Something for everybody

Great polling for Labor in Victoria, catastrophic polling for Labor in Victoria, and a mixed bag of federal seat polling — but seemingly a very clear picture in Western Australia.

Scattered accounts of opinion polling ahead of what looks like being a lean week for it, with both Newspoll and Essential Research entering an off-week in their respective cycles:

• Some seriously mixed signals coming out of Victoria, starting with Roy Morgan, who have published results of an SMS poll conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday from a sample of 2325 that records a 70-30 favourable split for Daniel Andrews’ performance as Premier. Respondents also split 63-37 against allowing restaurants, hotels and cafes to provide table service, 54-46 against ending the rule limiting travel to within 5 kilometres of a person’s home, 63-37 against an end to the 9pm curfew, although there is a 59-41 split in favour of allowing Melbourne residents to visit the homes of immediate family members, and a 76-24 split in favour of state government compensation for businesses forced to close.

• The contrast is provided by a Herald Sun report in Liberal internal polling by MediaReach of five marginal Victorian state seats, showing devastating swings against Labor. The Liberals are credited with leads of 70.6-29.4 in Bayswater (50.4-49.6 to Labor at the 2018 election), 68.0-32.0 in Hawthorn (50.4-49.6 to Labor), 54.5-45.5 in Monbulk (58.6-41.4), 54.9-45.1 in Mount Waverley (51.8-48.2) and 57.9-42.1 in South Barwon (54.6-45.4). Daniel Andrews is nonetheless said to have preferred premier leads over Michael O’Brien of 46-37 in South Barwon, 43-37 in Mount Waverley and 39-29 in Monbulk, with O’Brien leading 46-33 in Hawthorn and 37-33 in Bayswater. The polling was conducted on Tuesday from samples of between 523 and 694.

• Labor-linked firm Redbridge Group has published polling from three Labor-held federal seats, which collectively suggest Labor has gone backwards since last year’s election. Including results for a follow-up prompt for the initially undecided, and applying preference flows from the last election, I estimate the two-party results at 54-46 to the LNP in Lilley, where Labor’s margin is 0.6%; 54.7-45.3 to Liberal in Hunter, where the margin is 3.0%; but 53-47 to Labor in Corangamite, improving on their existing 1.1% margin. Whereas One Nation came close to making the final two-party preference count in Hunter last year, this poll has them a distant third with 9.5%. The poll also presented respondents in Hunter with Liberal as the Coalition response option, whereas the seat was contested by the Nationals at the election. The poll was conducted from August 20-22 from samples of 1000 to 1200 per electorate. Pollster Kos Samaras notes on Twitter that their state-level polling is “not reporting the same trends”, and suggests the firm will publish polling over the coming days casting doubt over the aforementioned MediaReach findings from Victoria.

• The West Australian published further results on Monday from last week’s Painted Dog Research poll, which credited Mark McGowan with a 91% approval rating, this time on Liberal leader Liza Harvey. Harvey was found to have an approval rating of just 10%, down nine since June, with disapproval unchanged at 37%. The balance included 36% neither satisifed nor dissatisfied and 10% for don’t know – I’m not sure where that leaves the 7% balance. The poll was conducted last week from a sample of 837.

• I took part in a podcast this week with Ben Raue at The Tally Room, together with former Australian Electoral Commission official Michael Maley, in which a highly wonk-ish discussion was had about electoral redistributions.

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.

2,679 comments on “Something for everybody”

Comments Page 45 of 54
1 … 44 45 46 … 54

  1. Steve777
    Agree. Policies dont matter either looking at the last election. The Coalition found that 3 word slogans appealed to voters. Say no more.

  2. south,
    You lost me at calling Mark Butler a, ‘second tier player’. You just don’t want to approve of anything Labor does, unless it’s agreeing to say the sort of things The Greens have the luxury of saying. It’s obvious you don’t know anything about political tactics and simply react viscerally to issues. I’ll take Dandy Murray’s analysis @ 10.30pm over yours as being the most perceptive and astute.

    Have you ever seen politics played up close? I’m thinking not. Well I have, and Albanese has, and it’s true, even though you may not want to concede it but the Queensland state election is just around the corner and Scott Morrison is looking for a ‘miracle’ win for the LNP. Because god knows, Deb Frecklington needs all the help she can get. And you better believe the big boys are doing all they can to help her. By fair means or foul. Mostly foul.

  5. Zerlo @ #2202 Tuesday, September 15th, 2020 – 10:56 pm

    Albo supports Gas Supply but not gas stations.

    Exactly. Labor had a policy before the last federal election to supply gas to large commercial enterprises, such as CSR, where the announcement was made, in order to keep their costs down via diverting overseas-bound supply back to domestic use. Whilst at one and the same time massively expanding Renewables and Storage for Electricity Supply to domestic users. Makes sense to me because the commercial users that require massive amounts of electricity every day cannot immediately be supplied with energy from Renewable sources. Eventually, just not right away.

    Sensible real politik that takes into account reality, not overblown idealism.

  10. And deny Annastacia the opportunity to shout “Queenslander” at a Sharkies supporter? What good would that do?

    Palaszczuk doesn’t need defending.

  11. So the same weasal words and rationalisation from Laborites they had for Adani, say nothing and hope it will all just go away in the end.
    Now say nothing on Scomo’s gas power, and just hope despite all the taxpayer money thrown at it, it just fails

    Almost reminds me of a certain POTUS response to bushfires in California just today. Y’all know it will cool down all on its own, right.

    I’d say they’re terminally not listening and blindly partisan to your entreaties south

    If the prospects are that insecure for the ALP that a few apparently wrong words from Albo can turn the whole Qld election and the known world on its head. Perhaps the world is in a more parlous state than anyone could believe.

  14. C@t,
    Albo isn’t doing well. The math was simple, Fossil Fuels are Bad, Clean Energy is good. There’ll be more clean energy jobs in the future than bad fossil fuel jobs. Instead of highlighting those points. It seems labor was talking about old election policies, investment risk and how the government won’t sign up to it’s thingy. boring!

    The message needs to be clear. It’s called leadership.

    Barrie Cassidy agrees with me.

  15. Perhaps my memory isn’t what it used to be, but the way I recall it, Labor has been stuck in this rut since around April 2010, when the factional warlords coerced the PM into dispensing with any strong or consistent stance on climate action.

  19. If QLD was in the USA it would be a Trump state. Its a wonder the whole state doesnt slope to the right.Thats why there are so many RWNJs in that state running for federal parliament seats.

  20. “itsthevibesays:
    Tuesday, September 15, 2020 at 11:22 pm

    Perhaps my memory isn’t what it used to be, but the way I recall it, Labor has been stuck in this rut since around April 2010, when the factional warlords coerced the PM into dispensing with any strong or consistent stance on climate action.”

    About the best quote to come out of Rudd’s mouth ever, when referring to Karl Bitar and Mark Arbib:

    “And there goes the heart and soul of (Labor faction) the NSW Right. Off to casino land, the moral epicentre of that particular factional grouping.”

    Those two are responsible for destroying a potential decade of ALP federal rule. And people laud these factional warlords as if they actually have a clue as to what they are doing. They are little short of amateurs who bully others into getting their own way and don’t care what they destroy along the way. You can (rightfully) criticise the likes of Rudd plenty, but at least he was trying to do something useful. Unlike those two useless pieces of excrement.

  22. Steve,
    QLD is easily won with jobs. Either defense industry or big industrial jobs. Building a solar power station that can keep the lights on in Singapore is the sort of project that would win votes in Far North QLD.

    The people of QLD are no different to that of anywhere else. They just want a decent life and the ability to earn a living where they live.

  24. Quoll says:
    Tuesday, September 15, 2020 at 11:11 pm

    Adani was and remains a Green Herring. Hunter Gas is a Lib catfish. Try to grapple with it and get spiked.

    Really, what have the Greens and the Liberals accomplished in energy/climate policy since 2009? Absolutely made things much much more difficult than they needed to be.

    Remember, Everything The Greens Touch Dies. They are uncannily Trumpy in this respect.

  25. Steve davis,

    Then Labor need to get onto it and promise them something big and lucrative because they going nowhere there at the moment.

    Qld Labor are doing this. The ads on TV are relentless.

    Albanese is trying to give them clean air and not trying to take the credit.

  27. Labor have been taking a licking on climate change politics ever since late 2009. This is a direct result of the collusion between Abbott and Brown, ably assisted by Joyce and Minchin.

    These scoundrels are the authors of our misfortunes.

  28. Qld voters doubtless believe that Federal Labor are Greens in fancy dress. Albo will struggle to get a hearing in that State, where the Greens are considered to be public enemies. The Green brand is like bad oysters.

  32. The ALP lost the 2013 election, partly on carbon pricing.
    The ALP went to the 2016 election with a climate change policy, and lost to the Coalition.
    The ALP went to the 2019 election with a climate change policy, and lost to the Coalition.

    In all three elections, the ALP were attacked by the Coalition and the media on their climate change policies. It’s hardly surprising the ALP are now a bit gun shy on the topic.

    While most of us on here might think that climate change is an existential threat and needs to be addressed now, it appears that the majority of the electorate do not. For the ALP to be able to address the issue, they first need to gain power.

  35. Anyone remember being approached by Ten Fingers and Toes Friedeggburger about using debt to get out of the recession? I don’t remember seeing any emails or texts or letters from asking if he can go ahead with yet another LNP gas powered brain fart. Yet the SMH said, “Australians have given Treasurer Josh Frydenberg the green light to borrow big…” so I guess I must have done it in my sleep.

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/treasurer-wins-support-to-use-debt-to-build-australia-out-of-recession-20200915-p55vqn.html

    Oh wait, when they say Australians they must mean the big donors and Gina and Twiggy and Clive and others because I keep forgetting that they are the LNP’s bestest and favouritest Australians. Silly me.

  36. Lol. The Labor Party, The Liberals and the Nationals developing a policy with the Refugee Council to facilitate refugees coming to Australia:

    Government and opposition MPs are backing a proposal to have refugees go bush to fill vital fruit and vegetable picking jobs left behind by backpackers locked out of the country.

    There are tens of thousands fewer backpackers in Australia this year than normal, which has left Australia’s fruit and vegetable stock at risk of rotting in the fields if an alternative supply of workers cannot be found to harvest it.

    Fruit growers are urgently trying to find enough workers to harvest their crops this year.
    Fruit growers are urgently trying to find enough workers to harvest their crops this year.CREDIT:DEAN SEWELL

    Labor’s Julian Hill, The Nationals’ Damian Drum and Liberal John Alexander, who are all on a parliamentary committee trying to find solutions, said there was some merit in a proposal put forward by the Refugee Council of Australia to offer the 17,000 people in Australia on two classes of refugee visas an easier path to residency in exchange for helping out.

    “There’s a desperate need for warm human bodies prepared to work hard in the regions right now and for the next couple of years until the borders reopen properly,” said Mr Hill, who represents the diverse south-eastern Melbourne electorate of Bruce.

    “The idea to offer the chance to proven refugees in Australia to go bush and do this work in return for a permanent visa is worth backing,” he said. “If they do the right thing by the country and prove their commitment then we should embrace them in return.”

    There are about 17,000 refugees who came by boat to Australia years ago on two visa classes, Temporary Protection Visas, which last three years and do not have a direct path to permanent residency rights, and Safe Haven Enterprise Visas.

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/mps-back-proposal-to-give-refugees-residency-for-fruit-picking-20200914-p55ved.html

    Notice who’s missing? The fantastically ineffectual bleeding hearts in The Greens.

  37. C@t,

    This sounds like that “creeping socialism” that Barnaby warned us about:

    “Interim report into the Working Holiday Maker program recommends the government appeal to young Australians’ patriotism to fill gaps in agricultural work”

  38. Jaeger @ #2205 Wednesday, September 16th, 2020 – 7:05 am

    C@t,

    This sounds like that “creeping socialism” that Barnaby warned us about:

    “Interim report into the Working Holiday Maker program recommends the government appeal to young Australians’ patriotism to fill gaps in agricultural work”

    As the Coalition are involved, we are all socialists now! But we knew that, as the Coalition also seem to be embracing deficit funding strategy. Also, who is more patriotic than a refugee in the country that took them in and gave them shelter? 🙂

  39. I’m just an average politically unsophisticated voter, and if I can’t work out what Albo is saying over gas, many others won’t. Fitzgibbon is pretty clear on coal, however.

    When a message needs someone else to explain it, communication has failed.

  40. C@tmomma

    Notice who’s missing? The fantastically ineffectual bleeding hearts in The Greens.

    They may be ‘missing’ but your hyper partisan Green Mania sure isn’t.

  42. Well, I object to the idea that we pander to farmers by forcing people to work for them. (There’s a word for that).

    What is needed is a serious look at why these jobs aren’t appealing to workers.

    A few hints –

    1. It doesn’t pay enough.
    2. The working conditions are sh*t.
    3. The Federal government doesn’t reward job agencies for finding short term work, so job agencies don’t refer their clients to short term work.
    4. Farmers are not investing in infrastructure which would make the work easier. They prefer to rely on a cheap workforce.

    It may be that an Australian farmer can’t compete with fruit and veg from overseas AND pay a decent wage. In which case, capitalism should take its course and that farmer should be off the land or farming something which doesn’t rely on exploiting workers.

  43. It’s all Dan Andrews fault. Lol!

    MFW
    @MadFckingWitch

    To think that the Tories have been screaming for weeks that there would have been no problems with hotel quarantine in Victoria if ONLY they’d brought in the ADF earlier, hmmmm?
    Quote Tweet

    Chelsea Hetherington
    @chelsea_hetho
    · 13h
    #BREAKING: A member of the ADF completing mandatory hotel quarantine at Pier One Sydney Harbour has been fined for a COVID-19 breach. The 26-year-old man had a 53-year-old woman stay in his room overnight. She was not in quarantine. @abcnews

  45. poroti @ #2208 Wednesday, September 16th, 2020 – 7:12 am

    C@tmomma

    Notice who’s missing? The fantastically ineffectual bleeding hearts in The Greens.

    They may be ‘missing’ but your hyper partisan Green Mania sure isn’t.

    I’m ‘hyper partisan’? Lol. Go get a room with Firefox, who I’m sure will be along soon to go off like a frog in a sock at some perceived flaw in the proposal.

    I just made the obvious point that, after their decades of crocodile tears for refugees, stunts, and deals with Scott Morrison and the Coalition to stymie Labor proposals to deal with refugees when Labor were in government federally, The Greens, when the opportunity arose to create a system that advances refugee interests, were nowhere to be found.

    It’s not a mania on my part, the mania has been all theirs and it has amounted to nothing.

  46. zoomster,
    If the work is so shitty, why were there planeloads of backpackers, pre-COVID19, who were willing to come to Australia to do it? It can’t have been THAT bad. Also, what about the Pacific Islanders who have been coming here for years now to do it? What makes verified young refugees incapable of doing that which the others are capable of?

  48. C@

    Firstly, farmers complain every year that they can’t get pickers.

    Secondly, a backpacker of no fixed abode, travelling around Australia, doesn’t have the same issues that someone moving from their home to work short term has. They’re not relying on the work to live, either – in most cases, it’s pocket money, and if the conditions are too sh*tty, they move on after a few days (farmers can build a business case around that).

    Thirdly, yes, Pacific Islanders do come for the work. The pay and conditions are sh*t but they’re better than you can get on a Pacific Island. I’m not sure that justifies it, though.

    All of this is very different from an Australian resident who is having to earn a working wage to live in Australian conditions.

    None of it is a justification for slave labour.

  49. Suddenly the bastards who have spent years demonising refugees as illegal immigrants, queue jumpers and a potential danger to the fabric of society, are suddenly all human rightsy and woke for them and the farmers and their generous offers of riches for those prepared to work.

    That the ultimate ambition of Laborite partisans is getting back ‘teh Greens’ votes they think they own or something, says much about how moribund and lacking in ambition, vision and capability the ALP currently is.

    Why bother taking on Scomo’s gas led economic recovery and fossil fuel nirvana, when a never ending stream of pettiness on someone else’s blog, for years and years, is so much easier.

    Your right Lizzie, if it takes a pile of other people to explain what Albo really meant, it seems more like a communication and understanding failure.

  50. …the solution in the past has been to exploit migrants who don’t have the understanding or the language skills. They used to be bused into the farm from the city, dumped there (with no real idea of where they were or how to get back home), housed in substandard conditions, underpaid and then sent home after the harvest.

    The unions have done a lot of work in trying to combat this.

Comments Page 45 of 54
1 … 44 45 46 … 54

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *