Australian Federal Polls

[RogueBeaver]

This is her last election as leader.

[Smid]

Any chance Gillard continues as Labor leader if the defeat is narrow enough?

There will be a by-election in Lalor after the election.

[Talleyrand]

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/labor-has-no-hope-with-julia-gillard/story-e6frgczx-1226430400815

Labor failed to secure candidates in five Queensland seats, two of which were held by Labor before the last election (Dawson and Flynn). A third, Herbert, was also notionally Labor until 2010. If this happens, will the party just pick some college students/minor party activists to be its sacrificial lambs or will it not contest these seats at all? (I know in Quebec last year, the NDP picked a number of college students to contest seemingly safe seats and they won. While I understand that situation was quite different than the one for Queensland Labor, it seems better to have people in the waiting.)

http://www.news.com.au/national/kevin-rudd-renominates-for-labor-preselection-in-south-brisbane-seat-of-griffith/story-e6frfkvr-1226409700526

So Rudd is renominating. I understand he thinks he could become PM before the next election, but after that, his political career doesn't seem to have too bright a future. Could we see a Griffith by-election after the election? (Lol, maybe Anna Bligh could take a crack at the seat.)

[morgieb]

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/labor-has-no-hope-with-julia-gillard/story-e6frgczx-1226430400815

Labor failed to secure candidates in five Queensland seats, two of which were held by Labor before the last election (Dawson and Flynn). A third, Herbert, was also notionally Labor until 2010. If this happens, will the party just pick some college students/minor party activists to be its sacrificial lambs or will it not contest these seats at all? (I know in Quebec last year, the NDP picked a number of college students to contest seemingly safe seats and they won. While I understand that situation was quite different than the one for Queensland Labor, it seems better to have people in the waiting.)

http://www.news.com.au/national/kevin-rudd-renominates-for-labor-preselection-in-south-brisbane-seat-of-griffith/story-e6frfkvr-1226409700526

So Rudd is renominating. I understand he thinks he could become PM before the next election, but after that, his political career doesn't seem to have too bright a future. Could we see a Griffith by-election after the election? (Lol, maybe Anna Bligh could take a crack at the seat.)

They'll gain some uni students to contest. Happened in the NSW state election for safe rural seats.

[Smid]

The latest Newspoll is out

As before, first bracketted number is the election result, second bracketted number is the change since the last poll.

Primary Vote
Labor          (38%) 33% (+5%)
Coalition     (43.6%) 45% (-1%)
Greens        (11.8%) 10% (-1%)
Others        (6.6%) 12% (-3%)

Two Party Preferred
Labor (50.1%) 46% (+2%) vs Coalition (49.9%) 54% (-2%)

1141 Respondents, MoE +/-3%

[RogueBeaver]

Dead cat bounce or did Lab have some good news recently? Biggest primary bump we've seen in a while.

[Smid]

Dead cat bounce or did Lab have some good news recently? Biggest primary bump we've seen in a while.

Labor didn't so much have good news, but rather no news... it's Winter Recess and the Olympics have taken most media coverage. With the focus off the government, there seems to have been something of a recovery. I don't like including leadership ratings here because they don't change the primary vote/2PP polls, but I might mention them because they seem to back up this "no criticisim" period - the PM's satisfied level has stayed the same, and her dissatisfied level has dropped 3%. The Opposition Leader's satisfied level has increased 2% and his dissatisfied level has dropped 5%, however the Opposition Leader is attracting 2% less support on the question of preferred PM, although he's lost that support to "Uncommitted" rather than directly to the PM. When the Olympics conclude and the focus is turned back on the Government, I suspect things may change a little once more.

[Smid]

The latest Newspoll is out, taken 17-19 August.

As before, first bracketted number is the election result, second bracketted number is the change since the last poll.

Primary Vote
Labor          (38%) 35% (+2%)
Coalition     (43.6%) 45% (nc)
Greens        (11.8%) 11% (+1%)
Others        (6.6%) 9% (-3%)

Two Party Preferred
Labor (50.1%) 47% (+1%) vs Coalition (49.9%) 53% (-1%)

1129 Respondents, MoE +/-3%
9% uncommitted and 2% refused were excluded from the sample.

[RogueBeaver]

Summer bounce, right?

[Smid]

Summer bounce, right?

There are a few theories out there... But I don't think so (or Winter bounce, for that matter, since our seasons are reversed).

Firstly, the Prime Minister backed down on asylum seeker policy. She's implemented one of the three planks of the Coalition's policy, as recommended by the panel of experts she appointed six or so weeks ago. There were news stories praising her for breaking the deadlock, there were news stories condemning her for not having acted sooner and for dismantling this policy when Labor first came to office, and there have been news stories condemning her for being too harsh by going back to Howard Government policy - so the plus one to the Greens might have been disgruntled Labor voters adopting that third position, but it seems that generally the electorate is viewing the policy backdown as a positive for Labor.

The other reason being cited is state-level factors, particularly in Queensland. The government is considerably decreasing the number of public sector jobs in the bureaucracy (not front-line workers like police, nurses and teachers). A non-partisan friend of mine who used to be in the public service up there, and with a number of friends in the public service up there, and whose company has several departments as a client, was saying that if you look at the jobs figures under the previous government, the public service was used as a way of hiding the true level of unemployment, and that the public service is too bloated and that when he was visiting a client a couple of weeks ago, there were numerous examples that he could see of people with nothing to do. That said, he also believes that the cuts go too far. I think that's probably an unbiased assessment - that it needed to be done, but this is seen as too many jobs.

This is reflected in a ReachTEL poll commissioned by Channel Nine and on which Channel Nine News reported last night. ReachTEL does push-button-response style polling, which gives them higher response numbers (since they're not paying a call centre). They do quite a bit of single electorate polling for this reason (and are typically the only public polling company that does single electorate polling, because they're the only ones who use that style of polling and therefore the only company where it's economical to do that). They haven't been around long enough for me to have an opinion on their accuracy. The poll shows the LNP dropping by 12% compared to the election result, and Labor increasing by 10%. On the question "The Queensland Premier Campbell Newman is implementing a number of initiatives to reduce the states debt. How do you feel about the new initiatives?" 49.3% responded with "Gone too far."

That said, these numbers seem to have come off "Others" rather than the Coalition. Perhaps Coalition supporters don't oppose what's being done, but there were some who were upset at Federal Labor, who had parked their vote with "others" and are now returning because of Queensland State Government public sector cuts? Of course, I don't know what's causing it and the poll doesn't reveal state figures, but that's one of the theories I heard discussed on the news this morning, and it was also mentioned last weekend (as in, a week ago, and before this ReachTEL poll) on The Insiders.

[RogueBeaver]

Hmm. Once Parliament resumes there should be another uptick. I expect the final 2PP margin to be no more than 53-54.

[MaxQue]

Hmm. Once Parliament resumes there should be another uptick. I expect the final 2PP margin to be no more than 53-54.

I agree. Elections in Australia are apparently never won by huge margins, even if a party has huge leads during the campaign.

[Smid]

Hmm. Once Parliament resumes there should be another uptick. I expect the final 2PP margin to be no more than 53-54.

I agree. Elections in Australia are apparently never won by huge margins, even if a party has huge leads during the campaign.

In the past 63 years, representing 25 federal elections, the highest nation-wide Two Party Preferred vote received was 56.9% by the Coalition in 1966, followed by 55.7% for the Coalition in 1975. The highest 2PP result for Labor was 53.23% in 1983. This gives a range of results of just over 10%. Even in 1996, the Coalition only obtained 53.63%, and in 2004, 52.74%.

Obviously, state-wide ranges vary more considerably - even disregarding the ACT (for being so small), with its 22.3% range of 2PP results. Tasmania is over 17% and Victoria is over 16% from best to worst result in 2PP.

Furthermore, although there was a 2.58% swing to the Coalition nationally in 2010, this was by no means uniform. There were swings to Labor in Tasmania (4.41%), Victoria (1.04%) and South Australia (0.78%). Indeed, despite a knife-edge result nationally (second narrowest margin since 1949 - only slightly wider than 1990), Victoria and Tasmania recorded their strongest result for Labor in that time.

In terms of swing from one election to the next, the largest swing was recorded in 1975 (7.1% to the Coalition), with the second-largest in 1969 (7.1% to Labor - interestingly, the election before they formed government). In recent years, the largest swings were in 2007 (5.44% to Labor), 1996 (5.07% to Coalition) and 1998 (4.61% to Labor). Of the 25 elections, only 6 have experienced a swing to the incumbent government, while 18 elections have swung against the governing party (and swing isn't available for the 1949 election, obviously).

EDIT: It's not immediately obvious, but I was saying all that to support your "never won by huge margins" comment.

[Smid]

The latest Newspoll is out, taken 31 August - 2 September.

As before, first bracketted number is the election result, second bracketted number is the change since the last poll.

Primary Vote
Labor          (38%) 33% (-2%)
Coalition     (43.6%) 46% (+1%)
Greens        (11.8%) 8% (-3%)
Others        (6.6%) 11% (+2%)

Two Party Preferred
Labor (50.1%) 45% (-2%) vs Coalition (49.9%) 55% (+2%)

1151 Respondents, MoE +/-3%
7% uncommitted and 2% refused were excluded from the sample.

[Talleyrand]

So the latest Newspoll has Labor and the Coalition tied at 50% on 2PP. Is there an outlier or are there plausible explanations for this result?

[minionofmidas]

This pollster bumps around a bit too much for my taste, especially given all we know about GE volatility in Australia.

[RogueBeaver]

I second TexasDem's question. We haven't seen Lab tied or ahead in over a year.

[Hatman 🍁]

Read his post guys, the number in the brackets is from the election. Labor is down 55-45.

[Talleyrand]

Read his post guys, the number in the brackets is from the election. Labor is down 55-45.

We're not referring to Smid's post from September 3rd. We mean the Newspoll that came out today.

http://news.brisbanetimes.com.au/breaking-news-national/labor-gillard-pull-ahead-in-latest-polls-20120917-260ww.html

[Smid]

The latest Newspoll is out, taken 14-16 September.

As before, first bracketted number is the election result, second bracketted number is the change since the last poll.

Primary Vote
Labor          (38%) 36% (+3%)
Coalition     (43.6%) 41% (-5%)
Greens        (11.8%) 12% (+4%)
Others        (6.6%) 11% (-2%)

Two Party Preferred
Labor (50.1%) 50% (+5%) vs Coalition (49.9%) 50% (-5%)

1,166 respondents, MoE +/- 3%
6% uncommitted and 2% refused were excluded from the sample.

[morgieb]

That's good, though I reckon there's a significant bounce there. But it makes me more confident of us winning 2013.

[morgieb]

This pollster bumps around a bit too much for my taste, especially given all we know about GE volatility in Australia.

Newspoll last year got the election result dead on IIRC.

[Smid]

Yes, Newspoll has been very bouncy of late, although somewhat explainable. The headline accompanying last fortnights poll was "Riddle me this: both leaders are unpopular" (or words to that effect). This fortnight saw the Prime Minister's father pass away, which (fairly) meant that the Opposition didn't get stuck into her. There may also be a bit of public sympathy reflected in the poll. At the same time, the Opposition Leader has faced an extremely negative personal campaign over the past week. 35 year old claims from his university politics days came up, completely unsubstantiated by witnesses, which did not stop most news agencies running the sorry. That said, Newspoll's personal ratings for him haven't really changed - approvals down one, disposals up one, it's the O'Neil numbers that have changed the most, with both moving 5 points in the right direction for her. Preferred PM also shifted in her favour, she's up seven and the Opposition Leader down six.

Neilson is better for the Liberals, also out today, showing the Coalition on 53% 2PP.

[Platypus]

I think most news agencies ran the story because it was so thoroughly believable.

-------

Not reading too much in to this poll, will wait for it to be reconfirmed next time. Pretty confident the libs are still up 2pp, but also confident Gillard's gap as preferred PM is growing.

[minionofmidas]

This pollster bumps around a bit too much for my taste, especially given all we know about GE volatility in Australia.

Newspoll last year got the election result dead on IIRC.

I wasn't referring to their final poll, which by definition does not bump around.

Also,

Pretty confident the libs are still up 2pp, but also confident Gillard's gap as preferred PM is growing.

Sounds right. A lot of this is probably just people looking at Abbott more closely as election time comes nearer.