Newspoll: 51-49 to Labor

A crash in Scott Morrison’s standing finds Labor edging ahead on voting intention, and Anthony Albanese taking the lead on preferred prime minister.

The first Newspoll for the year, and the third under the new YouGov online polling regime, finds Labor opening up a 51-49 lead, after they trailed 52-48 in the poll in early December. On the primary vote, the Coalition is down two to 40%, Labor up three to 36%, the Greens up one to 12% and One Nation down one to 4%. Perhaps more remarkably, Scott Morrison now trails Anthony Albanese as preferred prime minister by 43-39, after leading him 48-34 in the previous poll. The damage on Morrison’s personal ratings amounts to an eight point drop on approval to 37% and an eleven point rise on disapproval to 59%. Conversely, Albanese is up six on approval to 46% and down four on disapproval to 37%. The Australian’s report is here; the poll was conducted from Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1505.

UPDATE (Essential Research): The Guardian has numbers from the first Essential Research poll of the year, but they disappointingly offer nothing on voting intention. What they do provide is corroboration for Newspoll’s finding that Anthony Albanese has taken the lead over Scott Morrison as preferred prime minister, in this case at 39-36, which compares with a 44-28 lead to Morrison when Essential last asked the question in early November. We are told that Scott Morrison is up nine on disapproval to 52% and that Anthony Albanese is up four on approval to 43% – their respective approval and disapproval ratings will have to wait for the full Essential report, which will presumably be with us later today or tomorrow. UPDATE: Morrison is down five on approval to 40%, Albanese is up two on disapproval to 30%. Full report here.

Despite everything, the poll finds 32% approving of Morrison’s handling of the bushfire crisis, which may be related to the fact that his approval rating was down only three among Coalition voters. The Guardian tells us only that 36% strongly disapproved of Morrison’s performance, to which the less strong measure of disapproval will need to be added to produce an equivalent figure for the 32% approval. Fifty-two per cent disagreed that Australia had always had bushfires like those just experienced, and 78% believe the government had been unprepared for them. Efforts to shift blame to the states do not appear to have borne fruit: Gladys Berejiklian’s handling of the bushfires scored 55% approval among New South Wales respondents, while Daniel Andrews was on 58% (these numbers would have come from small sub-samples of around 300 to 400 respondents).

The poll also offers a timely addition to the pollster’s leaders attributes series. The findings for the various attributes in this serious invariably move en bloc with the leaders’ general standing, and Morrison is accordingly down across the board. However, a clear standout is his collapse from 51% to 32% for “good in a crisis”, on which he was up 10% the last time the question was posed in October. Other unfavourable movements related in The Guardian range from a six-point increase in “out of touch with ordinary Australians“ to 62% to a 12 point drop on “visionary” to 30%.

More on all this when the full report is published. The poll was conducted online from Tuesday to Sunday from a sample of 1081.

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.

2,417 comments on “Newspoll: 51-49 to Labor”

Comments Page 42 of 49
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  3. Not concerned about this poll at all. The faux outrage (and sustained personal bashing) about ScoMo and his handling of a STATE BASED problem will cause anyone’s personal ratings to go down. Not to mention the Climate Twitterati peddling absolute lies online helped. The Media Colombo got what they wanted – a faux kink in ScoMo’s armour – but the real people, not those in AC offices with shiny keyboards, but those in the electorate will see through the utter rubbish that has been sprouted over the last couple of weeks by the Media Colombo, Twitterati and the loony left. They haven’t exactly hidden it. Enjoy the rays of sun for a few minutes, Albo.

  4. Catherine King:

    “ An Australian National Audit Office report released this week found almost half of $226 million in grant money and one in four projects funded by Labor in the final two rounds of the program were not supported by an independent expert panel.”

  5. @collettesnowden
    ·
    16h
    $10 million to Financial Counselling Australia (FCA) the peak body for financial counsellors in Australia.
    How quick public money rolls into the private sector while many wait on Centrelink processing!!

  8. Rob Oakeshott
    @RobOakeshott1
    ·
    Jan 13
    Centre for Austn Weather+Climate Research briefing notes from 2010. All MP’s received the same briefing. We knew.

  9. Barney

    If true it shows even more how accountability has been taken out of government administration.

    Not sure that helps the case Buc is making.

  10. ‘It was all about Biden — it was never about corruption’: Lev Parnas tells MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow

    President Donald Trump said that the reason he was so interested in former Vice President Joe Biden and his son was because of potential corruption in Ukraine. As Lev Parnas’ documents show, that’s far from the case.

    According to Parnas, who was interviewed by MSNBC host Rachel Maddow Wednesday, the efforts were never about corruption.

    “It was all about Joe Biden, Hunter Biden and also Rudy had a personal thing with the [Paul] Manafort stuff, the black ledger,” Parnas said. “That was another thing they were looking into. But it was never about corruption. It was never — it was strictly about Burisma which included Hunter Biden and Joe Biden.”

    https://www.rawstory.com/2020/01/it-was-all-about-biden-it-was-never-about-corruption-lev-parnas-tells-msnbcs-rachel-maddow/

  12. 380
    3.4K
    12.4K

    Claude Taylor
    @TrueFactsStated
    ·
    1m
    House paves way for new evidence in impeachment trial – Axios

    House paves way for new evidence in impeachment trial
    The resolution passed today gives impeachment managers “broad authority” to submit additional evidence.
    axios.com

  13. Buce

    You are going to have to try harder. It was a story reported years ago in the Oz and not substantiated as to what was in actual report. It was Abbott and co making the allegations,
    Lol. Too funny

  15. If pork barreling is so bad then I assume you all are opposed to the Ellenbrook rail line here in Perth that the ALP government has committed to. There is no business case or independent body that supports the construction of these pork rails.

  16. But

    Your case of the LNP are better at doing the crime than Labor won’t help stop the public expecting no crimes from politicians.

    The public expects the government to be accountable.

  17. Barney

    A story of a few paragraphs in the Oz, 6 years ago. And basically alleged by Abbott and co. Nothing to see here. Move along. Buce is going to have to try much harder than that crapola

  18. Joyce Alene
    @JoyceWhiteVance
    Just now,
    @chrislhayes
    says he’s read the transcript of
    @maddow
    ’s interview with Lev Parnas & he also implicated AG William Barr.

    Talk later bludgers

  21. I’ve figured it out. Ring Australia with desal plants and pump water inland through massive pipelines. We can call it the Watering Australia project.

  23. Buce

    Next you’ll be telling us about the Adelaide to Darwin railway, which John Howard spent $1billion of taxpayers money on – and 2 years later sold to his US mates for $400m.

  24. Barney, not a problem. It’ll serve to cool Australia off and probably come down again somewhere else in Australia as rain.

    Hey, we could call it the Cooling Australia project. How’s that for solving our Global Warming problem.

  25. From no rain in months to a flooded ceiling to clear again in 30 minutes (in the lower Hunter).

    Good luck KayJay my guess is its getting to your place about now.

  27. DisplayName

    I’ve figured it out. Ring Australia with desal plants and pump water inland through massive pipelines. We can call it the Watering Australia project.

    Scrott will love it, as will the Hutt twins, Gina and Clive.Think of all the coal fired power stations we would ‘have to build” 🙂

  30. That awkward moment when you’re want to pretend “adaptation” is your new thing, but you actually cut all funding to the adaptation body:

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jan/16/coalitions-axing-of-of-funding-to-climate-change-adaptation-body-condemned

    I’m assuming even LNP voters now agree this is the worst government we’ve ever had.

    Isn’t that right LNP voters? I’ll take your silence as agreement with my excellent point. 🙂

  31. Severe thunderstorn warning for intense rainfall
    from Thu 12:55 until Thu 15:49.

    Newcastle plenty of thunder and lightning .

    Damned BOM can’t get anything right. 12:58 and no rain yet.

    Ms. Hanson was right.

    https://www.news.com.au/www.news.com.au › technology › environment › news-story
    Pauline Hanson on Today denies climate change impacted …
    https://www.news.com.au/
    3 days ago – Pauline Hanson has backed a royal commission into the Australian … “they can’t even get my weather right and tell me it is going to rain” for the …
    ☔☔☔☔☔☔

    Terminator. ☔ Soon – synchronise watches. ☔🙏🙏

  32. lefty e @ #2078 Thursday, January 16th, 2020 – 10:03 am

    That awkward moment when you’re want to pretend “adaptation” is your new thing, but you actually cut all funding to the adaptation body:

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jan/16/coalitions-axing-of-of-funding-to-climate-change-adaptation-body-condemned

    I’m assuming even LNP voters now agree this is the worst government we’ve ever had.

    Isn’t that right LNP voters? I’ll take your silence as agreement with my excellent point. 🙂

    Ahhhh!!!

    But now they’ll be able to allocate less money than they cut and claim an increase in funding.

  33. 20 second googling turned this up:

    No more pork-barrelling: Labor promises infrastructure shake-up

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/no-more-pork-barrelling-labor-promises-infrastructure-shake-up-20190405-p51b6r.html

    He said Australians are “frustrated by the constant short-termism in the infrastructure debate”.

    Both Labor and the Coalition have been accused of pork-barreling in recent elections. Marginal seats have received funding at a rate almost 3½ times greater than safer seats, according to an analysis by The Sunday Age and Sun Herald.

    Up to 80 per cent of ministerial decisions to decline funding to recommended applications in community infrastructure funds were in Coalition-held electorates under Labor when it was last in office, while as many as 39 out of 45 the “congestion busting” infrastructure projects announced by the Morrison government are flowing to Liberal-held marginal seats.

  34. Zoomster:

    Buce

    Please provide a source for your quote – it doesn’t come up in any google searches.

    Perhaps it comes up in Angus Taylor’s Internet searches – you are not Angus Taylor (as far as I know), so you don’t see it!

    More generally (and more seriously), the very widely held misconception that everyone sees the same Internet is a very serious problem and lies at the heart of the current problem

  35. Sprocket the railway to Darwin has a military strategic value so the standard economic cost benefit doesn’t apply.

    It’s like the bare bases at Curtin, Scherger and Learmonth.

  37. Both major parties pork-barrel, to suggest otherwise is risible.

    Detailed analysis, 2018:

    The $1 billion cost of pork barrelling revealed

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-1-billion-cost-of-pork-barrelling-revealed-20180117-h0judh.html

    Voters in marginal seats collect tens of millions of dollars more than those in safer electorates, a Fairfax Media analysis of seven years of pork barrelling by both Labor and Coalition governments shows.

    For the first time, the true scale of electorate-winning promises can be revealed, with figures showing that both parties shamelessly reward their own constituents and the seats in which they have the most to lose.

    Almost 20 per cent of the taxpayer-funded $624 million allocated to Community Development Grants under the Coalition since 2013 has gone to just five marginal seats, which hold just 2 per cent of the population.
    :::
    The Coalition learned their trade from Labor, who awarded 40 per cent of $568 million in grants to marginal seats they held before they lost the 2013 election. That equates to marginal seats receiving funding at six times the rate of safer seats.
    :::
    Former Liberal leader John Hewson has lashed the findings, labelling the billion-dollar slush funds as “blatant political exercises” and accused both parties of a race to the bottom.
    :::
    The decade-long tit-for-tat means that many community organisations located in safe seats have to wait years to be considered for funding, while grants worth millions of taxpayers of dollars are provided with few checks and balances at the minister’s discretion.
    :::
    Under former prime minister Julia Gillard, Labor gave 70 per cent of their $550 million program to marginal electorates. Money handed to marginal Labor-held seats totalled nearly 42 per cent of the program.

  38. Sprocket the railway to Darwin has a military strategic value so the standard economic cost benefit doesn’t apply.

    As an example: when the PLA disembarks at its port in Darwin it can get straight on the train and be in Adelaide the next day

    How good is that!

  39. I’m not anti Elizabeth Warren. She be a massive improvement on the current President. But can’t understand why she wouldn’t shake Bernies hand in such a public way. Like when Penny Wong did a similar thing, it’s not a good look.

  42. Pegasus @ #2045 Thursday, January 16th, 2020 – 1:13 pm

    Both major parties pork-barrel, to suggest otherwise is risible.

    Detailed analysis, 2018:

    The $1 billion cost of pork barrelling revealed

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-1-billion-cost-of-pork-barrelling-revealed-20180117-h0judh.html

    Voters in marginal seats collect tens of millions of dollars more than those in safer electorates, a Fairfax Media analysis of seven years of pork barrelling by both Labor and Coalition governments shows.

    For the first time, the true scale of electorate-winning promises can be revealed, with figures showing that both parties shamelessly reward their own constituents and the seats in which they have the most to lose.

    Almost 20 per cent of the taxpayer-funded $624 million allocated to Community Development Grants under the Coalition since 2013 has gone to just five marginal seats, which hold just 2 per cent of the population.
    :::
    The Coalition learned their trade from Labor, who awarded 40 per cent of $568 million in grants to marginal seats they held before they lost the 2013 election. That equates to marginal seats receiving funding at six times the rate of safer seats.
    :::
    Former Liberal leader John Hewson has lashed the findings, labelling the billion-dollar slush funds as “blatant political exercises” and accused both parties of a race to the bottom.
    :::
    The decade-long tit-for-tat means that many community organisations located in safe seats have to wait years to be considered for funding, while grants worth millions of taxpayers of dollars are provided with few checks and balances at the minister’s discretion.
    :::
    Under former prime minister Julia Gillard, Labor gave 70 per cent of their $550 million program to marginal electorates. Money handed to marginal Labor-held seats totalled nearly 42 per cent of the program.

    Pork barrelling is probably the most effective tactic for the modern day LibNats and Labor, who both have a dearth of talented mp’s. I’m absolutely certain both major parties will serve up lashings of pork to the outer suburban voters at the next election.

  43. Buce

    Me and the other posters who couldn’t find the source (why single me out?)

    It’s a basic courtesy on a site like this to link to where you get your information, so that others can check it out. Saves arguments about the reliability of sources.

    Of course, I understand that basic courtesies are a thing unknown to you, but now you’ve been informed, you’ll know for next time.

  44. Oh yes, the old same-same argument used to discourage the majors from holding each other accountable, and maintain the status quo.

    You know what, if it means lifting each other out of the swamp, I think I’ll take noisy hypocrisy over quiet consent.

  45. Partisan Pork Barrel in Parliamentary Systems: Australian Constituency-Level Grants

    https://www.researchgate.net/publication/231992752_Partisan_Pork_Barrel_in_Parliamentary_Systems_Australian_Constituency-Level_Grants

    This note examines the distributive calculus of the Australian Labor government in apportioning millions of dollars of constituency-level grants in the weeks preceding the 1990 and 1993 Australian federal elections. While parliamentary systems have long been assumed to stymie constituency-level electoral effects—given their foundation on party government, caucus discipline, and voter loyalties directed to parties, not candidates—they also create a collective incentive for the party in government to pursue victories in its most marginal seats, including the tactical apportioning of discretionary funds. The results confirm a distinctly parliamentary form of distributive politics dominated by partisan and marginal seats priorities, while the decision-making influence of cabinet members appears sufficient to secure them funds disproportionate to their marginality.

  46. Federal ICAC NOW! The rorts must end!

    We could have had a Federal ICAC years ago if the Labor/Liberal two party establishment hadn’t teamed up to block the Greens attempts to establish one!

  47. Playing political tit-for-tat ignores the comparative cost of the pork-barrelling, and/or the consequent harm to communities who lost out.

  50. peg

    Instead of devoting yourself to defending the Liberals, you could examine the issues around McKenzie’s allocations of funding. It goes beyond pork barrelling.

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