Tracking the bludge

McEwen, Hughes and Ryan join the list of seats to watch, at least if you believe what you read in the papers. Also: an in-depth explanation of the BludgerTrack poll aggregate.

First things first:

• I had a piece in Crikey yesterday looking at how-to-vote cards, preference deals and the media coverage attendant to them. It considers a claim by Greg Sheridan of The Australian that any teal independent victories will be owed to ovine fealty to how-to-vote cards on the part of Labor and Greens voters; Labor’s decision to put the United Australia Party ahead of the Greens in central Queensland seats, in sharp contrast to its treatment of the party everywhere else; and One Nation’s tokenistic direction of preferences against the Liberals in five seats, without endangering Pauline Hanson’s second placement on the Liberal National Party Senate ticket in Queensland. Had I held back a day, I might have been able to note the latest full-page United Australia Party advertisements proclaiming &8220;Labor are preferencing the Liberal Party”.

• Andrew Tillett of the Financial Review reports the Liberals are boosting resources in the Labor-held seat of McEwen in outer Melbourne. However, Labor sources say they expect to retain the Victorian seats that have become the source of media chatter over the past week, the others being Corangamite and Dunkley, as “national concerns over cost of living and antipathy towards Mr Morrison” are registering as strongly here as anywhere else.

• The Australian reports the Liberals are newly concerned that the normally safe Brisbane seat of Ryan will be lost to Labor. There has also been increasing talk that the Greens could prove competitive in both Ryan and neighbouring Brisbane, together with Labor-held Griffith immediately to the south.

• Alice Workman of The Australian reports “independent polling conducted over the phone, towards the end of April” shows Liberal candidate Jenny Ware on a low enough primary vote to put her in danger of losing Hughes to independent Georgia Steele. Liberal sources are quoted saying Ware is “on the nose with locals after being picked by Scott Morrison to run, against the wishes of rank-and-file branch members”. Assuredly not in contention is the seat’s incumbent, Craig Kelly, notwithstanding United Australia Party advertising proclaiming him the “next Prime Minister of Australia”.

• The Age/Herald today reports that this week’s Resolve Strategic poll showed 32% rated the Coalition as best to manage the Solomon Islands issue compared with 29% for Labor.

Now, by popular demand, a post probing into this site’s popular BludgerTrack poll aggregate, for which a permanent link can be found on the sidebar. This presently suggests Labor holds a lead of 54.0-46.0 on two-party preferred, which I don’t think anyone seriously expects to be actual result at the election. It does, however, show a narrowing trend commencing slightly before the onset of the campaign period, though not sufficient to suggest any chance of the Coalition closing the gap. Given the record low support for the major parties, the Coalition can at least hope that parity on two-party preferred need not be required to at least hold on to minority government – and also for another pollster failure like that in 2019 (the likelihood of which is considered in a post by Mark the Ballot).

BludgerTrack is one of a number of endeavours around the place that seek to plot a signal through the noise of federal opinion polling, together with one on the Wikipedia federal election page maintained by a user called Canley; Twitter user @Gergyl’s regular posts aggregating trends both short-range and long-range; and semi-regular blog posts from the aforementioned Mark the Ballot. That’s aside from the sites Armarium Interreta and Buckleys and None which, together with Professor Simon Jackman’s betting odds model, are tracking the horse race in other ways.

BludgerTrack and its close relatives, each of which produce very similar results, use LOESS (locally estimated scatterplot smoothing) functions to trace a path through the data points that keeps the distance between the path and the points at an appropriate level. The degree of tolerance for this difference is set by a smoothing parameter, which produces something resembling a straight line if set too high, and zooms all over the place in response to each individual poll result if set too low. The industry standard for determining the Goldilocks point is called the Akaike information criterion, which I use (thanks to a library available for the R statistics package) without really understanding its mathematical intricacies.

The data points themselves consist of every opinion poll of voting intention published since July 2019 by YouGov/Newspoll, Essential Research, Roy Morgan, Resolve Strategic and, just recently, Ipsos, which are weighted according to their perceived accuracy and adjusted to smooth out the peculiarities of each series. My methods here are quite a bit less presumptuous than they were before the pollster failure of 2019, when I imagined there was value in calibrating pollsters’ historic performances. I now assume that YouGov/Newspoll, the only pollster with any track record to speak of since 2019, is essentially free of bias, and calculate other pollsters’ biases based on the extent to which they deviate from a trend measure of it. These are halved so the peculiarities of each pollster have at least some weight in the overall result, rather than it being totally centred around Newspoll. The biggest change made is to Resolve Strategic’s Labor vote, which is increased by over two points. All other adjustments amount to less than one point.

Each pollster gets a weighting based partly on how much bias adjustment they’re being loaded up with, but mostly on my subjective impression of how accurate they’re likely to be, together with consideration of how frequently they report. The latter ensures the aggregate doesn’t get overwhelmed by the more prolific polling series. The most heavily weighted pollster at the moment is actually Ipsos, which is a (presumably) high-quality pollster that has so far produced only two polls released several weeks about. However, the mainstay of the series, Newspoll, is not far behind – a Resolve Strategic poll is worth about half a Newspoll, and an Essential Research (the most prolific series over the current term) and a Roy Morgan (which has a dubious track record) are worth about a quarter each.

Where BludgerTrack goes deeper than its rivals is in providing state breakdowns (together with leadership ratings). This is done using trend measures of each state’s deviation from the national results, which are then combined with the national trends (excepting Tasmania, for which next to no state-level data is published). Unfortunately, only Ipsos offers complete state data for each poll, as the others don’t care to have their small sub-samples held up to scrutiny their margins of error can’t bear. Essential Research comes close, but it smooths results for the smaller states by publishing three-poll rolling averages. Newspoll has always dealt with the issue by publishing state-level aggregates on a quarterly basis, which are a big deal for BludgerTrack when they come along (it would be nice to see one soon). Resolve Strategic only goes as deep as Queensland, and Roy Morgan’s are not used as they only provide two-party preferred at state level, whereas BludgerTrack works off primary votes.

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.

1,084 comments on “Tracking the bludge”

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  1. Why are Roy Morgan polls reported at all. They are constantly outlier’s, and from memory only they inevitably miss the mark come polling day.

  4. Still what the polls do show with ( a few exceptions) is both major parties have consistently polled under 40PV.

    Not a lot of enthusiasm anywhere it seems!

  5. Lars Von Triersays:
    Thursday, May 5, 2022 at 5:53 am
    Roy Morgan polls exist to give good cheer to Labor hacks!

    A rather inauspicious start to the day!

  7. Niki Savva is in fine form today!

    Unless Scott Morrison comes up with a compelling new policy or gambit in the next few days, he could go down in history as the Liberal leader who won an election he should have lost, then lost the one he should have won in a canter.

    So far, Morrison’s arguments for re-election have been short on substance, contradictory, confusing, or jarring. Distilled, Morrison’s early campaign pitch offered voters more of the same, appealing to them to stick with him because he was better at managing the economy and national security.

    Then as inflation hit a 20-year high, triggering the first interest rate rise in a decade, his message veered from warning voters it was too risky to change because everything was turning to custard to arguing everything was going as planned, and if it wasn’t, the Reserve Bank had carefully pointed out none of it was his fault.

    Each formulation is delivered with such conviction – which remains his great strength – that it is easy to forget what happened yesterday or the day before, although if you believe the polls it is catching up with him.

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/morrison-s-election-pitch-is-short-on-substance-contradictory-and-confusing-20220504-p5aict.html

  8. Even so, wishing and hoping and praying for Albanese to screw up is a poor substitute for a fourth-term agenda, especially as there was no third-term agenda; just like an ability to spit out stats at will or going falsetto to deny the undeniable is no substitute for leadership. Morrison’s highly agitated, high-pitched insistence that interest rate increases had nothing to do with politics did nothing for his credibility.

    She is spot on about going falsetto. Morrison is sounding increasingly shrill as the campaign wears on.

  9. Plenty of the jockeys in the Political Steeplechase of 2022 know, after having passed the half way mark, that their “conveyance” has little chance of finishing in the top 151.
    Made even more disappointing for some in that the second favourite is to face a steward’s enquiry at the completion of the chase.
    And so says all the FICAC!

  10. Reading Nikki Savva about Morrison’s re-election strategy, I’m reminded of this..

    “Do not repeat the tactics which have gained you
    one victory, but let your methods be regulated by the
    infinite variety of circumstances.” (Sun Tzu)

  12. Lol sprocket – I was sure you’d be reading the collected works of Graeme Frederick Richardson at this ungodly hour for inspiration .

  14. Seats that will most feel the interest rate rise:

    Werriwa ALP +5.5%
    Greenway ALP +2.8%
    Wentworth Lib +1.3%
    Lindsay Lib +5%
    Reid Lib +3.2%
    Dobell ALP +1.5%
    Paterson ALP +5%
    Hunter ALP +3%
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/the-sydney-marginal-seats-most-exposed-to-rising-interest-rates-20220504-p5aijm.html

    Listed in order of the percentage of home borrowers in financial stress. Werriwa tops the list with 70% of home borrowers in financial stress. Wentworth is on the list with nearly 50% of home borrowers in financial stress – that does surprise me. But I suppose housing is so expensive in those suburbs.

  16. The SmearStralian riposte to Nikki Savva skewering ScoMo, is to once again parade Peta Credlin.

    Tony Abbott’s former CoS is in denial…

    Labor-lite or Liberal-left? It’s a dire choice
    A re-elected Morrison government is unlikely to be a better government than the one we’ve had, while an Albanese government is likely to be a lot more leftist than it makes out.

  17. sprocket:

    Along the same line as Credlin, I notice Howard has said that voting in Teals would be the end of the government.

    And he says this like it’s a bad thing. Is that meant to turn people off voting Teals?

  19. Confessionssays:
    Thursday, May 5, 2022 at 6:37 am
    Seats that will most feel the interest rate rise:

    Werriwa ALP +5.5%
    Greenway ALP +2.8%
    Wentworth Lib +1.3%
    Lindsay Lib +5%
    Reid Lib +3.2%
    Dobell ALP +1.5%
    Paterson ALP +5%
    Hunter ALP +3%
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/the-sydney-marginal-

    Thanx Fess. You saved me the trouble of looking that up. The upside for Labor is Paterson and Hunter might be kept in Labor hands because of cost of living stressors despite the concerns I have about the ‘miners’ whacking Labor again in those seats and Hanson’s strong presence there in those seats in 2019.

  20. 2 weeks out, and the Courier Mail can’t find an anti-ALP beat up to run on the front page..

    Nor can the HeraldSun….

  21. I have no words. You’d think that parents of vulnerable children would be flocking to get their kids vaccinated, not putting their faith in crackpot conspiracy theorists.

    How wrong was I when I said two years ago that the advent of a Covid vaccine would spell the end of the anti-vax movement as people rushed to get vaccinated in the face of a deadly new disease!

    Children on the National Disability Insurance Scheme are more likely to be unvaccinated against COVID-19 than their peers, as providers and health authorities grapple with parental hesitancy.

    Inclusion Australia chief executive Catherine McAlpine says it is “very highly concerning” that parents of children who are NDIS participants are hesitating to consent to COVID-19 vaccination.

    “Parents are saying no and substitute decision-makers are saying no, because they are part of the whole anti-vaccine movement that has grabbed a whole lot of people,” McAlpine said.

    She said the National Disability Insurance Agency and NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission seemed hesitant to tackle the problem.

    “It is very politically difficult to disagree with parents who are being swayed by emotional, anti-vaccination arguments not based in evidence,” McAlpine said.

    “Families want the best for their loved ones, but decisions should be based on medical advice.”

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/anti-vax-parents-leaving-children-with-disabilities-unprotected-from-covid-19-20220504-p5aii8.html

  23. Thank you William for documenting how BludgerTracker works and the rationale behind how you program it. Good insights for us less statistically minded.

  24. If only one could believe Peta Crellin. A lot more left than they make out. Ha.

    The only thing that would make them worse than the current lot is if it turns out they’re a lot more useless than they make out.

  28. A few mentions of the poor LNP campaign so far. The hammering of Morrison is working I think. Even extremely politically unengaged people I know are mentioning the guy not wanting to shake his hand. The LNP ads are just irritating with a smarty pants female voice reminding me of some of the less than stellar females in the current LNP lineup. Time is running out for Scomoe.

  29. The gruesome twosome – ‘moderate’ Republican Senators Collins and Murkowski – have surfaced to comment on the Roe v Wade situation:

    Collins – “If this leaked draft opinion is the final decision and this reporting is accurate, it would be completely inconsistent with what Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh said in their hearings and in our meetings in my office,” Collins said in a statement. “Obviously, we won’t know each Justice’s decision and reasoning until the Supreme Court officially announces its opinion in this case.”

    https://edition.cnn.com/2022/05/03/politics/susan-collins-reaction-kavanaugh-gorsuch/index.html
    __________________________________________________________

    Murkowski –

    No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen
    @NoLieWithBTC

    NEW: Lisa Murkowski, who voted to confirm Amy Coney Barrett when Trump specifically said he was nominating justices to overturn Roe v. Wade, just said she “finds it shocking that this would happen” and her “confidence in the court has been rocked.”

    5:23 PM · May 3, 2022·Twitter Web App

  31. Ray (UK) @ #29 Thursday, May 5th, 2022 – 6:42 am

    The gruesome twosome – ‘moderate’ Republican Senators Collins and Murkowski – have surfaced to comment on the Roe v Wade situation:

    Collins – “If this leaked draft opinion is the final decision and this reporting is accurate, it would be completely inconsistent with what Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh said in their hearings and in our meetings in my office,” Collins said in a statement. “Obviously, we won’t know each Justice’s decision and reasoning until the Supreme Court officially announces its opinion in this case.”

    https://edition.cnn.com/2022/05/03/politics/susan-collins-reaction-kavanaugh-gorsuch/index.html
    __________________________________________________________

    Murkowski –

    No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen
    @NoLieWithBTC
    NEW: Lisa Murkowski, who voted to confirm Amy Coney Barrett when Trump specifically said he was nominating justices to overturn Roe v. Wade, just said she “finds it shocking that this would happen” and her “confidence in the court has been rocked.”
    5:23 PM · May 3, 2022·Twitter Web App

    Charlie Brown shocked that Lucy once again lifted the football just as he was about to kick it.

  33. PHON, UAP, the Liberal Democrats and IMOP, should all merge into one party. They’re all working together anyway, according to a friend of mine who I spoke to yesterday that has connections to someone high up in the Liberal Democrats. They’re all basically the same with slight differences.

    They would be a more formidable political force that way. Not that I want that, but there you are, they exist. They would also be able to access the resources of Clive Palmer and maybe the shake up would produce a better slate of candidates, once combined. Not that I want a party with the evil intent of the Republican Party and the candidates to carry it out successfully like they have. But it looks like the same tentacles are spreading here.

    Ultimately, I believe, the Liberal Party and the LNP in Queensland will split and leave the Moderates, who will align with the Teals, and the Radical Religious Right, who will also carve off into the nascent Repugnant Libertarian Authoritarian Populist Party with PHON, the UAP, IMOP (the Anti Vaxxers) and the Liberal Democrats.

    Which will leave Labor to govern for a few terms. 🙂

  34. Adding my thanks to William for the introduction/
    And the honesty in ‘without entirely understanding mathematical intricacies of Akaike information criterion’. In my field it is widely used in testing evolutionary scenarios from molecular data – as a black box. We should all add ‘not entirely understanding …’

  35. Jaeger @ #32 Thursday, May 5th, 2022 – 7:15 am

    Pauline Hanson’s One Nation asked to please explain why some of her candidates are invisible in the seats they’re supposed to be contesting
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-05/pauline-hanson-one-nation-asked-to-explain-invisible-candidates/101039240

    Maybe this is why, Jaeger:

    One Nation was still scrambling to find people to run for this month’s federal election just hours before the close of nominations, telling one prospective candidate to leave the electorate he was running in “blank” on his form while the party desperately tried to fill seats.

    Guardian Australia can also reveal that several of the candidates chosen to run for the party live in other states than the seat they’re standing in, including a husband and wife selected to run in separate seats in New South Wales and Victoria.

    Pauline Hanson said last month that One Nation would field candidates in all of the House of Representative seats for the first time thanks to “enormous support” from membership, which she said had “grown exponentially” during the pandemic.

    “It’s taken almost 12 months to bed down the team we’re taking to voters at this election,” she said at the time.

    But internal emails seen by the Guardian show the party was still trying to find people to run for it just hours before the nominating deadline on 21 April, telling one prospective candidate the party didn’t “require you to do anything or campaign at all”.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/may/04/emails-reveal-one-nations-last-minute-scramble-to-find-candidates

  37. Not sure if this has been posted already, but there was a great assessment of Morrison yesterday when his minders let him mingle with the public. Mt Eliza is in the Labor held seat of Dunkley.

    https://www.news.com.au/national/federal-election/rogue-heckler-sets-off-scott-morrisons-toughest-day-of-election-campaign/news-story/e289fb80257274c01541cf9c5c8a3d61
    Rogue heckler sets off Scott Morrison’s toughest day of election campaign

    ‘Still, sometimes, a speckle of authenticity glimmers in the sunlight. And it usually comes by way of rogue hecklers who yell out at the Prime Minister like they’re drunk-ordering at the Maccas drive-through from the open back window of an Uber.

    These are the moments of truth.

    As ScoMo proceeded to walk around the grocer and feign interest in fresh produce, Sues stood back near a counter of whirling smoothie blenders with crossed arms and sighed at the throngs of security, advisers and TV crews that crowded the narrow aisles of the tiny store where she does her weekly shop.

    “I just wanna buy zucchinis,” she shook her head.

    “I’m a part of the kinder and the primary school – he does not have hold here. Everyone’s been talking – it’ll be Albo. And that’s why he’s (Morrison’s) here – blocking people from getting their shopping done.

    “He rolled up in a couple of white BMWs and hopped out of his car and didn’t say hi to anyone and just walked directly to what represents the cost of living (the grocer). It’s a prop. And much like the hairdressing thing last time – he’s the butt of the joke.” ‘

  39. Trend shows lib/nats combined primary vote will stay under 40%
    Still expect declaration of the lib/nats federal government being defeated around 7-7:30 pm on the night of the election

  42. I hope Hanson is running ghosts in Bass, Braddon, Hunter, Paterson, Lingiari and some of the Qld seats as well. She is all pony, no show !! We have not got any mailbox political junk from PHON at all and I have seen zero PHON corflutes anywhere here in Bass. All the other including JLN yes, Hanson nada.

  43. ‘Listed in order of the percentage of home borrowers in financial stress. Werriwa tops the list with 70% of home borrowers in financial stress. Wentworth is on the list with nearly 50% of home borrowers in financial stress – that does surprise me. But I suppose housing is so expensive in those suburbs. in order of the percentage of home borrowers in financial stress. ‘

    Um, unless you bought in the last year, the value of your house has gone up by at least $300,000, generally much more! I think you can afford a bit higher mortgage payments.

    But will greed and fear make you more likely to vote LNP?

  44. Good morning Dawn Patrollers

    “Morrison’s election pitch is short on substance, contradictory and confusing”, is Niki Savva’s excoriating evaluation of the PM and has campaign.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/morrison-s-election-pitch-is-short-on-substance-contradictory-and-confusing-20220504-p5aict.html
    David Crowe and Rachel Clun tell us that Anthony Albanese will tell business leaders he wants a new phase of economic reform to lift Australia’s growth and create the conditions for rising wages, ramping up his message on jobs after this week’s interest rate rise focused the election campaign on the economy And in a competing pitch, Scott Morrison will vow on Thursday to help 400,000 small business owners set up shop over the next five years under policies he claims would be better for business.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/albanese-morrison-make-their-pitches-on-business-and-economy-20220504-p5ail9.html
    Half-time results are in and Mark Kenny tells us who’s having a good election campaign, and who isn’t.
    https://theconversation.com/half-time-results-are-in-whos-having-a-good-election-campaign-and-who-isnt-182122
    Cost-of-living spending in the federal budget “100 per cent” helped pull forward the Reserve Bank’s decision to increase official interest rates, say economists who warn most Australians will suffer real falls in wages over the next 18 months.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/federal-budget-spending-pushed-interest-rate-move-by-rba-economists-20220504-p5aiio.html
    Millions of Australians pushed the envelope on mortgage applications to get a foothold in the housing market. Now they face the threat of higher interest rates, says Clancy Yeates about so-called “liar loans”.
    https://www.smh.com.au/business/banking-and-finance/the-risk-of-liar-loans-can-overstretched-borrowers-cope-with-higher-interest-rates-20220504-p5aig7.html
    The housing affordability challenge requires leadership and vision, declares the editorial in the SMH.
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/housing-affordability-challenge-requires-leadership-and-vision-20220504-p5aikv.html
    Elizabeth Redman compares the major parties’ policies on housing.
    https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/help-to-buy-v-home-guarantee-will-either-party-s-plans-help-aspiring-homebuyers-20220504-p5aii0.html
    Oliver Frankel explains what the monthly digest on housing stress, affordability and homelessness shows.
    https://johnmenadue.com/monthly-digest-on-housing-stress-affordability-and-homelessness/
    Jordyn Beazley explains how a shared equity scheme could help break the cycle of insecure renting for single parents.
    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/may/05/a-shared-equity-scheme-could-help-break-the-cycle-of-insecure-renting-for-single-parents
    John Kehoe writes that cash handouts and election outlays will fuel more inflation and interest rates rises, so the Coalition and Labor must cut spending or raise taxes to help the Reserve Bank of Australia cool price pressures. Former senior government economists are saying cash handouts and election outlays will fuel more inflation and interest rates rises, so the Coalition and Labor must cut spending or raise taxes to help the Reserve Bank of Australia cool price pressures.
    https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/parties-told-the-budget-needs-fixing-to-cool-inflation-and-rate-rises-20220504-p5aies
    Labor and the Coalition should stop lying to voters about how important controlling the budget bottom line is to getting on top of headline inflation, urges the AFR’s editorial.
    https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/tighter-fiscal-policy-must-join-inflation-fight-20220503-p5ai5m
    Matt Wade has a look at the Sydney marginal seats most exposed to rising interest rates.
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/the-sydney-marginal-seats-most-exposed-to-rising-interest-rates-20220504-p5aijm.html
    Labor-lite or Liberal-left? It’s a dire choice, writes Peta Credlin.
    https://amp.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/election-2022-laborlite-or-liberalleft-its-a-dire-choice/news-story/6107fb6706d4bfdcb0d43a85f92029ab
    Paul Daley lays out five stark differences between the major parties this election.
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/05/undecided-jaded-with-australias-major-parties-here-are-five-stark-differences-between-them-this-election
    Alice Workman writes that Liberals are becoming increasingly worried about losing the blue-ribbon seat of Hughes to Climate 200, as new polling reveals the party’s primary vote has dropped to 37 per cent. Liberal candidate Jenny Ware is facing off against independent Georgia Steele in the southern Sydney seat, ­\notionally held on a margin of 9.9 per cent. Sources close to the campaign say Ms Ware is on the nose with locals after being picked by Scott Morrison to run, against the wishes of rank-and-file branch members.
    https://amp.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/election-2022-liberal-fears-rising-in-craig-kelly-seat-of-hughes/news-story/cb8c4838e3fb0f54c41ebdde75d96378
    Scott Morrison, and his treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, have both said voting for independent candidates in the federal election could lead to the “chaos” of a hung parliament. Nick Evershed tells us that a Guardian Australia analysis of legislation passed and not passed under various governments shows the minority government led by Julia Gillard actually had a better success rate in passing legislation than the Morrison government.
    https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2022/may/05/will-a-hung-parliament-lead-to-chaos-what-a-gillard-v-morrison-comparison-reveals
    Independent analysis by the Parliamentary Budget Office found 57% of negative gearing deductions go to the top 20% of income earners.
    https://www.theage.com.au/property/news/negative-gearing-and-capital-gains-tax-breaks-go-to-top-income-earners-and-men-20220503-p5ai3v.html
    john Warhurst provides us with the lessons and legacies of the 2019 ‘miracle’ election result.
    https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/7723325/lessons-and-legacies-of-the-2019-miracle-election-result/?cs=14258
    None of the ten community hospitals promised by Daniel Andrews on the eve of the 2018 election campaign have been built or upgraded, despite the Victorian government unveiling billions of dollars in new health spending, write Rachel Eddie and Sumeyya Ilanbey.
    https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/big-promises-on-big-hospitals-but-little-progress-on-little-ones-20220504-p5aicc.html
    Josh Frydenberg has distanced himself from the prime minister’s attack on the Independent Commission Against Corruption as a “kangaroo court”, saying he would not have used that language.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/treasurer-steers-cleer-of-morrison-s-kangaroo-court-criticism-of-icac-20220504-p5aicz.html
    Alaxandra Smith reckons Morrison has jumped shark from an ICAC being kangaroo court to be a “public autocracy”. She says Commissioner Rushton’s buffoon comments may have been provocative but Morrison’s narrative around anti-corruption commissions significantly undermines public confidence in such agencies and indeed the integrity of governments, including his own.
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/pm-jumps-shark-from-kangaroo-court-to-public-autocracy-20220503-p5ai5s.html
    Mike Foley reports that an independent Commonwealth agency has delayed the release of a crucial report on coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef until after the federal election, raising questions about the politicisation of scientific processes. “Independent, eh?
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-report-delayed-until-after-election-20220504-p5aiga.html
    Nick O’Malley writes that Smart Energy Council chief executive John Grimes has rejected complaint by the government that his organisation is acting politically and instead accused the federal government of committing an “economic crime” against the Australian people by blocking the renewable energy industry.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/charity-boss-governments-should-be-horsewhipped-over-energy-policy-20220504-p5aigk.html
    Climate decisions taken here and globally within the next three years, the term of the new government, will determine the future of humanity. Climate is not a single issue. It is going to change every aspect of our society, so we cannot allow a continuation of the lies and deception around climate policy which the two-party system perpetuates, say Chris Barrie and Ian Dunlop.
    https://johnmenadue.com/to-the-next-minister-for-climate-change-energy-the-execution-plan-for-climate-mobilisation/
    Anthony Galloway reports that a Coalition candidate for the Senate has repeatedly backed a conspiracy theory that Bill Gates was behind the outbreak of COVID-19 and suggested that PCR tests don’t work. Where do those parties from the right FIND these clowns?
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/lnp-senate-candidate-believes-bill-gates-was-behind-covid-and-mmr-vaccine-causes-autism-20220504-p5aicl.html
    One Nation’s fielding of a candidate from suburban Melbourne to represent the north Queensland city of Townsville has drawn a chorus of condemnation from rival candidates, one of whom says she is “flabbergasted and disgusted” by the move.
    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/may/05/flabbergasted-melbourne-based-one-nation-candidate-running-in-north-queensland-seat
    A long-term push to mandate nurse-to-patient ratios in NSW hospitals is likely to fail after the opposition supported the state government and refused to back the measure amid a bitter industrial dispute. Alezandra Smith writes that the battle over pay and conditions between the government and the nurses’ union is expected to escalate following Labor’s decision not to support a recommendation to mandate increased staffing levels.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw/labor-sides-with-nsw-government-to-block-demand-for-nurse-ratios-20220503-p5aiap.html
    Lisa Visentin tells us that Australia’s elite research universities have urged an incoming government to fund 1000 extra places every year for domestic medical students as a matter of priority, warning it was unsustainable to rely on recruiting overseas doctors to cope with critical workforce shortages.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/1000-extra-student-doctors-needed-every-year-to-avert-workforce-crisis-universities-20220504-p5aigo.html
    Children on the National Disability Insurance Scheme are more likely to be unvaccinated against COVID-19 than their peers, as providers and health authorities grapple with parental hesitancy, reports Dana Daniel.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/anti-vax-parents-leaving-children-with-disabilities-unprotected-from-covid-19-20220504-p5aii8.html
    Boris Johnson has lost the Tories’ respect – so why has he not lost their support, wonders Rafael Behr.
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/04/boris-johnson-conservative-party-local-elections
    After 49 years, outlawing abortion in the US won’t stop abortions – it will just make them dangerous, argues Prudence Flowers
    https://www.smh.com.au/national/after-49-years-outlawing-abortion-in-the-us-won-t-stop-abortions-it-will-just-make-them-dangerous-20220504-p5aife.html
    And Joe Biden has warned that overturning a landmark Supreme Court decision legalising abortion in the US would be a radical move that could threaten same-sex marriage and the entire “notion of privacy” in American life, writes Farrah Tomazin.
    https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/radical-roe-v-wade-ruling-threatens-same-sex-marriage-privacy-in-the-us-joe-biden-20220504-p5aibx.html
    The prospect of the US supreme court overturning Roe v Wade has dominated front pages across the world, with the global media reporting in detail on one of the most polarising issues in American politics.
    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/may/04/new-peak-culture-wars-global-media-react-roe-v-wade-leak
    Rebecca Solnit explains how Americans can fight back to protect abortion rights.
    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/03/heres-how-americans-can-fight-back-to-protect-abortion-rights
    Nomination for “Arseholes of the Week” goes to McDonald’s which is offering its managers a beefed-up wage rise, but at the expense of conditions the company is already accused of ignoring.
    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/can-i-have-a-break-with-that-macca-s-staff-asked-to-trade-in-longer-rests-for-more-pay-in-flexibility-deal-20220503-p5ahzw.html

    Cartoon Corner

    David Rowe

    Peter Broelman

    Andrew Dyson

    Cathy Wilcox

    Matt Golding






    Fiona Katauskas

    Mark Knight

    Simon Letch

    Dionne Gain

    John Shakespeare


    Leak

    From the US
















  45. Thanks William for the timely insight into Bludgertrack.

    As for Credlin, I can only agree that “a re-elected Morrison government is unlikely to be a better government than the one we’ve had” – except that “unlikely” implies much more uncertainty than there actually is, and any implication that the Morrison government has been vaguely competent is absurd.

    And if “an Albanese government is likely to be a lot more leftist than it makes out” I can only say I’d be doing cartwheels of delight. Way, way more leftist would be great.

  47. Stephen Koukoulas @TheKouk
    The US Fed hikes 50. Admits it’ll be a struggle to get inflation lower and back to target.
    Stocks skyrocket. Bond yields fall back nicely.
    RBA now looking at 50 in June.

  49. I think instead of ‘the devil you know’, Morrison’s catch cry is, if he were to be honest, ‘more of the same’.

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