Morgan: 52.5-47.5 to Labor

The Christmas-New Year poll drought ends courtesy of a new result from Morgan, which suggests little has changed over the break.

Morgan has released what it describes as the “first major public opinion poll of 2014”, though it could just as easily have dropped the “major”. It provides no indication of festive cheer softening attitudes towards the new government, showing the Coalition down 1.5% on the primary vote to 39% with Labor also down half a point to 38%, the Greens up half a point to 10.5% and the Palmer United Party steady on 3.5%. That translates to a 53-47 lead to Labor on 2013 preference flows and 52.5-47.5 on the headline respondent-allocated figure. As has been Morgan’s form for a while now, this poll combines its regular weekend face-to-face polling with SMS component, in this case encompassing 2527 respondents from the two weekends past. The first Essential Research result for the year should be with us tomorrow.

UPDATE: Little change also from Essential Research, which opens it account for the year with a result from the polling period of Friday to Monday only, rather than its two-week rolling average. This has the Coalition leading 51-49, with the Coalition, Labor and the Greens each up a point on the primary vote to 45%, 38% and 8% respectively, with the Palmer United Party steady on 4% and others down two to 6%. Also featured are the monthly personal ratings, showing a slight improvement for Tony Abbott – up two on approval to 47% and down three on disapproval to 43% – and a softening for Bill Shorten, down four to 35% and up one to 32%. Preferred prime minister is little changed, Abbott’s lead shifting from 43-33 to 42-31. The poll also finds strong opposition to fees for GP visits, with 28% approving and 64% disapproving, and 47% support for Australia becoming a republic at the end of the Queen’s reign against 32% opposed.

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.

1,586 comments on “Morgan: 52.5-47.5 to Labor”

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  1. Player One

    One question is why last time Murdoch and the GG lead the charge against the deal and why so far they have been :tumbleweeds: ?

  2. I think the lies and broken promises from Abbott and his team of clowns and chancers are really starting to bite. The electorate is suffering from a bad case of buyer remorse.

  3. Sean

    Since the 2010 State Election the Victorian economy has slowed and has experienced decreased business activity and higher unemployment.

    The State Government’s problems have resulted from not delivering on several key promises.

    -PT is still a mess
    -Traffic congestion has worsened
    -Hospitals have been a weak point for the government

    The only positives for the government
    -PSO
    -East-West link although it could turn into a expensive lemon with Transurban already declaring it wants nothing to do with the project.

    Historically Victoria swings against the government, with only three positive swings towards the Government since WWII

    1973/1976/2002

  4. from previous

    Rorters

    People who claim taxpayer funded travel to attend a mates wedding

    People who claim taxpayer funded travel to check on their investment properties

    People who claim travel to attend rugby games

    People who claim taxpayer funded travel to attend AFL games

    People who claim taxpayer funded travel to promote their book

    People who claim taxpayer funded travel to ride a bike

  5. Correct me if i’m wrong…

    But didn’t Morgan give up on F2F polling for a while because their F2F polls were so blatantly Labor biased?

    And yet here they are.. back at it again(tho admittedly with some SMS polling thrown in)

  6. They never gave up on F2F polling, but early last year they added online and SMS polling to produce their new “multi-mode” series. For whatever reason, they dropped the online component a couple of months back. And yes, the greater the weight of F2F polling in the overall result, the more biased to Labor it seems to be.

  7. What do you care Sean? Don’t get your frilly little knickers in a twist

    These polls mean nothing 3 years out from an election – apparently. (well that’s what you earlier)

  8. Sean, Naptime, and his inept crew are GONE come November.
    The only people who vote for your mob in victoria are the mentally deficient bottom feeders.
    something you have the most experience in being.

  9. The fact that F2F polling favours Labor raises a couple of possibilities. One is the classic “shy Tory” syndrome. I’ve never quite understood that one. Why vote for someone you’re ashamed of? If you think voting for them makes you look like a twat, to the extent of lying about it, is your chosen party really that wonderful?

    The other, of course, is that maybe Tories are more likely to shut the door on pollsters. If they do, I wonder what proportion are reasonably polite about it and how many are rude gits. For the sake of balance, I’d be equally interested to know the same for left of centre voters. Given the data one could make a stab at assessing whether attitudes to doorknockers have a party political bias ;-).

  10. theintellectualbogan

    [Why vote for someone you’re ashamed of?]

    Simple. I’m a racist prick but publicly declaring to be so in a society which now frowns on such attitudes means there is a big incentive to hide such an attitude.

  11. I think the incompetent decision making and poor management of the economy by Abbott will take time to translate into the polls.

    In the meantime, make sure you hang on to your kiwi 20 cent coins as Australia sinks under the Abbott government.

  12. I’ve heard it said that F2F produces biases because, unlike phone polling, interviewers cannot call back later if there is no response. This depresses representation of respondents on higher incomes, who are more likely to be away from home.

  13. Re poll bias: I find it hard to credit the ‘shy Tory’ hypothesis given that a large section of the media including 70% of the press have been bellowing that Labor, the Greens and all their works are of the Devil. I think it more playsible that conservatives / right wingers are more likely to tell door knocking pollsters to bugger off.

  14. YB,

    Australian economic success requires an Aussie dollar below 90 cents because our resources are sold at U.S dollar prices.

    Also other Aussie exports benefit from a lower Aussie Dollar.

    A High Aussie dollar encourages imports and international travel, which isn’t good for our country.

  15. YB,

    Australian economic success requires an Aussie dollar below 90 cents because our resources are sold at U.S dollar prices.

    Geee, aren’t you a sharp little sharp little tack, you condescending git

  16. [A High Aussie dollar encourages imports and international travel, which isn’t good for our country.]
    This is absolute economic stupidity of the highest order.

    Wrong again Sean.

  17. YB,

    Australian economic success requires an Aussie dollar below 90 cents because our resources are sold at U.S dollar prices.

    Geee, aren’t you a sharp little tack, you condescending git

  18. Australian economic success requires a government that supports education, a fair wage and not pander to the wealthy.

    Name one policy Abbott has implemented that has not benefitted the high end of town while reducing benefits to the low paid etc

  19. WB, I have a low tolerance towards people who consistently make dumb statements.

    I’ve never encountered anybody who makes the amount of dumb statements that Sean does.
    It’s a pathological thing with him.

  20. Tisme @ 24

    My stock market efforts here at PB measure up pal.

    It is not out of the realms of possibility that the kiwi dollar could reach parity with Australia for the first in history, as you read it here first.

    So how stupid does that make you!

    Speaking of currency stupidity:

    Newcrest a producer of gold (both a currency and a commodity) appear not to be doing too badly at all, as tipped here as a buy at $7.35 where you also read that first.

    You see it takes skill to overcome your useless economically innumerate Monkey to deal on the market 😎

    You stick to your next dole cheque, I’m sure it will go up soon under Abbott 😆

  21. poroti@1

    Player One

    One question is why last time Murdoch and the GG lead the charge against the deal and why so far they have been :tumbleweeds: ?

    Just guessing, but perhaps it was because Murdoch used to have sufficient Australian financial holdings that he would have suffered financially. But things have moved on since, and he has had time to divest, and now he will presumably make enough money from his US holdings to compensate for the losses he will incur in Australia as a result.

  22. Ideally the AUD would be about 85c but it is wrong to say that a high dollar is all bad news.

    Australians have benefited from cheaper imports and international travel has been boasted.

    From a consumers point of view this period of the high dollar has been very good indeed.

    One of the unspoken positives of the floating dollar is if we were still fixed we would have a dollar at about $1.40cents.

  23. [It is not out of the realms of possibility that the kiwi dollar could reach parity with Australia for the first in history, as you read it here first.]

    Imagine the hordes of New Zealand holiday makers! 😀

    4 Mullion Kiwi’s wull be able to afford a trip to the Aussie mainland(get used to talking Kiwi folks) 😀

  24. The falling AUD is not going to be enough to inject the economy and provide the market with confidence to maintain pace with other global indices, it seems.

    So one could imagine that interest rates may fall further -unless the housing sector is too hot at the moment to keep them from falling.

    Monkey :mrgreen: may be facing serious shit soon.

    They will all be telling him what to do!

  25. Polling-wise, Abbott’s term seems to be shaping up as mirror image of Gillard’s. Except his plunge has if anything been even faster! All without a hostile press, perpetually lying opposition leader and white-anting rival*, too. There’s a certain ironic justice in that.

    * Well, that we know of. I suspect some knives are already being sharpened, but I wouldn’t venture a guess as to whose wielding them.

  26. As I get paid in AUD a falling dollar is effectively a wage cut for me on anything purchased from outside Australia – I can’t believe the low dollar advocates have fooled so many.

  27. Asha Leu, no doubt the knifes within the COALition camp are being sharpened.
    Now that the precedent has been set in ridding first term PM’s, I give tony till the end of the year

  28. Australia and NZ have a lot of similarities. Not only are our flags oftenLuckily the Vic opposition leader is such an arse clown I can’t see him ever being Premier confused with each other, but both Australia and NZ have a North Island and a South Island. But for NZ, the South Island is the larger.

  29. Please disregard my 47. Here is what I meant to say:

    Australia and NZ have a lot of similarities. Not only are our flags often confused with each other, but both Australia and NZ have a North Island and a South Island. But for NZ, the South Island is the larger.

  30. This is just classic stuff!

    [Australian economic success requires an Aussie dollar below 90 cents because our resources are sold at U.S dollar prices.]

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