The News Corp papers yesterday had a Fox & Hedgehog poll putting Labor at 30%, up one from early January; One Nation at 25%, up four; the Coalition at 24%, down one; and the Greens at 12%, down two. While other polls with similar primary votes have had Labor well ahead, this poll’s respondent-allocated result finds a strong flow of One Nation preferences to the Coalition putting that gap at just 51-49, in from 53-47 last time. A three-candidate preferred measure has Labor down two to 44%, the Coalition down two to 27% and One Nation up four to 29%.
Angus Taylor makes a somewhat encouraging debut in being rated positively by 26% and negatively by 23%, with 34% neutral or unsure, and in trailing Anthony Albanese by a modest 40-35 on preferred prime minister, compared with 39-31 for Sussan Ley in the previous result. Approval was sought on various political parties and figures (together with the pollster’s stand-by fictitious inclusion of John Morsett, of whom 6% approved and 12% disapproved), producing the remarkable finding that 44% of respondents took a favourable view of One Nation, with 32% disapproving. Pauline Hanson recorded very similar ratings of 44% and 35%, while Barnaby Joyce, who was scoring a minus 27 net rating a little over two years ago, almost broke even at 30% approval and 38% disapproval.
The poll also finds 29% rating themselves more likely to vote Coalition following the leadership change, with 12% less likely; 59% supporting a temporary ban on visa applicants from “countries or regions deemed ‘high risk’, for example Gaza or Somalia”, with only 17% opposed; 64% opposed to allowing the wives and families of ISIS fighters to return to Australia, with 15% supportive; and an even 35% supporting and opposing lowering the capital gains tax discount on investment properties (“so more of the profit is taxed”). The poll was conducted Tuesday to Thursday from a sample of 1625. The pollster’s full report features breakdowns by gender, age, education and for the three largest states.
A few other notable polling data points that slipped through the gaps:
• Nine Newspapers reports last week’s Resolve Strategic poll gave Donald Trump a net approval rating of minus 41, which was better than Vladimir Putin on minus 60, but solidly worse than Xi Jinping on minus 26%. Volodymyr Zelensky led the field at plus 22, with Benjamin Netanyahu on minus 20 and Keir Starmer at minus five. Newcomer Sanae Takaichi scored plus six, although her familiarity rating was only 43%. Forty per cent wanted support for Ukraine maintained and 16% increased, with 21% wanting it decreased or withdrawn. Thirty-six per cent said Australia should support the defence of Taiwan, seven per cent preferred to side with China, and 38% favoured not taking sides.
• The Australian reported findings from last fortnight’s Newspoll on how voters for parties other than Labor and One Nation would allocate their preferences. Forty-three per cent of Liberal voters said they would favour One Nation and 33% Labor, with 24% saying they did not know or that they would follow how-to-vote cards. The corresponding numbers were 70%, 6% and 24% for Nationals voters, 1%, 91% and 8% for the Greens, and 32%, 53% and 15% for others.
• The regular JWS Research True Issues survey on issue salience, in which respondents are asked unprompted to identify the three issues the government should be most focused on, recorded an eight point increase for immigration compared with November to 34%. Cost of living leads at 77%, followed by housing on 50%, health care on 46%, the economy on 39% and immigration on 34%. The poll was conducted February 5 to 8 from a sample of 1000.
“… the Shy Tory effect.
How’d that go in 2025?”
2025 was the one exception to a myriad times when the Shy Tory effect held.
1992 – Conservatives under John Major re-elected
1998 – Howard re-elected while losing the 2pp but was much further behind in polls
2016 – BREXIT!
2016 – TRUMP!
2019 – Morrison
2020 – Biden barely wins despite being up by double digits in many polls
2024 – TRUMP!
Timmy says:
Monday, February 23, 2026 at 10:13 pm
If an election were held in the next few weeks, the true ON vote on election day will be even higher, because of the Shy Tory effect.
Except the ‘Shy Tory Effect’ has evaporated as people who aren’t ignorant rednecks have voted for Teals. Or Labor (94 seats at the last election says instead there were Shy Labor voters in the Liberal camp). In actual fact, if there are any ‘Shy Tory’ voters left they have probably overcome their shyness by now and jumped on the One Nation bandwagon.
Pretending everything is going to be okay isn’t going to work.
Trying to foist such an absurd proposition on us isn’t going to work either.
Bushfire Billsays:
Gave up my Ancestry.com subscription once I confirmed what I’d long suspected: that at least one great-grandparent was black… West African, one of the slave states that supplied the Caribbean colonies. In my case, British Guiana. The Ancestry lineage came back 6% West African (this is over and above the common “African” lineage we all share from 2 million years back).
My red-haired, freckle-faced Irish cousins, Howard Battlers (and now probably One Nationals) to a man and woman, hate me saying “We’re black”. Too bad
________________________
No shit. Same with me. Except it’s my GG Grandfather. Came back 2% West African on Ancestry and 1% Jewish.
You should see how my brother squirms when I say we are black jews. Fckn hilarious.
Anyway, I’m down with it, I always loved hip hop and it means I’m a descendant of the Middle Passage. Plus it was something different in a sea of Irish, Scottish and English ancestors.
ALABAMA might have 16.
Trump and Brexit get all caps. 🙄
“My red-haired, freckle-faced Irish cousins, Howard Battlers (and now probably One Nationals) to a man and woman, hate me saying “We’re black”. Too bad. It’s true anyway. DNA doesn’t lie. Interestingly I didn’t find any of them listed on Ancestry.com. So I guess they didn’t want to know the truth. I am actually quite thrilled by the confirmation.”
So? A sizeable proportion of Afrikaners in apartheid South Africa had at least some African DNA, from their ancestors screwing around/raping native women. That didn’t stop them from treating the indigenous majority of the population like expendable trash. They wouldn’t have cared one iota or purine or pyrimidine.
newy boy lol
definitely more than 46
Howard transferred the less effective dog-whistling about legal East Asian migration to Middle East/Afghan refugees through 9/11, Tampa and Children Overboard. He used it to win back 4% of the One Nation vote. Turning a slim 50.95 to 49.05 2PP lead into an 85 to 65 win on seats.
Timmy @ #301 Monday, February 23rd, 2026 – 9:51 pm
This is what is known as cherry-picking as well as goalpost-moving.
“Trump and Brexit get all caps. ”
But even you can’t deny that I’m right 🙂 How smart I am!
Cue Asha and his Simpsons gif
I reckon she just cbf’d denying you’re right and besides she can’t just go showing off her incredible power on some lesser troll.
Shy Tory is a thing.
I know dozens of them. Just like there were 860,000 people at the MCG for the underarm, I know no-one at all who voted for Morrison in 2019. Not a soul.
You got me, Cat – what does that meme mean?
Okay, let’s play it that way then.
2025 – COOK! (WA)
2025 – CARNEY! (Canada)
2025 – ALBANESE! (Australia)
2025 – MYEUNG! (South Korea)
2025 – STØRE! (Norway)
2026 – SEGURO! (Portugal)
Not quite all steam ahead to World MAGAville as it seems.
MABWM @ #313 Monday, February 23rd, 2026 – 10:16 pm
That’s not a Shy Tory effect. It’s just a reflection of the unreliability of anecdotal evidence.
Nath, we’re practically brothers.
MABWM – she is probably equating me with that mouse in a mocking way.
Lesson: One way to get MAGA men (and men in general) to do something REALLY nasty is by making a joke like that to challenge, demean or belittle their masculinity, intentionally or otherwise.
I call them MAGA steers, they won’t be up at the big table with the bull MAGA.
There was a bit of a shy tory thing going in Victoria after Kennet was elected and started the ‘budget repair’ and deficit levies. I could not find anyone who would admit to voting Liberal then but they must have. Probably a bit of buyers remorse, but I bet it happened in QLD after Newmann won as well.
I think Timmy is a but confused over what a shy tory actually is – it is people who pretend to be labor/progressive/woke to pollsters but then secretly vote liberal. Guess too ashamed to admit what they are.
Currently, with ON in the 20%+ there are a far more Out and Proud tories telling the pollsters how they will vote now being a racist/anti immigrant is apparently now all OK.
I never believed in the “shy Tory” effect, with most of our media mainstream bellowing on behalf of the Torys when things get political. Shy racist, perhaps, although racism is often disguised as concern over crime, terrorism, the housing crisis or any other of society’s ills that are inevitably blamed on “the other”. But with the surge in the One Nation vote, the racists now seem to be out and proud as well.
Omar Comin’ says:
Monday, February 23, 2026 at 10:58 pm
I call them MAGA steers, they won’t be up at the big table with the bull MAGA.
中华人民共和国
In Australia I reckon you could say “Hanson’s Bullocks” cobber.
Can’t be Wagyu or Brahmans though – too Asian.
Good call Upnorth, temperament too peaceful as well
I’ll bet that Tony Abbott’s “Sir Prince Philip” nonsense in January 2015 cost the Queensland LNP an extra 10-15 seats and that started the shitfight on the right that’s still going on today.
Abbott can’t stand that he was the one who broke Labor on his gallant white stallion in 2013 and lost it all so quickly so he and Credlin have opened whatever hell this Pandora’s Box of Trumpism has in store for us these next few years.
Thankfully it seems to be of more concern to the Coalition than it is to Labor going by polling.
Timmy says:
Monday, February 23, 2026 at 10:57 pm
MABWM – she is probably equating me with that mouse in a mocking way.
Lesson: One way to get MAGA men (and men in general) to do something REALLY nasty is by making a joke like that to challenge, demean or belittle their masculinity, intentionally or otherwise.
_____________________________
Oh yes those big strong MAGA masculine males full of manliness, those warriors and hunters and cage fighters who drip testosterone, make a joke of the MAGA Masculine Warrior in Chief and what happens – Out come the lawsuits, the threats to cancel, the outrage, the ‘oh poor me’ tantrums.
The MAGA Men are just a bunch of cowards and bullies who like nothing better than putting on caps and masks and flags and punching down on anyone seen as weak that they dislike, blacks, women, LGBT, immigrants….oh yeah big tough men there.
Entropy
Until you renounce it you would be ineligible to sit in Aus parliament if eg your father or grandfather was British(and you were born before 1984 in wedlock) as it makes you a foreign citizen. Same thing must apply re the new rule the UK brought, though how they would be able to tell if you’d never applied IDK. I travelled on British pass years ago for its EU access, but next time I’ll go as Irish. There must be a lot of Aussies with multi-citizenships
@subgeometer
They (UK) have changed alot of the rules as well making even more people eligible, e.g can use the maternal parent line now instead of just the father and fixed an issue with adopted children as well, although adopted children always had a right of abode in the UK with British parents.
I would check if you are going on an Irish passport as the new rules apply to them as well – guess that is because NI residents can choose between Brit or Irish passport.
Here’s another poll, this time from DemosAU, for those of you who feel you need more of them: ALP 29, ON 28, L-NP 21, GRN 12. Presumably there will be a YouGov poll for Sky News tomorrow.
https://www.capitalbrief.com/article/one-nation-closes-in-on-labors-primary-vote-as-its-poll-surge-continues-224ffb9c-517c-4ac9-9bd5-ac3a8ca6b836/
At some point I’m going to put together a bar chart illustrating the dramatic increase in polling activity this term.
Timmy
you and P1 (and anyone else who cares for that shit) can argue about who is always right. For mine it’s pitiable insecurity
Fresh protests in Iran in anticipation of US intervention. Those brave students! Let’s hope these monsters get what’s coming to them soon.
No one seems to have picked up on this strange fact in the Mar-a-Lago incident:
“On Sunday morning, police were seen surrounding a silver Volkswagen parked at Midtown Beach, a public area that is about a 30-minute walk from Mar-a-Lago.”
Is it likely that the young man walked towards Mar-a-Lago for half and hour carrying a can of petrol and a loaded shot-gun at 1:30 in the morning and was not noticed? Even at that early hour there would be some traffic.
Could be another slip-up by the Secret Service. After the Trump golf course incident, you would think there would be surveillance cameras set up all over the area, including the beach where it appears the man entered the perimeter.
And while he may have been mentally disturbed, how likely is it that he would plan a fire-bombing of Mar-a-Lago and also carry a loaded shotgun, which around the Secret Service would be a death sentence. What did he think he could do with that shotgun in the middle of the night anyway?
Ven says Monday, February 23, 2026 at 8:51 pm
…. favourite tree?
Socrates at 2.30 pm, Upnorth at 6.21 pm
“There was a golden opportunity to reform the UN in the 90s when the USA was still dominant but it was missed.”
There was a difference between the early 1990s, immediately after the Cold War, under former Egyptian FM Boutros-Ghali, and the situation from about 1997 under Kofi Annan as UN Secretary General.
Boutros-Ghali managed to offend the US so he got only one term.
The US position re Security Council reform under Clinton in the early 1990s was a quick fix lacking any realistic perspective, namely just add Japan and Germany as permanent members. Even then it was misguided, as it could not have got the necessary two thirds majority in the General Assembly.
By 1997 it was clear even to the US that any reform had to be serious, that is increase the representation of the most populous regions, including Africa and Asia and Latin America.
The issue of SC reform has been debated for 32 years and never got near a compromise resolution, partly because of a lack of US leadership, but also because of division elsewhere about who should get new permanent seats.
John Howard in his own ignorant way once offended Kofi Annan mightily about the issue. He went to New York in May 2003 soon after the first phase of the Iraq war. Before going he spoke to The Bulletin about his vision of Security Council reform.
His suggestion was not to expand the Security Council from 15 to 24 or so, which was the only thing almost everybody else could agree on, but rather to make 10 rather than 5 of the seats permanent. The consequence of that would be to make it twice as hard for any other state, including Australia, to become a non-permanent Security Council member. The media were kind to him in not pointing that out.
Howard initially proposed India, Japan, Brasil, Germany and Indonesia as the new permanent seats. Then Kofi Annan pointed out to him privately that he had totally overlooked Africa. A proposal without majority African support has no prospect of success since there are many African states.
So, Howard quickly replaced Germany with an unspecified African country.
His suggestion was so confused that he failed to mention it in his memoir Lazarus Rising when he referred to his meeting with Annan in New York.
The story is told in ch 11 of this official history of Australia and the UN:
https://www.dfat.gov.au/about-us/publications/Pages/australia-and-the-united-nations#Anchor-39
Only $20 on ebay at:
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/389535326920?srsltid=AfmBOoqQjjQppKSxppbuGPiqZPEJL0vWDa07pGUvqxd0eX99XtdhcVe3
What Howard was not confused about was Hanson and her brand of racism. He borrowed her policies but refused preference deals, to marginalise her. He succeeded. It was only the supreme toff, Turnbull, who resuscitated her, as a result of the 2016 DD election.
Gusgate Taylor & Co. are imbeciles compared to Howard. The Rowe cartoon says it all.
Murray Goot knows polling inside out. His observations are sensible but he did not note the squeeze factor. The Libs have squeezed themselves out of the cities, except for a few outer urban seats, due to their misogyny and their denialism of global warming. Having lurched to the right with a total failure under Dutton, they are now extending the failure and facing a new self-inflicted squeeze from the xenophobic drongos. Serves them right.
As for Hanson, except for the initial success in the 1998 Qld election she has always underperformed the polls. Her form of populist ignorance has steady support in Qld, an undrainable small reservoir of support in WA and rural NSW, but comparatively little support in Victoria, a key state federally.
The Farrer by-election will be a side-show. The SA election is a foregone conclusion, except for the wooden spoon. The Victorian election is the one to watch. When that comes around Gusgate will be hanging by a thread.
William at 11.51 pm
“At some point I’m going to put together a bar chart illustrating the dramatic increase in polling activity this term.”
I remember the eternal wisdom of Albert Della Bosca, the organic veggie man from Pickering Brook who with his wife Grace used to set up their stall at the South Fremantle Sunday morning market much earlier than others.
Albert said: “Quality always beats quantity every time.”
The next federal election is over two years away. Gusgate Taylor is the only pollie with urgency in his pants at present. He won’t last the distance.
Dr Doolittle
One thing about Farrer – I think the Liberals won’t win it (Independent, National or One Nation) – so Taylor’s first rodeo will be a loss. And that will be hard to explain away given that the Liberals have held the seat for 25 years (And that his Liberal team is bravely fighting the worst Australian Government since Federation!)
South Australia I think will only be interesting if the Liberals are dumb enough (with Alex Antic pulling the strings they probably are) to preference One Nation. Then any One Nation lower house seat wins will be seen as a huge ‘own goal’.
Which as you say leads to the main event of 2026 (a few weeks after the US midterms!): the Victorian election. I am quite prepared for Labor possibly losing, but so far I don’t really feel convinced it’s going to happen. Some people compare it to 2010 when Labor looked OK months and even weeks out before losing narrowly. But the locations and margins on Labor seats make it pretty hard for the Coalition to win, and any statewide TPP or ON vote in polls will always be pretty skewed to the rural seats where Labor is not going to win (and maybe a few big swings in the rural ones they hold like Bendigo).
If Jess Wilson wins her seat (no certainty) and becomes Premier but has to rely on a few ON members in the lower house to pass legislation it may turn out to be somewhat of a poisoned chalice, especially if they join forces with the Bev McArthurs and Moira Deemings of this world to prosecute s0-called ‘culture wars’.
If the Coalition don’t win in Victoria I expect that Andrew Hastie will be Federal leader by Christmas.
DemosAU Western Australian state poll: Labor 36%, Liberal 21%, Nationals 4%, One Nation 17%, Greens 13%. TPP: Labor 57, Liberal-Nationals 43.
https://thewest.com.au/politics/state-politics/wa-opinion-poll-one-nation-hits-17-per-cent-as-new-poll-puts-basil-zempilas-and-rita-saffioti-under-pressure-c-21726084?utm_source=push-notification&utm_medium=new_article
They will have a South Australian poll probably tomorrow. Upper house results from the poll are available here:
https://www.indailysa.com.au/news/just-in/2026/02/23/exclusive-polling-results-reveal-surprise-election-players
New thread.