Newspoll: 54-46 to Labor in South Australia

The final Newspoll of the South Australian campaign is a bit closer than the mid-week Newspoll, but still suggestive of a change of government.

The election eve Newspoll for South Australia is a little more moderate than the mid-week YouGov result for The Advertiser, but nonetheless suggests Labor is in a surely election-winning position with a 54-46 lead on two-party preferred. This is from a GhostWhoVotes tweet, so more detail to follow. For further late-campaign news and analysis, see my previous post.

UPDATE: The front page of The Australian further reveals that Peter Malinauskas holds a 44-41 lead over Steven Marshall as preferred premier, and their respective approval ratings are 54% and 47%.

UPDATE 2: Full results now up at The Australian. The primary votes are Labor 41% (up two since the Newspoll three weeks ago), Liberal 38% (up one) and Greens 9% (down one) – the two-party result compares with 53-47 last time. Steven Marshall is down one on both approval and disapproval, to 47% and 46%, while Malinauskas is up three to 54% and down one to 30%. However, Malinauskas’s lead as preferred premier of 44-41 is narrower than his 46-39 lead last time. The poll was conducted Friday to Thursday from a sample of 1012.

Late mail:

John Ferguson of The Australian reports Labor hopes to see a continuation of the dynamic that has been evident particularly in Melbourne, where well-heeled and well-educated electorates that have traditionally been safe for the Liberals move to the left, potentially to the extent of reeling in Davenport (8.2%), rated a possible gain by “multiple Labor sources”. Conversely, Paula Leuthen in King (0.8%) is “widely being seen as a potential saviour for the Marshall government due to her effective on-the-ground campaigning in Adelaide’s sprawling north-east”.

Paul Starick of The Advertiser says the Liberals have all but written off Adelaide (0.8%) based on their tracking polling; that Paula Leuthen in King will be “hard to dislodge”; that #8220;both sides are confident about their prospects in Elder” (2.0%); that Davenport is “considered a prospective Labor gain by some on both sides”; and that Dunstan (8.1%) and Gibson (9.9%) are “dark horses”. However, concern among Liberals that independent Geoff Brock might dislodge Deputy Premier Dan van Holst Pellekaan in Stuart has “abated”.

• With due regard to the fact that their error margins overlap, some methodological distinctions worth noting about the 56-44 YouGov poll and the 54-46 Newspoll, notwithstanding that they were conducted by the same agency. The YouGov poll was conducted earlier, from the Monday before last through to Sunday, whereas the Newspoll was in the field from last Friday through to Thursday. The Newspoll has a sample of 1012 compared with 835 for the YouGov, but both emerged with identical effective error margins of 3.5%. This accounts for the extent to which the data was weighted to match a population profile, which was more elaborate in the case of the Newspoll (accounting for age, gender, location, education and income) than the YouGov (age, gender, location and religious affiliation). It should be noted that I can tell you all this because YouGov fulfils the transparency standards of the Australian Polling Council, which has been established since the last election. Non-members include Resolve Strategic and Roy Morgan. The methodological statements for the polls can be viewed here for the YouGov and here for the Newspoll.

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.

188 comments on “Newspoll: 54-46 to Labor in South Australia”

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  1. A man had to be pulled away from Peter Malinauskas after dropping his pants and shouting “Peter is number one” at a polling booth in Woodville Gardens this morning.

  2. If the ALP win, who will b the next Lib leader? Please not Spiers. Fingernails into steering wheel voice.

    If he survives Brock’s challenge, Dan van Holst Pellekaan. I don’t know who it might be if he doesn’t. Maybe Speirs? Gardner? I dunno. Maybe Vicki will put her hand up (normally that would be preposterous, considering the issues she’s facing but she has that level of arrogance.) I haven’t really thought about next leaders because I don’t want to put the cart before the horse.

    As for Labor, I imagine Malinauskas will stay on if they lose but have reduced the Libs to a minority government. If things are way off and the Liberals win comfortably (to the embarrassment of the Labor Party) I dunno. Whoever Don likes. Hopefully not Turbo (although, I am not too worried about this scenario happening.)

  3. I reckon Vince Tarzia could be the SA opposition leader by next week. Dan VHP will be lucky to hold his seat and much as I love her, even the Liberals couldn’t make Vickie Chapman leader!!

    All power to Rick Sarre, by the way, who had risen to the unenviable challenge of contesting Bragg for Labor.


  4. Spencesays:
    Saturday, March 19, 2022 at 8:56 am
    5% c. 100 of the voters (from 2018 numbers) were lined up at 8 am at the polling booth in Light that I helped set up. Most of early crowd actually taking HTV but that will no doubt drop off later. And pretty good Covid avoiding behaviour.
    Not sure why New Daily would be saying something about first post Covid test – numbers in SA are at highest levels of the last 2 years. About 16000 people already applied for getting voting papers at Covid test places because they are isolating.

    Sorry Spence
    I don’t understand what you are trying to convey. If you are at booth, then you may not look at my post.

  5. Outsider…..I have a few reasons for my apprehension about King. Firstly as noted the Liberal Member Paula Luethen has been a very grass roots candidate and now member…..she is everywhere. She may get a sophmore boost as well. She has a well groomed slightly upper class air about her which seems to play well with the aspirational and middle class types that live in Golden Grove and surrounds.

    The area, tho outer suburban, is wealthy with low unemployment and steeply rising housing prices making everyone feel just that little bit more well off.

    The down grading of Modbury hospital is wearing off but is still there I think. The area has been spared much of the covid outbreak or at least fared better than other areas, and so maybe feeling less inclined to punish Marshall…..who was probably going to get a swing toward him here before opening up too early.

    But counter to all this, if the swing is truely on then King will be swept away in the tide….I hope. But I believe that Dunstan and King are about as equally likely to fall to labor if the swing is on, despite a large difference on the pendulum

  6. use the main thread for Mean girls talk….came to the SA thread to get away from it
    ——————————
    It was in response to a q about Wong campaigning in SA election. So no apologies from me. And it’s goodnight from him.

  7. SK…..Yes I saw your comment and knew it was in response to some minor trolling about Penny Wong….but then a second mean girls comment arrived in the post from someone else….just wanted this about SA election….sorry for the misunderstanding

  8. I’m assuming you meant a text, Toorak Toff. If not, and he (or his account management) is just tweeting people to vote for him, that’s just very lazy and bad targeting.

  9. Ven earlier.
    2 separate points.

    Plenty of early engaged voters

    Plus for some reason New Daily had a headline “Nation eyes South Australian election as litmus test for post-pandemic polls” which seems odd given the level of Covid currently around SA.

  10. “With due regard to the fact that their error margins overlap, some methodological distinctions worth noting about the 56-44 YouGov poll and the 54-46 Newspoll, notwithstanding that they were conducted by the same agency. The YouGov poll was conducted earlier”…

    Yep, as usual the 2PP difference shrinks as we get closer to election day, and yet the final product in this case (the Newspoll result) remains beyond the margin of error as we compare Libs and Labs 2PPs. That’s exactly what I also want to see in the lead up to the federal election, because in 2019 the shrinkage ended up taking the 2PPs within the margin of error.

  11. Do Labor use paid workers on booths anyone know?…..Just had a conversation with someone wearing a Labor booth worker shirt….seemed not to know too much about the election or the candidate to be honest

  12. “sprocket_says:
    Saturday, March 19, 2022 at 9:46 am”

    I like it: To get the “right” priorities in, you have to vote for the “left”….

  13. “The Toorak Toff says:
    Friday, March 18, 2022 at 10:49 pm
    A lot of votes will be wasted in safe seats – by both major parties. Cui bono?”

    On the other hand, without that “waste” of votes the seat wouldn’t be safe anymore…. 🙂

  14. I have never heard of Labor paying for booth workers, but it’s quite common in other parties, including the Libs (so I understand). People front up to hand out HTVs at booths for all sorts of reasons – friend of a friend etc. Although I have no doubt that a focused, friendly and well informed team of booth workers has the ability to swing a few votes and in close contests this can be very significant, obviously.

  15. One of the accepted wisdoms of Australian electioneering is that Labor has a greater capacity to motivate volunteers which offsets to some extent the Libs’ greater fund raising capacity. From what I’ve observed, the Greens also share a high level of volunteer enthusiasm – perhaps to an even greater extent than Labor. Although I expect the SA Greens could be headed for a pretty dismal day today….

  16. Is anyone aware of who the election night panels may be on ABC News 24 and SkyNews.
    As an ex Adelaidean I plan to monitor and discuss with my fellow ex Adelaidean friend down in Tassie tonight. As well as monitor Poll Bludger of course

  17. “Poor Cameronsays:
    Friday, March 18, 2022 at 11:16 pm
    So does anybody think the Liberals can keep government tomorrow in SA?

    Yes I think they can, The Liberals have only been in for 1 term after about 16 years of Labor and people will think Labor are going to win anyway so they will say ill vote Liberal the same as the last federal election”…

    Your “last federal election” example vs my Qld state election 2015 example, when the first-term LNP government led by Campbell Newman went to “battle” against the unknown Annastacia Palaszczuk leading a miniaturised ALP (7 seats vs the LNP 78 seats!). Do you remember who won that election?

    Oh, and Peter Malinauskas is in a far better position in 2022 in SA than Palaszczuk was in Qld in 2015.

  18. Prime Planet

    “As a Queenslander who suffered under the brutal Cando Newman LNP debacle I’m hoping that SAers will feel the same excitement and sense of relief that many Qlders felt the day after Newman was ignominiously booted into oblivion.”

    Agreed, they were a very ugly three years and reminded most QLDers of the worst of Bjelke-Petersen. The relief was palpable when he was gone, the cortisol level in QLD felt as though it had halved.

  19. Outsider:

    At the last federal election, my booth had two young women – both backpackers – handing out for the UAP. It was pretty obvious that neither of them had the faintest idea about the party they were representing and spent most of the day chatting to each other and ignoring the crowds, only engaging with voters if they were directly approached.

  20. Yes, I was well aware that some of Clive’s millions were spent on paying people to hand out HTVs! No doubt it will happen again.

  21. Kevin Bonham is reporting that any Opposition Leader leading the PP by 3 points in the final Newspoll has never lost the Election. Malinauskaus is leading 44-41%. Another factoid pointing to a Labor victory later tonight.

  22. QLD 2015 is probably the most satisfying election night I have ever experienced. I don’t think even the most optimistic of Labor supporters thought it possible that the LNP could lose enough of their enormous majority to actually be kicked out of office, with the best case scenario being a far larger Labor opposition up against a minority LNP government led by Seeney, Nicholls, or Springborg.

  23. ABC election night:

    “Trusted election coverage as South Australia Votes in the 2022 State Election. Presented by Jessica Harmsen, Rory McClaren and Chief ABC Elections Analyst Antony Green plus a panel with Vickie Chapman and Tom Koutsantonis.”

    It would have to be better than the NT election coverage in 2020 hosted by a clueless Greg Jennett!

  24. SA has a long history of not letting the Liberals stick around for long. Since the removal of the “Playmander” malapportionment, the Liberals have been in government three times and re-elected just once – in 1997, when they entered the election with a landslide seat majority and won a bare re-election with the help of crossbenchers.)

    Since the Playmander, the shortest Labor Government (Dunstan-Corcoran 1970-79) was longer than the longest Liberal government (Brown-Olsen-Kerin 1993-2002.)

    If today’s election ends in Labor’s favour, that trend will continue. (In fact, the Liberals still would need to win this election and the next election to make the second paragraph no longer accurate.)

  25. On the issue of paid booth workers. I have an good story from a election some years ago.
    The Liberals were paying backpackers to hand out HTVs. In a local booth the Labor booth captain was approached by a young backpacker who said he had ben sent to work on the booth. The booth captain pointed him to the Liberal camp where he should sign on and told him to then come back for his kit. The backpacker handed out Labor HTVs for 4 hours then went back to the Liberal, signed off and left.
    The Labor booth captain is now a local state member.

  26. Details of the evidently far superior Channel 9 coverage. Download 9Now and watch it live! It’s the other big contest tonight: Bowe v Green….

    “Presenters Kate Collins and Brenton Ragless will be joined in the studio by Nine Political Editor Chris Uhlmann and 9News State Political Reporter Harvey Biggs.

    9News Correspondent Ben Avery will be alongside them to break down the key results and trends, along with outgoing Liberal Treasurer Rob Lucas and former Federal Labor Minister Kate Ellis.

    Adelaide’s team of reporters will also be covering the key seats right across South Australia that will decide the result.

    You can livestream the special coverage throughout the country on 9Now and follow results and our liveblog at 9news.com.au.”

  27. Note also that Channel 9 will be graced with the presence of the wonderful Kate Ellis. Rob Lucas isn’t a bad bloke either. And then there’s Chris Uhlmann….

  28. Sounds like This Steven Marshall gaffe on the eve of the 2014 State election is relevant for S.A today

    One the eve of the state election, South Australian Liberal leader Steven Marshall has played a surprising card, imploring voters to “vote Labor tomorrow”

    “If people in South Australia want change, they want a better future, they want to grow our economy then they need to vote Labor tomorrow,” Mr Marshall told a packed press conference.

  29. Asha

    “QLD 2015 is probably the most satisfying election night I have ever experienced.”

    I don’t usually take pleasure in other people’s misery but I certainly did that night ……… and I knew and worked with Newman in an earlier life. Leopards never change their spots.

  30. People don’t queue up first thing in the morning to back the incumbent, not in these circumstances. I’ve seen a couple of anecdotes here that to me anyway suggest people are motivated to get a first kick in at the Liberal party, who I believe are in existential danger after the federal election, given their unfitness, climate denial,anti-woman ideology and practise, and general all round resemblance to a bag of hungry ferrets. That would require an annihilating defeat like in WA, but we have seen a few blowout results in recent years. One can at least hope

    That’s not to say there wouldn’t be a liberal plutocratic party, but it may be one centred around characters like the Teals. I wouldn’t be one of their voters, but a 2 party system like ours requires some integrity in the 2 dominant groups.

  31. William Bowe

    “if they want to admire the fruits of my database work.”

    , be assured William, your work is already very much admired and appreciated by the many politics wonks out here in Bludgerland.

  32. Election day vibe is a thing. The 2007 Federal election day was my personal highlight. At the 2013 Federal and 2018 SA elections, the “feel” was very strong that Labor would lose.

  33. As a long term member of the alp 40 plus years I was never aware of my party paying booth workers to hand out htv. But I know of at least one time the liberals did . In about 2000 there were a couple of young blokes early 20 s who said vote liberal for the gst as they were handing out lib htv

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