Essential Research: protests, union power and coronavirus policies

Support for anti-racism protests, though perhaps not right now; a mixed bag of outlooks on the trade union movement; and concern that coronavirus support is being withdrawn too early.

As reported by The Guardian, this week’s Essential Research survey focuses on black lives matter protests, union power and the government’s coronavirus policies, producing a mixed bag of results on each:

• Sixty-two per cent felt protesters were “justified in their demands for authorities to address the issue of Indigenous deaths in custody”, but 61% felt “the situation in America is very different to Australia and has no relevance”, and 84% felt protests amid the pandemic put the community at risk.

• Sixty per cent rated unions as very important or quite important for working people, and 74% felt they provided essential services, but 62% thought them too politically biased and 58% agreed that “union protection makes it difficult for employers to discipline, terminate or even promote employees”.

• Sixty-four per cent expressed concern about how the withdrawal of Jobkeeper subsidies “would sit with any second wave of the pandemic”, 53% considered the government had broken a promise by withdrawing payments for childcare workers, 55% thought it too soon to remove support and 43% supported extending free childcare (up seven points on a month ago), but 57% thought the government needed to withdraw help from “some industries”.

The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1087; a full report will be published later today.

UPDATE: Full report here.

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.

1,991 comments on “Essential Research: protests, union power and coronavirus policies”

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  1. If there were no corrupt like liberal party branch stacking

    John Howard , Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, Scott Morrison would never been leaders and prime ministers

  2. Scott

    When you compare the bullying between Labor and the LNP its clear to me that the formal faction system has led to less bullying. Edit: Just ask Julie Bishop
    Reform not throwing out the whole system is the go.

  3. guytaur

    Yes it is brutal in the Liberal Party to make matters worst , the liberal party and National party are controlled by foreign influences , media and not in the best interest for Australians ,hence the more bullying by those in the liberal party

  4. Victoria – the Parliamentary Party is behind their leader. Onwards to the election. Not sure why some planks thought they would try it on now given the LNP are in a pretty good position.

  5. Mr and Mrs McCormack attend the Melbourne Cup via return flights on the taxpayer.
    Feeling some sort of weird compulsion to follow the ‘rules’ McCormack repeats a three year old funding pledge which has somehow missed coming up in three years of rorts.

    This follows shortly after Robert, Tehan and Birmingham snouted the trough.

    The Deputy Prime Minister and three ministers in the most corrupt Government since Federation.

  6. Why isn’t Morrison under pressure about the disgusting comment that Senator Stoker made , for political advantage against the QLD premier

  7. boerwar @ #55 Tuesday, June 16th, 2020 – 6:55 am

    Mr and Mrs McCormack attend the Melbourne Cup via return flights on the taxpayer.
    Feeling some sort of weird compulsion to follow the ‘rules’ McCormack repeats a three year old funding pledge which has somehow missed coming up in three years of rorts.

    This follows shortly after Robert, Tehan and Birmingham snouted the trough.

    The Deputy Prime Minister and three ministers in the most corrupt Government since Federation.

    It would be interesting to see how much correlation there is between re-announcements and Party/social events.

  8. lizzie @ #41 Tuesday, June 16th, 2020 – 8:33 am

    @Bukumbooee
    ·
    10h
    Geez it’s a shame a Labor MP wasn’t just bonking staff, getting other MP’s to give them a job while they were preggers, then a made a big of chunk of change selling salacious details to MSM while LNP covered up with Envoyship shut up bribes etc. They’d be off Scotty-free. Mr Albanese said this morning.

  9. Scott

    Stoker said wtte “it was just the language that was floating around”.

    That says so much about her lack of sensitivity and judgement.

  10. Phillip Lodge
    @phlogga
    ·
    6m
    The thing about branch stacking is it cheats the genuine members of the party and has little to do with the general public who ultimately vote for candidates or not. On the other hand, rorting parliamentary allowances is directly stealing from the taxpayer. That’s a real crime.

  11. Frednk
    The state liberals were up against it in 2018. A bit hard when your opponent is using taxpayer funded staff for internal party business. How much do you reckon the Vic ALP will have to reimburse the Vic taxpayer this time ? Was 380k after the redshirts saga.

  12. [The thing about branch stacking is it cheats the genuine members of the party and has little to do with the general public who ultimately vote for candidates or not]

    There is a box marked tendentious into which that proposition should be placed, probably at the top.

  13. mundo says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 8:58 am

    Mr Albanese said earlier this morning.
    ————————–

    Albanese and Labor members need to keep the pressure on during question time, in asking questions to Morrison about his involvement

    They will catch Morrison out in misleading the house

  14. Cud Chewer

    If you are around, there is some happier news here about public transport and Covid19. It suggests that, with mask wearing and moderate social distancing (less than here) there is no evidence of covid 19 transmission in major city metros in Paris and Tokyo.
    https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2020/06/coronavirus-risk-transit-france-japan-trains-subway-buses/612841/

    Final comments on branch stacking – yes it is everywhere but so is tax evasion. That doesn’t make it right and all those who don’t do it still don’t like it. Labor won’t win unless it is seen to oppose it. Also, those who have practiced it hardest are precisely the faceless men who have most damaged Labor’s electability while in office. So like tax-evasion, the fight against it must be eternal.

  15. Trump is only concerned about his own reelection at this point, things like Supreme Courrt decisions I doubt bother him at all.

    But this has interesting repercussions here, just as the US has decided religious objection is no basis for discrimination against LGBT+ people in employment or service provision, we are talking about introducing laws to legalise religious discrimination against LGBT+ people……Urgh

  16. It will be interesting to see what the orange one has to say about one of HIS judges going against him.

    There is a point in time where the most blind adherent will realise the cause is lost. Trump MAY think the MAGA rallies prove massive support but the reality is that his campaign is heading towards a brick wall and barring exceptional actions (aka Civil War) Trump will lose Bigly.

  17. Thanks Victoria.

    Any big scalps come to mind?

    Do you think the Vic police commissioner would be pleased that the Gobbo Royal Commission won’t report until fairly long after his retirement?

  18. Barney

    I did not say that. I said the culture of the LNP denying factions allowed the attempt.

    The Greens had a similar problem with Left Renewal.

    Its not the politics of others infiltrating its keeping the democratic forms in place to prevent manipulation.

  19. lizzie says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 8:59 am
    Scott

    Stoker said wtte “it was just the language that was floating around”.

    That says so much about her lack of sensitivity and judgement.
    ———————

    The media would not let any Labor member to get away with
    Albanese would be bombarded with questions like

    Does he agree with what was said ?

    If not will the person that made the comment be punish?

  20. Questiom now is does Tim Kennedy take Somyurek’s position on the National Executive and if so does he vote with the Left.

    Albanese is playing with fire.

  21. guytaur says:

    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 7:51 am

    [‘In a bonus Chief Justice Roberts ruled against the Trump administration.’]

    That’s not surprising. Roberts is quite a reasonable judge, who pulled Trump into line when he referred to certain federal judges as “Obama judges”. I note that Trump appointed lackey Kavanaugh dissented, though his other appointee, Gorsuch, was in the majority. Overall, a very good decision, and a slap in the face for Trump.

  22. “Donald Trump Jr has put a ‘poll’ up on his website. Takes pushpolling that one step further..”

    ***

    Oh, and what do you know, he’s still calling the Dems socialists. How is that possible though?!? This was only supposed to happen if Fidel Castro was their nominee!

    …oh, sorry, I meant Bernie Sanders. All that brainwashing from the mainstream media must have got me.

    Biden the socialist hey. lol

    …it’s not as stupid as it sounds though. The far-right extremists who dance to Trump’s tune love this kind of garbage.

  23. Europe correspondent for Age & SMH.

    Bevan Shields
    @BevanShields
    ·
    3h
    Just watched the full Daniel Andrews press conference from yesterday. An alarming, slippery performance. Five stars to @sumeyyailanbey for some brilliant questions

  24. Shellbell

    There have been quite a few cases involving police misconduct
    Also, the falsifying of amount of breathiliser tests conducted by police.
    Dept of education big wigs

  25. Scott @ #69 Tuesday, June 16th, 2020 – 9:04 am

    mundo says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 8:58 am

    Mr Albanese said earlier this morning.
    ————————–

    Albanese and Labor members need to keep the pressure on during question time, in asking questions to Morrison about his involvement

    They will catch Morrison out in misleading the house

    Currently Labor couldn’t ‘catch’ Scrooter murdering his grandmother on the floor of the house during question time live on TV.

  26. Doug Cameron
    @DougCameron51

    A hard lesson for Labor arising from the horrendous branch stacking and power grab by unscrupulous individuals in Victoria.
    Failure to deal with this corruption of democracy allows Liberals like Dennis Napthine to undermine a good Premier and divert from building a good society.
    ***
    It makes it hard to focus on the economic incompetence and heartless behaviour of Coalition govts. It allows Libs to smear all party members while they hide Coalition corruption rort public funding, cut penalty rates and impose trickle down policies and wage stagnation.

  27. Shellbell

    I reckon the police commissioner will take the view that he is not in control of timelines for such matters.
    Considering he is due to retire any day now

  28. guytaur says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 8:58 am

    Read the article you linked- it actually debunks your claim because it was stopped, you moron – the Nationals didn’t allow it to happen and they were thrown out.

  29. Wonder if Scrooter will go harder on Albo today or ease up and give him a break.

    It’s the wrong question. If only morrison started the day hoping the opposition would go easy on him!

  30. High ranking members of the Government and the Opposition should be attending globally and nationally significant events like the Melbourne Cup. It’s their job.

  31. Buce

    Obviously MickMack felt guilty about using his allowances as he forced the Council to arrange a function (to their annoyance) for an announcement, at the wrong end of their territory.

  32. guytaur @ #75 Tuesday, June 16th, 2020 – 7:08 am

    Barney

    I did not say that. I said the culture of the LNP denying factions allowed the attempt.

    The Greens had a similar problem with Left Renewal.

    Its not the politics of others infiltrating its keeping the democratic forms in place to prevent manipulation.

    Is it branch stacking if a group of people want to become involved in a political Party?

    Sounds like you’re arguing to maintain the status quo.

    How do political Parties change unless people are willing to join and work towards it?

    This has nothing to do with democratic forms.

    There was nothing democratic about the Nats saying, we don’t want neo-Nazis in our Party, piss off.

  33. lizzie- when Barney is agreeing with me because an idiot like Guytaur has said something stupid then moron is surely acceptable and appropriate.

  34. Barney

    If its genuine people joining a party that then dominates it that says something about both the people in the area and the political party.

    Branch Stacking is about the false effort to change numbers. Thus fraud and bribes are out.

    If its genuine representation too bad. Them’s the breaks.

  35. Bucephalus says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 8:42 am
    The ALP are going to stop factionalism? They have formal factions with lists of members in Parliament and trade positions in Cabinets, on Committees and Preselections. The Unions belong to factions and have parliamentary seats allocated by the size and power of their factions in State Conference.

    How are they going wipe all that away?
    _________________________
    Of course they will not. But it was one bad apple who was swiftly dealt with, nothing to see here. And anyway the Liberals have branch stackers and rorters too!

  36. Gabriella Power
    @gabriellaapower SkyNews
    ·
    19m
    #Breaking I have been told Vic Labor MP Marlene Kairouz has been asked to resign following branch stacking allegations. She is refusing to stand down.

  37. lizzie says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 9:32 am

    The system forces all politicians to do this.

    My position remains that senior politicians should attend these types of events- it’s their job.

  38. Bucephalus
    says:
    Tuesday, June 16, 2020 at 9:28 am
    High ranking members of the Government and the Opposition should be attending globally and nationally significant events like the Melbourne Cup. It’s their job.

    The value of corporate hospitality and a lot of the travel and other goodies associated with it will be more heavily scrutinised going forward. Most of it is not actually needed from a business point of view, and is mainly done so that those that seem to benefit can keep their snouts in the trough. Think of all the unnecessary meetings orgainized around the Grand Prix, Melb Cup etc to provide a pretence of an excuse. I know my ticket to the Grand Final last year didn’t change anything other than my appreciation of Dusty

  39. guytaur @ #93 Tuesday, June 16th, 2020 – 7:35 am

    Barney

    If its genuine people joining a party that then dominates it that says something about both the people in the area and the political party.

    Branch Stacking is about the false effort to change numbers. Thus fraud and bribes are out.

    If its genuine representation too bad. Them’s the breaks.

    I’m sure the neo-Nazis, as abhorrent as their beliefs are, are genuine people.

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