As foreshadowed earlier this evening by a cunning stuntman in comments, ACNielsen shows Labor’s two-party lead narrowing to 54-46 from 56-44 earlier in the month. Primary vote figures suggest rounding accounts for part of the 2 per cent shift – the Coalition is up from 40 per cent to 42 per cent, but Labor also is up from 47 per cent to a formidable 48 per cent. Here’s a table of ACNielsen’s recent results. In typing the results over the template from my earlier Galaxy table, I was struck by how similar the two series have been.
| TWO-PARTY | PRIMARY | ||||
| ALP | LNP | ALP | LNP | ||
|
Oct 19
|
54 | 46 | 48 | 42 | |
|
Oct 6
|
56 | 44 | 47 | 40 | |
|
Sep 8
|
57 | 43 | 49 | 39 | |
|
Aug 11
|
55 | 45 | 46 | 41 | |
|
Jul 14
|
58 | 42 | 49 | 39 | |
|
Jun 16
|
57 | 43 | 48 | 39 | |
|
May 19
|
58 | 42 | 48 | 39 | |
|
April 21
|
58 | 42 | 50 | 37 | |
GG online strangely subdued this morning apart from the predictable article that says 53/47 (Galaxy) means a Government win (severe credibility challenge here). Is the dead tree version any more favourable for the government? (I won’t buy it on principle).
I think these are great numbers for Rudd. He hasn’t had a great week, has released no big bang policies, yet the 2PP moves only a couple of points and his primary vote goes up!
I don’t know what all the fuss is about. 54-46 on margin of error is actually somewhere +/3% aproximately. Given the series (without the sweaty excitement of electioneering clorouring the interpretation), the only thing that you can say is that there has been a slight movement to the Libs since the 58-42 results, but the rest of the series are all in the same range. The results haven’t changed since the phoney campaign started.
Oh and another thing, the variability in TPP in down to a handfull of swinging voters and non-major party voters. In a sample 1126, were perhaps talking about the opinions of about 150-200 people at most. 200 people who can set the national heart palpitating!! It would also explain the noisiness of the TPP but the greater stability on the first preference series.
This is the government’s Battle Of The Bulge.
A schwerpunkt in a quiet sector, leading to temporary retreat, followed by counter-attack and ultimate defeat.
Many in the punditocracy seem to assume that Labor is coasting on its previous poll results and will not, or cannot counter-attack. There is no law of psephology that says polls can only keep moving downwards once they nudge in that direction. We’ve seen this before. The clever general absorbs the attack, keeps his cool and responds with his strengths, on ground of his own choosing.
$34 billion to buy 2% of the 2PP vote? Can’t be maintained.
How about releasing a tax policy on Sunday afternoon, sufficiently late that Howard doesn’t have much time to digest or be briefed on it before the debate?
56 – That would be a good tactic, and would allow Rudd to offer Howard another debate in a week or two to discuss it.
So PD41 has replaced “lose the election please after “lose the election please” got called out.
As the margin of error for the polls is abut 3% the whole series could come from a straight line at 56%.
The basic truth, something may have happened or this may be a result that has a sampling error about 2 standard deviations from the straight line and after all the sound and fury, labor wins the election at 56%.
I was hoping for a result on the other side as it would have resulted in a lot more entertainment.
Entertainment: http://www.theorstrahyun.blogspot.com/
A QUEENSLAND Liberal MP has been caught questioning the invasion of Iraq on a video posted on YouTube.
In a recording made last week by a Sunshine Coast University student, member for Fisher Peter Slipper expresses doubt about the wisdom of the invasion – suggesting the wrong decision may have been made.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,22609385-5013650,00.html
Without wishing to exhibit hubris, I did predict (on this site) this week’s polling to be about 53-47 to the coalition, a definite narrowing. That’s only to be expected. The tax policy would certainly have made an impact, as would the anti-union ads, as would the simple act of Howard calling the election and getting on the front foot.
I would expect Labor to reduce the gap in the next week or so, but they’ll need to work hard to do it.
On the question of Labor’s tax policy…there are a couple of smart tactics available. One would be to release it DURING the debate. It would certainly make Labor the lead story in the next day’s papers, and dominate the debate itself. Why release it Sunday afternoon, and give Howard even an hour or two to analyse it?
Another tactic would be not to release the tax policy, and say it would be irresponsible for Labor to make tax decisions before the inflation figures come out next week. That would link Howard’s tax policy with a possible interest rate rise, and paint Labor as fiscally cautious, and sleep allow Labor to keep its tax policy up its sleeve.
Rudd could announce a major health or education policy during the debate instead, to help steer the debate away from the economy.
It has always surprised me in the past that few leaders have used the debates to announce policy. Howard, in particular, never seems to have done this, when it seems to be to be a good debating tactic. Their minders probably tell them not to release anything new on a Sunday night, but I don’t reckon that would be such a bad thing. Policies always take a few days to filter through to the populace anyway. A new policy – and an ad campaign to back it up – could make the debate quite effective for either side.
Pretty reassuring basically, even if MSM declares it ‘race on’. Grattan claims it’s Howard’s best result for months.
But with Lab getting 48 primary, things aren’t really happening. Galaxy seems improbable at least on their primary figures. Playing it up doesn’t hurt, however. Helps get rid of any smugness in Labor’s approach.
Steven, good to have you back for a while. Please stick around long enough to do your Morgan deconstruction thingo when it comes out(bearing in mind Morgan too is apparently showing a shift to the Libs). I’ve missed them since you’ve been gone.
BB @ 55
All we have to do is force march two divisions through the winter snow for a few days and fight a pitched battle against a remnant army group, complete with SS disguised as allied soldiers and we’ve got it won.
The primary figures for both Labor and the coalition are very high. This presumably incidates a polarising of the electorate to the major parties, because there is a genuine chance of a change of government.
But the figures suggest the greens won’t do as well as they’d hoped, and the other minors will barely get a look in.
I’d dispute this. I think the Greens will do pretty well in some seats, and where there’s a good independent, they’ll poll strongly. Independents never show up properly in the polling.
Speaking of independents, I’d be surprised if Gavan O’Connor can beat either Labor or Libs on primary vote in Corio, which he’d need to do to get a preference flow to win. But it was enjoyable watching him do the spray against the ACTU. However, There is a chance, that the people of Geelong, who are a parochial lot, may exhibit some loyalty to O’Connor, even though he was a lacklustre member.
Now if they only go and poll in non-liberal seats then the real result will be known
As much as Laborites spin it here, two polls in one day have it at 53/54, the trend a clear and statistically significant shift from the not so distant 56+ days (which we shan’t see again). No-one has any idea the extent of that ‘soft’ Labor vote.
Labor’s problem for more than a decade has been its running from its own principles and history in the interests of a small target. It now faces a relentless (yes, over the top to us) anti-union campaign, and it’s far too late to turn around now and start countering with a: ‘we’re proud of what unions represent, have done etc’. Its left with a ‘aren’t the Libs negative’, but that is bare commentary on process: ie won’t mean anything if negative campaigns don’t work to begin with.
If mondays newspoll confirms the narrowing im gonna be in titches of laughter as each of the ALP’ers here trys to justify why.
Seriously people Krudd and his team (ummm what team) were never ever going to get a result of 55/45, 56/44 etc.
54 – 46 means 87 seats to labor, and the primary is still incredibly high at 48.
Looks like some of the wavering undecideds and libs are giving labor a bit of stick early in the campaign.
It also appears they are having a joke with labor early on, giving them a bit of a scare, more of hah hah, that got you worried. Like a mate does when he tells you he is thinking of supporting Collingwood or Manly next year.
But come election day come the wipeout that 60% of Australians want.
The best time for Rudd to announce Labor’s economic policy would be during the debate on Sunday night. Howard’s bluster in response will be healthy worm food.
Steven Kaye – Galaxy is NOT the most accurate of the pollsters. It favours the Coalition, as do you. I’m happy with the labor vote in ACN and Newspoll. This is an outlier.
This is an outlier = Galaxy is the outlier.
Graeme, three polls (I expect Morgan to show improvement for Coalition) over two days ain’t no trend. A trend is a trend – over time!
These polls are exhibiting a response to events since last Sunday. John Howard has had centre stage (see Hartcher “Look at me”) for days. It is no trend when all of the polls are reflecting a reaction to a single set of events.
Rudd has had a quiet week. Let’s see what the polls say after major Labor announcements and then decide if there is a trend.
Regardless of polls I think it’s an ebarasement for Australia, that we live in a country where the public is so stupid that they can be bought for $20 at best in 3 years.
Shame, shame, shame, dumbing down the electorate is obviously very effective. No wonder they haven’t invested in schools for 11 years.
The Lib are spending 17 billion per 1% polling support.
So 34 billion got them 2%. At this rate they will need to spend an easy 150 billion of our money to make up the gap.
What is money if power is at stake? You can never get in the way of a cunning politician and power. Whatever it will take to secure power. Absolutely whatever it will take.
These results were totally expected. The huge tax bribe was bound to have a significant effect and that’s why it was announced very early to start the momentum back to the Coalition.
The final result was never going to be 56-44 or anything like that.
At best it would be 53-47.
Surely Kevin Rudd will use the debate to announce his tax policy plus a few other goodies.
Peter Costello has now given him permission to spend over thirty billion.
The Coalition can’t complain if Kevin Rudd announces a similar level of expenditure and that is where the weakness lies in the Coalition’s early announcement.
The Reserve Bank will look carefully at Kevin Rudd’s announcement as they must be at Peter Costello’s.
It would be smart of Kevin Rudd to provoke the Reserve Bank into increasing interest rates on November 7th by announcing outrageous expenditure proposals!
The good thing from Labor’s point of view is that they still hold a comfortable lead in both polls even after the “king hit” tax announcement.
That effect will diminish now.
If Kevin Rudd does indeed announce a well-targetted tax reduction policy at the Great Debate he will regain the initiative.
The polls may well go back to 57-43 at least for a while.
It’ll still be a very close election and every seat will be vital for both sides.
We might find the independents holding the balance!
The main fly in the ointment for the Coalition is if interest rates go up on November 7th. It would be very provocative. They may wait till December.
Gavan O’Connor ‘s comments ‘Kevin Rudd is a good man,he told me that he couldn’t do anything to help me, as he wasn’t strong enough’ ( or words to that effect). Chris Uhlmann, again showed his bias on AM.
El Rodente, has jumped on this statement saying this proves that the Ruddster can’t make a decision without consulting ‘The Unions’, he slammed the Labor frontbench – 70% union bosses, O’Connor had shown this.
Very interesting AC Nielsen poll this morning. Both Labor and Coalition primary votes go up. And I think a 54:46 split is way too generous to the Rodent: surely the Coalition wouldn’t get 40% of 2nd preferences?
Considering Rudd has had a virtually uneventful week and his campaign so far has been boring, and it would seem Howard has already fired off his big guns, this isn’t a bad result for Labor. However, they’ll need to step it up in a big way and create some policy momentum of their own, starting with Sunday.
Look at the Laborites here snivelling and squealing that the narrowing of the Rudd’s ‘lead’ doesn’t really matter.
Too funny.
Delusion is a characteristic all too common amongst the Young Labor geeks, failed AEU school teachers and paper shuffling Union administrative officers who reside on this discussion board.
Thanks Isabella. You’re bound to get the reaction you’re after from someone here I’m sure.
Isabella, go fart somewhere else.
Isabella,
The issue is not the narrowing of Labor’s lead, but the hypocricy of the Young Liberals and party hacks who say that “they don’t believe the polls” when Rudd is in front, but suddenly the polls take on new significance when Howard begins to gain. The Arrogance is startling. Somehow, when Rudd is in fornt, the people aren’t thinking straight, so the polls can’t be right. Or the polls are rubbish: “But I haven’t been polled!” is the usual retort from the Howard supporters.
Yes, I believe Howard is gaining, but I have consistenly believed that the polls are accurate to within MOE. Young Libs & Coalition Hacks are hypocrites in this regard.
And there it is
Centaur… it’s not the people’s fault. Labor has proposed nothing better than the government. In fact nothing is exactly what they’ve proposed. Yet they expect the swinging voters to stay loyal? Don’t blame the voters for mistakes made by the Labor Party.
Centaur, why blame the public? Politics is, in part, the art of persuasion. Rudd/Labor’s high polling figures over the past twelve months have shown unaligned voters are willing to look & listen, it’s up to the campaign to persuade these voters to convert that interest into definite votes. The Coalition face the same challenge; their tax policy release was done to grab the attention of the same unaligned voters & make people look at them. The subsequent polling figures are reflecting a degree of success in that regard. Nonetheless, the numbers are no more (or less) real than Labor’s historic highs – converting just those that have moved so far into actual votes will take a sustained & successful campaign, not to mention winning even more “soft votes” over.
As long as the ALP primary vote is in the low forties or higher, the coalition are in deep do-do. The largest non major party is of course the greens, and those preferences are likely to be better than 75-25 for the ALP. I will only have concern if the ALP primary hits the 42-43% mark.
You can plug the holes in the titanic in some places (ie Braddon), but then watch the water p*ss out in other places (ie Leichhardt).
The coalition have fired their big bazooka (ie tax cuts), and the ALP can now wedge Howard nicely with the economic conservative line.
quick Q:
1.are the Libs allowed to term themselves pm,minister etc
Is the media allowed to term them “the Government”, pm,etc and is their advertising allowed to use any of the above terms
(the AEC website is a tad ambigous)
Its a little sad that there is so much vitriol from the right leaning posters on this one. Seems like left leaning people at least try and make their postings that might be derogatory of the Government or its supporters (even the obvious FemBots!!) funny. Doesn’t always work but they try.
Anyhow, from an objective standpoint (down with the Fascistii Wan$%3s in power!!!!! Up the Workers!!!!!), i think that while the ALP primary holds in the 45 – 48 range the ALP is ok and on track.
I think that over the next week we’ll see the ALP come out with more significant policy. In fact, they have over this week, but just not the things the rabid Right have wanted. I think the ALP have a plan for this campaign and they will stick to it. By election day it think the analogies are going to be “JWH fed into ALP threshing machine over campaign”. We’ll see.
Isabella: grow up! You must be Steven Kaye’s sister.
LTEP
I am thinking more and more that you are one of the Liberal “concern trolls”, who are trying very hard to sink Rudd and sow doubt in the minds of supporters. Well, two can play at that game…
Don’t be too harsh on LTEP, he’s just a glass half empty kind of fellow. Still a genuine ALP supporter however.
Not much to see here. Monday’s newspoll will have factored in the ALP tax policy (which I expect to be released in coming hours). I think the Libs would have hoped for a bigger bounce out of their inflationary spendathon, but it was not to be.
Obviously, the economy feels like a home ground advantage for the Coalition, but they can’t go for the next five weeks pretending that climate change and I.R don’t matter.
John of Melbourne (#43) – I don’t think you should hold your breath for Coalition health and housing policies to help them build momentum – keep an eye out for a big childcare announcement (tax deductability perhaps?).
Oh and Stven Kaye (#12) – Sol Lebovic is hardly an oil painting mate.
Watcher and LTEP please you are missing the point. what the polls are saying is that the average pleb is willing to switch sides for $20. Isabella I’m medical, how about you dopey shop assistant?
Seriously we have to do sometrhing about the obesity problem as shown by the walk in Griffith with that candidate i can’t remember (funny neither can Coward) and all his cronies. What a pack of butter balls!
oh dear… I’m being accused of being a concern troll again. Obviously need to do a more convincing job of it. My cover’s blown.
The Libs have had the headlines this wek, so of course polls will reflect that. Labor needs to keep playing their game, release a few big policies and don’t get sucked in.
I feel i have to defend LTEP here.
I too am pessimistic about the ALPs chances at this election. Just because he is more eloquent and consistent in voicing these opinions does not make him a concern troll.
He is clearly not sowing any seeds of doubt in the bloggers here. Most of you seem very confident your side (and i include the conservative bloggers) are going to win.
Let the man be.
Chill everyone. This is 5 days into a 40 day campaign. Take a valium and have a snooze for a week or two (Ben Cousins can probably pass on the valium).
Can someone enlighten me as to what a “concern troll” is??
I think I have identified a new variety of troll, the double agent troll.
Known for making strident, virulently partisan statements which are intended to crush morale for “their” side because by their very strident outlandish nature there claims are unachievable.
I am convinced that imacca and Mathew Sykes are in fact double agent trolls.
What is Rudd’s strategy?
I certainly don’t buy the idea that Labor has simply been caught on the hop and doesn’t have anything to announce. That’s ridiculous.
You can bet your bottom dollar that they have each and every day of a 6 week campaign planned out, and that many many different 6 week campaign plans have been worked out in order to respond to LNP moves.
So, I conclude that Labor is deliberately holding its cards during the first week. Not only have they withheld policy, they have withheld negative ads, and there’s no union ads either. In fact, the only Labor ads I’ve seen are the ones responding to the Liberal advertisements.
Does this strike anyone else as odd? All silent on the western front.
This can only mean that they have decided to concede the first week of the campaign in advance, in order to bolster their ammunition for the remaining 5 weeks.
A risky approach, because it has given Howard some clear air. I trust they have a cunning plan — you certainly wouldn’t plan a first week of the campaign like this by accident.
ESJ
where is your crowing at the “good” result for the libs
Im waiting for the EB bounce myself 🙂