Polls: Newspoll and Resolve Strategic (open thread)

Little change from Newspoll, but the first Resolve Strategic poll for the year produces a somewhat unexpected fillip for the Coalition.

The Australian reports the three-weekly Newspoll shows no change on two-party preferred, with Labor maintaining a lead of 52-48, and little change on the primary vote, with Labor down one to 33%, the Coalition steady on 36%, the Greens steady on 12%, One Nation down one to 6% and others up two to 13%. Anthony Albanese is up a point on approval to 43% and steady on disapproval at 51%, while Peter Dutton respectively steady at 37% and up one to 51%. Albanese’s lead on preferred prime minister is 47-35, out slightly from 46-35. The report provides no information on field work dates or sample size, but the last one was Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1245.

UPDATE: It turns out to have been Monday to Friday, with the sample again 1245. Respondents were also told of “a proposal to build several small modular nuclear reactors around Australia to produce zero-emissions energy on the sites of existing coal-fired power stations once they are retired”, of which 55% approved and 31% disapproved.

We also have from Nine Newspapers the first Resolve Strategic poll since late November/early December, which is at at odds with its competitors in recording movement to the Coalition: up three points to 37%, with Labor and the Greens each down a point, to 34% and 11% respectively, and One Nation up one to 6%. My own estimate of two-party preferred based on preference flows in 2022 is a narrowing from around 54.5-45.5 to 52-48. This pollster had hitherto been comfortably the strongest series for Labor, but these numbers bring it back to the field.

There are also peculiarities on personal ratings: Anthony Albanese records a five-point increase in approval (or to be more precise, the sum of his good plus very good results) to 41% with disapproval (poor plus very poor) down one to 47%, but his lead as preferred prime minister has narrowed from 42-28 to 39-32. Peter Dutton is up one on approval to 35% and down three to disapproval to 45%. Further findings from the poll include 52% support and 14% opposition to the revised stage three tax cuts. It was conducted Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1603.

US South Carolina Republican primary live

Trump set to effectively seal the Republican nomination contest by crushing Haley in her home state.

Live Commentary

8:47am Monday Haley won one of SC’s seven districts, so she avoided a delegate wipeout. But it’s still a 47-3 delegate split in Trump’s favour. I will cover the UK Rochdale by-election on Friday AEDT.

5:20pm With almost all votes counted, Trump wins by 59.8-39.5, a 20.3-point margin. There were almost 756,000 Rep primary votes, compared with just over 131,000 for the SC Dem primary. Trump has won 44 of the 50 delegates, with results for two Cong Districts uncalled. These will need results by CD before they can be called.

1:23pm With 75% in, Trump leads by 59.7-39.6, and the NYT needle is forecasting a final margin of Trump by 19. This was a thumping victory for Trump in his only remaining opponent’s home state. He leads by 61 points in national Rep polls, and has massive leads in California and Texas, which vote on Super Tuesday March 5. If Haley stays in until ST, she’s likely to be buried.

12:13pm With 34% in, Trump leads by 59-40. The NYT needle is now at Trump by 20.

11:58am There were just over 131,000 total votes in the Feb 3 South Carolina Dem primary that Biden won with 96%. With 21% counted in today’s Rep primary, there are already over 158,000 votes.

11:51am With 13% in, Trump leads by 58-42. The NYT needle has returned to Trump by 23 after briefly having him winning by 26.

11:40am Votes counted so far are early votes according to NYT analyst Nate Cohn. Election day vote likely to be more pro-Trump.

11:32am Trump now up by only 53-46 as Charleston reports, but the NYT estimate is for a final margin of Trump by 23.

11:29am Columbia has just reported, reducing Trump’s statewide lead to 55-44 with 3% in.

11:07am Trump has been credited with 44 of SC’s 50 delegates, presumably winning the state and five of the seven districts by large margins.

11:05am South Carolina has been CALLED for Trump based on exit polls before any votes have been counted. Here’s the NYT results page.

7:44am It looks like late gains for Haley in SC, with the final Trafalgar group poll, conducted Wednesday to Friday US time, giving Trump a 21-point lead, down from 30 points in the previous Trafalgar poll in mid-February. But it’s still likely to be a big win for Trump. And there’s no sign of any gains for Haley in national polls.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

Polls close at 11am AEDT today for the South Carolina Republican presidential primary.  This is Nikki Haley’s home state, and she was governor from 2011 to 2017.  But Donald Trump leads Haley by 63.6-32.9 in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate of SC Republican polls.  The last polls were taken a week ago, and two of the last four polls had Trump’s lead in the low 20s.

In national Republican polls, Trump leads Haley by 77-16, while in national Democratic polls, Joe Biden leads Dean Phillips by 75-7.  Most national general election polls show Trump leading Biden by low single-digit margins, and Trump is likely further advantaged by the Electoral College system.

South Carolina is the first state to use a winner takes all/most formula to allocate its Republican delegates.  The 29 statewide delegates go to the statewide winner, and the 21 district delegates (three for each of SC’s seven Congressional Districts) are allocated to the winner of each district. With Trump’s large lead, he is likely to take a clean sweep of all 50 delegates.

On Super Tuesday March 5, 15 states hold Republican contests including the two most populous states of California and Texas.  All of California’s 169 delegates go to the winner if a vote majority is reached (which is almost certain as there are only two candidates remaining).  In Texas, the 48 statewide delegates go to the state’s winner, and the 114 district delegates (three for each of Texas’ 38 districts) go to the district’s winner.

Trump has massive leads in FiveThirtyEight polling averages of both California and Texas.  He leads Haley by 83-13 in Texas and by 73-19 in California.  California is a strongly Democratic state at general elections, but only registered Republicans can vote in the Republican primary.

Less than 4% of Republican delegates have currently been allocated, but after Super Tuesday that will increase to 47%.  For Democrats, 42% of delegates will be allocated by Super Tuesday.  By March 19, 69% of Republican delegates and 64% of Democratic delegates will be allocated, and Biden and Trump will almost certainly have clinched their parties’ nominations.

Weekend miscellany: issue polling, Cook preselection, retirements and more (open thread)

Rising concern about housing affordability and immigration, but signs of improving sentiment on the economic front.

New polling from the past few days:

• The weekly Roy Morgan poll has Labor’s two-party lead out from 52-48 to 52.5-47.5, from primary votes of Labor 34% (down half), Coalition 37% (steady), Greens 13% (up one) and One Nation 4% (down half). The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of 1706.

• Two recent issue salience polls – the SECNewgate Mood of the Nation report and JWS Research’s True Issues survey – continue to find cost of living well in the lead as the issue of greatest concern, but with housing affordability and interest rates narrowing the gap. Immigration and border security, while still well down the lists, are up in both surveys, by five points to 13% in the case of JWS Research. The latter’s “performance index” scores across various issues record “population growth” as the issue on which the government has lost the most skin over the past year. The SECNewgate poll was conducted February 1 to 5 from a sample of 1588, while JWS Research was from February 8 to 11 and a sample of 1000.

• DemosAU found 51% supportive and 32% opposed to the tax cut changes in a poll of 1154 respondents conducted from February 1 to 13, while the SECNewgate poll had it at 60% and 21%. The latter also recorded improvement since October on national direction (with the right-wrong direction split narrowing from 37-63 to 44-56) and predictions for the economy, particularly for the “in twelve months” time frame (from 25% better and 48% worse to 39% better and 36% worse).

Also:

• Samantha Hutchinson of the Financial Review reports a field of five has emerged for the looming federal by-election in Scott Morrison’s seat of Cook, including Sutherland Shire mayor Carmelo Pesce and McKinsey partner Simon Kennedy, who have generally been reckoned the front-runners, and the likewise previously noted Gwen Cherne, Veteran Family Advocate commissioner. The other two are Alex Cooke, head of institutional and private banking at ANZ, and Benjamin Britton, a former United Australia Party candidate and presumably a long shot.

• Western Australian Labor Senator Louise Pratt announced earlier this week she will not contest the next election. Dylan Caporn of The West Australian reports the party’s state secretary, Ellie Whiteaker, has “emerged as the front runner” after confirming her interest in replacing her on the ticket. Whiteaker is a former staffer to Pratt and shares her association with the Left faction Australian Manufacturing Workers Union.

• Two significant Liberal Party events will be held this weekend: the preselection for the Perth seat of Curtin, which the party lost to teal independent Kate Chaney in 2022, between Matt Moran and Tom White; and a meeting of the New South Wales state council that among things will vote on a motion to expel Mitchell MP Alex Hawke.

• Jake Dietsch of The West Australian reports the Liberal preselection for Forrest, previously thought to be a lock for former Senator Ben Small, will in fact be a contest involving Bunbury councillor Gabi Ghasseb, who won an internal party appeal against his exclusion for submitting his nomination 20 minutes after the deadline (and who has also nominated for state upper house preselection). However, Small “remains the overwhelming favourite”. Incumbent Nola Marino recently announced she would not seek another term.

uComms: 50-50 in Queensland

Labor draws level in a Queensland state poll for the first time in over a year.

The Courier-Mail has a uComms poll of Queensland state voting intention showing a tie on two-party preferred, compared with a 51-49 lead for the LNP in a similar poll just before Christmas, shortly after Steven Miles succeeded Annastacia Palaszczuk as Premier. This is the first Queensland poll not to show the LNP in front since December 2022, although its leads tended to be fairly modest. After allocating a forced follow-up question for the 12.5% initially undecided, the primary votes come out at 34.2% for Labor (down 0.2%), 37.3% for the LNP (down 0.7%), 12.2% for the Greens (down 1.1%), 7.7% for One Nation (up 0.4%) and 3.9% for Katter’s Australian Party (down 0.1%).

David Crisafulli nonetheless records a narrow 51-49 over Miles on a forced response preferred premier question, in from 52.2-47.8 last time. Steven Miles is rated positively by 44.2% (up from 42.7%), neutrally by 25.2% (down from 27.6%) and negatively by 25.2% (down from 27.6%). Crisafulli is 41.7% for positive (up from 37.8%), 31.2% for neutral (up from 30.2%) and 18.7% for negative (down from 22.8%). The sample for the poll was 1743, with field work dates not provided in the Courier-Mail report.

Further news related to the state election to be held on October 26:

• Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath announced yesterday she would retire at the election, creating a vacancy in her northern Brisbane seat of Redcliffe, which she holds on a margin of 6.1%. Kerri-Anne Dooley, founding director of a home care nursing firm, will make her fifth attempt to win the seat for the LNP. The Australian reports Corinne Mulholland, former federal candidate for Petrie and now in-house lobbyist for Star casinos, is the favoured candidate of Steven Miles, “but several sources say she is reluctant to stand”.

• The southern Brisbane seat of Mansfield, held for Labor by Corrine McMillan on a margin of 6.8%, will be contested for the LNP by Pinky Singh, Indian-born public relations consultant, Order of Australia medal recipient and candidate for McConnel in 2020.

• James Ashby, high-profile adviser to Pauline Hanson, will be One Nation’s candidate in Keppel, which the party came within 3.1% of winning on 2017. Brittany Lauga holds the seat for Labor with a margin of 5.6% over the LNP.

Tasmanian election minus five weeks

Multiple developments from the Tasmanian campaign, as prospective candidates caught on the hop by an early election scramble into place — and out of it.

There is now a semi-complete Poll Bludger guide to the Tasmanian election, featuring the usual extensive guides to each of the five electoral divisions, complete with displays of past election results in chart, table and booth map form, and an overview page that reviews the electoral terrain and a term’s worth of political developments in the state. The sections detailing the party candidates and their backgrounds will need updating after nominations close at the end of the month, with the parties presently scrambling to get their line-ups in place for an election called over a year ahead of time, and independents both entering and dropping out at a bewildering clip. Notably:

• Observers were surprised when Liberal advertising appeared for Franklin promoting the candidacy of former Police Minister Jacquie Petrusma, who resigned from parliament in July 2022 after a career going back to 2010. Petrusma is yet to be formally endorsed, but has confirmed that she is indeed seeking preselection, which will presumably be a formality. This compounds the challenge faced by the electorate’s two Liberal incumbents, Nic Street and Dean Young, who already had Eric Abetz to contend with.

• Jane Howlett, who has held the Legislative Council seat of Prosser for the Liberals since 2018, has announced she will run in Lyons. Prosser will be up for election in any case when the annual periodic elections are held in May, and there will be nothing to stop Howlett running again if she is unsuccessful in Lyons. Labor will likewise run a Legislative Council member, Josh Willie, in Clark, presumably having made the same calculation that familiar candidates will improve its chances overall.

• The number of former major party members running as independents has hit four, and nearly made it to five. Sue Hickey has announced she will seek a comeback in Clark, where she was elected as a Liberal in 2018 and was narrowly unsuccessful in a bid to retain the seat as an independent in 2021, having quit the party four days before the election was announced. Elise Archer also announced she would run in Clark on Wednesday but withdrew the following day, owing to a “health circumstance”. According to David Killick of The Mercury, “concerns were expressed for Ms Archer’s welfare after an appearance on ABC Radio on Thursday in which she did not sound like her normal self”.

• The Greens have announced Hobart deputy lord mayor Helen Burnet, who has run for the party on a number of previous occasions, will be a candidate in Clark. The party will be hoping the new regime of seven-member electorates will put it in contention for a second seat in Clark, which Burnet came close to achieving even with only five seats on offer in 2010. The party’s sitting member in Clark is Vica Bayley, who filled a vacancy created in July 2023 when former leader Cassy O’Connor stepped aside ahead of her run for the Legislative Council seat of Hobart in May.

Freshwater Strategy: 51-49 to Labor (open thread)

Labor pokes its nose in front in what has been its weakest polling series through the term, though the primary vote records little change.

The Financial Review has a federal poll from Freshwater Strategy, the pollster’s first for the paper since mid-December, though it conducted one for the News Corp papers in early January. It has Labor leading 51-49, after its previous two polls both recorded a dead heat. There is little change on the primary vote, with Labor on 31% and the Coalition on 38%, respectively steady and down one from both the two previous polls, and the Greens on 14%, up one from the December poll and steady from January.

A preferred prime minister measure has Anthony Albanese leading Peter Dutton 42-38, little changed from 43-39 in December. A question on the tax cut amendments finds 44% supportive, 26% indifferent and 15% opposed, with 32% expecting to be better off, 12% worse off and 43% anticipating no difference. The poll was conducted Friday to Sunday from a sample of 1049.

Weekend miscellany: Moore preselection, and so forth (open thread)

Preselection action for the Western Australian Liberals, including a heavy defeat for a federal incumbent in Moore.

Despite a looming onslaught of by-elections (see the top of the sidebar for more information), there is not actually a huge amount to report at the moment. The only poll sure to report this week is the regular Roy Morgan, though Resolve Strategic for the Nine Newspapers (which was last heard from in early December) and Freshwater Strategy (which reports irregularly for the Financial Review, most recently in early January) are always possibilities. Which leaves:

• A party preselection ballot for the northern Perth seat of Moore yesterday ended with a 137-39 defeat for incumbent Ian Goodenough, the member since 2013, at the hands of Vince Connelly, who held the seat of Stirling from 2019 until its abolition in 2022. Connelly also mounted a narrowly unsuccessful challenge against Goodenough ahead of the 2022 election, and was made to settle for the lost cause of neighbouring Cowan. The preselection occurred against the backdrop of power struggles in the northern suburbs between the remnants of “The Clan” faction, which drew support from evangelical churches and of which Goodenough was a key member, and an alliance encompassing Connelly and state hopefuls Simon Ehrenfeld and Scott Edwardes.

• Further developments involving the WA Liberals with Senator Linda Reynolds’ announcement this week that she will not contest the next election, bringing her parliamentary career to an end when her term expires in the middle of next year. Dylan Caporn of The West Australian reports the front-runner to succeed her is Trischa Botha, who is of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander background, although she may be set for the uncertain prospect of third position on the ticket behind incumbents Slade Brockman and Matt O’Sullivan. Botha is the co-founder of an evangelical church in Perth’s northern suburbs with her husband, whose messianic language has been known to raise eyebrows. Also mentioned in a report by Katina Curtis in The West Australian is Kristy McSweeney, who ran unsuccessfully in Swan in 2022. McSweeney is a former adviser to Tony Abbott, founder of public relations firm The PR Counsel and daughter of former state MP Robyn McSweeney. UPDATE: The West Australian elsewhere reports that “former diplomat and long-time senior bureaucrat Jennifer Mathews” is a contender.

• The Poll Bludger’s guide to the Tasmanian election has been cobbled together in fairly short order, offering a general overview and extensive detail on each of the five multi-member electoral divisions replete with the usual charts, tables and maps. A few corners remained to be filled out, with the parties still getting their complete candidate line-ups in order.

UK by-elections live: Wellingborough and Kingswood

Will the UK Conservatives lose another two seats held by large margins at by-elections today? Also: a wrap of recent international elections.

Live Commentary

10:08am Saturday Wikipedia says the Weliingborough result was the largest Tory to Labour swing at a by-election since 1994 and the second largest since WW2. It was also the largest drop for the Tories at a by-election and the largest for any party since 1948. It was the worst Tory vote share in Wellingborough’s history, falling below the 25.4% they received in 1923.

3:28pm So another great UK by-election night for Labour and a dismal one for the Tories. I will cover the Feb 29 Rochdale by-election, which is interesting after the disendorsement of the Labour candidate. Before that, I will cover the Feb 24 South Carolina Republican primary, where Donald Trump looks set to effectively seal the Rep presidential nomination. Both these events occur the next day AEDT.

3:12pm Labour GAINS Wellingborough from the Tories by over 21 points. This seat went to the Tories by almost 37 points at the 2019 election. Another high vote for Reform, this time 13%.

2:46pm There’s a limited recount taking place in Wellingborough, just of two trays of votes, both on the same table.

1:53pm This was Reform’s best by-election result this term, easily beating 5% at Tamworth in October. The BBC reported at 1:40pm that the Wellingborough result should be soon.

12:56pm Labour GAINS Kingswood from the Tories, winning by 10% in a seat they lost by nearly 23% in 2019. Far-right Reform won 10.4% (new here).

12:26pm Unconfirmed reports from journalists that Labour has won Wellingborough. This is the more difficult one for Labour to win.

12:13pm Wellingborough turnout 38%, down from 64% at general election.

11:46am BBC live blog says turnout in Kingswood was 37%, down from 70% at the 2019 general election. Turnout is usually well down for a by-election.

11:39am Guardian says Wellingborough result expected about 3pm AEDT today, while Kingswood will be between 1pm and 4pm AEDT.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

Polls close at 9am AEDT today for by-elections in the UK Conservative-held seats of Wellingborough and Kingswood. Wellingborough Conservative MP Peter Bone was suspended from parliament for six weeks in October over a male employee’s allegations of bullying and sexual misconduct.

An MP can be recalled if suspended for more than ten days, with a recall triggered if at least 10% of registered voters in the seat sign a petition, with the petition open for six weeks. Bone was recalled when 13% of voters in Wellingborough signed the petition. Recalled MPs can contest the by-election, but the Conservatives chose a new candidate. In 2019 Bone won Wellingborough by 62.2-26.5 over Labour with 7.9% for the Liberal Democrats.

Kingswood Conservative MP Chris Skidmore resigned from parliament in early January in protest over the UK government issuing more oil and gas licenses. In 2019 Skidmore won Kingswood by 56.2-33.4 over Labour with 6.9% Lib Dem.

While both seats should be safe for the Conservatives, they’ve lost safer seats at by-elections this term. Labour won the October 19 Tamworth by-election by 45.8-40.7 over the Conservatives. At the 2019 general election, the Conservatives had won Tamworth by 66.3-23.7 over Labour.

In UK national polls, Labour continues to be far ahead of the Conservatives. However, two polls taken in the last week gave Labour 11-12 point leads, down from the normal Labour lead range of 15-25 points. The next UK general election is likely to be held by late 2024, though it could be held as late as January 2025. It’s been a long time since the last UK general election in December 2019, when Boris Johnson led the Conservatives to a thumping victory.

There will be a by-election in Labour-held Rochdale on February 29 owing to the death of the previous MP. In an embarrassment for Labour, they were forced on Monday to disendorse their candidate after nominations had closed owing to comments he made implying that Israel knew of the October 7 Hamas attacks, but did nothing to stop them. Labour defeated the Conservatives by 51.6-31.2 in Rochdale in 2019, with 8.2% Brexit Party and 7.0% Lib Dem.

Pakistan, Finland, German and Tuvalu elections

Former Pakistani PM Imran Khan’s party was banned from running at the February 8 election, but independents linked to him won the most seats, but were far short of a majority. Of the 336 seats, 266 were elected by first-past-the-post, with a further 60 for women and ten for non-Muslims elected by proportional representation based on the number of FPTP seats won. On Tuesday, a coalition government was formed by various parties to shut out Khan.

At Sunday’s Finnish presidential runoff election, conservative Alexander Stubb defeated Green Pekka Haavisto by a 51.6-48.4 margin. Both candidates had qualified for the runoff by finishing top two in the January 28 first round.

A repeat of the 2021 German federal election was held Sunday in 455 of Berlin’s 2,256 polling booths owing to irregularities in the original election. The only change in seats was a one-seat loss for the pro-business FDP, with that seat also removed from the total number of MPs. The governing coalition of centre-left SPD, Greens and FDP retains a majority, but polls are bleak for them ahead of the late 2025 election.

Tuvalu’s previous government had been pro-Taiwan, but at the January 26 election the incumbent PM lost his seat. Tuvalu’s population is estimated to be just 11,900, but the China-Taiwan issue was significant internationally. There are no political parties, with all 16 parliamentarians elected as independents in eight two-member electorates representing the islands by FPTP.