Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor

The latest Newspoll doesn’t quite replicate the Coalition’s relatively encouraging result a fortnight ago.

NOTE: Apologies for the ongoing situation with the formatting in comments. This is not intentional and the former state of affairs will be restored, hopefully soon.

The latest Newspoll result from The Australian moves a point back to Labor after an outlier result a fortnight ago, leaving its two-party preferred lead at 53-47. Both major parties are on 36% of the primary vote, with the Coalition down a point and Labor up one, and both One Nation and the Greens are on 10%, with the former steady and the latter up one. Still waiting on approval ratings, but Malcolm Turnbull’s lead as preferred prime minister has narrowed from 43-29 to 41-32. The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1708.

UPDATE: Malcolm Turnbull is steady on approval at 30% and up two on disapproval to 59%; Bill Shorten is up three on approval to 32% and down three on disapproval to 54%.

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.

493 comments on “Newspoll: 53-47 to Labor”

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  1. The trick with Newscorp doing Labor puff pieces is to remember Murdoch will attack again as soon as he spots a Labor weakness for Labor to remember.

    When in government again Labor should do its media reforms early so people can see the results of those reforms instead of the “free speech” call of Murdoch’s mob. We have seen with 18C how effective that free speech narrative is.

    Labor must not forget they are going to win this election despite the media not because of them.

  2. JR – Lib maddies stamp their feet and demand answers from Labor and for Massola that’s an exclusive! Gee, journalisms easy, isn’t it.

  3. SenSanders: Trickle-down economics is a fraud and we will not accept it. It is and it has always been an abysmal failure and a fraud.

    Retweeted by Sally McManus

  5. ‘It’s long been clear that, acting on their belief that “the perception is the reality”, the political class – Labor and Coalition – has focused less on attempting to fix problems and more on being seen to be fixing them.

    But trying to game the political polls takes faking it to a new level: being seen to be seen to be trying to fix things.’

    Sorry, where has Gittins been for the last two decades or so? Howard was the master at gaming political polls; something which reflected badly on the government would come up, he would say, “Look, there’s a unicorn”, everyone would look at the unicorn, the bad issue would drop out of the news, the polls would be unaffected by it, and the unicorn would vanish.

    Of course, it’s possible that he gamed the msm so effectively that they still believe all those unicorns were real.

    ‘It hardly needs saying that Snowy 2.0 was just a stunt..’

    Yeah, I saw all those media stories saying that at the time.

    ‘The other group whose perceived trustworthiness has declined badly are the media. Purely coincidental, I’m sure.’

    But I get the feeling Gittins think that the media are collateral damage; they have been as much ‘conned’ by the governments as anyone.

    This ignores the reality that, for a government con to work, the media has to suspend disbelief long enough for the first gushing reports to go out.

    Admitting that Snowjob was a con a fortnight later doesn’t explain the positive media reporting in the interim.

    The media isn’t – well, it certainly shouldn’t be – a cohort of lonely, innocent old grandmas, eager to believe that the nice young man is going to fix their roof for almost nothing (although, to use another metaphor, I wouldn’t count on them not hopping into a car if a stranger offered them a bag of lollies…). It is supposed to consist of sceptical, intelligent, critical and slightly cynical professionals who report the truth without fear or favour – and I’m sure that’s how they see themselves.

    To ignore the correlation between declining trust in politicians and declining trust in the media is to ignore a significant part of the problem.

    ‘ Whoever’s leading the Coalition by the time of the next election – likely to be late next year because of last year’s double dissolution – it’s hard to see the Coalition surviving.

    But who could convince themselves Bill Shorten’s the man to restore stable government and the steady pursuit of good policy?’

    Well, Gittins, virtually anyone who’s looked at the state of the Federal Labor party over the last four years. It’s stable. It’s steadily pursuing good policy.

    On one hand, we blame the leader for everything that goes wrong. But if you’re going to do that, you also have to give them credit for the things that are going right. And if Labor is united and policy focused (to the extent that it can be argued they’re setting a large part of the political agenda) then there should be at least a little bit of speculation that the leader is responsible for that.

    Gittins immediately follows with this —

    ‘The superficiality of the way we’re governed these days has made our politicians even more prone to short-term thinking, to the quick fix.’

    ‘Our politicians’ is shorthand, of course, for ‘both sides are the same” – which appears to be one of the steps of grieving when it comes to political journalism – and again, Gittins ignores the fact that this couldn’t happen if the media was doing its job.

    Of course, phrases often used in media – ‘the thirty second grab’ , for example – indicate that they know political superficiality exists because of the demands of the media. Demand that politicians give you more than a grab and they will have to give you more than the grab. Ignore a detailed and complex explanation because you can’t reduce it down to a minute on the news, and politicians won’t waste their time trying to get the detailed and complex explanation across. Go for the colour and movement of a politician insulting a colleague over the bland exposition of an argument, and politicians will insult their colleagues.

    The media and politicians have a symbiotic relationship. The supposed job of the media, the whole Fourth Estate thing, is based on the idea that it is up to the media to force politicians to be better than they are. If political standards are declining, the media should accept a large proportion of the blame.

    The rest of Gittins article bashes mining investment. That’s fine. But surely there should be some actual numbers and examples in there, instead of just some generalisations? If Gittins has the knowledge to proclaim that the jobs attributed to mining are exaggerated, I assume he is doing so on the basis of evidence. It would be educational of him to share it.

    http://www.smh.com.au/business/politicians-addicted-to-the-appearance-of-economic-success-20170401-gvbje8.html

  6. Morning all. The poll, as expected, show that the Snow Job II gloss has melted.

    I have to say that, overall, Ross Gittins’ article is correct, at least as far as infrastructure funding goes. Labor is not as bad as Liberals on this score but still pretty bad. Former NSW Labor were terrible. Projects like Sydney SW rail reeked of pork. The original NBN rollout was also shameful. Under the Libs, litterally half the freeways currently under construction do not pass benefit tests. So they are pork for road construction companies.

    As for mine approvals, Paluszczuk did not promise Adani money, but did approve it despite strong grounds from the court case not to do so. Pure politics, with an almost Rudd-Gillard like lack of commitment to effective climate change action. Of course, Turnbull promising Adani public funds is a scandal, and against every supposed Liberal principle of government not interfering in markets.

  7. billshortenmp: Time for Turnbull to explain how he’s paying for company tax handout – what will he cut to pay for it? Medicare, education, family payments?

  8. One more thought on political perception and reality. The Nth Qld floods will have destroyed a lot of value in agricultural crops. Does anyone know if the coal mines have been flooded? If yes, our balance of payments will take a hit for a few months, just as it did in 2011. I’m sure Malcolm and Scott will have a sensible long-term solution in the budget… Have a good day all.

  10. Looks like i am on track to get my wish – 30 negative polls in a row for the Libs.
    Naturally Malcolm will voluntarily stand down once the threshold has been breached.

  11. Nice tweet from Shorten the question the media should be asking isn’t what a hypothetical Labor would do about the tax cuts, but how will the government we have is going to pay for them.

  12. guytaur

    Rupes is also well known for backing what he sees as being a winner. This may well be a sign that he has picked Shorten as being the next winner.

  15. A facebook friend of mine pasted an interesting graph – from a source I can’t access – showing that private school enrollments are declining for the first time in decades.

    I’ve tried to find (usable) evidence of this —

    ‘Private school enrolments have fallen for the first time in recorded history, placing more pressure on WA’s already stretched public school system.
    Student census figures collected in February show the annual enrolment growth rate for public schools outstripped private schools for the fifth consecutive year.
    But the number of students at private schools fell 0.3 per cent, the first decrease since the Education Department started keeping records 35 years ago.
    Public schools increased their market share of students to 66.6 per cent, continuing an upward trend that started in 2012 after nearly 30 years of a steady decline.’

    https://thewest.com.au/news/wa/private-school-enrolments-fall-ng-ya-103564

    …which tells us nothing about the national trend.

    However, this (from February) confirms the trend is national –

    ‘Public schools’ share of students have increased for the second year running nationwide, marking a determined end to a 40 year decline in government school enrolments.

    New figures from the Bureau of Statistics show that government schools in 2016 educated 65.4 per cent of all students, up from the historical low of 2014 when it was 65.1 per cent. ‘

    http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/public-schools-increase-share-of-enrolments-reversing-40-year-trend-20170202-gu42df.html

    The driver would appear to be financial uncertainty – this decline basically seems to have started around the time of the GFC.

    It’s interesting that this also seems to correlate with a cessation of stories about the success of the private system! It seems that, rather than point to the decline in private enrollments, the media would just prefer to ignore the issue.

  17. Morning bludgers
    Shorten is stating the obvious. Question should be directed to Turnbull and co. How are they going to pay for tax cuts to big business. Simple question really. Do your bloody job msm!
    Meanwhile Trump is doing his best to muddy the waters re his treasonous and corruptive conduct, and as posited, he will plead mental incapacity to get out of this imbroglio unscathed. He deserves to be locked up and keys thrown away. He is a crook and a pervert.

  18. guytaur

    Yes but Labor must never fall for that as being support of Labor,/blockquote>
    Of course not. Rupes supports whichever side he thinks will win and then busily pedals the line that it was his influence “wot won it”.

  19. Zoomster
    Health insurance and private school fees are rising much faster than wages. Add that to the increased cost of maintaining a mortgage, and easy to see a switch to public education.

  21. Russian twitterbots tricked me into believing Bernie could have won the general election when he couldn’t even win the primaries …

  25. Eeeeeek!

    Tony Abbott’s face might be one of the most recognisable in Australia, but sculptor Linda Klarfeld found herself caught off guard after sitting with the former prime minister for more than an hour.

    Mr Abbott’s distinctive ears and Roman nose – prime fodder for the nation’s cartoonists and photographers for decades – were almost too attractive to sculpt.

    http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/almost-too-attractive-artist-says-former-prime-minister-tony-abbott-has-a-good-face-for-sculpture-20170323-gv5f2p.html

  26. political_alert: Shadow Human Services Minister @LindaBurneyMP will comment on ‘Alan Tudge’s shameful breaches of Centrelink client’s privacy’, 10am #auspol

  27. victoria

    I wonder if there’s an element of MySchool kinking in; that it makes it easier to compare school performance, so parents can see if the $10k a year is getting their kids something better or not.

    I find the shift from private to public at the start of Year 11/12 suggestive; that’s when parents are looking for the school which will ‘get’ their kids the best ATAR. Traditionally, the shift used to go the other way.

  28. Socrates,
    There was an article in the SMH today about the coal mines affected by cyclone Debbie, and yes production will be affected, details not yet known.
    The impact may be alleviated by preparations the mines made.

  30. …upon reflection (after all, I only started on this this morning!) I’d be inclined to give MySchool the credit.

    After all, it’s exactly what MySchool was meant to do – give parents a tool to compare schools and decide which one was best for their child.

    It explains the shift from private to public in the final years of schooling as well.

    I’m sure money plays a part, but this is the result that experts at the time predicted – that MySchool would encourage parents to make schooling decisions based on actual outcomes, not advertising and word of mouth.

  32. Blahhhhhh

    If I load more – I get 3 times the first bunch of comments … great work crikey – I don’t know what I am spending my $180 year for!

  34. Zoomster
    I was never in a financial position to spend 20 plus thousand dollars per year per child. I know of those who did and I did not observe any great educational beneficial outcome for such outlay.
    I did outlay around 6000 per year per child at the local Catholic school, as I liked the co curricular opportunities offered compared to the local public schools. On a personal level, it was money well spent. Having said that I would much rather all schools have such opportunity afforded to all students.

  35. Why get an advice from Robert Richter QC? He badly marked his card in Sydney after defending the Ronens (clothes merchants) during a 8 month trial in which he delayed the case time after time forcing the trial judge to deliver 46 judgments.
    Result – his clients received the heaviest sentences for tax evasion in recent times.

  40. If you use the “Load More” button a couple of times you may be (or not) delighted with your time traveling and be able to view Monsieur BK’s “Dawn Patrol”.
    It works for me with my desktop. Good luck.
    I am told (care of this blog) the “The Pub” also has the Dawn Patrol.
    :really pissed of at this hopeless blog emoji”

  42. I am regularly amused by Massola’s writings. Mind you he has a few mates.

    We are possibly two years and three budgets from the next election (though most pundits expect a poll in late 2018) so why should Labor be required to outline their policy now.

    WHo knows what damage Morrison or his successor could do to the budget between now and then.

  43. KayJay

    If you use the “Load More” button a couple of times you may be (or not) delighted with your time traveling and be able to view Monsieur BK’s “Dawn Patrol”.
    It works for me with my desktop. Good luck.
    I am told (care of this blog) the “The Pub” also has the Dawn Patrol.
    :really pissed of at this hopeless blog emoji”

    But you only get to look at one link. When I press the back button, I am back to the most recent group of posts.

  46. victoria

    As a teacher, I KNEW that the quality of education wasn’t any different – for starters, I knew teachers across the sectors and the conditions they worked under. As a general rule, teachers were better off being employed in the public system – so good teachers tended to stay there.

    This meant private schools tended to have very, very good teachers (who got paid above the odds) at one end of the system and below average at the other end (selecting teachers on the basis of religion, for example, limits your choices).

    And, of course, you also got private school teachers who were selected on the basis of their advertising value (one local private school has a number of teachers with doctorates, who are – reportedly – not very good teachers).

    MySchool allowed parents to look beyond the hype, the advertising and the disinformation and see the facts for themselves.

  48. Yes, that works.
    Go to a different tab, log in to PB, load more until BK’s links appear, copy the link you wish to see, open yet another tab, paste the URL into the address box, then back to the second tab.

    Use the first tab for any comments on BK’s links you wish to post.

  49. Zoomster

    The difference in high end private schools, is student to teacher ratio. It is much lower than the ratio in public and catholic schools which falls around 24 students per class. Teachers I know say that the lower number of students per class, aides greatly in supporting students with their learning

  50. Don

    I am hoping that the model they are working on is that of theWashington post.

    An auto update with a pause live feed button. Archived pages so you can go back and look at previous posts.

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