Essential Research: leadership ratings and the return of coronavirus

The Melbourne coronavirus takes its toll on the standing of the Andrews government, and a small amount of gloss comes off Scott Morrison’s still-impressive ratings.

The Guardian reports that Essential Research, which a fortnight ago published its first coronavirus-free poll since January, has naturally revived its interest in the subject. The poll finds 36% of respondents rating themselves very concerned about the virus, up from 25% when the question was last asked three weeks ago. The state breakdowns have it at 46% in Victoria, though New South Wales isn’t far behind at 42%.

The poll also finds approval of the federal government’s handling of the matter down from 70% when the question as last asked three weeks ago to 64%, while small sample breakdowns concerning state governments’ responses have the Victorian government’s favourable rating slumping from 65% to 49%. Below are charts recording the progress of these results since the pollster first asked the question in relation to the federal government in March and the state governments in April, although at this stage I only have “good” and not “poor” ratings from the latest poll. Keep in mind that the sample sizes for the Victorian results is only around 275.

The poll also features the pollster’s monthly (actually a bit longer than that on occasion, the previous result having been from May 28-31) leadership ratings, which find Scott Morrison down two on approval to 63% and up one on disapproval to 27%, while Anthony Albanese is up one to 44% and down two to 28%. The latter numbers are rather a lot different from Newspoll, whose poll a fortnight ago had Albanese on 42% for both approval and disapproval. Morrison holds a lead of 50-27 lead as preferred prime minister, narrowing from 53-23 last time.

The BludgerTrack aggregates have been updated with these numbers. Essential Research should publish the full report for the poll later today.

UPDATE: Full report here. The federal government’s poor rating on COVID-19 is up four to 16%, while the Victorian government’s has doubled to 26%.

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.

1,482 comments on “Essential Research: leadership ratings and the return of coronavirus”

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  1. Steve777 wrote:

    Whatever is allowed in NSW, I won’t be going to a club, pub, cinema, restaurant food court or theatre for the foreseeable future, nor will I use public transport unless there is absolutely no choice. Also not sporting events, church or rock concerts, but then I don’t attend those when there’s no Virus.

    Hopelessly racist, ageist, sexist, defeatist, elitist, isolationist and foodist. Homophobic, transphobic, agarophobic, photopbobic, misogynistic, misanthropic and antagonistic.

    Boomer!

  2. Assantdj

    Victorian govt has had 1500.00 payment in place for the past month.
    It’s for those in casual work or without entitlements

    Dont know if NSW has this.

  3. I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like in Florida in the next few weeks. I suspect it’ll make anything to date look good given Florida is like Bribie Island by x 10,000,000 (i.e. God’s waiting room as we call it here).

  4. It should not be the case that one contrary, poor or mistaken decision by Labor (or any party) is used to silence their criticism of the Coalition (or any another party) forever after.

    Labor could make one decision that disadvantages a group of people, and the Coalition ten, and we’re supposed to believe that the one means Labor no longer has anything to say?

    In a public debate over the merit (or otherwise) of some policy, Labor’s supposed hypocrisies are irrelevant. It’s their job to hold the government to account and speak on behalf of the people who voted for them. The people who vote for them expect them to do so, and be allowed to do so. While the people who vote for them expect their representatives to address their (the politician’s) flaws, they do not expect those flaws to be used to silence their (the *people* not the politicians’) voice.

    When the Labor criticises government policy and the media pull a “but look over there you hypocrites” they need to understand that it’s not *Labor* that they are silencing and dismissing, it’s the people that Labor represents.

    Similarly, Labor need to point out at the time of such deflections that, whatever policy Labor implements, the other part of their job is to give people a voice, that they are not just speaking on their own behalf, and that it’s not just Labor being shut up, it’s those people whose voices Labor are conveying.

  5. Like I said. Will people finally wake up

    Rafael Epstein
    @Raf_Epstein
    ·
    57m
    @VictorianCHO

    Pensive face
    Hundreds of Victorians will soon be in hospital

    “Over 1,800 active cases.. a really significant number.. in the next fortnight.. often 10%-20% require hospitalisation, so that’s a couple of hundred at least.. will require hospital in the next couple of wks”

  6. Vic,

    It’s not my daughter’s opinion. But her observations of the general population while she was there.

  7. dave

    Trump is too busy doing the whole racism thing (playing his base), totally his thing to attack China instead of focusing on crises(s) in America.

    Which some people on PB have fallen.

  8. Rob Morrison
    @RMorrison9
    ·
    3h
    BREAKING: 18 people now in Queensland are being tested for Coronavirus after attending The Crossroads Hotel in Casula.

    They are in quarantine awaiting test results.

    It’s expected that number will rise.

    @9NewsQueensland

    @9NewsAUS

  9. GG

    Oops. Sorry. I misread your post.

    Glad to hear she is not into the conspiracy

    Meanwhile Michael Obrien and co are demanding the resignation of Daniel Andrews

  10. BB

    Your post reminds me. A cultural point of difference between China’s Wuhan response and our response.

    In China their draconian measures of welding doors shut that eliminated the virus happened because the Chinese were isolating family members from other family members. It was not return to your family and then self isolate. This was most likely the best elimination strategy of eliminating the virus. Especially for densely populated areas.

    A point we seem to have overlooked here.

  11. Chelsea Hetherington
    @chelsea_hetho
    ·
    38m
    #BREAKING: Since 8pm last night, there have been an additional seven cases linked to the Crossroads Hotel at Casula, bringing the total number of infections in that cluster to 28, with another case under investigation. Of these, 14 had attended the hotel.
    @abcnews
    #COVID19Aus

  12. @Victoria 11.59…

    How is this,not a msm front page scandal?? Why is it left to Michael West to report such blatant liberal corruption? Is it that the MSM has just grown tired of constantly exposing coalition corruption and nothing happening?

  13. GG, which parts of Qld was she in?

    In inner Brisbane, people are still taking it kinda seriously, but there are very few cases here. On a recent trip to the Sunshine Coast, most people seemed wary but not strictly abiding the social distancing measures. Further out, there might be a fair deal of complacency, and in the regions I would guess so, given the very low incidence of the virus at any stage.

    FWIW, this is a cool map some colleagues have put together: https://qcpr.github.io/

  14. See new Tweets
    Conversation
    Rafael Epstein
    @Raf_Epstein
    Wow.

    Many
    @AmbulanceVic
    paramedics to be partnered with ADF personnel.

    @DanielAndrewsMP
    “not all of them, but many of them – a shared crew .. who can support the inevitable number of paramedics who will finish up having to quarantine

  15. Big A Adrian

    Having any expectations of our MSM at present is just going to disappoint.
    Of course if it was Labor, they would be singing in unison with bells on.

  16. GG
    When the magnitude of the pandemic was first being acknowledged there was some discussion around how this would change the world as we know it. I believe it should change the world order and instead of throwing our hands in the air and saying we just have to accept the new norm, we should be fighting for a new reality.

    Australia is a blessed country, we could and should be looking at the opportunities to make Australia self sufficient.
    We grow enough food to feed us all, the problem is we don’t have enough packaging, so let’s think about how we package and what packaging is needed.
    We are oil dependant, so let’s ramp up electric vehicles.
    We value things over experiences lets expand our arts culture and decrease our reliance on screens for entertainment.
    Let’s look at returning government services to the communities, if the aged care home is staffed by the people related to the residents you get better outcomes, so let’s look at Childcare and aged care are about care not profit.

    The environment has been struggling for years so this worldwide disruption is a global benefit and if we all thought of ways to help a covid free Australia move forward in a more sustainable way without being dependant on opening to the world and living with it maybe something good could come from bad.

  17. ” Well, well so all those clamouring to “open the borders” – mainly those who put the well-being of business ahead of people, have questions to answer!”

    But they won’t be asked, at least not by the mainstream media.

  18. Jodi McKay
    @JodiMcKayMP
    ·
    1h
    Explosive evidence to the NSW Parliament Inquiry on South West Sydney health services this morning. Respected doctors have pointed to an “inequity” of resources across greater Sydney region and agreed that residents are being treated as “second class citizens”.

  19. If Dan Andrews had ordered doors to be welded shut here, or family members to be otherwise forcibly separated from their loved ones, imagine the hysteria.

    There is still a residual belief that by just being nice to each other, remaining cognizant of cultural values, being sensitive to the life histories of persecution and uniformed oppression of those locked down, deferring to the proscripts of various United Nations declarations, and phasing in restrictions over a period of days, accompanied by multi-language notices and presumably pictograms for those who are illiterate, the virus will realise it’s been beaten and quietly slink off to infect a less enlightened society.

    In reality, you act first, ask questions and answer them later.

  20. ‘Victoria says:
    Tuesday, July 14, 2020 at 11:59 am

    Should we be at all surprised.

    DropletMichael West
    @MichaelWestBiz
    ·
    3h
    Rort of the Day. When yer parents don’t know you’ve made em directors of a company getting millions in government contracts. Surprise!
    #QED #FederalICAC #auspol
    Stuart Robert listed parents as company directors without their knowledge
    Stuart Robert listed his parents as directors of an IT company awarded millions in government contracts including from his department. His father Alan said he was unaware he was a director of the…
    michaelwest.com.au’

    Robert’s own department contracting Robert to provide IT services for the Department?
    Why does this name keep cropping up?
    Scotty from Marketing should sack this shonk asap.

  21. Mary Trump has permission to talk about the highly critical book she wrote about her uncle, US President Donald Trump, a judge ruled on Monday in an 11th-hour decision that prioritised the First Amendment over a dated confidentiality agreement among members of the Trump family.

    Judge Hal B. Greenwald in Poughkeepsie, New York, rejected arguments by the President’s brother, Robert Trump, that Mary Trump could not talk about family members publicly as it violated the agreement in an inheritance case settled two decades ago.

  22. Greensborough Growler @ #181 Tuesday, July 14th, 2020 – 11:59 am

    We can go in to lockdowns and get the infection rate down in the short term. This will help us manage the problem. and not overwhelm medical facilities and manpower. However, as soon as you open up again, the infection rate will rise.

    Mostly yes. Though if your nation is a big island (or in the case of NZ, a small one), you can go into lockdown until the virus is gone from the entire island. And then it stays gone (unless you do something careless, like import new cases from outside of the island).

    Australia is one of a few nations that could plausibly get rid of the virus and keep it gone afterwards.

    Also, the virus has spread all over the world. One day we will be bringing in people from overseas at which time the infection rate will rise again.

    Yes. We should have travel bans up for any country which hasn’t controlled its outbreak. No one gets in except for repatriations of citizens and permanent residents. And each one of those gets mandatory two-week quarantine. It’s what we’d do if we were serious about eliminating the virus from Australia, anyways. Not that the current government actually is.

  23. There you have it people. Labor right is for authoritarian rule.

    I make a point about isolating family members who have tested positive and the response is lets weld the doors shut stuff human rights and compassion.

    An extreme position deserves an extreme response

  24. I see Albanese on the telly cashing in on the release of the letters for Labor.

    Then I see Anne Twomey mentioning how when she asked then AG Nicola Roxon and Tony Burke a few yrs ago to release the letters only to forthrightly told “NO they’re private !!” 😆

  25. ‘Assantdj says:
    Tuesday, July 14, 2020 at 11:23 am

    I also watched and enjoyed Julia Gillard last night. Sh is definitely the most articulate PM we have had in recent times.

    On the parenting payment, I personally thought it was another beat up by the media at the time, to show her as being mean and out of touch. I admit I hadn’t been closely following the conversation at the time it occurred, too busy as a single parent working to pay the bills and get ahead. I was even unaware she just bought forward grandfathering rather than it being a new initiative.

    As a single parent myself, I always saw the responsibility to provide for my kids as an extension of the need to provide for myself. It seems that in the minds of some having children is tantamount to being a homemaker until they reach some mythical age at which time you have the freedom to look for and participate in work. If the underlying issue is that the children of single parents get less educational options and a degree of discrimination then solve that problem with truly free education.

    Having said all that welfare payments also need to be at a level that allows for living not existing but single mums should not be better off just because they have kids.m’

    It is a great pity that the program missed around 99% of the achievements of the Gillard Government while focusing on two relatively minor issues: SSM and the rebalancing single parents payments across the payment front.

  26. BB @12:10 PM. Boomer!

    Perfectly sensible for someone pushing 70 with a couple of chronic conditions. Last thing I want to do is catch the Virus and then pass it on to family members.

    Anyway, that’s my plan. Others are free to make their choices within the law.

    I don’t know where all the other stuff about against, sexist, etc comes from -just stirring the pot I assume.

  27. “Scotty from Marketing should sack this shonk asap.”

    Why would he though? That shonk gets away with literally anything.

  28. For managing the virus. I suggest Labor state governments follow New Zealand. Look at Adern’s approval ratings just as an election is due. So bleak for the opposition they are playing musical chairs with the leadership position.

  29. “Silly old Firefox was was just saying the Greens are the best arbiters of best practice safe distancing. Who to believe. The experts or those with a political barrow to push?”

    ***

    WTF? Have no idea what you’re on about. Meh. Just more of the same mindless Green bashing from the right wing two party establishment.

  30. Who can forget this from the fiberals

    Imagewww.theaustralian.com.au
    Ball is in premiers’ court: we must reopen, and quickly Paul Kelly
    victorian liberal ads to reopen economy from http://www.theaustralian.com.au
    13 May 2020 · Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews. Picture: Getty Images … Picture: Getty Images. Economic reality is compounded by political reality.

  31. And who can forget this from April

    include: liberal
    Imagewww.theage.com.au
    Victoria’s political unity on schools turns into open warfare
    victorian liberal ads to reopen economy from http://www.theage.com.au
    25 Apr 2020 · “That is the Victorian government’s clear message. That is the Chief Health Officer’s clear message. Advertisement. “Remote and …

  32. Boerwar

    Australians need to do a reality check.

    We can wish to go back to business as usual, but just cos you want it to be so, doesnt make it so.

  33. So who’s in charge of censorship?

    @pteModil
    · 1h
    Michael West’s @MichaelWestBiz account has been suspended by Twitter. He’s is sharing an article about Stuart Roberts’ criminal activities and now Michael is suspended.

  34. For eg.

    Friend of my daughter.

    She rescheduled wedding back in March, to take place in October.
    On the expectation that things would get back to near normal then.
    She has now cancelled. Once she changed her attitude to accept the reality, she no longer has any angst and has adjusted accordingly.

  35. @curtin_rc tweets

    ‘… privatising strategic assets, signing bilateral free trade agreements, endless workplace deregulation, and the demise of Australia’s car manufacturing industry. These policies damaged our sovereign capability.’

  36. Laborites who defend Gillards’ actions on the single parenting payment ipso facto defend Howards’ cuts in 2006. They therefore reject the Whitlam and Hawke reforms in this area. I would like to see Albanese promise to return the single parenting payment to what it once was.

  37. Benjamin Law 羅旭能
    @mrbenjaminlaw
    ·
    1h
    Andrew Bolt has come after my sister three times in one week alone and I worry he may prematurely blow a gasket discovering there are three more siblings where we came from.

  38. Joe Biden on Tuesday will call for setting a 100% clean-electricity standard by 2035 and investing $2 trillion over four years on clean energy, three people familiar with his plan said Monday.

    The Democratic nominee’s new commitments mark a clear shift toward progressives’ environmental priorities and cutting the use of fossil fuels. The people briefed on his plan spoke on the condition of anonymity ahead of its formal rollout Tuesday in Wilmington, Delaware.

    The $2 trillion in spending across four years is in place of the more modest $1.7 trillion over 10 years plan that Biden proposed last year while fighting for the nomination. Most of that investments in the new proposal would be one-time costs with the goal of spending the money to the maximum extent possible during those four years.

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-14/biden-to-call-for-2-trillion-in-clean-energy-spending

  39. Silly old Firefox has been hard at work at his cliche lessons. Good for him.

    He is now also mastering the age old Greens tactic of denying what he says even though it is posted in plain sight. See 10:58 where the Greens spokesperson was spouting her epidemiological credentials. Is she an authority or just another mug politician using the Covid situation to push a tawdry agenda.

    The departed but unlamented Peggy would be proud.

  40. How do Labor partisans feel about seeing Biden reaching out to the left while they also see Albanese reaching out to the climate deniers of the right …?

  41. Rex Douglas @ #249 Tuesday, July 14th, 2020 – 1:28 pm

    How do Labor partisans feel about seeing Biden reaching out to the left while they also see Albanese reaching out to the climate deniers of the right …?

    1. Unaffected, because the Democrats aren’t Labor and Morrison is (unfortunately) traveling significantly better than Trump right now.
    2. Like I should buy Tesla shares if there’s $2 trillion going into clean energy over the next 4 years.

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