The usual weekly Essential Research coronavirus poll finds “only a quarter” of respondents now consider it too soon to be easing coronavirus restrictions, down from a peak of 49% in mid-April. There was also strong support for a range of fresh restrictions being imposed if there is a new surge of cases, but not for making the coronavirus app compulsory, which only 38% supported. Only 45% were confident the government would be able to adequately protect data from the app, and 44% were confident the government itself would not misuse it. Kristina Keneally’s call for a reduction in temporary migration after the pandemic had the support of 67% of respondents. All this detail is derived from The Guardian, which also tells us that the number of respondents who are “quite concerned” about the virus is up three points since last week to 49%, but without the “very concerned” figure it’s hard to know what if anything to make of that. The full report from the pollster should be published later today.
UPDATE: Full report here. The government reaches new heights on the eighth weekly iteration of the question as to how well it is handling the crisis, with good up five points to 71% and poor down one to 13%. The goodwill extends to state governments, who are collectively up three on good to 73% and steady on poor at 12%. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1067.
I’ve been following this Twitter handle with respect to the Victorian stats on covid
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Conversation
Mena Ning WANG, PhD
@mena_wang
Replying to
@JennyMikakos
Thanks for the update!
120 Active cases (+9)
~230.9 confirmed cases per million people
+15,745 tests
Tests per thousand people: ~43.8
Test positive rate: 0.53% (relatively low, pls see my other tweets for international comparison)
Interactive charts: https://infogram.com/covid-19-cases
meher baba @ #1429 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:13 pm
The flip side of that is that by trying to filter down to just the “deserving” businesses a lot of legitimate claimants get left out. Or delayed to the point that they starve to death. Not what you want if you’re trying to avert disaster.
Better to pay everyone and not worry about it. As long as the abusers aren’t just throwing their cash in a pile somewhere (and some of them will, sure) they’re not actually harming the intent of the stimulus. As soon as they spend the money on something it still ends up supporting legitimate businesses and jobs.
Bucephalus @ #1438 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:21 pm
That’s something for the courts to work out (jobs and growth!) after the crisis has been averted. If the goal is to save jobs you act to save jobs. Playing legalese quagmire won’t.
Not that most of what I mentioned hasn’t been implemented to some extent, anyways. Direct payments are being done; certainly there’s no legal difference between making a $1500/fortnight payment and making a $1500+/fortnight payment. Interest rates have been slashed. Rent relief is available to some, if not many. So…meh. 🙂
So, Cedar Meats is the Andrews Government’s Ruby Princess.
‘Bucephalus says:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:27 pm
boerwarsays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:04 pm
You must be extremely confident of getting an Albanese Government after the next election then, like you were about getting a Shorten one.’
Nice try at deflection.
I have no confidence that the systems of accountability in Australia can any longer prevent Morrison, Freydenberg and Cormann from lying big time about anything.
In relation to your other point, I was confident. Until I counted the hundreds of millions of dollars in corruption money used to prevent it.
It is now 100% clear from the sequence of events that Morrison authorized grant expenditure when he had no authority under the Constitution so to do.
Which is just one of the myriad examples of why this the most corrupt government since Federation.
The Alt- Right of Pollbludger seem unduly prickly and defensive today …
Victoria
They stuffed up. The very first employee testing positive should have been the trigger for a day long shutdown whilst absolutely everyone (and everyone they’ve contacted) is tested. There have been so many stupid decisions like this and not just in Victoria. Why weren’t we blanket testing nursing home staff from the first day?
There’s an Alt-Right here? How exciting.
Me either we deliberately built an economy that excluded workers and then built a fiction that it was their fault they’d been excluded, and then decided it was ok to deliberately humiliate starve and kill them. That kind of deep down nasty greed that has dominated Australia for at least 4 decades isn’t going to change over night.
a rsays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:30 pm
You are unserious and your recommendations lack merit.
You’ve gotta be paranoid and delusional to join so, no big surprise.
WeWantPaulsays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:33 pm
“Me either we deliberately built an economy that excluded workers and then built a fiction that it was their fault they’d been excluded, and then decided it was ok to deliberately humiliate starve and kill them. That kind of deep down nasty greed that has dominated Australia for at least 4 decades isn’t going to change over night.”
What the fuck?
The LNP is in big trouble.
They are going to an election campaigning on you lose your job.
Great to see Labor on the front foot.
Blind Freddy could see that the Cedar Meats cluster was not perfectly handled. At least the CMO is now being honest with the Victorian public. Which seems to be beyond Mikakos.
The media’s dole bludger view of the unemployed wasn’t far below the surface at today’s press conference when one asked the PM a question about how soon should they be looking. The media types wouldn’t know too many unemployed people so naturally assume the stereotype view. The government could just treat the jobseeker payment as income and tax it because its now high enough to justify taxing it.
Cud chewer
I call bullshit too.
The bushfires actually helped us with this crisis in more ways than one.
It made Morrison focus more keenly 0n the potential pandemic, after failing with the fires.
Also tourists were not coming to Australia, despite Morrison publicly asking for tourists to ignore their nations warning advices not to travel here.
In fact my Italian relatives were so concerned for us at the time. They kept contacting us to ask how we were coping with the fires.
Who would have thought just weeks later, Italy would be the one dealing with a major crisis.
It’s been a weird 2020
Post Virus the situation for workers is going to go backwards, not forwards.
It will go backwards because the Coalition wants it to go backwards.
There will be more, not less casualization.
The attempts to kill Super for the ordinaries will be strengthened, not weakened.
Wage stagnation and wage falls will increase, not decrease.
Unemployment and underemployment will go up, not down.
meher baba
“Hasn’t the ABS measured the concept of being “employed” in the same way for several decades now?”
Yes and no; that is the problem. The measures have stayed the same but the nature of employment has been changing, making them a less accurate measure of reality. The funding to ABS has declined in real terms over two decades, meaning that they have reduced the sample rate of the employment survey to the point where it is not very reliable. In my own work I have found gross errors in terms of inconsistencies between the census and labor force survey results for a given area.
Changes in total hours worked is probably a more accurate measure of changes in work in Australia today. The need to change the way we measure employment has been flagged well before Covid 19 came along.
https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-find-new-ways-to-measure-the-australian-labour-force-68802
That all being said, these figures are terrible by any measure.
There was much chatter here re cats and dogs…..
One cat, one year, 110 native animals: lock up your pet, its a killing machine
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6756566/one-cat-one-year-110-native-animals-lock-up-your-pet-its-a-killing-machine/?cs=14261
A current couple on Newstart with the supplement get $2120 per fortnight.
Pensioner couple get $1662 per fortnight. This includes the $1500 bonus each gets factored in.
Better not have your 66th birthday until the supplement ends.
Buce
WWP just described the neoliberal ideology of the LNP.
Stop following Reagan and Thatcher.
As it is the LNP are now campaigning with Peter Dutton the albatross poster boy of a party happy that people lose their jobs.
Taylormade
I doubt there is not one thing that can be perfect, but we use the word anyway to describe something close enough to being really good.
I guess the vic govt should have already reopened all the schools to all students.
all the cafes and restaurants to all and sundry, as the vic and fed coalition members have been demanding.
You know it makes perfect sense.
nath
lol. Hyperbole much by FS lol
Socrates
Thanks for stating the crux of the matter.
BW
Spot on about the trend.
The LNP ideology has been shafted by reality.
Already Cash has announced delay of returning to “Mutual Obligation”
That’s going to keep happening. Those numbers are a lot of voters receiving the you are not worth anything because the market cannot employ everyone social security policies.
Remember the cruelty is the point.
boerwar @ #1452 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:32 pm
I have no confidence that the Labor party can prevent Morrison, Freydenberg and Cormann from lying big time about anything.
boerwarsays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:32 pm
The Sports Grants had bugger all impact in the outcome of the election. It was no different to what King did before the 2013 election but that wasn’t followed up because the ALP lost. It really is “inside the Canberra Bubble” stuff. The ALP lost because Shorten was a boat anchor and their policies woofed.
Your definition of corruption is as rubbery as your definition of the Unemployment rate.
Without any fanfare as far as I’m aware, the Palaszczuk Government has given lessees in trailer parks in Queensland a $200 rebate on their electricity (one payment per trailer and payment made via energy suppliers). The rebate may also apply to households.
Bob Lynch
A retiree will likely have a lower cost of living with most being free of any mortgage or rent.
Hmm the senator that is being investigated for insider trading……?
emptywheel
@emptywheel
Honestly, my suspicion is that Trump runs the GOP such that everyone is allowed to crime, so long as they don’t cross him. That’s how he ran his campaign too.
The big Q is–how did Burr cross him and is that why Burr is so anxious for a quick declassification of SSCI’s report?
12:45 PM · May 14, 2020·TweetDeck
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Ben Caspi
@Ben_Caspi
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Replying to
@emptywheel
The Senate Intelligence Committee that Burr chairs came to the conclusion that Russia interfered to help Trump in 2016. That’s probably enough.
On one point Bushfire Bill is absolutely right.
I am privileged to be on a pension and therefore need not spend time fretting over getting a job.
However, I do sometimes worry that the pension will suddenly evaporate.
Mavis @ #1478 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:43 pm
It does. my last bill included the $200.
We should stop creating more Rainbow Lorikeet habitat because if we are not very careful we will be setting up the next pandemic:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-01/mysterious-virus-killing-lorikeets-in-queensland/12205888
Bucephalus @ #1440 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:27 pm
There’ll be no Albanese government.
But, Mundo can say with some degree of confidence the next Prime minister in Britain will be Keir Starmer. Put it in the bank.
A devestating reality for the LNP.
Regional areas will recover much more slowly than the city.
That’s a decade of voters self interest being to reject Laffer Curve Neoliberal Economics.
It’s Keynesian season
Lizzie
If the pension suddenly evaporates, it would mean that most other safety nets have also broken down. Which would mean that the whole system has collapsed for one reason or another.
In other words, a catastrophic situation.
The Pension will never go away. Too many Aged Care Providers rely on it for their income.
Buce
You seem confused.
My point was not that the corruption would lose them the next election but that the corruption is the worst since Federation.
You keep deflecting from that. I am not sure why.
Perhaps you are more concerned about keeping the corruption going by ensuring that the Coalition wins the next election.
And please don’t deflect by naming various Labor people who were corrupt as if that somehow or other absolves the most corrupt government since Federation.
You appear reluctant to acknowledge this.
I am not sure why.
guytaursays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:38 pm
You are still an irrelevant speck of dust.
Dutton got a +2.9% swing despite the massive campaign against him – that’s how terrible he is.
Slater & Gordon or Maurice Blackburn can kick off a class action re Cedar Meats against the Vic Govt using the provisions which increase their entitlement to legal costs legislated for them by the Vic Govt.
The only way the aged pension will be ended is if the superfund industry was able to generate above threshold balances.
I thought I read that slaughterhouses had been shut down in America for the same reasons of worker proximity – perhaps it wasn’t all of them.
Buce
That was before he started campaigning for people to lose their jobs
Qld Labor could not have asked for a better response in trying to save Virgin Airline workers jobs.
Great opening for Labor.
lizzie @ #1570 Thursday, May 14th, 2020 – 1:51 pm
No, I read today that slaughterhouses/meat processing facilities aren’t collating numbers affected by COVID-19 any more. They are going all in for Trump. Bugger the employees contracting Coronavirus. I didn’t know people could be so obviously venal!
It was in South Dakota though, where Michelle Bachmann 2.0 is the Republican Governor. So, like she cares.
boerwarsays:
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 1:48 pm
If there’s corruption call the Police.
Politics that you don’t like isn’t corruption.
Real corruption has been found in the ALP and Unions – do want the list of names of those jailed for corruption – the real “call the Police” corruption?
Wiki says no.
Wiki says it has only voted for a democrat pres once in 30 years – being 2008. Wiki says, up and down the ticket the district votes Republican.
So, the Ruby Princess is the Morrison Government’s Ruby Princess.
As for the government and its minders being thin skinned today, they have good reason. Today’s unemployment figures are far worse than any seen under Rudd or Gillard, which the Liberals blamed them for even though the GFC was plainly not their fault.
And those hubristic promises of a surplus by Scomo who has “already delivered a budget surplus next year”. No, he lied. It wasn’t already delivered, and now it never will be.
Dark shadow of Queensland Inc hangs over ‘investment’ that isn’t
Queensland Inc appears to be lurking behind this Government-inspired bid for Virgin. If it is we should all be worried.
https://inqld.com.au/opinion/2020/05/14/dark-shadow-of-queensland-inc-hangs-over-an-investment-that-isnt/
“Queenslanders are going to have to put a lot of trust in QIC boss Damien Frawley to carry this bid for Virgin because this is not an investment, it’s something else entirely.
It has been a few years since we saw Queensland Inc strutting its stuff down George Street so it’s timely to remember just how badly the Government has botched things when it dabbled in the market. The investment in Virgin sounds like a political decision, not one that has come from within the sharp pencils of QIC.
We can surmise that because the Queensland Government had already put its hand up for $200 million to have Virgin Mk II base itself in Brisbane without mentioning QIC. They were willing to throw $200 million of taxpayer money at reviving a company that had just collapsed with almost $7 billion in debt with very little to show in return on investment.
That’s not a sound basis for investment. You can guarantee that when QIC does its modelling on whether to invest in a company it doesn’t have anything to do with collapsed corporations overburdened with debt, crippling costs and in an industry littered with failures and government bailouts.
It might be politically astute to do this in an election year to save the estimated 5000 Virgin jobs in Queensland but when your revenue has been shattered and you can’t even deliver a Budget, it’s a brave government that tries to throw a few hundred million at a failed company.
Dubbing it “Project Maroon” and giving it a State of Origin flavour just adds to the concern.
:::
It was all lost. A big smoking ruin of political overreach.”
Socrates,
That was what Frydenberg was speaking about when he had that coughing fit earlier in the week.
He clearly could not swallow his own bullshit!
Bucephalus:
[‘The Sports Grants had bugger all impact in the outcome of the election.’]
In the defence of your team, you sometimes don’t get it. Even if the Sports’ rorts had no effect on the outcome of the election – and that’s moot – you are basically contending that it was okay to attempt to sway an election with bribes, with Morrison still claiming, contrary to the evidence, that he was he’s unaware it.