The Age has the first Victorian state poll since the November 25 election, which shows Labor on 41% of the primary vote (36.7% at the election), the Coalition on 30% (34.5%) and the Greens on 13% (11.5%). No two-party preferred is provided, but this would pan out to at least 59-41 in favour of Labor based on preference flows in November. The poll also finds Daniel Andrews leading new Liberal leader John Pesutto by 50-26 as preferred premier. The poll was conducted from a sample of 825 “in late January and mid-February”, suggesting this follows the pollster’s usual practice of combining samples from two monthly polls to produce state voting results for Victoria and New South Wales in alternating months. This suggests the pollster should be good for a poll of federal voting intention very shortly.
Can we please keep this thread for discussion of Victorian state politics. The general discussion thread is here.
And just to think, it was almost a hung parliament just three months ago. Or, at least, that’s what the Canberra press gallery told us.
Taylormade ,Should be calling for the liberal party to reinstate Micheal O’Brien as Liberal party leader
Or even Michael O’Brien 🙂
After the hysteria, mostly from the anti-ALP media & the Cookers, during the run up to the 2022 Victorian State Election this is a fabulous polling result and probably closer to the result, had the election been conducted in a more sober climate.
The return and continued competency of the Andrews Government is reflected in this result.
Had these figures been realised, last November, the following seats may have been won by the ALP: Mornington, Benambra, Croydon, Hawthorn (retain), Polwarth, Caulfield, Brighton, Kew, Rowville, Brighton & Warrendyte.
This could increase the ALP seats from 56 to 67 or 70 or 72 if the following Country Party seats are included.
Morwell, Berwick &Sandringham are very close to this margin,too.
Mildura & Shepparton fall within this margin but may be out of reach for the ALP.
Affectively, Sandringham with a margin of 5.1% could potentially be the LP’s safest seat.
One can only dream and hope for better things.
Something not much mentioned out in the punditland is that the pandemic anger is draining away. It’s going to be old news by 2026. Andrews more than likely will not be running in person anyway. If the Liberals are hanging their hats on winning seats which swung in large part because of pandemic anger they will need to keep their eye out for those seats simply returning to the fold next time instead.
Wasting your turn only works if you pit up a viable alternative.
In Matt guy’s defence, he did almost as well in 2022 as he did in 2019.
I would guess Dan Andrews and other Victorian ministers will be campaigning a fair bit in the Aston byelection, it can’t hurt the federal Labor candidate.
How frustrating for the likes of Chip Le Grand and Annika Smethurst that the Victorian government is more popular than they were at the election.
Arky has called it – the statue of Dan Andrews will be running for premier in 2026. Evan, I think the media will feel good about this poll, they’ll say it shows that their campaigning skills are good for 4 or 5 points 2PP. If only the government wasn’t so popular they could have won this election!
Just like post federal election, people have realised that alot of what the MSM was saying was false and have liked what they’ve seen from the Gov’t.
Arky
Yes the Coalition seem to be eternally ‘fighting the last war’. I think by late 2026 we will likely have a different Labor Premier but the Coalition will still be complaining about what ‘Dictator Dan” did in 2020 and 2021. Things can change in four years but it’s hard to see any way back for the Coalition given the electoral map that cushioned the anti-Labor swings in the West of Melbourne, and the gradual change in demographics with dyed-in-the-wool Liberals quite literally dying out.
I still can’t get over the irony of Kennett’s “3000 day” rule for those Premiers’ statues – at the time he must have thought he was a sure thing! And on that note, I do not understand why Glaswegian James McCullough doesn’t get a statue – he was Premier over four separate stretches for a total of 8 years and 304 days (3227 days if I’ve worked out the three February 29th’s correctly).
Even from far away Queensland is is obvious that the Liberals in Victoria will never recover until they heed the wise words of Andrew Bolt and the other mighty Sky News analysts, and rid themselves of all the moderates, waverers and woke sympathisers in their ranks.
Mr Pesutto will never do, bring back Jeff Kennett – not far enough, but a step in the right direction.
It is actually quite poetic that Kennett’s planned monument to his own ego will go to the Anti-Kennett instead.
My elderly mother, who many decades ago was a reliable Nationals voter until the Kennett era trashed the public service in the entire of country Victoria, voted Labor last year at least partly to help the statue happen and rub it in Kennett’s smug face.
Fargo61, its patently clear that the complete opposite is true. Victoria doesn’t tolerate rightwing conservative governments. The only viable option for the Liberal party is to reform to be more socially progressive, and be economically conservative.