Essential Research 2PP+: Labor 53, Coalition 41 (open thread)

Little change from Essential, a narrowing from Morgan, budget polling from Resolve Strategic, and strong support for the Indigenous Voice from YouGov.

The voting intention numbers from the latest fortnightly Essential Research survey, which include a 5% undecided component (up one), have Labor down one to 33%, the Coalition steady on 31%, the Greens steady on 14% and One Nation down one to 5%. The pollster’s 2PP+ measure has Labor up a point to 53%, the Coalition down two to 41% and undecided up one to 5% (the missing point being down to rounding).

The Essential Research report also features the pollster’s monthly “leaders favourability ratings”, which invite respondents to rate Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton on scales from one to ten, as distinct from its separate and more conventional measure of approval and disapproval. After a seven point drop for Albanese in the previous survey for “positive” ratings (seven to ten), this survey has him up a point to 41%, while negative ratings (zero to three) are down four to 24% after a six point increase last time, and neutral (four to six) are up two to 30%. Peter Dutton is down three on positive to 23% and up two on negative to 35%, with neutral up a point to 34%.

A monthly question on national direction finds “right direction” sneaking back into the lead over “wrong track” after falling behind last time, being respectively up three to 41% and down four to 39%. Other findings from the poll include 48% support for raising the rate of JobSeeker with 29% opposed, and 52% support for allowing New Zealanders who meet character tests to become Australian citizens after four years of residency with 22% opposed.

Ahead of the budget, the poll finds 41% approving of Jim Chalmers’ performance as Treasurer with disapproval at 27%, although a forced response question on whether respondents were able to name him as Treasurer came down 67-33 against. Respondents were asked if they felt current spending in seven policy areas was too high or too low, which found health and Medicare leading the field by some distance on 56% for too low. Despite recent awareness-raising exercises on various fronts, only 18% felt national security and defence spending was too low while 26% felt it was too high, the latter being the biggest out of the seven.

Respondents were also asked if various categories of tax rate were too low or too high: only “taxes for international corporations” scored a plurality for too low, with super, property and income taxes all scoring a shade below 50% for too high. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1130.

Further recent polling:

• The most recent Resolve Strategic poll had 43% support for raising JobSeeker with 31% opposed; 34% support for cancelling or scaling back stage three tax cuts with 23 opposed; 60% support for increasing the corporate tax rate, with 13% opposed; 58% support for increasing the tax on resource company profits, with 12% opposed; and pluralities in favour of reducing concessions on negative gearing, capital gains, superannuation and franking credits. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday before last from a sample of 1609.

• This week’s Roy Morgan voting intention results have Labor’s two-party lead narrowing to 53.5-46.5, which is apparently in from 56.5-43.5 (though it was 56-44 when I checked a week ago), from primary votes of Labor 36%, Coalition 35.5% and Greens 13% (my record of last week’s results shows Labor at 37%, Coalition 33% and Greens 12%). The poll was conducted last Monday to Sunday – as usual, nothing is offered on sample size, survey method of preference method (Kevin Bonham calculates that Labor is a point higher on two-party based on 2022 election flows).

• The Age/Herald reported on Monday that a YouGov poll for the pro-Voice Uluru Dialogue group, which encompassed a vast national sample of 15,060, had 51% in favour of an Indigenous Voice and 34% opposed, with yes leading 52-32 in New South Wales, 53-31 in Victoria, 47-40 in Queensland, 48-37 in Western Australia, 51-34 in South Australia, 50-35 in Tasmania, 64-24 in the Australian Capital Territory and 52-32 in the Northern Territory. Respondents were specifically asked how they would vote if the referendum to be held “on a proposal to establish a Voice to Parliament for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the Constitution” were held today. This turns out to be the poll cited by Rebecca Huntley of The Guardian last week which found support among Indigenous people at 83%, from a substantial sub-sample of 732. However, the poll was conducted well over a month ago, from March 1 to 21.

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.

1,485 comments on “Essential Research 2PP+: Labor 53, Coalition 41 (open thread)”

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  1. Q: We cracked a bottle of English bubbly (Nyetimber, $80 at Dan Murphy’s) to toast the King.

    I skulled a bundy and coke after work and enjoyed the music.
    Husband stormed off to bed…..

  2. Haven’t watched one second of the coro yet but Ms 98.6 is.
    Having a slight cold helps me stay in the bedroom on PB and the TV in here is broken so no football either.
    Apparently to fix the TV one goes on google and it tells you to get a USB stick and put some magic words and numbers in it and stick it into the back of the TV.
    We tried that a year ago but to no avail and nobody has bothered since.
    Seems a bit of a waste having a rather large TV hanging on the wall which doesn’t get used.
    Such is life !

  3. FFS seriously what has some fancy costumes and some (badly) choreographed moves got to do with a system of executive government. On that basis why the f*** don’t we just hand Yarralumla over to cirque de soleil?

  6. ““1 vote, 1 value” reforms are well overdue for the Senate”

    The Senate was intended to be a states house and was constitutionally enshrined for that purpose. It clearly has moved on from that role but it will never be reformed as the smaller states will never vote to reduce their representation at a referendum. To be fair though the Senate doesn’t seem particularly unrepresentative atm despite the disproportionality of seats between states. Where it is out of step is that Senators can just get elected by virtue of their position on the ticket. I think it’s worth considering a Hare-Clark style model to electing senators in a more democratically legitimate way.

  7. I haven’t watched the coronation in total but my wife called me to watch the crown being “put” on Charlie’s head. I thought he could do with a haircut but what I enjoyed was the way the padre screwed it onto his head and then bent down to check that it was level. The crown was much taller than I thought it would be.

    I can hear it from the computer room and have never heard as much dreadful music in all my life. I am also a little intrigued as to how religious it is.

    I have been to a cathedral, in Worcester. What gets me is how old parts of them are.

  10. I personally have no problem with supreme executive power deriving from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. Oh and some guillotines would also help.

  11. I looked at our TV’s program guide and Sky after dark (regional free to air) is covering the coronation non-stop until 6am! Suppose it will keep the royalists out of mischief overnight.

  14. Q: All this pageantry dates back to when the UK was a powerful empire…it looks out of place now.

    Indeed, imagine if Putin or Trump put on a parade like this (they are/were heads of state) what would people say?…..Leave this sort of thing to Kim Il Sung and Xi.

  15. Coronations at Westminster Abbey date back to 1066, when England was conquered by William. So the very opposite of being a powerful empire.

  17. I’m sure coronations have occurred forever but the marches give the air of a great power circa the Victorian age rather than now.

  19. Prince Charles came up to me, with tears in his eyes, and said

    “Mr. President, I wish my crowds were as large as yours”

  25. @catmomma

    Yeah, the Dees barely getting across the line against Gold Coast.

    Still worth a little rendition of “Grand Old Flag” 🙂

  26. Evening bludgers.

    I missed the coronation I’m afraid: i was too busy watching Brisbane lad Max Neumann being crowned the new King of Triathlon by winning the PTO European Open in Ibiza Spain – along the way defeating the last three Gold Medal winners of the olympic triathlon as well as the reigning world champion. Well done Max.

    The bit of the coronation I missed the most was the choir singing Zadok the Priest; but I’m sure I’l find it on You Tube in the morning.

    Night all.

  28. ”We’ll probably be a republic in a few years, the Voice is kind of a test run.”

    It will take longer. I would suggest 2029-30 at the earliest, but that’s dependent upon keeping the right-wing reactionaries out of office in the meantime.

  32. Good to see that the Archbishop of Canterbury checked to make sure Charlie head was screwed on before he let go of the crown… Did Charlie give him the fountain pen stare ?

  33. Nobody does dress-ups like the British and including all the old people in dress-ups is nice.

    Australian old people just clutter the roads with camper vans and wear thongs.

    The Americans would call the old/new King and Queen the “homecoming King and Queen”.

    The Coronation certainly made good use of all the old curtains sitting in boxes in the quaint British garden sheds and the question has to be asked,
    “Is the cotton wool used in the costumes real cotton or some non-recyclable stuff” ?

    What an absolutely amazing day for the poms.

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