More coronavirus polling, more Eden-Monaro by-election wash-up

More evidence that Australians are heartily satisfied by the approaches taken by their governments in tackling COVID-19, even in Victoria, plus some concluding book-keeping from Eden-Monaro.

When too much of the above is barely enough:

• The Australian Electoral Commission has published preference flow data from the July 4 Eden-Monaro by-election, showing exactly how many of each candidate’s preferences ended up with Labor and Liberal. Of the 6.34% Nationals vote, 77.73% went to Liberal and 22.27% went to Labor, compared with an unusually polarised 87.16% and 12.84% in 2019, and 55.98% of preferences from the 5.34% Shooters Fishers and Farmers vote went to Labor and 44.02% to Liberal, after the party directed preferences to Labor on its how-to-vote cards. More on this from Kevin Bonham.

• Roy Morgan has published an SMS poll conducted in Victoria, which finds strong support for the state’s lockdown measures: 89-11 in favour of compulsory face masks, 76-24 against reopening schools and day care centres to all, 71-29 against relaxing the 5km travel restriction, 75-25 against allowing table service at pubs, restaurants and cafes, and 72-28 against lifting the curfew. The closest result to dissent was a relatively narrow 57-43 against allowing visits to immediate family members, currently allowed only for delivering care or essential services. The poll was conducted Tuesday and Wednesday from a sample of 2110.

• A Pew Research Centre survey global survey finds 94% of Australian respondents believing their country had done a good job of handling COVID-19 compared with 6% for bad, a shade behind Denmark as the best result out of 14 countries. The only two countries that failed to crack 50% positive ratings were the United States and United Kingdom, at 47% and 46% respectively. Australia’s performance on the question of whether the country was now more united than before the outbreak was more modest, at 54% for more united and 40% for more divided, compared with a 14-nation median of 46% and 48%. The United States was a serious outler at 18% for more united and 77% for more united. The Australian component was conducted by telephone from June 11 to July 25 from a sample of 1016.

• The West Australian reports that WA Liberal Party state director Sam Calabrese will not contest the preselection to fill Mathias Cormann’s Senate vacancy, after earlier being considered the front-runner. The list of prospective nominees now seems to consist of Joe Francis, a Barnett government minister who lost his seat of Jandakot in the 2017 state election landslide; Sherry Sufi, arch-conservative party policy committee chairman; and Julian Ambrose, a director at construction company BGC and the stepson of its late founder, Len Buckeridge.

• My coverage of the Northern Territory election count contains with daily updates and live results reporting here. Labor has 13 confirmed wins out of 25 and leads over the CLP in another two; the CLP with six confirmed wins and leads over Labor in one; and the Territory Alliance with a lead over CLP in another.

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.

1,001 comments on “More coronavirus polling, more Eden-Monaro by-election wash-up”

Comments Page 3 of 21
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  1. Never mind refrigeration problems with vaccines.
    A GP mate does volunteer work in PNG. Last year he noticed that the WHO IV vaccines were being administered orally because they had no needles/syringes.

  3. I suppose a federal quarantine system could have been established on Commonwealth property but that would have taken too long to have established.

  4. alfred venison @ #80 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 10:00 am

    its not just refrigeration. its production of enough glass vials to hold it, its production of enough syringes to administer it, and much more. -a.v.

    Surely producing sufficient quantities of (safe and effective) vaccine is more of a challenge than producing enough mundane things like glass vials and syringes? We already have some quantity of the latter objects just lying around, and existing production capacity that can be harnessed if necessary.

  5. Barney ITB

    In the usual way,

    Instead of going into hotel quarantine. They are transported to a commonwealth run quarantine facility.
    After the travellers are cleared, they can return to their homes. It isnt a difficult concept

  6. Victoria @ #105 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 8:38 am

    Barney ITB

    In the usual way,

    Instead of going into hotel quarantine. They are transported to a commonwealth run quarantine facility.
    After the travellers are cleared, they can return to their homes. It isnt a difficult concept

    It is when the Commonwealth have very few of these sort of facilities.

  7. Barney @ 10:34
    “So, how do people return to Australia?”

    Surely that’s a Commonwealth resposiblity, just like Agreements with China and University managment!.
    Of course all returners should receive the same humane treatment as other refugees!. I believes the Government has spent a lot on facilities in Xmas Ialand!

  8. Victoria
    “Instead of going into hotel quarantine. They are transported to a commonwealth run quarantine facility.”

    Put them on a cruise ship. I’m not kidding. Transfer all international arrivals to a cruise ship off the coast, physically separated from the rest of the community. All security guards, ADF personnel, etc to enforce quarantine can be quartered on the ship. No one leaves the ship until they test negative.

  10. Gippslander @ #107 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 8:44 am

    Barney @ 10:34
    “So, how do people return to Australia?”

    Surely that’s a Commonwealth resposiblity, just like Agreements with China and University managment!.
    Of course all returners should receive the same humane treatment as other refugees!. I believes the Government has spent a lot on facilities in Xmas Ialand!

    Xmas Island was full after 1 or 2 plane loads.

    What then?

  11. Yabba @ #109 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 8:46 am

    Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #61 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 9:23 am

    Victoria @ #59 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 7:22 am

    And today would be a perfect time for Abdrews to tell Victorians, that as a state, we will not be recommending hotel quarantine for returned travellers. Even though inquiry is ongoing.

    So how would you deal with them?

    Let Dutton figure it out. Its his responsibility.

    It would be nice to actual arrive at a solution. 😛

  12. I think Abbott is quite intelligent and well-read, as Malcolm Farr observes. Political opponents have been underestimating Abbott for decades to his obvious benefit.

    Abbott also has aggression, cunning, ruthlessness and determination as traits to aid him in his so far pretty successful career. He can also take big risks which, when they come off – as they often have – push him higher up the ladder. He is pugnacious and a contrarian, both good techniques to test the will of others in the same race.

    However, he lacks almost all emotional intelligence, has an awful, smouldering temper, he’s infected by the religion bug, is probably actually or close to a sex addict, is obsessed about his masculinity and is bound up with old fashioned ideas of empire and chivalry. He has many weaknesses and demons, which he readily admits to himself.

    If I was up against him, I would never take Abbott’s ability to land knockout punches early in the fight (thus ending it then and there) for granted.

    The way to deal with Abbott is to step back and let him tie himself in knots, exhaust himself, then put him out of his misery.

    The Poms will no doubt learn this the hard way.

  15. Barney @ 10:46
    “Xmas Island was full after 1 or 2 plane loads.

    What then?”
    Don’t ask me ask Scomo, it’s his responsibility!

  16. The Queensland dictator has banned schoolies week.

    Destroying our cultural heritage.

    Won’t anyone think of the children.gif?

  17. Morrison:

    What I’m suggesting is that he needed to go and urgently deal with a matter in a particular facility in Victoria. That’s what he was doing last night. That’s what he should be doing. That’s what he’s doing every night, every morning, and every day. This is a very challenging situation in Victoria – a situation that started because we had widespread community transmission of the virus in Victoria.

    So the Minister had to fly back to Victoria? Or was it just a phone call?

  18. a r : read the article & post a comment at the conversation if you think he’s wrong.
    the author’s a professor of health policy and management at the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Public Health and [has] been working in and studying the worlds of vaccine development, production and distribution for over two decades.
    _____
    https://theconversation.com/approval-of-a-coronavirus-vaccine-would-be-just-the-beginning-huge-production-challenges-could-cause-long-delays-144179

  19. Phillip Lodge
    @phlogga
    ·
    9m
    All states except Qld were or are using security companies for hotel quarantine. All experienced or are experiencing issues. Victoria was just unlucky.

  20. Barney @10:48
    “It would be nice to actual arrive at a solution. ”

    Of course it would! But all we’ll get from Scomo is a plan for a plan, and possibly a smiley emoji. He might delegate it to Dan Tehan to set up afacility in Euroa!

  22. Holdenhillbilly says:
    Friday, August 28, 2020 at 10:53 am

    The Queensland dictator has banned schoolies week.

    Destroying our cultural heritage.

    Won’t anyone think of the children.gif?

    Well!
    The commonwealth is completely incapable of managing old folks homes.
    What are the states to do?

  24. links from from the article at the conversation.
    US companies make roughly 663m syringes a year but the Trump administration has calculated that an extra 850m may be needed
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/21/syringe-shortage-covid-19-vaccine-experts
    _________
    A race is on to make enough small glass vials to deliver coronavirus vaccine around the world — A shortage of specialized containers could cripple the global response to covid-19
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/07/13/coronavirus-vaccine-corning-glass/
    _________
    Drugmakers Race to Build Covid-19 Vaccine Supply Chains — Supply shortages, specialized handling and tight transportation capacity will make it harder to distribute hundreds of millions of vaccine doses
    https://www.wsj.com/articles/drugmakers-race-to-build-covid-19-vaccine-supply-chains-11596101586

  25. Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #111 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 10:48 am

    Yabba @ #109 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 8:46 am

    Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #61 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 9:23 am

    Victoria @ #59 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 7:22 am

    And today would be a perfect time for Abdrews to tell Victorians, that as a state, we will not be recommending hotel quarantine for returned travellers. Even though inquiry is ongoing.

    So how would you deal with them?

    Let Dutton figure it out. Its his responsibility.

    It would be nice to actual arrive at a solution. 😛

    He’s had six months.

    Au pairs took 2 hours. He could ring a mate. I hear that a certain Kangaroo Island firm is good at nearly everything. Unfortunately their shed burnt down in the bushfires, but they are operating from a public toilet. NBN isn’t great, but there is apparently a very low Corona virus risk, because they issue masks at the door.

  26. Richard Willingham
    @rwillingham
    ·
    2m
    All of today’s 12 fatalities are in aged care.
    There’s 513 people in hospital, 29 in ICU 17 of them on ventalitors.
    @abcmelbourne

  27. Ben Eltham
    @beneltham
    ·
    18h
    Well, well, well. The decision-makers who wanted private security guards to do quarantine in Victoria were …. Victoria Police

  30. Spray

    Will be interesting to see what Plan B is.

    Easy, blame Victoria for the “second wave”. Bound to get Scrott and Rupert providing backing vocals.

  33. Ye gods, life imitates farce.

    “Mitch McConnell warns Democrats will take away hamburgers (among other things)
    Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) urged Americans to not only reelect Trump, but to vote for Republican Senate candidates across the country, warning that if Democrats take control, they’ll regulate how many hamburgers you can eat.
    “They want to tell you what kind of car you can drive. What sources of information are credible. And even how many hamburgers you can eat,” he said, listing all the things he claims will be taken away by Democrats. (The hamburger reference is to Democrats’ aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, particularly from livestock.)”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2020/08/27/republican-national-convention-live-updates/#link-GUMA5YLL2NHA3IWF3E4DP3ASJI

  35. Barney
    Its about managing the process so people will need to accept that is the only way they can return. The lack of serious quarantine is a major failing of Peter border joke Dutton.

  36. Sutton must get frustrated by having to answer exactly the same questions every day. Like taking a beginners’ class but with no results..

  38. I might add that, like with Abbott, letting flawed characters do most of the hard work in their own downfalls is usually the easiest way to ultimately defeat them.

    This applies to ScoMo as well. He’s already tying himself in knots that will soon be too difficult to unravel. The lies built on lies upon lies are already getting too complicated for him to sustain. Nothing has changed since his Tourism days. If anything, things have probably gotten worse.

    From a very unpromising start, and a less than illustrious education, he’s found his niche: bullshitting others into going along with his marketing plan-for-whatever-they’re-planning-for-today.

    He is utterly ruthless and at least superficially untroubled by doubt. People like this make many enemies, because the colleagues they associate with realise that they’re only seen as gofers and errand-boys, never as peers.

    The whole world saw how he gave Turnbull that Judas Hug before betraying him. This includes the Liberal party caucus, who must shiver when they think about the cold-blooded perfidy of it. They know the true Scott Morrison.

    They also know that when the TV lights are off and the cameras and microphones are packed away, Morrison doesn’t turn into an affable, courteous, quietly-spoken statesman, a first among equals. He stays the arrogant, smirking, intense, loudmouthed, obnoxious, Happy Clapping bullshit artist that he has always been. He must drive his Cabinet members crazy.

    Speaking of “Happy Clapping”: it doesn’t sit well with the more traditional Catholic and Protestant demographics in the Liberal ranks. They would be seeing the incursion of talentless American-style religious nutters into their ranks as an existential threat. A lot of these mainstream guys are in the thrall of their bishops and other gaudily-vestmented holy men. They’re not particularly ecumenical about new-fangled apostles and latter day prophets trying to take over their turf with megaphones and cheezy pop religion.

    The myth that a billion dollars above or below the line in the national accounts is the difference between success and failure has been blown out of the water by the virus. We now know that there’s no money like funny money, and that if everyone in the world’s printing it, then the mythical Gnomes Of Zurich, imagined money lenders to the World’s governments, will have to wait for their loans to be repaid. Get in line, Gnomes!

    Who else is in that line ahead of them? There’s the unemployed, the elderly trapped in a dysfunctional Aged Care system, tanking small (and some large) businesses, The Arts (and its artisans), pensioners, tradies and others currently doing it tough because of a tiny microbe. They don’t care about surpluses anymore. They won’t so readily as before swallow the line that a country is just like a household. One of the great pillars of Liberal political dominance – fiscal probity – is exactly what the country does NOT need for the foreseeable future. Anyone preaching it will be buried.

    Anyone looking to buy a “Back In Black” coffee mug cheap?

  39. poroti @ #129 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 11:35 am

    Spray

    Will be interesting to see what Plan B is.

    Easy, blame Victoria for the “second wave”. Bound to get Scrott and Rupert providing backing vocals.

    Have to say that shutting the Victorian border a week earlier would have prevented this. But having delayed that decision, it’s a bit late to be blaming them now.

  41. Spray

    If only they had of listened to Scrott and flung open the border weeks and weeks ago then…………………………oh wait 🙁

  42. Bushfire Bill @ #137 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 11:45 am

    I might add that, like with Abbott, letting flawed characters do most of the hard work in their own downfalls is usually the easiest way to ultimately defeat them.

    This applies to ScoMo as well. He’s already tying himself in knots that will soon be too difficult to unravel. The lies built on lies upon lies are already getting too complicated for him to sustain. Nothing has changed since his Tourism days. If anything, things have probably gotten worse.

    From a very unpromising start, and a less than illustrious education, he’s found his niche: bullshitting others into going along with his marketing plan-for-whatever-they’re-planning-for-today.

    He is utterly ruthless and at least superficially untroubled by doubt. People like this make many enemies, because the colleagues they associate with realise that they’re only seen as gofers and errand-boys, never as peers.

    The whole world saw how he gave Turnbull that Judas Hug before betraying him. This includes the Liberal party caucus, who must shiver when they think about the cold-blooded perfidy of it. They know the true Scott Morrison.

    They also know that when the TV lights are off and the cameras and microphones are packed away, Morrison doesn’t turn into an affable, courteous, quietly-spoken statesman, a first among equals. He stays the arrogant, smirking, intense, loudmouthed, obnoxious, Happy Clapping bullshit artist that he has always been. He must drive his Cabinet members crazy.

    Speaking of “Happy Clapping”: it doesn’t sit well with the more traditional Catholic and Protestant demographics in the Liberal ranks. They would be seeing the incursion of talentless American-style religious nutters into their ranks as an existential threat. A lot of these mainstream guys are in the thrall of their bishops and other gaudily-vestmented holy men. They’re not particularly ecumenical about new-fangled apostles and latter day prophets trying to take over their turf with megaphones and cheezy pop religion.

    The myth that a billion dollars above or below the line in the national accounts is the difference between success and failure has been blown out of the water by the virus. We now know that there’s no money like funny money, and that if everyone in the world’s printing it, then the mythical Gnomes Of Zurich, imagined money lenders to the World’s governments, will have to wait for their loans to be repaid. Get in line, Gnomes!

    Who else is in that line ahead of them? There’s the unemployed, the elderly trapped in a dysfunctional Aged Care system, tanking small (and some large) businesses, The Arts (and its artisans), pensioners, tradies and others currently doing it tough because of a tiny microbe. They don’t care about surpluses anymore. They won’t so readily as before swallow the line that a country is just like a household. One of the great pillars of Liberal political dominance – fiscal probity – is exactly what the country does NOT need for the foreseeable future. Anyone preaching it will be buried.

    Anyone looking to buy a “Back In Black” coffee mug cheap?

    You’ve been predicting Scrooter’s imminent downfall for some time with all this psychobabble BB….any day now?
    So far his falling has been in a general upward trajectory…..

  44. Bushfire Bill @ #111 Friday, August 28th, 2020 – 10:49 am

    I think Abbott is quite intelligent and well-read, as Malcolm Farr observes. Political opponents have been underestimating Abbott for decades to his obvious benefit.

    Abbott also has aggression, cunning, ruthlessness and determination as traits to aid him in his so far pretty successful career. He can also take big risks which, when they come off – as they often have – push him higher up the ladder. He is pugnacious and a contrarian, both good techniques to test the will of others in the same race.

    However, he lacks almost all emotional intelligence, has an awful, smouldering temper, he’s infected by the religion bug, is probably actually or close to a sex addict, is obsessed about his masculinity and is bound up with old fashioned ideas of empire and chivalry. He has many weaknesses and demons, which he readily admits to himself.

    If I was up against him, I would never take Abbott’s ability to land knockout punches early in the fight (thus ending it then and there) for granted.

    The way to deal with Abbott is to step back and let him tie himself in knots, exhaust himself, then put him out of his misery.

    The Poms will no doubt learn this the hard way.

    Morrison also has aggression, cunning, ruthlessness and determination as traits to aid him in his so far pretty successful career. He can also take big risks which, when they come off – as they often have – push him higher up the ladder. He is pugnacious and a contrarian, both good techniques to test the will of others in the same race.

  45. If only they had of listened to Scrott and flung open the border weeks and weeks ago then…………………………oh wait

    Those trolling the Andrews government are hoping that condemning the over-severity of lockdowns, then whingeing they weren’t severe enough, then back to condemning them again won’t be noticed by their readers and viewers.

    Dan Andrews has three things that Scott Morrison and his companion hecklers do not: authenticity, empathy and consistency.

  47. I don’t think the Queensland premier has any intention of opening the border prior to the election. The closed border is popular and the LNP/Murdoch would attack ferociously should there be a widespread outbreak of the virus.

    Similarly for the ACT – the Liberal opposition is a virtually leaderless rabble but they would love for there to be an outbreak before the election.

  48. Question without notice:

    Early on some people were allowed to self quarantine at home.

    Is this still happening?

    If so, how can they justify charging people for hotel quarantine when some are able to avoid it?

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