As always, a flurry of federal polling is emerging in the wake of the budget, with more to follow over the coming days. Newspoll in The Australian finds Labor holding its ground on 31% of the primary vote, the winners out of any budget backlash seemingly being One Nation, up three to 27%, putting them well ahead of the Coalition, down one to 20%, with the Greens down one to 12%. Anthony Albanese’s personal ratings are unchanged at 40% approval and 57% disapproval, while Angus Taylor is respectively up three to 36% and up two to 48%. Preferred prime minister is little changed, with Albanese’s lead at 46-38, in from 46-37.
This is despite perceptions of the budget’s impact on the economy being the worst recorded since Labor’s horror post-election budget in 1993 (Newspoll has consistently posed the same suite of post-budget questions since 1988), with 22% rating it good for the economy (in fact no different from last year’s budget, which came six weeks before Labor’s landslide win) and 47% bad (up 15 points on last year). In terms of personal financial impact, the net result is the worst since the Abbott government’s disastrous debut budget in 2014, with 11% expecting they will be better off and 52% worse off. However, this is not immensely worse than for the Albanese government’s first budget in October 2022, for which the respective results were 12% and 47%. On the other regular Newspoll post-budget question, relating to whether the opposition would have done better, the results are unremarkable: 39% say yes and 47% no, compared with 38% and 47% last year.
Further questions find 48% expecting the budget will worsen inflation, 9% improve it, and 32% make no difference; 39% expecting they will pay more tax, 7% less, and 41% no change; 27% rate it a step in the right direction on housing, compared with 38% for wrong direction and 22% for no difference; and 26% felt the government was “rebalancing the playing field to make things further” compared with 47% for “driving a wedge between younger and older generations” and 18% for neither. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1252.
Other polls are less sanguine with respect to Labor’s electoral standing, the monthly Resolve Strategic poll for Nine Newspapers finding them down three points to 29%, with the Coalition unchanged on 23%, One Nation up one to 24% and the Greens up one to 12%. The poll notably has Angus Taylor leading Anthony Albanese on preferred prime minister by 33-30, after Albanese led 33-32 last month. Albanese’s combined very good and good rating is down three to 34%, while his poor plus very poor rating is up four to 56%. Taylor is respectively down four to 37% and up three to 29%.
The Resolve Strategic poll finds 24% saying the budget will be good for their household compared with 35% for bad. Thirty-six per cent say the broken promises have damaged their view of Labor, with 31% saying they have not and 14% holding that their view of Labor has improved. However, pluralities are recorded in favour of the changes in capital gains tax, supported by 36% and opposed by 21% with the remainder undecided or neutral, and negative gearing, supported by 35% and opposed by 21%. Of 11 budget measures canvassed, only the cancellation of further work on the Inland Rail project, supported and opposed by 27% apiece, does not find more supportive than opposed.
A Freshwater Strategy poll for the News Corp papers records a tie on two-party preferred, after a 53-47 in the pollster’s last result three weeks ago, with Labor down three on the primary vote to 29%, the Coalition up two to 25%, One Nation up one to 26% and the Greens down one to 11%. The poll finds 21% rating the budget as positive and 46% as negative in terms of economic impact. Forty-five per cent say the changes to negative gearing, capital gains tax and trusts have reduced their trust in Anthony Albanese and Labor, with 13% saying their trust has increased. Forty-one per cent say they are less likely to vote Labor compared with 15% for more likely. Fifty-eight per cent believe the budget increases the chances of further interest rate rises, compared with 10% for decreases and 21% no effect. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Friday from a sample of 1384.
A poll by Wolf & Smith, conducted on Wednesday from a sample of 1002 (for “Amplify, a non-partisan community group founded by tech investor Paul Bassat”, as related by the Financial Review), has Labor on 30%, the Coalition on 24%, One Nation on 22%, the Greens on 11% and others on 13%. It finds pluralities in favour of the changes on negative gearing (41% with 32% neutral and 27% opposed) and capital gains tax (38% with 35% neutral and 26% opposed), but only for those who own their homes outright is it felt the impact will more likely be positive than negative (37% positive, 43% neutral, 20% negative), followed by prospective homebuyers (34%, 28% and 38%). Only 16% said the changes would be positive for renters and mortgage-payers, with a respective 45% and 43% expecting it to be negative.
Dr Doolittlesays:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 6:46 pm
nadia at 6.25 and 6.27 pm
1) “I’m not a Sir Keir fan, and haven’t been for about 8 months.”
With respect, you were behind the UK electorate, many of whom worked Starmer out soon after the Oct 2024 budget. Talk about broken promises. What Albo has done is nothing. Anyone without a blindfold knew that the ditching of Shorten’s 2016/19 policies was temporary.
_______________________
Would have been nice to know it was only temporary during the 2022 and 2025 election campaigns.
As for Starmer. He lost me with that dodgy clothing donation.
So typical and true to form for this Govt.
All the leaders in the Ukraine and Iran wars have made bloodcurdling threats and then walked away from them. The Iranians were ready to deploy a wonderwaffe of some sort or other. Putin rattles the nukes. Netanyahu simply depopulates large swathes of land with threats to the inhabitants. (Z has been the most restrained.)
Every day on which Trump does not resort to actually trying to bomb Iran into the stone ages is a good day, IMO.
While some folks were happy with Ukraine’s massive attack on Moscow, I am not so sure. How is Putin going to respond? Will he regard it as an escalation by Ukraine to which he must respond?
It is hard to see any of the combatants in Ukraine, Russia, the US, Israel or Iran being at all ready to negotiate or to give up. Yet it is hard to see the current situations as sustainable over time.
It is hard to see any other course of action other than that Putin and Trump escalate. It is hard to see their adversaries doing anything other than escalate in response. There is now active discussion in Russia about attacking NATO countries. There is now active discussion about Russia’s nuclear options.
Trump is probably not sane enough to realize that he has lost. He is insane enough to go nuclear.
It is hard to see those escalations doing anything other than drawing more european and middle eastern countries into war fighting in Ukraine and the Middle East.
It is hard to see the continuing SoH closure as doing anything other than driving the global economy into recession and to drive millions into extreme ‘food insecurity’.
Distrust is now so very, very deep on all sides that the incremental build up of trust is a must have. Arguably, we are getting a build up of distrust instead.
Even were both wars to stop tomorrow, the impacts would go on for years.
When the elephants play, the mice had better look out.
Kage says:
“…. Capital gains within a superannuation scheme are exempt.”
That’s not correct. Earnings within a retail superannuation fund are taxed at 15% regardless of whether the earnings are capital or (dividend) interest. (This is a sticking point over plans to tax earnings of funds over $3m. How is this to apply to retail funds?)
Any treatment of SMSFs is irrelevant in practice as less than 5% of Australians have one.
Taylormadesays:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 8:36 pm
Dr Doolittlesays:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 6:46 pm
nadia at 6.25 and 6.27 pm
1) “I’m not a Sir Keir fan, and haven’t been for about 8 months.”
With respect, you were behind the UK electorate, many of whom worked Starmer out soon after the Oct 2024 budget. Talk about broken promises. What Albo has done is nothing. Anyone without a blindfold knew that the ditching of Shorten’s 2016/19 policies was temporary.
_______________________
Would have been nice to know it was only temporary during the 2022 and 2025 election campaigns.
=============================================
LOL Taylormade
We all know it didn’t change your vote, so don’t pretend otherwise.
Taylormade – feel free to switch your vote from Labor to someone else next time 😉 , if you feel let down by the Government’s changes to NG, CGT and trusts. Personally, I never made the status quo on those things a condition for voting Labor.
What’s more, I’ve been around long enough to know that Governments often do things they previously said they wouldn’t. The Howard/Costello ‘core and non core promises’ Budget in 1996 and the Abbott/Hockey flood of broken promises in the 2014 Budget to name two. How soon after those Budgets did voters change the Government?
Entropy – snap!
Interesting speech from Tim Ayres at the McKell Institute today, especially this part:
https://www.minister.industry.gov.au/ministers/timayres/speeches/manufacturing-australias-future-resilience-and-statecraft-science-and-industrial-policy
Latest National Poll from YouGov:
{Comparison with 2 weeks ago}
* ALP 28 (-2)
* ONP 25 (+1)
* LNP 23 (+2)
* GRN 13 (-1)
* Oth/Ind 11 (nc)
Link: https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/politics/labors-primary-vote-plummets-amid-backlash-to-anthony-albaneses-budget-broken-promises/news-story/85b0175fa0db4e02b85f4161771cdefd
Boerwar, Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 8:49 pm:
BW – you must know by now I am going to critique any effort by anyone to ‘both-sides’ the actions of Russia and Ukraine in their war. Apart from the obvious fact that self defence entitles the victim of genocidal aggression to respond to that attack, I challenge you to cite any Ukrainian language which matches this for ‘bloodcurdling’ aggression:
1) “Russia’s Medvedev Threatens Nuke Strike That Would Turn Kyiv Into ‘Gray Spot'”
https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-ukraine-west-nuclear/33119997.html
Need I cite the multiple instances of Russian nuclear sabre rattling, from Putin down, any time they wanted to scare the West out of providing this or that means of support to Ukraine? When has Ukraine threatened anyone with nuclear attack? (Not that any of these Russian nuclear threats to retaliate against a Russian ‘red line’ proved anything but completely empty.)
To cut to the chase – Gen Z, via YouGov.
* ALP 32%
* GRN 29%
* ONP 12%
* LNP 10%
* Oth/Ind 17%
No 2PP provided, but given the primaries I wouldn’t worry. Look’s around 75-25 at a rough guess.
Preferred PM
Albo 41%
Taylor 38%
Regardless of the “headlines” tomorrow, younger people are actually very supportive of the gov’t’s measures.
At the end of the day, the overall 2PP with ALP v ON is 53% in favour of the ALP
With the ALP v LNP, it is 52% in favour.
The past six days of “Get Jim & Get Albo”, has been a media circus.
SL, Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 8:54 pm:
SL, I think we were discussing the fate of Tomago Aluminium in the context of Labor MP’s in Hunter and Paterson fending off challenges from One Nation next election. It is obvious the Federal Government is alive to the importance of this industry to this region. Let’s hope the State Government is equally alive to the fact that it is due to face the voters about 14 months before the Federal Government is, and that it is defending even more seats in the region than the Feds are.
Thanks Nadia, gen Z loves the Greens
Quick look at the Primaries for the Baby Boomer Generation.
* LNP 30
* ON 30
* ALP 25
* GRN 4
* Oth/Ind 11
Rough Guess at the 2PP : 63-37 in favour of the LNP
Hard Being Green says:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 9:27 pm
Thanks Nadia, gen Z loves the Greens
=========
The media “carry-on” about screwing family trust funds, shafting start up businesses & death taxes, has not resonated.
I thought the “Get Albo” thing over New Year’s was bad enough, but the campaign this past week from the media has been hysterical.
YouGov is not a muppet club polling company.
53% to the ALP tonight is fairly similar to the 54% 2PP reported on Sunday via Newspoll.
The budget will be bedded down over the next year. There is nothing apocalyptic in the budget delivered last week. The sun will rise in the east tomorrow and the earth is not spinning on it’s axis.
Time to move on, and I hope the media “moves on” too.
nadia says:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 9:28 pm
Being one I say BS…
We were born in the Whitlam era.. not possible … we understand that there is no such thing as a right minded conservative ..
Labor’s primary vote continues softening and TPP should settle at 52/53, the economic outlook is increasingly gloomy.
“The budget will be bedded down over the next year. There is nothing apocalyptic in the budget delivered last week. ”
Spot on, Nadia.
The course of a capital market worth several hundred billion is not going to change overnight with these moderate changes to taxation treatment. Changing the mix of ownership is a long term game and slow and steady progress is exactly what is required.
Re Nadia
From what I can tell, no one will be made worse off than an everyday worker in the PAYE system who doesn’t have a chance to hide their income or wealth (if any) in complex financial arrangements.
There may be kinks to iron out but pretty much all of the wailing from losers in this Budget, amplified by the lamestream media, is nothing more than self-interested blather, best ignored.
nadiasays:
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 at 9:38 pm
There is nothing apocalyptic in the budget delivered last week. The sun will rise in the east tomorrow and the earth is not spinning on it’s axis.
Time to move on, and I hope the media “moves on” too.
_______________________
I doubt it.
Don’t be surprised if the govt caves in on the CGT. Or at least some tinkering.
This is Labor’s equal worst polling average of the whole election cycle so far. It will be interesting to see how they would try to shake it off.
Couldn’t give a stuff, couldn’t be bothered even to find a tiny violin…
Self-interested blather. Any Government assistance to start-ups, if warranted, should be specific and targeted, not scattershot. We don’t seem to be great at innovating other than finding new ways to milk the system, so what we were doing wasn’t working.
They should be brought back.
well at least they shouldn’t. The lamestream media will keep it going as long as they can.
newy boy at 9.09 pm
This is a long article about debates within the Russian elite over a potential use of nuclear weapons, in the context of Putin’s war:
https://academic.oup.com/isagsq/article/6/2/ksag072/8661591 (link to pdf)
Two points: 1) it is the most extreme belligerents in Russia, such as Sergey Karaganov (a former new thinker under Gorbachev who has reinvented himself as a Russian Herman Kahn, proposing to make nuclear weapons militarily useable), who have claimed that Russian threats or talks about threats made Western policy makers wary, a dubious claim (see pp 8-9).
2) Putin did not endorse Karaganov’s proposals, with his spokesman Peskov saying directly that he remained “extremely cautious” regarding any proposed use of nuclear weapons (p 10, top of second column).
That may not be the impression resulting from Putin’s public statements, but it is the upshot of a serious policy debate that Karagonov basically lost.
Thomas Brian Mutter at 10.31 pm
Look at the wood not merely some groups of trees. There has essentially been no change for almost 3 months, in a period of increased uncertainty together with greater economic stress, caused primarily by Trump’s war.
Compare the graph of the NZ National Party’s steady decline in this period:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2026_New_Zealand_general_election
Mr Luxon would be pleased to be facing the political situation facing Albo.
Apologies, but there’s a proof-reader who lives in my head, who squawks at me when I read this. “Does it mean what you think it means? Have you missed the sarcasm? Again!” It’s why I must point out that it is precisely because the earth still spins on its axis that the sun will appear to ‘rise’ tomorrow.
Preferred PM
Albo 41%
Taylor 38%
Until Hanson is included its pretty meaningless.
Herman Kahn, that’s a blast from the past. Said to br the inspiration for Dr Strangelove.
It seems like the main coverage of Labors “drafted by the gas industry” reservation policy is largely republishing of the gas industry’s views on the matter:
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/gas-giant-warns-labor-on-risk-of-argentina-style-industry-collapse-20260519-p5zypi.html
https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/gas-reservation-design-will-kill-industry-santos-ceo-20260518-p5zyhe
So is this all controlled opposition?
That leaves “further right” macrobusiness as the only independent media still covering the issue:
https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2026/05/omg-albo-is-going-to-crash-gas-prices/
“This is Labor’s equal worst polling average of the whole election cycle so far. It will be interesting to see how they would try to shake it off.”
By saying they aren’t as bad as the alternatives? That seems to work.
Said to br the inspiration for Dr Strangelove.
I thought he was Teller crossed with von Neumann
Murdoch destroyed US and UK because he wanted his team/ side to be in power to do favours for people like him. I don’t know how US and UK will recover from the destruction of their political system, where fascist are either in power or on the rise with good people wringing hands from sidelined
Australia was almost destroyed by shenanigans of him and his political team being in power in last 20 out of last 30 years. It could still happen, who knows. Australia like India is a lucky country to get out of the destruction caused by previous governments. Those that caused previous destruction are still around. The danger is not gone. It is lurking in shadows.
The current Albanese government should not only do good work but also communicate it in a way that the general public understand.
Thinking that our people will understand the good work by the government is at best naive.
Albanese is just lucky till now because the opposition is self destructing itself.
Albanese government is driving the Australian media crazy. They just don’t understand how he is able to survive even after some of worst sustained attacks the government has seen in a long time.
You want Albanese government to do things that will benefit people. But when they do that you are not happy about it.
You will never be happy the Albanese government. When you can relentlessly criticise SA government (the most popular government), you will never be happy with whatever Albanese government.
You want a L-NP government.
I know this Yougov poll. But it is Sky after dark poll
I will leave at that.
InteractivePolls@IAPolls2022
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23m
2026 Generic Congressional Ballot
Democrats: 46%
Republicans: 43%
Last week: Democrats +5
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YouGov/Economist | 5/15-18 | RV
InteractivePolls@IAPolls2022
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15m
2026 Generic Congressional Ballot
Democrats: 45% (=)
Republicans: 42% (=)
Morning Consult | 28,525 RV | 5/11-17
The age, independent always, is now complaining about the level crossing removals taking too long.
Yesterday level crossing removals were government waste.
Our ABC was carrying on about the boomer uproar over CGT treatment.
And yet Albo (and Jacinta) will win the next election.
Those silly voters, they just won’t listen.
nadia
As per post, You might have been a teenager when Hollingworth resigned as GG over a scandal.
John Howard appointed him to keep the Christian fundamentalists happy. Do you know that Australian PM has 2 ultimate powers
1. To appoint GG, which English monarch will approve, no questions asked.
2. To go to war against with another country.
The PM need not have to take permission neither from his cabinet nor from the Australian parliament to do above.
As far as I know, Hollingworth was the only GG to resign due to a scandal and he was a man of cloth.
Dr Doolittle 10:47pm
Further to your point about Australia doing comparatively well fighting the oil crisis, I posted yesterday that Australia’s per capita GDP growth was the fourth fastest in the OECD since 2025. We are doing as well as we can.
By comparison, the last major oil supply crisis in 1973 saw global GDP shrink by 6%. Many western governments fell at the time including France, Germany, UK and ours within 18 months.
Yes, if we just look at Newspoll the Labor primary was 32% on the eve of Trump’s war, and has remained at 31% for the past two months or so.
NZ polling is more variable but taking just the News Verian poll National was still ahead of Labour in mid-Feb but dropped to 7% behind two months later.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2026_New_Zealand_general_election
BW, glad to see you’ve moved on to some new Ukraine failpost since ‘attrition favours russia’ didn’t work out
Nadia, thanks for the breakdown of the You Gov numbers. It seems that those under 30 do not respond to the MSM opinions (not news) in the manner in which the said MSM has directed them.
The hysterical attacks on Labor (State and Federal) by the Murdoch rags, the Age and our ABC do not seem to have landed.
New thread.
I see that the obsequious slimy little toad Blanche has given El Presidente what he’s been after for years.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5885763-irs-trump-tax-returns-settlement-agreement/
Alternate headline: “Forty get rich quick merchants complain about having to pay their fair share of tax”
Taylormade @ #623 Tuesday, May 19th, 2026 – 10:27 pm
As if that has any relevance to anything at all!