Newspoll has targeted 17 marginal seats in NSW, Queensland and Victoria, with results that are heartening for Labor: a manageable 1.3 per cent swing in NSW, a surviveable 3.4 per cent in Queensland and, remarkably, a 6.2 per cent swing in their favour in Victoria. We are told of a 4.6 per cent drop in the Labor primary vote in the six NSW seats, an 8.1 per cent drop in the eight Queensland seats and a 1 per cent increase in three Victorian seats. The Coalition are respectively up two to 47 per cent and 1.7 per cent in Queensland, but down 5.3 per cent in Victoria.
UPDATE: PDF here. The seats covered were Bennelong, Eden-Monaro, Gilmore, Macarthur, Macquarie and Robertson in New South Wales, Brisbane, Dawson, Dickson, Flynn, Forde, Herbert, Leichhardt and Longman in Queensland, and Dunkley, La Trobe and McEwen in Victoria.
Note also this evening’s Galaxy marginals poll and Nielsen national poll covered in the previous post.
Other matters of note:
Stephen Lunn of The Australian reports that Antony Green, Newspoll’s Martin O’Shannessy and Bob Brown’s chief-of-staff Ben Oquist all agree that Greens preferences will run 80-20 to Labor as usual. This is contrary to much talk around the place from such as Dennis Shanahan, who spoke of Labor two-party results bloated by heroic assumptions about Greens preferences. The Nielsen poll released earlier this evening gave Labor 86 per cent of respondent-allocated Greens preferences.
An article on the Liberal campaign by Simon Canning and Patricia Karvelas of The Australian is interesting both for its content, and in providing the first hint of pre-emptive recriminations in the Liberal camp. Senior Coalition frontbenchers have complained the Liberal camapign director, Brian Loughnane, had left Tony Abbott vulnerable with an overly safe advertising campaign. John Singleton is quoted in the article saying it had been the worst campaign the Liberal Party has ever run. Many of the specific criticisms proffered ring false to these ears, but it has indeed been notable that Liberal advertising has failed to target Kevin Rudd’s execution and re-emergence, and the constant distraction provided by former leader Mark Latham.
Michael Kroger in The Australian optimistically rates the week a draw, and appears to believe the decisive seats so far as a Labor majority is concerned will be Bass, Corangamite, Forde and Solomon. He also offers that a Labor loss in the seat of Melbourne now seems likely.
Emma Chalmers of the Courier-Mail notes the Australian Electoral Commission’s statistics on postal vote applications show Labor has lodged three times as many as the Liberal National Party in a a clutch of key Queensland marginal seats. Labor is said to have learned its lesson after being slow off the mark with its postal vote campaign at last year’s state election.
The Age reports the Northern Territory Country Liberal Party is likely to disendorse its candidate for Lingiari, Leo Abbott, for failing to inform the party he had breached a domestic violence order.
GetUp! have had another win, this time in their challenge against the Australian Electoral Commission’s refusal to admit enrolment applications signed with a digital pen and submitted through their website. One observer who declined to join in the congratulations was Possum, who argued it would strengthen the potential fraud argument the Howard government used to justify its franchise-curtailment measures in 2006.
what is wrong with dawson. Even with the outing that the LNP candidate is batpoop-crazy, the LNP is going to have the seat?
The seats covered in the Galaxy poll were Hughes, Lindsay, Macarthur and Greenway.
I don’t agree that a “more negative” campaign would have helped Abbott. Their campaign has been almost entirely negative as it is, and if they’d gone much further it would have backfired – even the Australian electorate has a gag reflex somewhere. As a great Labor figure once said “Nothing kills a bad product like good advertising.”
I have a really silly projection drumming up now.
John Howard: King of the Straw Man. He’s always known how to get people talking about what he wants them to talk about. What’s Abbott got going for him? Well, er, he’s been around for a long time. Ok, good, let’s turn that into a positive. “What’s this about people saying Abbott’s inexperienced? Balderdash!”
Of course it’s an absurd claim, John. It’s so absurd that nobody’s actually making it. But don’t let that stop you.
I can believe 6 per cent in Victoria, and I live here. Abbott is completely at odds with the values of many Victorians.
LOL:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/coalition-ads-too-soft-on-labor/story-fn59niix-1225905112924
Can anyone say:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiBJ92r2b8M
Alias
i think abbott’s views are at odd with most people,not just victorians
more like 10% like GG says
[what is wrong with dawson. Even with the outing that the LNP candidate is batpoop-crazy, the LNP is going to have the seat?]
In most seats the revelation that a candidate was an anti-Semitic misogynist racist loony might be seen as something of a problem for his campaign. But not in Dawson, it seems. Still, as I said earlier, Labor is not giving away anything in Qld.
Abbott is also sexually backward. He doesnt know if hes coming or going.
pseph
what is your worst case scenario?
William it looks as if people being polled were simply asked questions about Labor and the leaders. Where the punters asked if they were supporting individual candidates in individual seats because that can make a lot of difference where we are running popular candidates.
In Deakin most of weekend – will check the “vibe”. Bye.
shamahan the diehard:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/commentary/hang-on-to-your-hats-its-down-to-the-wire/story-e6frgd0x-1225905100
stu
I think the wire he mentions aint the copper stuff
The only issue on which the Libs have really drawn blood from Labor has been boat arrivals, and this is not an issue Victorians care about. It is a NSW-Qld-WA issue only, and in fact mainly a Sydney issue, to do with the toxic mix of class and ethnic politics in Sydney. In Victoria voters have been willing to judge Labor on other issues, such as the economy. Plus is a very Sydney Liberal, and Vics don’t like that. Especially when the PM is a western suburbs girl in a Bulldogs scarf. What’s not to like?
[what is your worst case scenario?]
We lose.
b t w
I get 404- page not found
LOL
pseph
smartarse
🙁
I meant as in Qld
[Plus is a very Sydney Liberal,]
Oops
Plus Abbott is a very Sydney Liberal,
psephos – Folks around these parts like their anti-Semitic misogynist racist loony’s. Bob Katter is as safe and some folk probably think George Christensen might turn out nearly as good as him.
Those figures of The Australian indicate Labor would lose Dickson!!!!!! Of course Dutton holds Dickson for the Libs….just how reliable are the figures?
yes i know i tried my own link and it was about as useless as a liberal
This election certainly has an inner weird.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/election/from-family-first-to-sex-please/story-fn5zm695-1225905068159
stu
u mean as useless as a fib policy statement
😉
when labor win what spin will shams put on it then ?
cupid,
In unseasonal weather, hell has frozen over.
Stu
Shammas goes on hols on the 22nd
😉
Abbott is a very northern beaches liberal at that.
labor win by 12 seats. Shams: “The libs came so close to winning today,just couldnt get over the line.”
Qld has a very fluid class geography compared to the other states. When we win, we win a huge swag of seats, and when we lose, we lose them all. In 1975 we held one Qld seat, and in 1996 two. It would easy to lose every seat in the state except Oxley, Rankin, Griffith, Lilley and Capricornia. Realistically, we are in danger in Leichhardt, Herbert, Dawson, Flynn, Longman, Dickson, Petrie, Forde and Brisbane. I think we’ll hold the majority of those, but I’d be very surprised if we got away with no losses. I still think we have a chance of winning Ryan.
Stu
still get 404
🙁
maybe den is getting the .303 treatment from rupe?
Is Christenson that rather tubby fellow I may have seen snippets of in the news?
To be so young and to be so obese is a concern.
oh bollocks ill try again http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/commentary/hang-on-to-your-hats-its-down-to-the-wire/story-e6frgd0x-1225905100
not again, theres a conspiracy going on lol
Stu
404 agin
i reckon the thesaurus Den uses has crashed the news server
even hardware rejects the fibs
try this way instead:
Hang on to your hats, it’s down to the wire
Dennis Shanahan, Political Editor
From: The Australian
August 14, 2010 12:00AM
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LABOR’s in front and likely to win but Government is still there for the taking for Tony Abbott.
As Labor prepares to throw everything into the final week before the poll on Saturday the result is still unpredictable.
While the policy debate is virtually non-existent it is the closeness of the race and the reluctance of voters to commit to either leader overwhelmingly and uniformly that makes this election so exciting.
In the battleground states of Queensland and NSW there are seats on wafer thin margins that may be held against an anti-Labor sentiment, while others with safe buffers appear certain to be lost.
Neither side is prepared to say they are in front. Both say they the underdogs and both fear the volatility in the electorate may suddenly turn against them.
Labor has the advantage of incumbency, a 13-seat buffer, a preferred prime minister, a lead in two-party preferred support and a massive negative advertising campaign directed against Tony Abbott, whom voters seem reluctant to turn to.
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End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.
But the Coalition has the advantage of a protest vote, complacency among Labor voters who assume Labor is going to win, strong primary vote support in areas where it counts and the damaging image of Labor leadership instability and divisions.
The latest Newspoll survey of marginal seats confrims the volatility of the vote and the huge differences between states and regions.
It’s not the debate that’s interesting this election, it’s the result
Stu
its bad enough when your hand rejects you,let alone a machine
[Shammas goes on hols on the 22nd]
and if Newspoll is bad for the Libs, he will go on the 20th.
Looking a the Newspoll marginal stuff, I was a bit surprised that Bennelong looks a lot more shaky than I would have expected. The betting is around $1.60 to $2.25 now – out a fair bit from earlier on for Labor. Hmmm…
cupidstunt at 85,
Your link is missing 3 numbers at the end. It should be…
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/commentary/hang-on-to-your-hats-its-down-to-the-wire/story-e6frgd0x-1225905100184
Scarpat@90
He’ll be seconded to write the kids section in the Sunday Telegraph 🙂
my comp is an abbott 1955
“Down to the wire” is a lazy journalist’s cliche which means “I don’t know what’s going on, or if I do know I don’t like it.”
[He’ll be seconded to write the kids section in the Sunday Telegraph :smile:]
Frank,
ah yes, same role, different fish and chips wrapper.
GWV
Kudos
Psephos@95
I’m pretty sure by the writing that Shamaham has been told the trend in any weekend polling.
wow a post from the ghost who votes
Putting these uniform state-wide swings into Antony Green’s calculator
we get the following result. Note that we may assume no swings in
SA,NT, WA, Tas and ACT as that would give an overall TPP of 53%
matching Neilsen.
ALP gains: McEwen, La Trobe, Greenway, Dunkley, McMillan, Aston, Swan, Gippsland, Casey, Menzies, Goldstein
Lib Gains: Herbert, Longman, Flynn, Robertson, Macquarie, Dawson, Forde
Final result: ALP 87, Libs 60, Ind 3