The Sydney Morning Herald reports the latest Nielsen survey has robbed a Morgan phone poll conducted a fortnight ago of its distinction as the only poll showing the Coalition’s lead reaching the heights of 59-41. Nielsen has the Labor primary vote at just 27 per cent – “the lowest level ever for a major party in the poll’s history of almost four decades” – with the Coalition at 49 per cent. No result has been provided for the Greens at this stage. Last month’s Nielsen poll had the Coalition lead at 56-44, with primary votes of 31 per cent for Labor, 47 per cent for the Coalition and 12 per cent for the Greens. More detail presumably to follow.
UPDATE: In anticipation of a Morgan face-to-face poll which didn’t arrive, I prepared a chart earlier today showing how both Morgan face-to-face and Essential had converged upon the Newspoll trend over the last year or two after traditionally having been more favourable to Labor. I did this by producing quarterly averages for each agency’s polling going back to the start of 2009. I didn’t bother to include Nielsen as it reports far less frequently and is thus more prone to variability. But Nielsen’s habits relative to other pollsters would seem to have become a live issue as of half an hour ago, so now I have. And as you can see, Nielsen seems to have gone very sour for Labor of late: whereas the other pollsters have been broadly consistent around 54-46, the last three Nielsen results have been 56-44, 56-44 again and now 59-41. “Morgan (RA)” and “Morgan (PE)” refer to their respondent-allocated and previous-election methods of allocating minor party/independent preferences, which tells a story of its own.
UPDATE 2: GhostWhoVotes reports the poll has a dizzying 60 per cent now favouring Kevin Rudd for Labor leader against just 31 per cent for Julia Gillard. We are also informed the Greens primary vote is on 12 per cent, up two from last time.
UPDATE 3: It now emerges that Tony Abbott is equal with Julia Gillard as preferred prime minister on 46 per cent, the first time Abbott has achieved this. Julia Gillard’s approval rating is down six to 37 per cent and her disapproval up seven to 59 per cent, while Tony Abbott is up one on approval to 46 per cent and steady on disapproval at 50 per cent. These all entail remarkably low undecided results: perhaps this is a feature of Nielsen I’ve just never noticed before.
What’s the bet Abbott starts for calling for plebiscites every other week now just like he does a censure motion every sitting day of parliament:. He is the stunt man (rhymes with anyway).
Here come votes on:
1. the mining tax
2. the Naru ‘solution’ (his ‘final solution?’)
3. NBN (he would not dare)
I love the idea of linking the plebiscite to the republic and equal marriage rights.
Other ones I’d like to see:
4. on Peter Reith as national president of the liberal party
5. on the liberal party reviving workchoices /winding back Fair Work provisions
6. on Abbott explaining to a public forum of economists and scientists how Direct Action will cost-effectively reduce greenhouse emissions
7. involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq
8. further sales of public assets
9. the abolition of tax minimisation schemes for the wealthy (negative gearing, family trusts)
10. means testing of upper middle class welfare
11. means testing of funding levels for private schools
12. means testing on how much /whether HECS is paid for higher education
13. ceasing government infrastructure subsidies to mining and forestry
14. banning of political parties receiving funding from the tobacco and mining sectors or ‘think tanks’ funded by these
15. proportional/hare-clarke voting in both houses of parliament?
16. breaking up the following oligopolies – Woolies, Coles, the Murdoch Media
17. increased funding for an independent ABC
18. appointees to high level public office (GG, High and Supreme courts, etc) and boards to be ratified by a 2/3 majority vote of both houses of parliament
19. any future military involvement to be ratified by 2/3 majority vote of both houses
Apart from the Murdochracy hired scribblers, the rest of the press are being pretty quiet. I get the feeling this is a stunt too far.
OzPol Tragic, I am not sure why your comments are directed at me. I was replying to a slogan, worthy of Abbott, by Boerwar, which I believe is nonsense.
[BH @ 3678:
Gary – I can’t remember which journo it was who got JG to say it was a carbon tax. I think all that was needed to say was ‘we’ll have the same model as the UK and the EU. Fixed price going to an ETS – just like John Howard’s plan.’]
I can’t recall which journo said it, but I can remember the PM being badgered at the time and she ended up saying wwtte: Well, if you want to call it a tax, we’ll call it a tax.
As others have said, calling it a tax was probably a mistake. Yes, it’s a direct tax on the top 1000 polluters but an indirect tax on the rest as it’s discretionary to a point (eg, if it is going to be applied, people have to option to use less petrol & electricity) and it will be offset by compensation for those in need.
charlton 3666,
Thanks for the link to the CM article. I live in Queensland but do not touch the CM.
I do not want to drag this on re what Kev said or did but I have read the article you provided and still cannot see any direct quote by Kev to a “assassination party “.
I do not know what state you live in but if you are not in QLd then you may not be aware Steve Scott, the journo responsible for that article, is a out and out torie supporter.
The point I was trying to make last night is in absence of any direct quote from Kev, ie Mr Rudd stated and a direct quote then I would not rush in and use any thing written by the CM as evidence. Actually even if they claimed a direct quote I still would not jump in.
Anyway, Kev is yesterdays news and the ” Great Non Binding Vote Debacle ” is up and running.
As I said earlier Abbott has wasted this whole week on this and I will just sit back and flow with the go.
cheers.
By the way enjoy your posts.
[HEATHER EWART: With this carbon tax – you do concede it’s a carbon tax, do you not?
JULIA GILLARD: Oh, look, I’m happy to use the word tax, Heather.]
sustainable future
You have come up with a great list. Perhaps the govt could use it?!!!
GET_SHORTENED | 4 minutes ago
[It gets absurder by the day RT @farrm51: Tony Abbott says a loss in a carbon price plebescite won’t change his policy: http://t.co/ZneZfxp%5D
So Abbott only wants the government to take notice of the referendum if the people say “No”, but not if they say “Yes”. He’ll just continue to say “No” whatever the result.
So what’s the bloody point of spending tens of milllions on what is a glorified opinion poll with a non-random, self-selected sample again?
An almost gotcha, no doubt after lots of work googling, Diogenes. She is very careful to speak of a carbon price. But she does not say “carbon tax”. Just that she is happy to use the word “tax”.
He has been *Mr Teflon* for so long on being held accountable for his multiple positions on most issues, why wouldn’t he take such a position?
joe2,
[Strange how many here have taken to using carbon “tax” as their preferred terminology when that description is a critical part of coalition propaganda. ]
What I find even stranger is that so many so-called Labor supporters have swallowed the Opposition’s strategy to use the anniversary of the transition as a golden opportunity to portray substantial leadership division and tensions within the ALP.
I have followed every written piece on Rudd over the past few days as well as the two direct interviews that he has given and can not for the life of me see anything that he has done wrong.
If anything, he has been trying to hose down the media campaign which is focussed on damaging Gillard.
Even a couple of media commentators have pointed out that Rudd is innocent of the ridiculous charges being levelled at him by the conservative media quoting anonymous sources and totally false so-called Rudd quotes.
That reasonably intelligent and politically aware people here on PB can fall for it and actually propagate and further enhance it, is to me, one of the mysteries of the age.
Get a grip, people. You make fun of people who seem to be influenced by the likes of Jones etc, and yet you have demonstrated over the past couple of days that you can get sucked in even easier than the so-called rabble out in talk-back land.
Blimey!
Danny Lewis
Most people in the electorate thinks that they should have a say on the carbon tax, which is why Gillard’s polling number is so abysmal.
If you look at Howard’s polling number during 2000-2002, they only dipped significantly after the commencement of the GST and people were paying the GST. There was a 5 points drop, after the start of the GST.
The ALP pain at the moment is directly linked with whether Gillard should have went to an election on the platform of no Carbon tax, then announced one 3 months later.
The Carbon tax pain? That will come later
Well said scorpio….agree 100%….surprised PBers get taken in by such an obvious beat-up…. 🙂
Please tell me that there is at least someone from the government who is sticking the boot into Morrison regarding his DIPLOMATIC NIGHTMARE visit to Malaysia …
Actually, Morrison could kill two birds with one stone and go to Indonesia as well and tell them they are also a bunch of nasty Muslim barbarians.
[TatteredRemnant Tattered Remnant
Tony Abbott has jumped the shark #auspol
]
Gillard just looks like Howie trying to avoid the phrase carbon tax. No-one is buying it.
scorpio
I agree with all you say, but why on earth was Rudd going to have a one year anniversary party?
[10.10am Tony Abbott says the Opposition won’t adopt the Government’s carbon pricing scheme if it was put to a plebiscite and passed.
The Opposition Leader indicated today only the Government would be bound by the result.]
LOL – is this seriosuly his ‘position’? The man is a complete time-wasting idiot and should never under any circusmtances be permitted to become PM.
dovif: the only reason people in the electorate believe they should have a say on a “carbon tax’ is because they have fallen for the BS spouted by the Opposition.
Every opinion poll shows that once you explain what is actually involved, INCLUDING THE QUESTION OF COMPENSATION, then the result is markedly different. And if you call it a CPRS with a fixed price to begin with and not even say the words “carbon tax” you get an even more positive result.
In short, the battle is being won by the liars. People WANT action on climate change and once they realise they will be compensated for any price increases, their fears will be allayed. But this will not happen until the media start doing their bloody jobs and report BOTH sides of every story without opinion, rather than just bolstering one over the other.
I am happy to go with what Ms Gillard on the use of the word ‘tax’ in this context.
Trying to argue that it is something else would just be a political own goal. Ms Gillard was wise, IMHO, not to go down that particular rabbit hole.
She is wise to argue the case on its merits.
[2FBS Stephen C
by AgnessMack
Hey @TonyAbbottMHR while you’re pushing for a CT plebiscite, can you get @BarryoFarrell to organize one for NSW on his IR changes?
]
victoria, Rudd has the right to do what he wants in his own time. The party has only been portrayed as something sinister and many here have fallen for it.
[geeksrulz geeksrulz
Plebiscite, latest stunt from Stunt Central also known as LIberalHQ. Crash or Crash through Tony: Great Stuntman but no Statesman #auspol ]
SK – great line “Great Stuntman but no Statesman”
[Diogenes
Posted Monday, June 20, 2011 at 11:54 am | Permalink
Gillard just looks like Howie trying to avoid the phrase carbon tax. No-one is buying it.]
gosh really, what else is it then how would you dress it up.
she is being honest, dont you think,
Abbott has screwed his plebiscite stunt with his bizarre comment that he won’t agree with it if it doesn’t give him the answer he wants. It’s easy to dismiss it in the eyes of the voters now.
i hope john key mentions the NZ carbon TAX just for dio
When does Keys address parly and is it being televised?
did any one bother to link the link i put here yesterday of the living arrangement for the AS in malaysia, not really that bad, no jail or barb wire to be seen.
i could of saved morrisson the trouble
[geeksrulz geeksrulz
Tony to Julia: Look, um err um your $12M Advertising is a Taxpayers’ ripoff. I only need $69M for my stunt. Taxpayers won’t mind 🙂 #auspol
]
I want a binding plebiscite on the Afghanistan War.
If Gillard won a plebiscite on the carbon tax, she then has a mandate to bring one in. How can Abbott oppose a policy for which there is a clear mandate?
[3718
Diogenes
Posted Monday, June 20, 2011 at 11:54 am | Permalink
Gillard just looks like Howie trying to avoid the phrase carbon tax. No-one is buying it.
]
Well if by no-one you mean no-one with reading comprehension and attention span to go beyond three short word slogans then you are probably right. If you are trying to expand that to people who might appreciate the difference between a very fine sharp cutting instrument and a sledge hammer for use in surgery well then you would need to be a little more careful with your choice of words.
I for one assume anyone who actually thinks of it as a tax has not even the slightest understanding of what it is. And like Julia if that is the very best you can do then fine I have to live with that – but no point discussing it with someone like that.
[Doyley
Posted Monday, June 20, 2011 at 11:41 am | Permalink
charlton 3666,
Thanks for the link to the CM article. I live in Queensland but do not touch the CM.
I do not want to drag this on re what Kev said or did but I have read the article you provided and still cannot see any direct quote by Kev to a “assassination party “.
I do not know what state you live in but if you are not in QLd then you may not be aware Steve Scott, the journo responsible for that article, is a out and out torie supporter.
The point I was trying to make last night is in absence of any direct quote from Kev, ie Mr Rudd stated and a direct quote then I would not rush in and use any thing written by the CM as evidence. Actually even if they claimed a direct quote I still would not jump in.
Anyway, Kev is yesterdays news and the ” Great Non Binding Vote Debacle ” is up and running.
As I said earlier Abbott has wasted this whole week on this and I will just sit back and flow with the go.
By the way enjoy your posts.]
Thanks Doyley.
I live in on the Gold Coast and unfortunately as the CM is the only state-based newspaper, I do buy it. It sure beats the Bulletin, which surprisingly isn’t rabid anti-Labor. Instead, it’s full of crime, real estate and escort services, with very little analysis. And, I refuse to buy the OO.
I take your point re. a direct quote by Rudd. If he didn’t actually say the words “assassination party” perhaps he should refute them. But, I guess that would only add fuel to the fire, in similar terms to my suggestion that the PM invite the Rudds to dinner at the Lodge.
One thing can be said with some certainty: leadership speculation, whether real or concocted, is just another negative aspect the PM is confronted with at the moment.
[Victoria
I want Gillard to last until the next election
I hope it happens]
We are in agreement dovif. I also hope Tone is there.
People should not be so surprised at Tones feeling he would not be bound by a pro Carbon Tax vote. For all the millions of plebs voting in such a plebicite only two votes count,those of JWH and George Pell.
Diogenes: what it shows is that Abbott doesn’t actually respect the views of the people at all. Fine if they agree with him, but if they don’t then they can get stuffed.
I can’t believe he came out with this stupidity before it has even been introduced into the parliament. What he has done is given the cross benchers a great excuse not to support it.
[timwilsoncomau Tim Wilson
Dear government, I’ll do you a deal, get out of my life and I’ll leave you alone in return, otherwise see you in the boxing ring, best, Tim
]
[timwilsoncomau Tim Wilson
Dear government, I’ll do you a deal, get out of my life and I’ll leave you alone in return, otherwise see you in the boxing ring, best, Tim
]
[10.10am Tony Abbott says the Opposition won’t adopt the Government’s carbon pricing scheme if it was put to a plebiscite and passed.
The Opposition Leader indicated today only the Government would be bound by the result.]
Let me repeat what I posted earlier: Reference (no embedding): http://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/referendums/Advisory_Referendums/index.htm First paragraph.
Let me repeat some of the most relevant wording in big bold black & caps: The Government IS NOT BOUND by the “result” of an advisory referendum as it is by the result of a Constitutional referendum.
I simply don’t believe that, in the entire Opposition, not one person actually looked up the AEC definition of plebiscite to see how it differs from a referendum. I’d also have expected at least a few political commentators at least to prepare themselves for interviews/ debate by looking it up!
Unbelievable!
[timwilsoncomau Tim Wilson
Dear government, I’ll do you a deal, get out of my life and I’ll leave you alone in return, otherwise see you in the boxing ring, best, Tim
2 minutes ago
in reply to ?
Space Kidette
@SpaceKidette Space Kidette
@timwilsoncomau Yes, the best and brightest minds of the fake institute for liberal stinkers.
12 seconds ago via web]
Boerwar, where’s your quote links on Julia saying a “carbon tax”?
And, Diogenes, that quote you gave would be interesting to see in the context of the whole interview. A link maybe?
The other thought on this is that he never had any intention of taking his own brain fart seriously; it was all about maintaining the narrative that the government is illegitimate and that Julia lied.
If it never comes to fruition he doesn’t care. He’s put it out there as a concept for people to discuss … may even as a distraction just in case the Malaysian stunt backfires badly on them 😉
[FakePaulKeating Fake Paul Keating
by geeksrulz
Dear #madmonk. The westminster system never has an automatic mandate. You vote for a local member. Parliament decides the rest. #wanker
]
victoria,
[scorpio
I agree with all you say, but why on earth was Rudd going to have a one year anniversary party? ]
I think he had intended to have a BBQ with the same people who attended his commiseration party last year.
I believe it was meant in a humorous, self deprecation way and to demonstrate that he was man enough to deal with the damage to his reputation and self esteem from the events of last year.
Even the likes of Samantha Maiden acknowledges that the Opposition is playing this up in an attempt to capitalise on the anniversary coinciding as it does with diabolical polling figures for Gillard & the government.
I can’t believe that staunch Labor supporters can fall for this. It is a media led beat-up designed to finish off a crippled Gillard & her government.
For people here to join in so enthusiastically and thoughtlessly in the assassination of their preferred leader & government I find bewildering.
Honestly, mind-blowingly bewildering.
Windsor will not support pleb. Its a STUNT!!
[theburgerman John Bergin
Joint news conference with PM Julia Gillard & NZ PM John Key live on #SkyNews at 12.30pm AEST.
]
I went to a speech by Garnaut a few weeks ago.
He thought it was ridiculous that some people were calling
an initial fixed price lead in to the ETS, a tax.
Windsor calls Abbott to allow conscience vote!