Who’s the fairest

Newspoll results on attitudes to the leaders find both performing poorly eve by the grim standards of recent history.

The Australian had follow-up results from the weekend Newspoll on Tuesday showing how the two leaders compared on nine attributes, with accompanying tables neatly comparing the results to 14 earlier following the same template going back go 2008. It is characteristic of such results to move in lock step with a leader’s overall approval rating, and these are no exception, with Scott Morrison’s position deteriorating by between eight (arrogant up from 52% to 60%) and sixteen (likeable down from 63% to 47%) points since April, while Anthony Albanese’s movements ranged from positive two (arrogant from 40% to 38%) to negative four (trustworthy from 48% to 44% and experienced from 64% to 60%).

The result is that both leaders are at or near the weakest results yet recorded on a range of measures. Scott Morrison had the worst results yet recorded for either a Prime Minister or Opposition Leader on “understands the major issues” (52%) and “cares for people” (50%) and the worst for a Prime Minister on trustworthy (42%). However, he has the consolation that Anthony Albanese’s results were hardly better at 54%, 56% and 44% respectively. Both also scored poorly on being in touch with voters, at 41% for Morrison and 46% for Albanese, while landing well clear of the 33% Tony Abbott recorded a few weeks after the Prince Phillip knighthood. Conversely, Albanese’s arrogant rating of 38% is the lowest yet recorded, comparing with a middling 60% for Morrison.

Other news:

• A Liberal preselection vote on the weekend for the eastern Melbourne fringe seat of Casey, which will be vacated with the retirement of Tony Smith, was won by Aaron Violi, executive with a company that provides online ordering services to restaurants and a former staffer to Senator James Patterson. The Age reports Violi won the last round of the ballot by 152 votes to 101 ahead of Andrew Asten, principal of Boston Consulting Group and former ministerial chief-of-staff to Alan Tudge, with the last candidate excluded being Melbourne City councillor Roshena Campbell. Earlier reports suggested Campbell and Violi to be aligned with state Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien and party president Robert Clark, while Asten is in the rival Josh Frydenberg/Michael Sukkar camp.

• A Roy Morgan poll, using its somewhat dubious SMS survey method, produced very strong results for the Labor government in Victoria, which was credited with a 58-42 lead on two-party preferred, compared with 57.3-42.7 at the 2018 election. The primary votes were Labor 43%, Coalition 31% and Greens 11%. A forced response question on Daniel Andrews found 60.5% approving and 39.5% disapproving. The poll was conducted last Thursday from a sample of 1357.

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.

2,044 comments on “Who’s the fairest”

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  1. Bucephalus

    Oh, I don’t know – investing Pharmaceutical Companies and Higher Education (both through donations and taxation) that leads to the ability to develop vaccines for a global pandemic in under a year. Just one example.

    Tell me about the IT hardware and software you are using to communicate with us today? No benefit?

    Very poor examples to use to defend the tax lurks of the wealthy. Pharmaceutical companies are heavy beneficieries of public research funding -via basic research testing new ideas and concepts, university/industry partnerships, or direct government grants. Covid vaccines were only able to be developed so quickly because governments directed billions to unversities and pharmaceutical companies for their development.

    IT hardware and software almost entirely originated in the public sector via public research and development. For example WiFi was developed by the CSIRO.

    In both of these example government and community effort in developing these goods has resulted in disproportinately privatised profit.

    To suggest that accumulated wealth produced these privatised goods rather than collective action funded by the taxpayer is just delusional.

  2. The indue card is a costly and unnecessary joke from a government that wants to get out of people’s lives because the disabled face enough barriers in their lives without needing government to rub their face in it by controlling where and how they spend their money.

  3. The idea of wealth re-distribution is not to make the less wealthy recipient wealthy, as facile as that idea may be. The idea in its purest form is to assist the less fortunate to live.
    It’s also good for the economy with the multiplier effect also in play, ie give the poor a dollar and they’ll spend it, thus it filters through the economy.

  4. JimmyD says:
    Sunday, November 21, 2021 at 8:22 pm

    You’re full of it. Without private enterprise investment over many decades none of that would have been possible. The alternative is communism, socialism and planned economies which have all been abject failures.

  5. “Firefox – you did not answer my question.”

    ***

    Yeah I did, just obviously not in the way that you would have liked.

    Try this. One progressive policy here and there doesn’t make a party a progressive party. You’ve actually got to be consistent. When Labor sides with the Coalition to further their conservative agenda, they completely destroy whatever progressive credentials they may have had. Jumping up and down and saying “oh but what about what we did back in 1975” doesn’t excuse Labor’s recent track record. It’s nothing more than a cop-out and an attempt to dodge accountability.

  6. “Firefox
    Knowing the politician drink on the job those steps are a trip hazard.”

    ***

    Good point. They should install breathalysers at the doors while they’re doing the ramp. Get some of the AFP cops who patrol Parliament to stand there and check that every one of them is below the limit before entering. If they are over, they are suspended from the service of the House/Senate for 24 hours.

    If someone is too drunk to drive a car then they are too drunk to be making laws that govern our lives.

  7. Another thing with pensioner travel is the cost of airfares.

    3 months can make the trip financially beneficial, where 1 month could be completely unaffordable.

  8. Phalus

    You use legislation introduced by the LNP as your response – concluding nothing is illegal

    And therein lies the problem

    I note you do not respond to Menzies increasing Company and personal tax rates (and increasing the pension)

    You should learn to count to 99 so you can change hands

  9. Morrison has terminal poor judgement. Too many to mention, but his BozoBrainFart ™ this week was to dogwhistle about ‘Government getting out of people’s lives..’

    How clever of sQomo – get all those anti vaxxers and FreeDumbers to vote for him.

    But guess what? All those other policies where the dead hand of Morrison is resting like a dodgy preacher’s arm on their shoulder.

    No jab. No play.

    Borders closed for 18 months.

    Indue Card being extended to all pensioners.

    Why will this week’s foot-in-mouth example of poor judgment reveal?

  10. Thanks for your response Buce. Obviously we aren’t going to agree on what is fair, or whether the money spent on these tax concessions could be used to better effect reducing other taxes.

    On super, the cap is now $1.7 million. I think it went up on July 1st this year. My argument is that a couple don’t need $3.4 million tax free in the pension phase to enjoy a high standard of living in retirement. Wouldn’t, say, $2.0 million be enough? People can have as much money as they want in retirement, no problem, the question is how much should be tax free? I note there were howls of outrage from wealthy Liberals when Turnbull set the tax-free cap to 1.6 million. Super tax concessions should be used to finance a comfortable standard of living in retirement-they should not be used as a tax avoidance mechanism.

    I don’t agree that building depreciation should be tax deductible-why should the tax payer finance property investor maintenance and renovation costs? And are you saying that the price of houses isn’t going up?

    As for franking credits, my opposition is not avoidance of double taxation, but to the change made by the Howard government in 2001 so that no tax would be paid at all, by the simple device of putting the shares in the name of someone with a zero marginal tax rate.

    No doubt there are other tax avoidance mechanisms I’m not so familiar with. I’ve read that family trusts are another great way to beat the tax man.

    It also should be acknowledged that all of these tax avoidance devices cost money to finance, through the revenue that the Commonwealth foregoes. If the wealthy paid their fair share, other taxes, such as personal income tax, could be reduced, without increasing the total tax take.

  11. FFS Firefox

    Labor is not a band of angels. In Parliament it sometimes votes for shit that it shouldn’t have. We know this. I criticise this too. Its policies are not where I would like them on some issues. Some Labor MPs are frankly uninformed on some issues. Etc.

    If you stuck to valid criticism then fair enough. But then you go run your roomba over the dog shit and then all over the house with the “Lib-Lab same-same” shit. Not only is it just patently not true, but it actually makes it harder for anyone to have a decent discussion about policy.

    So, why do you do it? Especially in a place like this full of people who know you’re wrong?

    Do you expect people on here to recant, and go “I’m gonna vote Green”? Really? Or…
    Do you like wasting your time?

    I’m also tired of the people here who go “The Greens are the enemy of Labor.. exterminate! exterminate!”.. tedious shit that it is. So why do you encourage that by being the very stereotype they rave on about?

    The Greens stand for what they stand for. You can vote for them, or not. I don’t have a problem with that. In fact I’d like Labor to become more progressive in some ways. I can also acknowledge that its hard in some ways (and easier in some ways, if Labor is clever enough) for Labor to do the “right thing”. But in the end, why do you do this? Really?

  12. Firefox – yep disagree and you make my point re righteousness very well. Cheers

    Will try once more:

    Would a conservative government intitiate and implement Medicare, Superannuation, NDIS etc>

  13. sprocket

    Every time Scomo does or says something stupid, the media cover for him. And we still have Palmer determined on spending tens of millions on a campaign like last time – which if it does one thing, reinforces all the indoctrination people have had about “Labor and money”…

  14. nath being ignorant again…

    ‘Wi-Fi is one of the most popular modern technologies to come out in recent years. In areas known as “hotspots”, Wi-Fi works over short distances and lets people connect “wirelessly” to the internet easier than ever before. The tech is common in offices, public buildings, airports, cafes, homes and many other locations. It’s been suggested that there are over five billion devices all over the planet that use Wi-Fi. It was first created by a group of Australian scientists at the CSIRO.

    Doctor John O’Sullivan came from a background in radio astronomy. In the early 1990s, he wanted to solve the issues of wireless networking using radio frequencies. Some communication companies had shown some progress in the area but nothing near the transfer speeds needed to be practical. O’Sullivan put together a team from a variety of fields: software engineering, signal processing and mathematics.

    The problem with the concept of Wi-Fi at the time was reverberation. When data was transferred over radio signals, they bounced off different surfaces, caused an echo and were lost. The answer was found in an area of mathematics that was previously used to study black holes. By adding a Fast Fourier transform algorithm, radio frequencies were separated into specific tones and this saved the transfer from degrading. Wireless LAN (local area network) had been invented.

    Wi-Fi was patented by the CSIRO in Australia in 1992 and then in the United States four years later. The technology entered the market in 2001 and legal issues soon followed. A number of large American companies—some of which included Microsoft, Dell and Hewlett-Packard—incorporated Wi-Fi into their product lines but refused to pay any royalties. The CSIRO won their first case in 2007 against Buffalo Technology but it wouldn’t be until 2012 when everything was finally resolved. A legal agreement was reached between the CSIRO and over twenty American companies, together who controlled over 90% of the communications industry. They collectively paid over $430 million for the lost revenue.

    https://matthew-j-healy.com/2020/12/13/australia-invented-wi-fi/

    https://www.csiro.au/en/research/technology-space/it/Wireless-LAN

  15. Bucephalus

    Without private enterprise investment over many decades none of that would have been possible.

    I don’t disagree with that, but now you are conflating two separate points: the concentration of wealth, particularly inherited wealth, in the hands of relatively few people, largely free of taxation; and the economic decision-making of corporate enterprises.

  16. Barney

    “3 months can make the trip financially beneficial, where 1 month could be completely unaffordable.”

    Agreed. Some of my earlier trips were an exercise in couch surfing on a global scale.
    Mind you, that got a bit tiring. Especially the couple I stayed with in North Carolina who were having a breakup and literally throwing things at each other (whilst being nice to me – I just had to duck sometimes).

  17. Bucephalussays:
    Sunday, November 21, 2021 at 7:47 pm
    Barney in Tanjung Bunga says:
    Sunday, November 21, 2021 at 7:36 pm

    “So, it’s ok for someone well off to travel as much as they like in retirement, but those less fortunate are constrained by the Government.”

    Life isn’t fair and what some think is fair others won’t. My kids learnt that at a very young age. I don’t have the boat or car I want and I don’t get to ride up the front of the plane when I fly and I have to work to maintain my lifestyle – I think it’s unfair but that’s life.

    Major logical fail.

    How many of those things you have been so cruelly denied were because the Government said you couldn’t have them?

  18. “But in the end, why do you do this? Really?”

    ***

    More kayfabe.

    I could and will ask you the same thing. Why do you do it? Why abuse and harass someone for simply arguing the progressive case? What made you feel the need to do that, I wonder.

    I won’t be lectured by you of all people on such matters. Seriously.

    I come here to debate and discuss politics. It just so happens that I am considerably further to the left than most others here (I know what I am and don’t shy away from it) which means that we often have disagreements. That’s politics for you! There’s nothing wrong with that either. People are allowed to disagree with one another you know, it’s not just Labor’s way or the highway.

    You just don’t like it when people hold Labor accountable.

  19. sprocket_ says:
    Sunday, November 21, 2021 at 8:44 pm

    9 year old article from nath

    yeah, nah
    ____________________
    If you read it you will find that there were a multitude of organizations claiming credit for wifi and that the author concludes with this paragraph.

    “Success has many fathers,” Van Nest told the jury in 2009. The slew of lawsuits over the origin of WiFi—a technology that wasn’t really invented by anyone in particular—is pushing that aphorism to the limit.

    This outsized claim has never been proven. It hasn’t been acknowledged by any of the dozens of tech companies that have created actual WiFi products. It hasn’t been recognized by anyone who isn’t on CSIRO’s payroll or rooting for them from a nationalist perspective.

  20. the fact that there were probably hundreds of people who each had a significant hand in inventing wifi won’t stop Australians insisting it is proof of the Australian genius.

  21. James Curran in the AFR today putting another BozoBrainFart ™ into context…

    ‘Morrison claims the mantle of John Curtin and Robert Menzies. But in his recent fracas with President Macron, his response carried a whiff of Billy McMahon’s reaction to being hamstrung when America’s China policy changed abruptly in mid-1971. The same testy dissembling and blustery vacuity.

    A closer comparison for Morrison may be Billy Hughes during the First World War. Australia then, just as now, had every right to be prudently concerned about the menace it saw in the rise of an Asian great power. And the strategic nightmares about Japan ultimately eventuated.

    The strategic situation then, however, was hardly helped by Australian bellicosity arising largely from British race patriot pride. Prime Minister Hughes fractured national unity in a debilitating domestic debate over “loyalty”: the result was an Australia almost totally unprepared for the Second World War.

    Reflect, then, on the unforeseen consequences that can occur when a ruthless politician opts for headlines exploiting hostility to an Asian power, rather than crafting a longer-term strategy for Australia’s place, and peace, in the region.

    https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/morrison-turns-china-threat-into-an-election-wedge-20211120-p59alf

  22. Interesting that SBS has been running stories for days about the resurgence of covid in Europe and now, finally, tonight, the ABC news has had to start covering this issue too (along with the idiotic protests).

    Multiple countries in Europe dealing with very high covid cases and are head back to at least partial lockdown. Seeing this on the news might help people here to remain vidulent and act a bit more safely.

  23. nath

    the fact that there were probably hundreds of people who each had a significant hand in inventing wifi won’t stop Australians insisting it is proof of the Australian genius.

    That wasn’t the point I was making, but fair enough.

  24. Nath,

    What part of “they solved the a problem that made high speed data transfers using radio signals workable” are you disputing?

  25. ” the fact that there were probably hundreds of people who each had a significant hand in inventing wifi won’t stop Australians insisting it is proof of the Australian genius.”

    I’m surprised that Scott Morrison hasn’t claimed the credit yet.

  26. Barney, it seems to me that the Australian team had a hand in the development what we know as wifi technology, but the claim that it ‘invented wifi’ is way over the top. But it makes us feel good.

  27. Nath,
    They created something no one else had at that time.
    We now know it as Wi-Fi.
    That sounds an awful lot like an invention.

  28. Fulvio Sammut @ #1589 Sunday, November 21st, 2021 – 8:51 pm

    Wayne with a dictionary.

    Yeah. I’m like, who freaking cares who ‘invented’ WiFi? It’s just another one of those red herrings nath throws on the barbie to start another verbal stoush with people. Doesn’t he have a life anymore? I know I’m too busy with my life to waste it on arguing the toss over absolute crap like that. Let alone scratching around for something new to waste people’s time with. Like he seems to do quite regularly….Napoleon Bonaparte…he’s your man! Tonight though, once the re-heated Labor’s changes to the Single Mothers Pension ran it’s course, up he pops with, who invented WiFi.

    Oh well, stops him hanging around Collingwood Football Club I guess. 😐

  29. Just saw the ALP blaming the Federal LNP for fuel prices on the news. They obviously think they’re going to win the election because they have given up on being serious about economics.

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