Ipsos Issues Monitor and much else

An Ipsos issue salience poll finds environmental concerns elbowed aside by health care and the economy. Also: prospects for elections amid coronavirus in Queensland and the Northern Territory, finalisation of the Brisbane City Council election, and a Greens plebiscite on leader selection.

Ipsos has published its latest Issues Monitor survey results, in which respondents are presented with 19 issues and asked to identify the three of greatest concern. This is conducted monthly but published haphazardly: the last set of results was published on the precipice of our new era back in January, but the accompanying chart in the latest release allows you to at least eyeball the results from February and March. The big news in January was an unprecedented concern about the environment in the wake of the bushfires, pushing that issue to the top of the pile for the first time. It has now been put into the shade by a massive surge of concern about three issues: health care, up since January from 31% to 55%; the economy, up from 25% to 47%; unemployment, for which the result went unpublished in January (it was at 18% in December) and is now at 39%. The environment is now equal fourth on 22%, down from 41%, where it ranks alongside cost of living, down from 31%.

The Ipsos release also features results on the best party to handle the five aforesaid issues, which are consistent with an improved standing for the Coalition since December, the last time comparable figures were published. Most striking is its improvement on its traditional weak spot of health care, on which it now leads Labor by 34% (up eight) to 29% (steady), with the caveat that 7% favoured the Greens and most of those would presumably have Labor as a second preference (a further 3% favoured another party). The Coalition has also widened its lead on the economy, up seven to 43% with Labor down to 22%, the Greens on 5% and others on 3%, and gained five on cost of living to 34%, with Labor steady on 29%, the Greens on 7% and others on 4%. It also holds a lead over Labor of 34% to 28% on unemployment, with the Greens on 6% and others on 3%, no figures from December being available for comparison in this case. On the environment, the Coalition is up four to 23%, Labor is down one to 17%, the Greens are on 28% and others are on 6%.

The poll was conducted online from a sample of 1000, and was presumably conducted over the previous fortnight, but all we are told is that the numbers are for April.

Further news:

• The count for the Brisbane City Council election is now all but complete, confirming a repeat of the 2016 result with the Liberal National Party winning 19 seats to Labor’s five and the Greens’ one, plus independent Nicole Johnston in Tennyson. The Greens came within an ace of taking Paddington off the LNP but no cigar, with LNP incumbent Peter Matic prevailing by 11,064 (50.7%) to 10,753 (49.3%) after preferences, a margin of 311 votes. Unlike at state elections, optional preferential voting prevails at Queensland’s local government elections, in this case to the advantage of the LNP since many preferences that might otherwise have flowed between Labor and the Greens instead exhausted. As Antony Green notes on Twitter, this certainly made the difference in Paddington, and might have saved the LNP from Labor in their three most marginal wards. LNP incumbent Adrian Schrinner’s winning margin over Labor’s Pat Condren for the Brisbane lord mayoralty was 286,297 (56.4%) to 221,309 (43.6%).

• Annastacia Palaszczuk has raised the prospect of Queensland’s October 31 state election being held entirely by post, as has been advocated by Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington. The ABC reports the next update of federal government modelling on the spread of the virus in around two weeks will guide a decision that is “expected in the next month”. However, it appears the Northern Territory election will proceed in a more-or-less normal fashion on August 22, with the Northern Territory News ($) reporting the local electoral commission does not consider a postal election an option because “postal services were still limited in many remote communities”. It is accordingly “looking to accommodate social distancing at the upcoming election by opening up more early voting centres, encouraging postal voting and extending early voting times”.

• The Greens are in the process of conducting a plebiscite of party members on how it will choose its leaders in future, the three options being the status quo of election by the party room, the “one member one vote” model of a straight ballot of party members, and Labor’s approach of a 50-50 model in which the result is evenly split between the two approaches. The party’s three former leaders, Bob Brown, Christine Milne and Richard Di Natale, jointly wrote a column in The Guardian that beseeched members to reject “one member one vote”, noting the disastrous consequences the model eventually had for the Australian Democrats, and gently suggested the status quo was to be preferred. A counter-argument was subsequently advanced in the same publication by five party luminaries, including current Senator Mehreen Faruqi and former Senator Scott Ludlam.

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.

2,719 comments on “Ipsos Issues Monitor and much else”

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  2. Blobbit @ #2499 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 4:41 pm

    I was there until 1995 as a student, up to 2006 or so as staff. The “hatred” between law and engineering continues. It’s all pretty good natured though.

    Engineers hate Lawyers because Lawyers make more money.
    Lawyers hate Engineers because Engineers have more charisma.

  3. “Yup. The Chinese lied. the WHO lied. The Democrats lied. The doctors and nurses lied. Anthony Fauci lied. It’s just a normal flu season.”

    They’ll just flip instantly from it being like normal flu, to it’s the worst thing ever, the Chinese did it deliberately, why didn’t those liberal scientists warn us.

  4. Blobbit

    Scrawled on the toilet wall at the Union building of Newcastle University, above the toilet paper roll was the words..

    “ARTS DEGREES”

  6. And FYI I used to hang out with a bunch of med students. The engineering students were too busy getting drunk and hiring hookers.

  10. “Cud Chewersays:
    Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 4:44 pm
    Blobbit

    Scrawled on the toilet wall at the Union building of Newcastle University, above the toilet paper roll was the words..

    “ARTS DEGREES””

    Yup. I think the toilets in every engineering building have that

  12. I tried to get a T shirt from the ETU while working in the Pilbara but wasn’t successful. (I wasn’t a member) Theres said “Put a spark in your life, love an electrician”

  13. “Cud Chewersays:
    Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 4:50 pm
    Blobbit.. I’ve no idea what news he was responding to.”

    The Peter Martin tweet? Me neither. I guess Albo has made a speech.

  15. I always remember in the more puritan days of Joh Bjelke-Petersen some union guys were being interviewed on TV over some dispute and for some reason they didn’t seem to spot a guy with a T-shirt on that said :

    Flo has ONE – Joe is ONE

  16. ”Labor proposes far-from-shovel-ready high speed rail as way out of the coronavirus slump…”

    We could do worse than, say, building school halls and insulating homes. I mean it, this type of work that can be up and running quickly, no long lead times, is just what we need. It was the way to go in the wake of the GFC and the way to go squared now. For the medium term, maybe some renewable energy projects might be suitable.

  17. Martin seems to think that short term sugar hits and medium term ‘shovel ready’ programs will be sufficient. This is not the GCF. It is not a normal recession. This global 21st century depression will need long term infrastructure and other government spending to pull us out of it. The response needs to be measured in decades, not weeks, months or a couple of years.

    VFT networks, Scaling up the EV charging network, rebuilding Malcolm’s fraudband to become the true NBN as originally envisaged, massively expanding commuter rail and metro rail networks in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane should all be on the drawing board. Start now and these programs will collectively be supporting the economy for the next 30 years. Good.

  18. Cud Chewersays:
    Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 12:31 pm
    mundo

    I agree. Now rather than continued snark, how about some good ideas about how Labor can become far more professional at educating voters.
    __________________________________________________-
    Stop sourcing MP’s from the Union movement would be the 1st step.

  19. re engineers versus everyone else particularly lawyers

    FWIW there are only two MP in the whole Australian parliament with a qualification or background in engineering that I can see
    There is a ridiculous number of arts/lawyers and MBA or business qualified.

    In terms of that supposed fight it looks like the lawyers won parliament and a more unrepresentative cohort of the Australian population seems hard to find. Given the jobs for mates and factional system of the major parties is that any surprise?

    I once started engineering at one of the G8 uni’s and found the engineering cohort such a bunch of immature dickheads, whose cultural activities amounted to weekly kegs of beers and porn movies, who also made paper planes during lectures… I figured they were mostly private school wankers at the time and the very few women enrolled found them mostly annoying wankers too.

    Anyway the two I can see as MP’s with engineering background are

    Karen Andrews LNP, who worked for power companies in Qld, a coal supporter likely but apparently not a lot to contribute

    The most qualified in engineering that I can see is Mehreen Faruqi of the Greens, with Bachelor, Masters and PhD level qualifications in engineering. Her father was professor of engineering, her husband, brothers, sister and father in law are all engineers, civil and structural mostly it seems.
    It seems one of Mehreen’s notable texts is – ‘Embracing Complexity To Enable Change’, and she won a 2013 award from UNSW school of chemical engineering for leadership in engineering

  20. Steve – I don’t think that kind of pump priming – while welcome and a ‘good start’ – will be sufficient. We need some real long term protein building projects as well.

  21. @noplaceforsheep
    ·
    2m
    Which is worse, Morrison organising a film crew before he prays, or Morrison organising a film crew before he makes curry?

  22. 12 months from now.

    The Trump administration will been seen as having threaded the needle but at an extremely high cost in future debt and to recover part of the money, they and many developed countries will tell China that the treasury bills they hold and other financial investments they’ve made are now worth zero.
    The November general election will be a bloodbath.
    Any Governor who issued authoritarian decrees that infringed on Liberty, particularly the first amendment will be voted out of office. Nancy Pelosi will be blamed for the Democratic Party losing the House because of her obstruction and Trump will be re-elected by a wide margin.
    China will be humiliated in the world stage and will explode in a bloody revolution ending in a fledgling democracy encouraged by current Taiwanese leaders.

  23. Steve777

    We could do worse than, say, building school halls and insulating homes.

    How about replacing demountable classrooms in NSW at least, with permanent, modern, solar powered classrooms. That should keep the construction industry engaged for years.

  24. Redlands Mowerman @ #2522 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 5:04 pm

    12 months from now.

    The Trump administration will been seen as having threaded the needle but at an extremely high cost in future debt and to recover part of the money, they and many developed countries will tell China that the treasury bills they hold and other financial investments they’ve made are now worth zero.
    The November general election will be a bloodbath.
    Any Governor who issued authoritarian decrees that infringed on Liberty, particularly the first amendment will be voted out of office. Nancy Pelosi will be blamed for the Democratic Party losing the House because of her obstruction and Trump will be re-elected by a wide margin.
    China will be humiliated in the world stage and will explode in a bloody revolution ending in a fledgling democracy encouraged by current Taiwanese leaders.

    And the Teletubbies will win the Eurovision Song Contest.

  25. ”VFT networks, Scaling up the EV charging network, rebuilding Malcolm’s fraudband to become the true NBN as originally envisaged, massively expanding commuter rail and metro rail networks in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane should all be on the drawing board. Start now and these programs will collectively be supporting the economy for the next 30 years. Good.”

    That would be great. We won’t see it under conservative governments, quite the opposite.

  26. Here’s a thought.

    Osman Faruqi
    @oz_f
    ·
    18s
    Morrison’s obsession with projecting himself cooking food from Sri Lanka and Indonesia, while bragging about stopping the boats (largely consisting of people fleeing Sri Lanka and setting sail from Indonesia) is a fascinating metaphor for Australia’s approach to multiculturalism.

  27. Player One @ #2502 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 4:43 pm

    Blobbit @ #2499 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 4:41 pm

    I was there until 1995 as a student, up to 2006 or so as staff. The “hatred” between law and engineering continues. It’s all pretty good natured though.

    Engineers hate Lawyers because Lawyers make more money.
    Lawyers hate Engineers because Engineers have more charisma.

    Rubbish, Engineers get plenty of sex. It’s just with themselves.

  28. Granny, those were glorious days, made more so I suppose because we were young, free and booze was readily available at Steve’s pub down the road.

    The enmity between the the Engineering faculty and the faculty of Law was legendary, particularly during the winter sporting season. We (the lawyers) would smash the Engineers in Rugby Union, and they had the edge in Aussie Rules. I played competitive club rugby at the time, but the stouches with the Engines were up there with the most enjoyable..

    The Law faculty was housed in a square building designed like a fortress, with a pair of iron gates on two sides, and balconies all around on each of, I recall, two upper levels.

    Word would get around that they were intending to storm our fortress and we would prepare our defences with water balloons and flour bombs. As they attacked in droves, we pelted ’em from above.

    Because of the geographic location of the Engineering building and it’s design, we couldn’t return the favour. However, on one occasion we were informed that their faculty had acquired a television for use in their student’s common room. A mate and I raided the medical faculty and borrowed two lab coats. We then went into the Engineering common room wearing them and removed the TV, explaining that it needed servicing due to an electrical fault.

    That TV adorned the Law common room for six months before our Dean (who couldn’t stop himself from laughing) announced that the Dean of engineering had made a formal request for it’s return.

    My mate and I spent the evening disassembling the TV set valve by valve, put the parts and the carcass in boxes and delivered it back to the front of the Engineering faculty together with a note to the effect of “you’re engineers, fix it.”

    We also had an annual Tug of War with the Engines in front of the Reid Library building which had a long ornamental pool before it.
    There was a trophy involved, the R.U. Pulling Cup, as I recall.

    The idea was that the two teams would endeavour to “pond” each other by pulling the opposition into the pool. Now, in those days there were very few female Engineering students, but lots of female Law students, so the Lawyers were limited in the number of beefy blokes to select from. We almost invariably lost, and were sick of it.

    A cunning plan was hatched, involving a strategically placed escape motor bike, a bomb being exploded in the bushes from which a well tomato sauced lawyer emerged screaming blue murder, a series of passes of the trophy from the trophy table to the motor bike rider, and the securing of the trophy back to the Fortress.

    A few unfortunate lawyers were duly ponded by the engines, but that’s the price you pay for success.

  29. lizzie @ #2484 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 4:31 pm

    Bongiorno calling for a little calm on the evil Murdoch. Hmmm.

    Paul Bongiorno
    @PaulBongiorno
    ·
    3m
    BTW working for Murdoch does not equal sharing his views. I have worked for Rupert twice WIN 4 and Ten and Lachlan once. At all times the MEAA code of ethics was expected and adhered to.Maybe things are different now.

    Lala land stuff from Bongi there.

  31. And sadly HSR is not shovel ready
    But there are some rail projects in Sydney that could get underway within 18 months – including two new metros.

  32. The only thing i will say about engineers is their textbooks are scary. I did a group assignment with an engineering student and flipped through one of the textbooks and honestly it was a horror show yet he waltz through the degree with HD’s.

    Yet at the other end of difficulty are the communications students in one unit only needing to find four newspaper articles then write a small essay on each.

  34. “I once started engineering at one of the G8 uni’s and found the engineering cohort such a bunch of immature dickheads…”

    Yep, pretty much. Most of them grow up, but a first year tutorial is hard work.

  37. I pretty much agree with AE’s post above. For a short term hit, rather than halls and insulation this time, maybe solar panels. Set up a PV factory here as well.

    Other short term stuff; more social housing, upgrading existing transport infrastructure, replace old water mains.

    There’ll need to be projects on the soft side as well. Not my area, but maybe we could employ enough lawyers to make legal aid work, as an example.

  38. Blobbit

    Scrawled on the toilet wall at the Union building of Newcastle University, above the toilet paper roll was the words..
    ____________________
    Scrawled on the toilet wall at my high school were the words:

    “Don’t look up here, the joke’s between your legs. ”

    This didn’t apply to me though.

  42. The Engineering students at Sydney Uni would get drunk at the Union and march in a mob over to Manning House to harrass the Arts students. Gave campus security the heebeejeebees

  46. Blobbit @ #2510 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 4:49 pm

    “Peter Martin
    @1petermartin
    Labor proposes far-from-shovel-ready high speed rail as way out of the coronavirus slump. #thoughtbubble #notingovernment #auspol”

    Ridiculous. The future is in telecommunications, EV infrastructure, and renewable energy. Try building some of that.

  47. sprocket_ @ #2542 Sunday, April 19th, 2020 – 5:56 pm

    The Engineering students at Sydney Uni would get drunk at the Union and march in a mob over to Manning House to harrass the Arts students. Gave campus security the heebeejeebees

    The Engineering students at Sydney Uni were instantly recognisable by their flannelette shirts and footy shorts, worn all year round. The only difference being that the summer ones had the arms ripped off.

  48. Labor could propose immediately replacing FTTN with FTTP

    Not only something that can start happening tomorrow, but it will also drive the right wingers nuts.

  50. “Cud Chewersays:
    Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 5:54 pm
    Blobbit

    I have a pumped hydro energy storage plant they could build”

    Yep, should do that as well. And some wind farms – as long as we do more than pour the concrete footings here.

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