulated on a new set of animal welfare standards that will be enforced by a National Authority that will monitor and punish farmers as required.

  26. ‘Firefox says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 11:05 am

    Righto Boer. Why don’t you explain to us “why [you] would vote for Johnson” again. Or is it Swinson? Johnson? Swinson? Let me know when you decide which right winger you like best.’

    Typo. Were I a UK voter I would vote for Corbyn.

  27. “Labor aim to re-connect with mining communities. ”

    Maybe they could connect with those communities by offering them a future. Coal isn’t going to be a major export industry or energy source inside a generation. Trade sanctions on major coal-exporters are a genuine possibility within a decade.

    Germany has transitioned from coal by doing the following:
    – giving older workers job priority in the declining industry that remain
    – workers in the middle age bands are offered retraining or ongoing work
    – younger workers are retrained
    – retraining occurs on full wages

    It’s a real problem and requires a real solution and some innovation with unions onboard. Labor is best placed to do this. Wishing the future trends away isnt going to help those communities in the end.

  28. The NSW Environment Minister is coming out with all the right arguments. Wow! He’s an actual person and not a denier clone. Asked how the Fed Libs will react to what he’s saying, he replied “That’s up to them.” Bam!

  29. ‘Dandy Murray says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 11:03 am

    BW,

    Time for reality checks…

    You’ve not unpacked the drivers of those trends at all.

    One immutable comparative advantage Australia has, over pretty much anywhere else in the world, is access to the best wind and solar resources there are. We need to harness this to drive our future prosperity.

    None of it is in the inner urbs.

    *Off to work now*

    My point is more general. Those who are telling rural people they will be ‘transitioned’ are ignoring all the current evidence.

  30. ‘lizzie says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 11:08 am

    The NSW Environment Minister is coming out with all the right arguments. Wow! He’s an actual person and not a denier clone. Asked how the Fed Libs will react to what he’s saying, he replied “That’s up to them.” Bam!’

    He lives in a Sydney bubble.

  31. “Typo. Were I a UK voter I would vote for Corbyn.”

    ***

    Mate you’re all over the shop. First it was Swinson and the Lib Dems, then it was Johnson and the Tories (I’ll be fair and let you retract that error), now it’s Corbyn and Labour, even though you attack the left at every opportunity. Which is it? Make up your mind!

  32. C@tmomma:

    I would add that her ‘severe Trigeminal Neuralgia’ could be managed by providing breaks while giving evidence, either in person or via Skype.

  33. Boerwar says:
    Wednesday, December 11, 2019 at 11:06 am

    People in the bush know that the Greens want them to live in caves.
    ______________________
    They will have the choice of a cave or a kolkhoz.

  34. We’re still fighting city freeways after half a century

    https://theconversation.com/were-still-fighting-city-freeways-after-half-a-century-127722

    The building of freeways in the 1960s and ’70s triggered major protests by urban residents. These citizens were concerned about the loss of public land, established housing and the spatial divisions big roads create.

    Today residents of our cities still have these concerns, to which we can add climate change. The transport sector is the fastest-growing source of emissions that are driving climate change.

    There is now substantial international evidence building more freeways does not solve congestion, a principle evident since the 1960s. Instead, it induces more traffic, entrenching reliance on cars.
    :::
    In Victoria, the state government has had a resurgence of road-building frenzy. Melbourne will see the construction of the West Gate Tunnel, North East Link and Mordialloc Freeway projects, despite significant reservations expressed by transport academics.
    :::
    The link between public (and increasingly private) investment in mega-road projects and growing emissions appears to have escaped the attention of the processes that oversee public project decisions – panel hearings, ministerial processes and environmental impact assessments. The costs of these transport projects, driven by past decisions and plans, as well as the costs of not pursuing the alternatives, will affect budgets and our environment over decades

    ——–
    State government in the pocket of Transurban:

    https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2019/03/vic-parliament-approves-10-year-citylink-toll-gouge/

    In late 2017, the Victorian Labor Government completed a shady $6.7 billion deal with Transurban to build the West Gate Tunnel Project, which will see Transurban contribute $4.4 billion towards the cost in exchange motorists paying $15 billion in additional tolls on CityLink until 2045
    :::
    With this background in mind, the Victorian parliament has voted through the bill to extend CityLink’s tolls for 10 years, with tolls now permitted to rise by a whopping 4.25% a year:
    :::
    Yet another win for private monopoly Transurban, but another loss for ordinary Melbournians.

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