Newspoll: 50-50

Scott Morrison gains further momentum in his remarkable but apparently voteless approval rating turnaround.

Courtesy of The Australian, the first Newspoll in three weeks is consistent with the last in suggesting the coronavirus surge in approval for Scott Morrison in translating into only a modest dividend on voting intention, on which the two parties are now tied after the Coalition opened up a 51-49 lead last time. On the primary vote, the Coalition is down a point to 41%, Labor up two to 36%, the Greens down one to 12% and One Nation down one to 4%. Despite that, Scott Morrison has gained further on his huge approval rating boost in the last poll, up seven to 68% — a level not seen since Kevin Rudd reached 70% in late 2008 — while his disapproval rating is down seven to 28%. Anthony Albanese is respectively steady at 45% and down two to 34% (I assume — the report says 36%, but this would be unchanged on last time), and Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister is now 56-28, out from 53-29. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1519.

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.

827 comments on “Newspoll: 50-50”

Comments Page 9 of 17
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  1. meher baba @ #397 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 2:57 pm

    Victoria: “It’s just partisan trolling from the usual suspects.”

    Nonsense. There has been no trolling whatsoever from me. I have praised Andrews in the past: I’ve long been quite impressed with him. My criticism is specific to his handling of coronavirus, and it’s not just about him: I have also been frequently critical of the statements made by the CHO.

    All I would expect from State and Territory Governments is clear and consistent messaging, tied to transparent courses of action. Six out of eight of them (4 Labor, 2 Coalition) have done very well in this regard IMO. NSW appears to have stuffed up re the Ruby Princess.

    Victoria has been all over the place from the outset: Sutton’s series of dire early predictions, the advice to people to get two months’ worth of essential medicines (when they are only allowed one month’s worth under the PBS), the continuing vague ruminations by Andrews and Sutton about moving to stage 4, the on again-off again bonking ban, and the wildly inconsistent decision to allow people to go to their holiday houses (which was kind of sort of reversed when it was far too late). And, all the way through, a fair bit of posturing along the lines of: “Morrison doesn’t want to take action to protect the health of Australians, but I’m going to force him to do so.”

    You have called me a troll on a number of occasions and have made silly parochial comments about the Tasmanian Government (which institution I have no interest whatsoever in defending), but you have never commented on the list of failings I have given above (for the umpteenth time).

    You’re not trolling, you’re just being a pedant.


  2. Victoria says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 2:54 pm

    Frednk

    I see it simply as trolling. Nothing more.

    Trolling is supposed to annoy the shit out of you, this is as if the shovel guys have given up and decided to post on pollbludger.

    Given that trump has us injecting dettol, Pauline is lying down int he middle of a paddock and the potato is letting thousands of people into the country with corona virus I do understand them giving up, the shovel guys that is.

  4. Meher baba

    You mean I have missed your reams of analysis regarding the Morrison govt missteps or the latest backtracking from the NSW govt regarding beaches for example.
    Pull the other one

  7. So briefly is back? Has he been away doing a research paper for his PhD to ‘prove’ the COVID-19 virus originated anywhere but China? 😐

  10. Victoria: “You mean I have missed your reams of analysis regarding the Morrison govt missteps or the latest backtracking from the NSW govt regarding beaches for example.”

    And, over many years, I’ve missed all your positive comments about anything the Coalition side of politics has achieved. It’s a bit of a giggle when you start accusing me of being biased!

    I have frequently criticised the Morrison Government’s initial response to coronavirus: there was lots of confusion in their messaging, culminating in a bit of a train wreck performance by Murphy and Hunt on Insiders. And then they started to get their act together, and have performed pretty well since then IMO.

    I thought decisions about beaches in NSW were being taken by individual local councils rather than the State Government. But perhaps there was a stumble there somewhere that I missed: the NSW Govt has undoubtedly made a few.

  12. mundosays:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 11:02 am
    Australia’s 3 longest serving Prime ministers, in order;
    Morrison
    Menzies
    Howard.

    Has a ring to it dontcha think……
    _______________________________________________________________________________________
    Um, no.
    Australia’s longest-serving PMs, in order of time in office:
    Menzies
    Howard
    Hawke
    Fraser
    Hughes
    Lyons
    Bruce

    Morrison has been PM for only two years, come August. If he is still PM at the next election he will have been PM for about four years.
    I really don’t know why Mundo bothers to post.

  13. If act and intent were the only matters brought into account in sentencing, the personal circumstances including privations of those forced into a life of crime would count for nothing.

    That would not be a good outcome for indigenous defendants.

    Plus please of guilty would dry up in a hurry.

  14. New Zealand says it has stopped community transmission of Covid-19, effectively eliminating the virus.

    With new cases in single figures for several days – one on Sunday – Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the country had “won that battle” for now.

    The news comes hours before New Zealand moves out of its toughest level of social restrictions.

  15. I’m a pedant because, when I’m accused of being biased in my criticism of the Andrews Government, I produce a list of examples to back my case.

    I guess evidence-backed arguments are a bit of a novelty on PB.

  16. Meher baba

    And of course, you spend so much time telling us about the missteps of the Morrison govt, NSW govt and the Tasmanian govt at every opportunity.
    Oh wait……
    As I said. Pull the other one.

  19. C@tmomma says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 3:07 pm
    So briefly is back? Has he been away doing a research paper for his PhD to ‘prove’ the COVID-19 virus originated anywhere but China?

    ….a typically ‘bemused’ post by a fully paid-up Sinophobe….

  21. meher baba @ #417 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:13 pm

    I’m a pedant because, when I’m accused of being biased in my criticism of the Andrews Government, I produce a list of examples to back my case.

    I guess evidence-backed arguments are a bit of a novelty on PB.

    Your items of focus are very selective and I’d question your priorities.

  22. m b

    I guess evidence-backed arguments are a bit of a novelty on PB

    lol doesn’t take long to ascertain that. Speculation, rumour and anecdotes are the way to go!

  23. OC

    I would be surprised if that information was obtained without consent from MyHealth
    I worked in a hospital where one of the resident doctors did not follow protocol in attempting to access a My Health record. The response was immediate and punitive.
    The investigation and “please explain” was exytensive with the resident lucky to escape with a warning

    Thanks for that info. I have a friend who was a Police Detective. He refused to use the computer system and got admin people to do the searches he needed. Apparently if you stumbled into somewhere you should not be, even by mistake, the consequences were severe.

  24. Sure there’s been a couple of over-reaches by Andrews and his CHO … usually quickly wound back. Hardly a hanging offence and I think the voting public are sympathetic to the difficult choices facing the state governments, often with limited information.

    In the broad scheme of things Andrews is well regarded, and I think second only to the WA premier in the recent poll asking people to rate their State Gov’s response to Covid19.

    I suspect when the history of the virus in Australia is written the State Premiers will get a pretty positive write up, less so the Feds.

  25. Rex Douglas says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 3:18 pm
    meher baba @ #417 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:13 pm

    I’m a pedant because, when I’m accused of being biased in my criticism of the Andrews Government, I produce a list of examples to back my case.

    I guess evidence-backed arguments are a bit of a novelty on PB.
    Your items of focus are very selective and I’d question your priorities.

    Oh the lulz. Rexology has taken up self-satire.

  26. Interesting that NZ spent more than 4 weeks in a level 4 lock down and might zoom through level 3 to level 2 after just 2 weeks.

    ‘Level 3 will see retailers, restaurants and schools allowed to reopen on a smaller scale. Schools will reopen on Wednesday for children up to Year 10 who cannot study from home, or whose parents need to return to work.

    Workers will also be able to resume on-site work, provided they have a Covid-19 control plan in place, with appropriate health and safety and physical distancing measures. It is expected one million New Zealanders will return to work on Tuesday.

    Ardern said the country would remain at level 3 for two weeks before cabinet decided on whether to move to level 2.’

  28. Bushfire Bill says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 2:34 pm
    We’re not talking The Matrix here. It’s not a scene from Enemy Of The State, or The Conversation. Kafka wasn’t on the consultation panel for the app. It wasn’t written on a HAL-9000. George Orwell’s dead, and 1984 was a novel. You’re just as likely to get your daily dose of misinformation from Twitter or Facebook as you are to get it from a Trump media conference or Sky News.
    _______
    With so many pop-culture references is BB auditioning for a writing gig at the Good Weekend?

  29. D&M

    [OC
    I would be surprised if that information was obtained without consent from MyHealth
    I worked in a hospital where one of the resident doctors did not follow protocol in attempting to access a My Health record. The response was immediate and punitive.
    The investigation and “please explain” was exytensive with the resident lucky to escape with a warning
    Thanks for that info. I have a friend who was a Police Detective. He refused to use the computer system and got admin people to do the searches he needed. Apparently if you stumbled into somewhere you should not be, even by mistake, the consequences were severe.]

    You are right. Prosecution of offenders is very standard.

  31. RD

    Your items of focus are very selective and I’d question your priorities.

    Everyone of us can be accused of that at one time or another.

  32. Bushfire Bill @ #368 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 2:34 pm

    Love how the basement anarchists and underground guerillas here, waging war against the goosestepping Scott Morrison coming to burn their villages down and confiscate their yellowing Che Guevara posters from the 60s, instead place their trust in a completely unverifiable random message from an anonymous Twitterer. You read it above. It’s the one about a third party allegedly not getting a job because of a history of clinical depression revealed from alleged unauthorised access of their MyHealth records.

    With gullibility like this on open display it’s easy to see how Yummy Mummys in Mullumbimbie latch onto mad theories about vaccination causing autism, high voltage cables inducing cancer, wind turbines sending them mad, measles parties being a fun thing, and how 5G mobile data gives you coronavirus by upsetting natural life wavelengths deep in the cerebral cortex.

    Last I heard, your MyHealth records weren’t part of the virus app and Bluetooth can’t access your tax file number.

    Then we have “It’s not perfect, so I won’t install it. And I’m in IT. So I should know.” Whatever happened to the chants of “The perfect is the enemy of the possible” when you were giving stick to the Greens over Climate, or Boat People policy? “Possible” was a good thing then. Perfection belonged to the pixies in the bottom of the garden.

    And if your battery uses a few extra milliamps per hour, there’s this thing called “a charger”. You’ve probably got one lying around somewhere.

    So you go down to the local mall to do some shopping. There’s a shop assistant there soaking in the virus, touching everything, despite feelingbreal well (except for that tickle in her throat). She might even be the chick who’s wiping down the shopping trollies as “a service to our valued customers”. You’d rather not know this, why? You don’t like Bluetooth ads? When was the last time a Bluetooth ad put you on a respirator in ICU gasping for breath?

    We’re not talking The Matrix here. It’s not a scene from Enemy Of The State, or The Conversation. Kafka wasn’t on the consultation panel for the app. It wasn’t written on a HAL-9000. George Orwell’s dead, and 1984 was a novel. You’re just as likely to get your daily dose of misinformation from Twitter or Facebook as you are to get it from a Trump media conference or Sky News.

    Morrison is a liar, a deceiver and a natural born con-man. I fully agree with that. But if this app is found to be a Trojan Horse for control of all our lives and associations via the mechanism of Bluetooth pings we’ll hear about it real quick. About as quick as Morrison and his government will be hounded from office.

    It’s easy to sit back on a pension, or with a superannuation cushion and a paid-off mortgage to protect us, and allow us to live once again the various “They’re coming to get me” paranoia of our youths.

    Firstly, they’re not coming to get us. Not with an app.

    Second, there are millions out there who don’t have those economic buffers to fall back on, who are out of work actually. Today. Coronavirus is not theoretical to them. They can’t afford to nuance the politics of it. They need this catastrophe to be over, so they can get back to work and income. Don’t let YOUR perfect be the enemy of THEIR possible.

    The longer this goes on the more we ALL suffer. Eventually ALL our cosy cash and investment buffers will be worthless.

    If the app doesn’t work, or if it’s a Trojan Horse, just delete it, or turn your phone off. If it’s impossible to delete, then I’ll join you in storming the barricades, plus I’ll volunteer for the firing squad unless Morrison and his government aren’t hung from lamp posts first.

    Until then, put aside the drama and the paranoia, and run the app.

    Such a lot of grand guignol projections. Such a lot of discrimination in order to make people feel small. Such a lot of sturm und drang. Signifying a very weak case to take up the app if you don’t really need to. So yeah, I’ll continue sitting here on my well-padded backside, on my pension (and since when has that become a reason to deride someone?) and Not. Require. The. Damned. App.

    Btw, no one wipes down my trolley at Coles. None of the doomsday scenarios have occurred/are likely to occur to me.

    Where am I supposed to plug a charger in to when I’m at the shops? And no, I’m not going to carry around a heavy power bank as well just so I can feel as if I’m doing my civic duty in having the app on my phone.

    It’s got nothing to do with warm fuzzy reminiscences of my days as a spliff-smoking Che Guevara-idolising revolutionary anarchist either. I never have been a follower. I simply assess things on their merits. This app, which I’m not afraid of either, nor quaking in my boots that it will be used to follow my movements, is simply a burdensome boondoggle to me. Who needs it? I don’t.

    If you’re still working, like the people at the Post Office parcel sorting centre in the government’s slick TV ad, then yes. I just can’t see the need from my perspective.

  33. Continually Insufferable @ #419 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:17 pm

    C@tmomma says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 3:07 pm
    So briefly is back? Has he been away doing a research paper for his PhD to ‘prove’ the COVID-19 virus originated anywhere but China?

    ….a typically ‘bemused’ post by a fully paid-up Sinophobe….

    Absolute crap.

  35. Continually Insufferable @ #425 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:22 pm

    Rex Douglas says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 3:18 pm
    meher baba @ #417 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:13 pm

    I’m a pedant because, when I’m accused of being biased in my criticism of the Andrews Government, I produce a list of examples to back my case.

    I guess evidence-backed arguments are a bit of a novelty on PB.
    Your items of focus are very selective and I’d question your priorities.

    Oh the lulz. Rexology has taken up self-satire.

    Welcome back old trout.

    Looking forward to you jumping on the hook again. 😆

  37. The National Cabinet on the money c/- the Guardian

    [Brendan Murphy says there doesn’t have to be zero cases of Covid-19 to convince national cabinet to relax restrictions:

    National cabinet has endorsed a strategy of significant suppression, if we get elimination as part of that which we are probably are seeing in some parts of the country that is fantastic, elimination is never a certain situation, because you can never be sure, the fact you haven’t detected in cases for a week doesn’t mean there might be some cases circulating, so you still have to have all those public health response measures.

    On New Zealand, which went harder than Australia in an attempt to eliminate the virus, the professor says:

    It is a semantic difference between our situation here and New Zealand is very similar, in terms of per capita case numbers they have certainly because they are a smaller population with very few cases at the moment, but they would recognise elimination as a label, because you cannot be 100% sure there aren’t cases you are not detecting.

    So you still have to do all of that surveillance, testing, and have all the response capabilities ready if you release measures, you can’t be sure about elimination for many months, until after you have released measures. We are in a very similar position, it’s a somewhat semantic difference, both countries are committed to really controlling the virus to as low as possible, and of possible elimination, that’s great.]

  38. nath @ #428 Monday, April 27th, 2020 – 3:24 pm

    Bushfire Bill says:
    Monday, April 27, 2020 at 2:34 pm
    We’re not talking The Matrix here. It’s not a scene from Enemy Of The State, or The Conversation. Kafka wasn’t on the consultation panel for the app. It wasn’t written on a HAL-9000. George Orwell’s dead, and 1984 was a novel. You’re just as likely to get your daily dose of misinformation from Twitter or Facebook as you are to get it from a Trump media conference or Sky News.
    _______
    With so many pop-culture references is BB auditioning for a writing gig at the Good Weekend?

    Hasn’t he been sacked from there already …?

  39. Holden Hillbilly: “New Zealand says it has stopped community transmission of Covid-19, effectively eliminating the virus. With new cases in single figures for several days – one on Sunday – Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the country had “won that battle” for now.”

    Well, it appears that NZ has achieved their goal of “elimination” after having had around 40 new cases in the past week and while still having over 200 active cases. And having tested only 2.5 per cent of the population.

    I wonder what a “suppression” result in NZ would have looked like? It would be interesting to hear what the critics of Australian governments for having aimed for suppression rather than elimination would have to say on this topic.

  40. RD

    The big picture is always the priority.

    Leadership. Equality. Environment.

    Totally agree. That’s where I am always coming from. It’s why I don’t support either major political party.

  41. shellbell: “The National Cabinet on the money c/- the Guardian”

    Well, yes. Although, to be fair to the NZ Government, I can’t find a statement from them at any stage that they were going for a scenario of the type Murphy foreshadowed (that is, months of waiting and testing before restrictions could be lifted). This suggestion was more coming from their cheer squad in NZ and Australia.

  42. “The director general of health, Ashley Bloomfield, said that the transmission of the virus had been “eliminated”.

    Could I have a link for that. Given his performance over the last month or two I doubt he would mix up eradication and elimination.

  44. PB is always a far more interesting place to visit when posters such as MB and m b post. They add diversity of opinion, always expressed well whether you agree or not, a diversity that needs to be encouraged at all times.

  45. meher baba

    Perhaps you could spend more time slagging off your own state’s performance and policies ? How many 100% times higher death rate than Aus or NZ is it ?

  50. Lizzie:

    @colonelhogans
    ·
    2h
    The privacy concerns with governments app are bad enough, but I for one, never walk around with my blue tooth on as nearly every bloody app you use now wants you to have blue tooth on so they can track you for marketing reasons. My blue tooth stays off!

    I believe that (but have not been able to confirm) the Apple/Google framework effectively introduces a new BlueTooth mode that allows one to keep BlueTooth undiscoverable but somehow “pre-paired” to other instances of the App. This would stop marketing tracking etc. whilst providing a working App.

    Only the OS suppliers can do this (or Jailbreak the phone…)

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