BludgerTrack: 50.4-49.6 to Labor

It’s now been four weeks since the last poll showing the Coalition in the lead, and Labor has now poked its nose in front on the BludgerTrack aggregate’s two-party preferred measure.

The only new poll this week was the weekly Essential Research, owing to the poll glut last week and the Anzac Day public holiday on Monday. The Essential result was an eye-opener, with the normally sedate series lurching two points in favour of Labor, who have opened up a 52-48 lead. The primary votes are Coalition 40% (down two), Labor 39% (up three) and Greens 10% (down one). Other questions found 40% approving of a double dissolution election, up one from two weeks ago, with opposition up four to 28%; 42% expecting the Coalition to win compared with 28% for Labor; 35% saying Malcolm Turnbull’s leadership has made them more likely to vote Coalition, compared with 23% for less likely; and 67% saying they would view their vote as one in favour of the party they supported, compared with 21% saying it would be against the party they opposed. On next week’s budget, respondents anticipated it would be good for business and the well off, bad for everyone else, and neutral for the economy overall. The poll also found that 45% would sooner see Helen Clark as secretary-general of the United Nations compared with 21% for Kevin Rudd.

Single Essential Research results tend not to knock the BludgerTrack poll aggregate off its axis, but this result was forceful enough to drive a half-point shift on two-party preferred, which tips the balance in favour of Labor. However, the gains from last week to this have tended to be concentrated in states where they are of little use to Labor on the seat projection, which only ticks one point in their favour through a gain in New South Wales, leaving the Coalition with the barest possible absolute majority. That would be a little less bare if I started crediting Clive Palmer’s seat of Fairfax as a Liberal National Party gain, which I really should have been doing since a Galaxy poll of the seat in January credited Palmer with 2% of the vote. I’ll implement that one next week. Nothing new this week on the leadership ratings.

bludgertrack-2016-04-28c

Other news:

• The WA Liberal Party’s state council has endorsed Matt O’Sullivan as the party’s candidate for the new seat of Burt in the southern suburbs of Perth, formalising its overturning of a local party ballot three weeks ago. O’Sullivan is closely identified with mining magnate Andrew Forrest, as the chief operating officer of his GenerationOne indigenous youth employment scheme. The earlier ballot was won by Liz Storer, a Gosnells councillor who had backing from the Christian Right. Storer defeated O’Sullivan with 13 votes out of an eligible 25, but the state council ruled three weeks ago that the number of preselectors was insufficient, and that it would take matters into its own hands.

• The Central Western Daily lists four candidates for Saturday’s Nationals preselection in the rural New South Wales seat of Calare, to be vacated at the election by John Cobb: Andrew Gee, the state member for Orange; Alison Conn, a Wellington councillor; Sam Farraway, owner of the Hertz franchise in Bathurst; and Scott Munro, a butcher and Orange councillor.

• The Blue Mountains Gazette last week reported that a ReachTEL poll conducted on April 19 for the NSW Teachers Federation had Liberal and Labor tied in the Blue Mountains seat of Macquarie, which Louise Markus holds for the Liberals on a margin of 4.5%. Markus has secured the Liberal preselection for the seat after the withdrawal of a challenge by Sarah Richards, a local party branch president.

• It escaped my notice four weeks ago that The Australian had ReachTEL results commissioned by the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union from the Liberal-held Adelaide seats of Hindmarsh and Sturt. Results in the report are incomplete, but they appear to credit Christopher Pyne with a 5% margin in Sturt, down from 10.1% at the 2013 election, and also have the Liberals leading in the difficult seat of Hindmarsh. Only modest support was recorded for the Nick Xenophon Team, at 14.5% and 11% before exclusion of the undecided. A good deal has happened in the month since the poll was conducted, with Coalition support continuing to plummet nationally, and the government this week seeking to staunch the flow in South Australia specifically by committing to have the $52 billion submarine construction project built in the state. I have also obtained ReachTEL polling conducted early last month for The Australia Institute, which has the Nick Xenophon Team’s support in South Australia at 16.1% in the House of Representatives and 24.8% in the Senate – keeping in mind that polls like this have form in overstating the distinctions between House and Senate results (or at least, they did before the Senate vote went haywire in 2013). There are also Queensland results inclusive of the parties of Clive Palmer, Glen Lazarus, Nick Xenophon and Jacqui Lambie, which have their Senate support ranging from 1.6% (Lambie) to 3.4% (Xenophon).

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.

925 comments on “BludgerTrack: 50.4-49.6 to Labor”

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  1. I am beginning to think that what you see is what you get with regard to the Crikey upgrade. It looks like nothing further is going to be done in the foreseeable future.

    Putting in comment numbers is obviously in the too-hard basket.

  2. don

    I received an email from Crikey saying that they are still working on improvements, so don’t lose heart. I begged for page numbers and to lose this ridiculous older/newer comments method of navigation.

  3. lizzie @ #903 Saturday, April 30, 2016 at 6:17 am

    don
    I received an email from Crikey saying that they are still working on improvements, so don’t lose heart. I begged for page numbers and to lose this ridiculous older/newer comments method of navigation.

    Thanks Lizzie.

    What makes me sad about the prospect of an upgrade is that Musrum, in his own time, within a day or two, put page numbers in for those who use CCCP, so those of us who use CCCP have that, at least.

  4. Wrt the ‘Middle Income’ $80000+ Tax Cut to be proposed in the Budget, iirc don’t Labor have some $ squirreled away in a hollow log somewhere? They could trump the proposed tax cut and then some by offering it to taxpayers on $80000 or less as well!

    Which the Coalition couldn’t match because they haven’t made the Savings that Labor has already outlined. 🙂

  5. lizzie
    #909 Saturday, April 30, 2016 at 6:37 am
    don

    I am using Musrum’s upgrade on desktop but no numbers have appeared here – yet.

    This is very approximately (no avatar obviously) what your post looks like on my laptop. I presume it would look the same on my desktop. Note your comment is number 909.

    The quote below is what the comment navigation bar looks like, from Musrum’s script:

    Comment navigation
    1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18
    19

    thus at the moment we are on page 19, and I can navigate back to any of the previous pages.

  6. Good morning Dawn Patrollers.

    Michael Gordon – Behold! Malcolm Abbott.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/behold-malcolm-abbott-20160429-goi6er.html
    And Peter Hartcher follows through on the same theme as it applies to climate change policy. There is an interesting last sentence in the article.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/new-malcolm-turnbull-becomes-the-old-tony-abbott-on-climate-20160429-goi8sc.html
    Turnbull and Morrison must exorcise the demons of Abbott’s 29014 budget with this one opines the SMH editorial.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/smh-editorial/turnbullmorrison-must-exorcise-demons-of-unfair-2014-budget-20160428-gohtiq.html
    Laurie Oakes says Turnbull is no good at “doing scary”. Google.
    /news/opinion/laurie-oakes/malcolm-turnbull-cannot-run-a-scare-campaign-like-tony-abbott/news-story/6d1b7445d2e820ae856c14368fa70936
    Karen Middleton on the strange politics of negative gearing.
    https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politics/2016/04/30/the-strange-politics-negative-gearing/14619384003190
    Lenore Taylor bemoans the state of our politics as asylum seeker and climate change policy come back to centre stage.
    http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/apr/29/asylum-and-climate-change-are-back-in-the-news-and-the-response-has-been-pathetic
    Anne Summers puts Turnbull’s love of negative gearing into perspective.
    http://www.smh.com.au/comment/malcolm-turnbulls-indulgence-of-negative-gearing-out-of-kilter-with-stinginess-on-childcare-20160428-goh1hs.html
    This Saturday Paper contributor who has worked at ASIC says it’s time heads rolled there and for them to toughen up.
    https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/opinion/topic/2016/04/30/heads-must-roll-corporate-regulator-asic/14619384003187
    Phil Coorey talks about the laziness on the MSM in properly holding politicians to account. Well he could start doing it himself! Google.
    /opinion/columnists/malcolm-turnbulls-advocacy-not-slogans-leadership-experiment-is-over-20160427-gogku2
    I’d say the Nurofen mob got off lightly for its egregious deceptive behaviour.
    https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/apr/29/nurofen-manufacturer-fined-17m-for-misleading-customers
    Has Turnbull sent Australia down a dangerous road with the scrapping of the RSRT?
    https://newmatilda.com/2016/04/29/turnbull-sends-australia-down-a-dangerous-road/

  7. I can now see comment numbers and page numbers on previous threads, so for example:

    On the thread:
    BludgerTrack: 50.1-49.9 to Coalition

    I can now say that on page 40,

    Fess wrote, at comment number 1960:

    confessions
    #1960 Sunday, April 24, 2016 at 4:13 pm
    lizzie:

    A guy at work on Friday also said he’d never heard of Prince. When we were all talking about Prince dying his first question was which one!

  8. Section 2 . . .

    Sinodinos – the not so artful dodger.
    https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/sinodinos-the-not-so-artful-dodger,8941
    Kristina Keneally pours scorn on Arfur.
    http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/29/open-letter-to-senator-arthur-sinodinos-from-kristina-keneally?CMP=share_btn_tw
    Manus Island and Nauru – this is not our Australia.
    https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politics/2016/04/30/manus-nauru-detention-this-not-our-australia/14619384003189
    Mike Seccombe on the failed state of PNG.
    https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/immigration/2016/04/30/the-failed-state-png/14619384003181
    Nice goings on in Bankstown.
    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-investigating-shooting-at-bankstown-shopping-centre-20160429-goi0zr.html
    Sean Nichols asks where are the non-Anglos in the NSW parliament.
    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/women-on-the-rise-but-parliament-remains-a-poor-reflection-of-multicultural-nsw-20160428-goh6fo.html
    Morrison’s blocking of the sake of the big Kidman property has the Chinese fuming.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2016/scott-morrisons-decision-to-block-s-kidman-and-co-sale-leaves-investors-fuming-20160429-goievx.html
    The chart that is scaring climate scientists.
    http://www.smh.com.au/environment/greenland-ice-sheet-melting-has-started-early-20160429-gohx1z.html
    Paul Bongiorno on how the government has tried to refloat the vote in SA.
    https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/opinion/topic/2016/04/30/coalition-attempts-win-votes-with-submarine-politics/14619384003179
    Another example of short termism.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/job-insecurity-is-driving-the-best-and-brightest-out-of-medical-research-20160427-gog9hh.html

  9. Section 3 . . . with Cartoon Corner

    More union corruption? Don’t think so!
    http://www.domain.com.au/news/six-melbourne-lj-hooker-estate-agency-offices-suddenly-close-20160429-goigc8/
    Google has been forced to restructure its businesses involving Australia.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/google-restructures-to-avoid-hefty-penalties-in-australia-as-tax-bill-hits-16-million-20160429-goi8fl.html
    There’s a range of penalties Arfur could face having refused to show up at the Senate inquiry.
    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/sinodinos-could-face-range-of-punishments-over-refusal-to-front-inquiry-20160428-gohulu.html
    The ACTU has unveiled its priorities in front of the election.
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/federal-budget-2016-actu-backs-crackdown-on-tax-breaks-for-rich-20160429-goi6o9.html
    Alan Moir is concerned about Potatohead’s sense of direction.

    Cathy Wilcox on Arfur. Now you see him . . . .

    What a ripper from David Pope on Turnbull’s 30 minute city thought bubble!

    Ron Tandberg with some home truths for the Liberals.

    Mark Knight on the tensions building within the CFA in Victoria.
    http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/2af00a8fbb86d84107c1547cb49ef356?width=1024&api_key=zw4msefggf9wdvqswdfuqnr5
    MUST SEE! David Rowe’s Dutton Island.

  10. FFA A-League Grand Final.

    Good game, Western Sydney Wanderers. Congratulations Adelaide United, League Premiers, and Championship Winners.
    A brilliant football match.
    We are rocking in South Australia tonight.

  11. Guardian Australia ‏@GuardianAus 1m1 minute ago

    Internet Australia backs calls to end geoblocking as video-on-demand use increases

  12. Michael Janda ‏@mikejanda 41s42 seconds ago

    So far the phrase “jobs and growth” has been uttered at least nine times by the PM and Treasurer in <15 min of #QT #auspol #Budget2016

  13. Josh Taylor ‏@joshgnosis 34s34 seconds ago

    Short Budget estimates hearings scheduled for Thursday and Friday this week. ABC gets 30 mins, NBN gets just under 2 hours.

  14. Natalie James ‏@NatJamesFWO 6h6 hours ago

    Natalie James Retweeted Adele Ferguson

    $200K fine for 7-Eleven franchise for underpaying workers and false records. Still 5 more 7-Eleven cases in court…

    Slap on the wrist…

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