Newspoll: 52-48 to Labor

After a fairly lengthy period where the phone pollsters marched in lock-step, GhostWhoVotes reports that Newspoll has broken away from the pack with a 52-48 lead for Labor. More to follow.

UPDATE: The Australian reports Julia Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister is up from 49-34 to 54-31, but that “only 23 per cent of voters believe the government should go ahead with the NBN without meeting the Coalition demands for a full costing of the venture”.

UPDATE 2: Full tables here, as usual courtesy of GhostWhoVotes. Labor is up two points on the primary vote to 36 per cent, the Coalition down four to 39 per cent and the Greens up one to 14 per cent. Julia Gillard’s approval rating is up five to 46 per cent and her disapproval down four to 37 per cent, while Tony Abbott is down two on approval to 42 per cent and up three on disapproval to 45 per cent. Given the lack of corroboration elsewhere, the collective move in Labor’s favour should be treated with due caution (although their figures were probably a bit undercooked in the previous poll). On the National Broadband Network, 42 per cent support the Coalition’s demand for a cost-benefit analysis with the aforementioned 23 per cent opposed, while 19 per cent express wholesale opposition to the project “in its current form”.

Other matters:

• Peter Wellington, who has enjoyed enormous electoral success since winning the Sunshine Coast hinterland seat of Nicklin at the 1998 state election, says he will run in the corresponding federal seat of Fairfax if the Coalition’s “spoiler” tactics succeed in bringing on an early election. Fairfax has been held since 1990 by Alex Somlyay, a former Liberal and current Liberal National who has said he will not seek another term. Kate Dennehy of Fairfax reports speculation that James McGrath, a “former federal Liberal Party deputy director who reportedly had a falling out with its director”, might be interested in the LNP preselection.

• Phillip Coorey of the Sydney Morning Herald has more on JWS Research focus group findings which were reported on in the context of the Victorian election by the Sunday Herald-Sun, this time in relation to federal politics. Labor is said to be suffering a perception that having dumped one leader they could very easily dump another, and that its minority government position has made it “too afraid to make a decision at the risk of offending someone”. While Gillard is “liked”, voters “do not think she is shaping up well as a leader”. However, Tony Abbott has problems of his own, with women finding him “a bit of a bully boy”.

• Joe Spagnolo of the Sunday Times reports speculation Alannah MacTiernan will run for lord mayor of Perth next year, after failing in her recent bid to move from state to federal politics. The story goes that MacTiernan is keen to again run federally for Canning, but “a three-year wait for another federal election was proving too much”. The report also says Labor was hoping the present lord mayor, Lisa Scaffidi, might make way for by running for the party at the next state election, but the ABC reports she “angrily rejected” suggestions she might do so.

• Tasmania’s Legislative Council last week voted against a motion supporting an increase in the chamber’s numbers from 15 to 19. This follows an agreement between the Labor, Liberal and Greens leaders last month that the Legislative Assembly should revert to the 35-member seven-seat region model which prevailed until 1998, when Labor and the Liberals combined to support a 25-member five-seat model in the expectation that it would neuter the Greens. The ongoing rise in the latter’s electoral support gave lie to that, and the state returned to minority government with the election of one Greens member in each region at the election held in March – with the added sting of the major parties being deprived of the range of parliamentary talent that they would have enjoyed in the old days. However, Premier David Bartlett told Tim Cox on ABC Radio that it would be up to the Council to decide if it wanted to follow suit in reverting to its pre-1998 numbers. The motion was opposed by the chamber’s three Labor members, who were no doubt mindful that the proposed increase in lower house numbers was a hard enough sell as it was – although the solitary Liberal, Vanessa Goodwin, joined with four independents in support.

• Also in Tasmania, state Treasurer Michael Aird has announced he will be quitting his upper house seat of Derwent, to which he was re-elected for a six-year term at the periodical election in May 2009. This means an election for the seat will be held concurrently with the annual periodical upper house elections on the first Saturday in May, which next year will cover the seats of Launceston (previously known as Paterson), Murchison and Rumney, respectively held by independent Don Wing, independent Ruth Forrest and Labor’s Lin Thorp. The ABC reports talk Labor preselection might be contested by David Llewellyn, who lost his seat in Lyons to party rival Rebecca White. More surprisingly, Damien Brown of The Mercury reports former Premier Paul Lennon might fancy a tilt at the seat. The Liberals have confirmed they will field a candidate for the seat, which has traditionally been safe for Labor.

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.

4,545 comments on “Newspoll: 52-48 to Labor”

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  2. pmz
    And we wait with baited breath for anything to do with Oz. I wonder how comfy Howard is feeling?
    “JEEVES, bring me my brown trousers.”

  3. Looks like the Govt. has only 1 vote riding on the Telstra legislation. Where are the Govt. members – surely Fitzgibbon had to round them up for today.

  4. Dio
    [There are so many extremists among highly placed Saudis that they turn a blind eye. Dont’ forget 15/20 of the 9-11 bombers were Saudis.]
    Yes the real “axis of evil” for sources of world terrorism was Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Pakistan. That covers virtually all of the recent bombers. Why? It isn’t just money.

    Saudi Arabia is wealthy, but terribly unequal; the ruling family is still quite tribal in the way it sees the rest of the population. They have a ruthless secret police force, who use torture. They rigidly enforce islamic law, including stoning women to death who have been caught “committing adultery” – which can just be on the husband’s word (a very convenient way to get rid of a no longer wanted wife, and you will never see a wealthy Saudi man accused of this crime).

    Yemen is home to oppression, poverty and bitter losers from southern Saudi tribes.

    Pakistan has been a military dictatorship that also turns a blind eye to terrorists in their midst, even having trained a few.

    Yet these nations are all US “allies” so we can’t admit they are the real source of world terror.

  5. socrates

    you have summed up the state of play pretty well really. Yet, the US were in a hurry to go into Iraq. We can only assume the real reasons why.

  6. There is one Wikileaks reported by Their ABC’s Lisa Millar which is not a hot goss but could be beneficial to Oi Oi Oi 2022 World Cup bid.

    QATAR, the favourite for 2022, wtte, has been branded by SOS as having the weakest anti terrorism efforts and programs.

    Surely, this is beneficial to our bid and the Oi Oi Oi Delegation should discretely mention this to FIFA.

    Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi Oi Oi.

    Bloody Poms, what are the hot goss Wikileaks about Her Majesty?

  10. [
    Bloody Poms, what are the hot goss Wikileaks about Her Majesty?
    ]

    Not her maj, but will a hound dog do

    [
    One cable reveals how the London embassy passed on intelligence about a British Labour minister, apparently picked up from civil servant contacts, saying he “reportedly remains a bit of a hound dog where women are concerned”.

    The minister, whose name the Guardian is withholding, was “forced to apologize … to a female … who accused him of sexual harassment … and has had marital troubles in the last few years”.

    The confidential dispatch continued: “Contacts who know him well report he has manic depressive tendencies – ‘he’s very up one minute, very down the next’, and at least one … colleague has described xxx as a ‘bully’.”

    ]

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/nov/28/wikileaks-labour-minister-hound-dog

  12. Surely, this has to be a very significant leak, very:

    [Iran ‘must be stopped’: Arab leaders pushed U.S. to attack, WikiLeaks disclosures show – Diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks show Saudi Arabia and Bahrain as among nations strongly urging the U.S. to attack Iran and destroy its nuclear facilities. The cables reveal the fear of Iran in the Arab world………. King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia and King Hamad bin Isa al Khalifa of Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet, were among the Arab leaders lobbying the U.S. for an attack on Iran. One Saudi official reminded Americans that the king had repeatedly asked them to “cut off the head of the snake” before it was too late.

    “That program must be stopped,” one Nov. 4, 2009, cable quotes Khalifa as telling Gen. David H. Petraeus, then head of U.S. Central Command. “The danger of letting it go is greater than the danger of stopping it.”]

    http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-wikileaks-iran-20101129,0,4288707.story

    The Israelis must be rubbing their hands with glee and saying “let me do it, let me do it”.

    The Tehran Mullahs mus be rubbing their swords and saying: “let march to Mecca, let march to Mecca”.

  17. [Mitchell told his paper’s website on Friday that the substance of the tweets – that he interfered with its climate change coverage by telling reporters what to write – was wrong, and he had briefed lawyers: “I am not one who believes new media should be exempt from the normal laws of the land.”]

    Well, effing Bilbo interfered with and told us what we can or cant write and keep on SNIP, SNIP, SNIP us. 😛

  23. When someone starts to get litigious with someone it is always prudent to expect them to get litigious with others.

    On the surface the wikileaks and the attitude being taken by old media guardians to the new media might not seem linked – but the fear being engendered among those who consider themselves the elite by their loss of control of the means of communication is palpable.

  25. [perhaps I should weave my views about the #twitdef case into an allegory about boat people. It might survive the snip then.]

    bg, you should heed this advice from Sun Tzu’s Art of War:

    [By altering his arrangements and changing his plans, he keeps the enemy without definite knowledge. By shifting his camp and taking circuitous routes, he prevents the enemy from anticipating his purpose.]

  27. blue-green:

    William was tiring of boat people rants too, hence his banning TTH from discussing them on this blog. 😀

    As for the Posetti thing, I’m just happy to wait and see what happens.

  31. [William was tiring of boat people rants too, hence his banning TTH from discussing them on this blog.]

    Fess, norty Bilbo enjoys banning Toothy. It gives him the thrill and excitement.

  33. FFO

    this #twitdef has gone troppo

    [I just received a call from Geoff Elliot from the Australian. He stated that he was referring to the police a tweet I made #twitdef 1/3 ]

    [with the #twitdef hashtag last Friday. In that tweet I merely RTd the famous #iamspartacus tweet, substituting “The Oz” for the airport 2/3 ]

    [ My #iamspartacus tweet was, like all of the 10,000+ others, intended as a gesture of solidarity and support to @julieposetti 3/3 ]

    http://twitter.com/JonPowles

  44. [For what it’s worth – if anyone hasn’t guessed yet, I write for a competing news company – here’s my view: The Australian sprinkles some fantastic journalism with unfortunate episodes of self-obsession, over-sensitivity and over-reaction. It’s difficult to see what could be gained from a defamation suit that could not be gained from a flat denial or letting the offending sets of 140 characters slide into the obscurity of the Twitter-ether, noticed only by the academic’s followers who happened to be reading her tweets at the time. And journalists suing themselves is rarely a good look.
    Ads by Google]

    http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/blogs/media-matters/the-editor-and-the-twitterer/20101129-18d87.html

    It’s got life of its own now. Seems lots against the OO editor.

  48. How long is this bag of hot air going to keep on. Now Hockey adds his one-plus-one-equals-six-bob’s worth. :/

  50. I can’t believe Oakeshott and Windsor voted for them to keep debating.

    Wilkie and Katter against. They seem pissed off, because there is 42 MP missing today, voted 60-57.

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