First up, note two posts below this one dealing with ongoing electoral events: the resolution to the Tasmanian election count and the New South Wales state by-election for Upper Hunter on Saturday week.
The Guardian today reports on the latest fortnightly Essential Research poll, which includes the monthly leadership ratings. As was the case with Newspoll, this finds Scott Morrison pulling out of the slump that followed the Brittany Higgins and Christian Porter episodes, with his approval up four to 58% and disapproval to five to 32%, without quite restoring him to the respective 62% and 29% he recorded in the March poll. The recovery has been particularly pronounced with women, among whom he is up nine points on approval to 55% and down eight on disapproval to 34%. Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened from 47-28 to 50-24; Anthony Albanese’s ratings are said to be “constant compared to his standing last month”, when he had 39% approval and 34% disapproval.
The poll also finds 48% support and 27% opposition for the India travel ban, with 41% supporting jail time and fines and 33% opposed. However, 56% said they would support allowing citizens to return “provided they complete the necessary quarantine procedures when they arrive”, with 22% opposed. There was also a suite of questions on budget priorities that are probably better saved for the full poll release, which should be along later today.
UPDATE: Full report here. Albanese turns out to be steady on 39% approval and up one on disapproval to 35%. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Monday from a sample of 1092.
Some notable preselection action to report:
• The Tasmanian Liberal Senate preselection has seen Eric Abetz, long the dominant figure in the state branch, dumped to the loseable number three position behind fellow incumbents Jonathon Duniam and Wendy Askew. A source quoted by Sue Bailey of The Mercury said Abetz won the first round of the ballot for top position with 29 votes to Duniam’s 26 and Askew’s 12, before Duniam prevailed on the second round with 36 votes to Abetz’s 31. Askew then defeated Abetz in the ballot for second position by 37 votes to 30.
• Labor’s preselection for the new seat of Hawke on Melbourne’s north-western fringe is in limbo after the Victorian Supreme Court ruled a challenge by ten unions against the federal party organisation’s takeover of the process should proceed to a trial on May 26. This complicates former state secretary Sam Rae’s bid for the seat, which was set to be signed off on by the national executive under the terms of a deal reached between elements of the Left and Right, with Rae being a member of the latter. The Age reports Rae “will be challenged by Maribyrnong councillor Sarah Carter and former Melton council candidate Deepti Alurkar” – I’m not sure where this leaves state government minister Natalie Hutchins, earlier identified as Rae’s chief rival. Hutchins is an ally of Bill Shorten and the Australian Workers Union, who have been frozen out of the aforesaid factional deal.
• Barnaby Joyce has easily seen off a challenge for the Nationals preselection in New England from Tenterfield army officer Alex Rubin, whom he defeated in the local members’ ballot by 112 votes to 12.
Fortunately Labor is not trying to guess the election date.
They are busy getting candidates up and running.
As are the Greens.
Albanese has already started campaign events. He is currently campaigning in Queensland. This is great. A long campaign is what Labor should be doing. So Labor is ready today.
The longer Morrison waits to call it the better prepared Labor will be. Ditto the Greens.
The budget reply was the start of Labor’s campaign.
It’s only going to heat up as every day passes.
Edit: Remember Morrison wants quarantine to work. He does not want campaigning to spread the virus as happened in India. That’s if he has the sense of a gnat.
Can’t wait till the public health warnings of covid exposure sites becomes itself a political issue. In other words they stop warning people where they’ve been exposed because they want everyone to calm down and get used to living with the virus.
CC
What Morrison wants and what Morrison does are not always the same because he knows the states will lock things down and he knows state leaders will shift the blame home to Morrison.
I can see it now Dan opening his presser with thanks to Morrison we are back to square one and only thanks to Morrison are we needing to go back into lockdown.
“ The Defence rests.”
15 minutes later the jury returns its verdict:
Guilty.
Privatising healthcare is LNP DNA.
They have no commitment to Medicare. In reality, they won’t move against it because the smarter operators know they can’t get away with it. For the moment.
Mediscare worked because the public could sniff out the truth: in that term of government the LNP had form for cuts to services, copayments, and privatisation of whatever they could get away with.
Beemer
At least one state is determined to do exactly what Morrison wants. Gladys has been trying to soften people up for months now. She’s perfectly happy to let the virus spread and not have lockdowns. She must actually believe that the vaccine we have now will prevent deaths and not be ineffective against the latest strains.
AE
Yes. Labor has a great example of using fear against the LNP.
A credit to them. It scared the LNP so much they changed campaign law.
And btw the faith that some politicians seem to have in our current vaccines is astonishing. Even if it was 100% fail safe against hospitalisation and death (and this is almost certainly not going to be the case) what about all the people who aren’t vaccinated? Are they thinking that the virus escaping and killing some of these people will simply incentivise them to get vaccinated? I hope not.
We need herd immunity and the thing that scares me is the extent to which some of these people are running away from that term. Do you ever see Glady mention herd immunity? Or Coatesworth?
Just to add to India’s current problems, a tropical cyclone is grazing the coastline around Goa, heading north towards Mumbai.
https://zoom.earth/storms/tauktae-2021/
@SenSanders tweets
Unbelievable but true: The same Republicans who voted for trillions in tax breaks for the top 1% and large corporations, now want to increase taxes on working families through user fees, more toll roads and higher gas taxes while cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
Just as the government is persisting with its plan to privatise the assessment of NDIS candidates/recipients., it is already underway doing the same with aged care. From early this year the potential providers have been visiting aged care facilities doing “shadow assessments” of residents’ ACFI (Aged Care Funding Instrument) classifications. These are the things that determine how much funding is forthcoming for their care.
Toeing the line is a saying that originated in the RN back in the early 19th century and meant lining up for inspection. Learnt that from the Patrick O’Brian Aubrey and Maturin series of books.
Guytaur (quoting someone)
Upwards is more a flood than a trickle, at least that was the experience in the 194os, 50s and 60s.
The difficulty is to work out why the atrophy of the 1970s set in. It involved capture of the economy by certain sectors therein (just as today we have an economy almost completely captured by the financial sector). Can these captures be avoided or must we oscillate between them (as has been recent experience and seems to be axiomatic to the Lucas critique). One clue is that the captures involve the financial sector either as captor (as recently, and in 1930) or as captive (as in 1970)
Clem,
We all bow to your lived experience.
Well may that continue GG.
Being born in 1962, make it a bit hard to live in the RN in 1805.
billie
Thanks for links.
Having died in 1967 makes you allegedly posting quite difficult to understand too.
Bludgers toe no line.
Origins:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toe_the_line#Armed_services
In New Zealand, a Newshub/Reid Research poll
Labour: 52.7 (+2.7 from election)
National: 27.0 (+1.4)
Green: 7.1 (-0.8)
ACT: 6.9 (-0.7)
MRI: 1.2 (0)
NZF: 1.9 (-0.7)
CON: 1.2 (-0.3)
TOP: 1.3 (-0.2)
ADV 0.1 (-0.9)
https://newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/05/judith-collins-allegations-of-maori-separatism-not-working-for-national-in-newshub-reid-research-poll.html
Newshub-Reid Research Poll: The race relations debate – Kiwis think Judith Collins is being divisive
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/05/newshub-reid-research-poll-the-race-relations-debate-kiwis-think-judith-collins-is-being-divisive.html
Newshub-Reid Research Poll: Majority of Kiwis back trans-Tasman bubble
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2021/05/newshub-reid-research-poll-majority-of-kiwis-back-trans-tasman-bubble.html
But all LNP Ministers line up to toe Morrison’s line. And they dare not step over it.
Greensborough Growler @ #2741 Sunday, May 16th, 2021 – 4:10 pm
Gee whiz Gobbler if it’s down to me our troubles are over.
Scrooter is toast!
Where do I sign?
‘lizzie says:
Sunday, May 16, 2021 at 5:21 pm
But all LNP Ministers line up to toe Morrison’s line. And they dare not step over it.’
Morrison’s ministers toe the gutter.
Andrew_Earlwood @ #2748 Sunday, May 16th, 2021 – 4:22 pm
Bingo.
mundo @ #2117 Sunday, May 16th, 2021 – 2:46 pm
Your choice. 😐
E. G. Theodore
In the finance sectors ideal world is one where everyone is wealthy and there is no inflation because its inflation they fear so the challenge is to avoid the things that cause inflation.
Wasn’t Judy Collins a folk singer back in the day?
Boy has she fallen a long way. NZ Opposition Leader now. 🙂
“James Massola reports that Liberal MPs are increasingly concerned Christian Porter has remained virtually silent in public since being appointed Industry, Science and Innovation Minister a month-and-a-half ago, with several warning his unwillingness to front the media is unsustainable.”
Well, that is the reason he is transferred (not de notes)to that ministry because there is nothing to talk about Industry, Science and Innovation. Turnbull atlleast pretended about’Innovation’.
Mundo,
Whingeing whiners like you whine.
It’s all you’ve got!
NOTICE FOR SA BLUDGERS
Scorpio is coming to Adelaide next week for a funeral and wants to catch up with the SA Poll Bludgers Chapter for a meal on Saturday.
Could you please let me know via https://www.facebook.com/ken.craig.9469 if you would like to come. I have in mind a reasonably priced place on Portrush Road where parking is easy.
Unfortunately I have lost some phone numbers and emails of the chapter.
Ven,
Do you know if the Government is picking up Porter’s legal expenses?
Singapore going into lockdown for one month:
https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/singapore-locks-down-for-a-month-as-mystery-covid-cases-rise-20210514-p57s1p.html
Greensborough Growler @ #2190 Sunday, May 16th, 2021 – 6:02 pm
I thought they were being subsidised by a rich benefactor? Which Labor picked up because Porter has failed to disclose it on his Pecuniary Interests Register. Wouldn’t surprise me if it was Stokes, Forrest or Reinhart.
Singapore going into lockdown for one month:
______
Oh, the Hub Bubble?
C@tmommasays:
Sunday, May 16, 2021 at 6:02 pm
Singapore going into lockdown for one month:
________________
Meanwhile Albo is wanting us to open up our international border.
cat,
Either way, we need transparency.
The increase in NZ Labour support (Leroy at 5:13pm) would probably also have something to do with this:
E. G. Theodore says:
Sunday, May 16, 2021 at 4:59 pm
Guytaur (quoting someone)
Albo’s Budget Reply is trickle-up-economics – which does work
Upwards is more a flood than a trickle, at least that was the experience in the 194os, 50s and 60s.
The difficulty is to work out why the atrophy of the 1970s set in.
The phase from the end of the war until the 1970s was characterised by several factors that greatly expanded real wages….a productivity boom reflecting very widespread state-driven fixed capital investment in infrastructure of all kinds, heavy investment in education and labour force training and the rapid adoption of technological innovations; the very rapid expansion of trans-border investment and trade, which greatly enlarged the productive potential of industrial sectors; the partial abolition of the gold standard in most economies; the rapid expansion of the workforce in industrial economies; a general political commitment to full employment and the use of fiscal policy to attain it.
The stagnation of the 1970s and 80s reflected the decay and collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system and the adjustment of economies to floating exchange rates, which greatly disrupted the mercantile order and prompted a reorganisation of the global division of labour, mostly marshalled by so-called transnational corporations. This further accelerated the growth in trade between industrial economies – a key driver in the expansion of real wages – and this endured until the GFC, a blow-off characterised by monetary disorder and the mis allocation of capital in industrial economies. This, in turn, has prompted a further rationalisation of the global division of labour, a process that is very far from being complete, and that is made more complex by the digital revolution, climate change and the re-construction of the energy and resources sectors.
In addition, we’re now in a quite reactionary phase in political economy, where supra-national, collective goals are being subordinated to more parochial, xenophobic and conservative reflexes. This is also harming the global economy and real wages.
BK
These assessments you are talking about. Is this to test a new funding tool against current cases. What the government likes to call an efficiency measure.
Taylormade @ #2194 Sunday, May 16th, 2021 – 6:10 pm
Scott Morrison should have a new figurine made:
‘I Stopped This’
* an airplane with International Travel stamped on its side*
Judy Collins sang about the travails of unionised coal miners….
https://youtu.be/uyd_Dov7hfs
These assessments you are talking about. Is this to test a new funding tool against current cases. What the government likes to call an efficiency measure.
______
Assantdj
The current ACFI classification is applied for by the aged care provider and it indicates the assessed acuity of each resident, that is, how much and what type of care is required. The department then reviews and sometimes visits to approve or retrospectively reduce it. The new system, the Australian National Aged Care Classification (AN-ACC), will have contracted agencies visit to make and institute the classification (13 available levels) and therefore funding. I wonder what performance measures will be put upon these contractors.
What could possibly go wrong?
Cud Chewer
The downside of the successful strategy to keep the population safe is the difficulties that have become apparent with people wanting to make exclusions for certain cohorts to return, such as students and ag workers plus the many stranded citizens.
To do this we need a highly effective vaccine, high take up and the ability to identify and revaccinate for new mutations.
I fear that this issues don’t rate highly with our government and that the chance of the very elderly or health compromised will pay the price because although the vaccine limits spread and disease it will in my opinion still be fatal for some people. Also the fact that most people will be a symptomatic will mean it will spread undetected until it flourishes in an aged care home or other area with compromised patients such as a cancer ward.
Quarantine therefore will need to be continued but our government has no appetite for the level of quarantine we would need to return to normal for international travel even if they exclude tourism
I hate to say it but I think our biggest risk will be post election with a LNP government who will just do as they please and be a bigger risk to the population.
mundo
I have mentioned here previously that I ended my Crikey subscription in July 2019. There were a few reasons, but none put as succinctly as the way Bernard Keane explained why Crikey campaigned against Labor in the lead up to the May 2019 Federal election.
After the election, I think I was not the only person to cancel my sub to Crikey because of this. So Keane wrote an article saying that the reason Crikey was so anti-Labor was because of “Mediscare”. Crikey did not feel they could call out the Coalition’s scare campaigns, because in 2016 Labor had done something at least as bad.
BK
I think it would be more appropriate to say what can go right.
How is this assessment supposed to work, will they use documentation provided by the home or just do an on the spot assessment and how hands on will it be.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think they would come up with a system like this but it will make some providers happy as they always talk about staff spending to much time on assessments.
I think it will be another kick in the teeth to aged care workers to be in essence told we don’t trust your clinical judgement in regards to what clients needs are.
Needed to edit my post at 6.39 pm, above, to get the indenting.
I have just finished doing my French homework (devoirs), and originally wrote “blockquote” as “blocquote”.
CNN article on the surge in home prices around the world. The causative factors overseas are similar to those being experienced in Australia.
Our daughter and SIL have a growing family and want a larger house and garden for the kids. It will be a balancing act getting the best price for their house and not paying too much for a new property. They’re hoping to move down our way where prices haven’t risen as much but not many places are listed for sale (houses built about 30 years ago on bigger blocks and many still with original owners who are “empty nesters” like us).
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/05/13/business/global-real-estate-prices/index.html
A really interesting read for those who read (or even write) modern fiction.
Two hundred years ago female novelists pretended to be men. Now, to get a fair shake, ought male novelists pretend to be female?
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/16/how-women-conquered-the-world-of-fiction
How is this assessment supposed to work
They’ll be paid a bounty for every application they reject…
C@t
Only recently the usual suspects were talking about a travel bubble with Singapore. When will they ever learn?
D&M
I dropped my sub when Crikey increasingly became a Greens rag.