BludgerTrack: 53.2-46.8 to Labor

Very slight movement back to the Coalition on the latest poll aggregate this week, with a not-quite-so-bad Newspoll providing the only new numbers.

The BludgerTrack poll aggregate is drifting back towards the Coalition as other pollsters fail to replicate their particularly bad result from ReachTEL a fortnight ago. There is no change on the seat projection, though this is due to the correction of an error that short-changed Labor two seats in Queensland last week. The is balanced by Coalition gains of one seat apiece in New South Wales and Victoria. Newspoll’s latest numbers have taken a big chunk out of Malcolm Turnbull’s readings on the leadership trends, while Bill Shorten holds even on net approval. Enjoy all the results in detail by clicking on the image below.

Note that there’s a post below this one on Newspoll’s latest state voting intention result from Victoria.

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.

2,643 comments on “BludgerTrack: 53.2-46.8 to Labor”

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  5. Internationally renowned experts in transport planning consider the Transurban West Gate Tunnel project a dud. They recommend that the Victorian Government revert to the plan that it took to the 2014 election.

    Victorian Labor’s decision to abandon its election commitments and good planning process in favour of providing corporate welfare to Transurban is the kind of politics that is lampooned by Utopia.

    The West Gate Tunnel would deliver extremely poor value to citizens compared with the 2014 West Gate Distributor Plan.

    Labor’s broken election promise is an example of a planning process being perverted by a well-resourced and well-connected company. Former Labor figures work for Transurban and pitched the idea to the Victorian Labor Government after the 2014 election. There are no doubt some current political staffers and MPs who would like to be employed by Transurban in the years ahead. There is an obvious conflict of interest in having these characters bypass evidence-based transport planning and try to ram through an ill-considered project.

    Co-author, RMIT University’s Dr Ian Woodcock, said that the project’s inability to meet its key objectives would have major consequences for many Melburnians, particularly those living in the city’s fastest growing metropolitan area – the west.

    “International and local evidence overwhelmingly shows that when it comes to improving traffic congestion, building new roads is only a short-term solution,” Woodcock said.

    “By building extensive new road capacity that simply entrenches car-based transport, the West Gate Tunnel Project will introduce new transport complexity to the west and the rest of the city, and will compromise many decades of carefully developed aspirations for the central, inner-west and north Melbourne.

    Dr Crystal Legacy, from the University of Melbourne, said the West Gate Tunnel was a clear case of “overreach” and the Government should revert back to the 2014 West Gate Distributor plan.

    “For too long, Victoria’s transport planning and infrastructure investment has occurred in a policy and planning vacuum.

    The report also includes an open letter to Victorian State MPs signed by 22 internationally renowned academic leaders in transport planning, urban planning, engineering and safety about the direction of transport planning in Melbourne and Victoria.

    Read the full report here:
    https://gallery.mailchimp.com/b38874b25e686137780eb836e/files/95f845d1-d454-4212-8b0a-e63965d91195/West_Gate_Tunnel_Case_Study_Report_2017.pdf

  6. Meanwhile, well known climate expert and solar physicist Maurice Newman declares in the Australian that the Ice Age comets. Or a ‘mini ice age’ anyway

    He writes that same column every year, at about this time.

    Someone should tell him it is more commonly called ‘winter’.

  7. rossmcg @ #241 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 1:52 pm

    BK

    in the last few months in WA we have had a handful of homebuilders and some bigger construction contractors go to the wall.

    What little money that can be realised from the liquidation most likely will go to the accountants and the subcontractors will get nothing.

    One firm I read the other day was about $25 million in debt and had no money and few assets. The report from the regulator said it had most likely been trading insolvent for a fair bit of the time since it was first set up some years ago.

    And what will happen? The people who ran the companies will no doubt have been paid their wages and will have protected their assets so they can walk away and at some time in the future do it again.

    Australian business regulators are, in my opinion, weak as water.

    I like to remind people that Bernie Madoff, who ran the world’s biggest Ponzi scheme, was in jail about a a year after his fraud was uncovered.

    In Australia he would have been investigated for a couple of years, a file would be sent to the DPP which would sit on it for a bit longer and the end result would most likely be a deal which would see the offender fined and disqualified from running a business for a token period.

    And then he would bob up later running some other dodgy scheme.

    “Phoenix Companies” is the term.
    Anyone trying that stunt should have all their assets seized and distributed to creditors, and do a lengthy term in gaol with hard labour, if that sentencing option is still available. It would be about the only honest work they will ever have done in their miserable thieving lives.

  8. Urban Wronski‏ @UrbanWronski · 40m40 minutes ago

    Hard times in the bush and soft wages make for a tepid economy despite all the Coalition braying about 400,000 (part-time, mostly poorly paid and insecure, casual) jobs.

    I appreciate “braying”.

  11. Voice Endeavour @ #246 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 1:55 pm

    This shows what can be achieved by a government with a bit of ambition. And this is the Tories we’re talking about.

    ” rel=”nofollow”>

    Indeed. The UK and the EU are weaning themselves off coal – and reducing C02 emissions at the same time – by using gas as a transition fuel: https://www.carbonbrief.org/huge-coal-gas-switch-drives-down-eu-emissions

    Here in Australia, we have the worlds largest supplies of gas, but instead of using it to replace coal, we export it at knock down prices. As a result, our C02 emissions are still increasing, not decreasing.

    How stupid are we?

  12. Bemused

    But senior tribunal member John McAteer, in a judgement handed down in mid-February, agreed the Gold Opal breached the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act and changes were needed.

    He said details would be a matter for TfNSW to manage given their budget and technical limitations but suggested the Queensland, Victorian and Hong Kong models offered potential solutions

    https://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/seniors-travel-cards-breach-privacy-laws/news-story/6edd51d69ecad1ef21c390e3fce48326

  13. Give the man a medal (or Michaelia Cash’s mobile number).

    Sky News Australia‏Verified account @SkyNewsAust

    .@corybernardi: If I were Adani what I would do is change my name to the CFMMEU and then @billshortenmp would be unable to resist supporting the project.

  14. Simon Katich @ #237 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 12:46 pm

    DTT -If you have false assumptions or subjective assumptions then you can be very reasoned but still absolutely wrong.

    I looked it up before I posted and the term ‘objective reasoning’ certainly gets a guernsey on the interwebby thing. But I am not budging from my objective reasoning. Redundant. Probs not a tautology but I just like to slip in the word ‘tautology’ when I can.

    You must not use tautology or unnecessary words.

  15. if you know anything about that part of town, you would know that the road is needed. End of story.

    Yeah well these experts in transport planning, urban planning, and engineering don’t agree with you:

    Professor Graham Currie, Monash University
    Professor Billie Giles-Corti, RMIT University
    Professor Robin Goodman, RMIT University
    Professor Michael Buxton, RMIT University
    Professor Brenden Gleeson, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Carolyn Whitzman, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Mark Stevenson, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Nicholas Low, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Andrew Butt, LaTrobe University
    Dr Julie Rudner, Latrobe University
    Associate Professor Wendy Steele, RMIT University
    Professor Libby Porter, RMIT University
    Dr Joe Hurley, RMIT University
    Dr Jan Scheurer, RMIT University
    Dr Elizabeth Taylor, RMIT University
    Associate Professor Janet Stanley, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Dominique Hes, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Derlie Mateo-Babiano, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Jennifer Day, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Kate Raynor, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Matthew Palm, The University of Melbourne
    Mr James Whitten, The University of Melbourne (PhD Candidate)
    Dr Ian Woodcock, RMIT Centre for Urban Research
    Dr Sophie Sturup, Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University
    Dr John Stone, University of Melbourne
    Mr Nathan Pittman, University of Melbourne (PhD Candidate)
    Dr Crystal Legacy, University of Melbourne
    Professor Jago Dodson, RMIT Centre for Urban Research

    https://gallery.mailchimp.com/b38874b25e686137780eb836e/files/95f845d1-d454-4212-8b0a-e63965d91195/West_Gate_Tunnel_Case_Study_Report_2017.pdf

  16. @bemused

    They breached the privacy laws, that’s what.

    Tracking you’re movements, metadata, national security and all that.

  17. Quoll @ #232 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 1:38 pm

    Hehe,

    Victoria I can’t think of any greater carping, moaning and whingeing than from the likes of some of the prolific posters on this blog.
    Really, infantile slogans and willful ignorance suffices for their so-called great parties sake.
    Why would anyone even bother to care what you or anyone else has to say, given the often insulting and imbecilic diatribes about others which appear to be the norm around here.

    “Victoria says:
    Thursday, March 8, 2018 at 12:36 pm
    Voice endeavour

    What I was really attempting to express but didn’t put into words, is that the Greens will whinge and moan at every single opportunity towards Labor.”

    I didn’t know there was a variety of Quoll, genus Snowflake?

  18. How to get 400,000 new placements. Find a reason for the new job to ‘disappear’ after a month or two. Have it ‘reappear’ later and you can double the result. If you can get any form of employer subsidy all the better. It is the figure of those who are unemployed or underemployed that paints the true picture.

  20. lizzie @ #263 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 2:18 pm

    Give the man a medal (or Michaelia Cash’s mobile number).

    Sky News Australia‏Verified account @SkyNewsAust

    .@corybernardi: If I were Adani what I would do is change my name to the CFMMEU and then @billshortenmp would be unable to resist supporting the project.

    If I were Cory Bernardi I would change my name to Far Kwit to avoid misrepresentation.

  22. Nicholas @ #265 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 2:25 pm

    if you know anything about that part of town, you would know that the road is needed. End of story.

    Yeah well these experts in transport planning, urban planning, and engineering don’t agree with you:

    Professor Graham Currie, Monash University
    Professor Billie Giles-Corti, RMIT University
    Professor Robin Goodman, RMIT University
    Professor Michael Buxton, RMIT University
    Professor Brenden Gleeson, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Carolyn Whitzman, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Mark Stevenson, The University of Melbourne
    Professor Nicholas Low, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Andrew Butt, LaTrobe University
    Dr Julie Rudner, Latrobe University
    Associate Professor Wendy Steele, RMIT University
    Professor Libby Porter, RMIT University
    Dr Joe Hurley, RMIT University
    Dr Jan Scheurer, RMIT University
    Dr Elizabeth Taylor, RMIT University
    Associate Professor Janet Stanley, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Dominique Hes, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Derlie Mateo-Babiano, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Jennifer Day, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Kate Raynor, The University of Melbourne
    Dr Matthew Palm, The University of Melbourne
    Mr James Whitten, The University of Melbourne (PhD Candidate)
    Dr Ian Woodcock, RMIT Centre for Urban Research
    Dr Sophie Sturup, Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University
    Dr John Stone, University of Melbourne
    Mr Nathan Pittman, University of Melbourne (PhD Candidate)
    Dr Crystal Legacy, University of Melbourne
    Professor Jago Dodson, RMIT Centre for Urban Research

    https://gallery.mailchimp.com/b38874b25e686137780eb836e/files/95f845d1-d454-4212-8b0a-e63965d91195/West_Gate_Tunnel_Case_Study_Report_2017.pdf

    Nicholas,
    Do you know who commissioned that report?

    Also, I can only see 6 names mentioned as authoring the document. Where did you get the other 22 from?

  23. daretotread. says:
    Thursday, March 8, 2018 at 1:35 pm

    “The problem is that I suspect that Lloyd George and the other whigs said something similar about the British Labour Party. Times change. Parties rise and fall.

    The greens do have a niche now in most lower houses . Being in a BoP position from time to time is expected. I think it unlikely they will ever emerge as a rival of the ALP – seemed possible in the time of Brown, but not so much now, however times change and so do party fortunes.”

    You probably mean the Liberals whom the whigs had long since morphed into.

    The superficiality of that comparison speaks volumes though. Comparing the rise of broad labour movements parliamentary successes with an environmental movement that morphed into a party whose vote appears to be inversely related to the number trees in the electorate is clearly daft.

    Ironically the Greens resemble the British Liberal party far more than Labor do. Perhaps if universal suffrage was reversed and only property owners could vote the Greens might triumphantly rise to party of government status?

  26. My guess will be that the Liberals will be the ones that blink on continuing to rescind planning approval for the westgate tunnel in the upper house.

    Easy to see that a key pitch by the ALP in this year’s election is “we’ve got on with the job – made tough decisions where needed and we need to keep going…”

    The Liberal have a weak spot here – they accomplished very little, in terms of infrastructure, in their four years of government. So, I think going to close to an election in lock step with the greens to block a major infrastructure project would be a political gift to the ALP. (Pretty sure the ALP would love to hammer home the idea of the Liberals being a party of inaction and tag them with the greens in the process).

    I suspect, at some point, the Liberals will consider they’ve created enough noise and revert to saying the ALP are wasting billions and they’d do a better job.

  28. guytaur @ #262 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 2:18 pm

    Bemused

    But senior tribunal member John McAteer, in a judgement handed down in mid-February, agreed the Gold Opal breached the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act and changes were needed.

    He said details would be a matter for TfNSW to manage given their budget and technical limitations but suggested the Queensland, Victorian and Hong Kong models offered potential solutions

    https://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/seniors-travel-cards-breach-privacy-laws/news-story/6edd51d69ecad1ef21c390e3fce48326

    He needs to think again.
    To get a concession MYKI you have to apply and of course they can then link your details to the card issued. If you want an anonymous one, then you don’t have to apply, but you pay full fare.
    I think the concerns are a lot of paranoid rubbish.

  29. poroti @ #245 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 10:54 am

    Dan Gulberry says:

    ** Telstra trouble?**
    Things have been in decline since Bob Dylan was awarded a Nobel Prize.

    Not half as steep a decline as that caused by Kissinger getting a Nobel Peace Prize !

    Why stop there. Things have been in decline since Julius Caesar was knifed (literally) in the Senate.

    Now that I think about it, humanity has been in decline since we came out of the trees and started living in caves. In fact, leaving the sea and moving into the trees was probably a bad move as well.

    (Hat tip to Douglas Adams).

  31. Bemused

    Not paranoid rubbish. However before that my worry is tracking my phone. If the government wanted to track me that gets me even when walking. Much more efficient than tracking public transport

    Edit: If I was worried about that

    Damn made a typo with edit 😆

  33. Practicality @ #273 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 1:37 pm

    daretotread. says:
    Thursday, March 8, 2018 at 1:35 pm

    “The problem is that I suspect that Lloyd George and the other whigs said something similar about the British Labour Party. Times change. Parties rise and fall.

    The greens do have a niche now in most lower houses . Being in a BoP position from time to time is expected. I think it unlikely they will ever emerge as a rival of the ALP – seemed possible in the time of Brown, but not so much now, however times change and so do party fortunes.”

    You probably mean the Liberals whom the whigs had long since morphed into.

    The superficiality of that comparison speaks volumes though. Comparing the rise of broad labour movements parliamentary successes with an environmental movement that morphed into a party whose vote appears to be inversely related to the number trees in the electorate is clearly daft.

    Ironically the Greens resemble the British Liberal party far more than Labor do. Perhaps if universal suffrage was reversed and only property owners could vote the Greens might triumphantly rise to party of government status?

    Practicality

    Yes of course I meant the Liberals.

    Have you noticed what is going on in Europe lately. Social democrat parties (like our Labor Party) are fading fast soon to be quaint minors JUST like the British liberals. Forced into minority coalitions with the right wing, they are essentially defunct. Germany is obvious, Greece, Spain and now Italy.

    Jeremy has stemmed the collapse of British labor but it is a close run thing.

    I think so far we in Australia have been lucky of clever and the ALP is still a major party. However
    those who sit and sneer
    saying it cannot happen here
    may find themselves amazed
    as electoral love is razed.

    Did not mean to write a rhyme but it sorta happened.

  34. If any Company gets a mining lease and complies with all Federal and State requirements, they are entitled to run a mine. If they have jumped through all the hoops and are ready to commence operations, it is legally difficult to stop them.
    In Adani’s case, they would no doubt state the mine would have run for many years, extracted a significant volume of coal and , therefore , they have been denied massive profits.
    So off to the Court we go, Government loses, compensation has to be paid. Guess who by?
    The current LNP Government is attempting to put in place iron clad guarantees to look after the mining company and make it impossible for a responsible future government to stop it.
    The fact that Labor will not allow a $1B loan to proceed does not mean the funds can’t be obtained elsewhere.
    Didn’t the Victorian Liberal Government do exactly this with a road project before being turfed out at the ensuing election?And from memory while in caretaker mode. How did that work out for the punters?

  44. bemused

    If you had you would have realised I said tracking by mobile phone is more likely to track your movements more efficiently than tracking a train card.

    That the truth not rubbish. The only way to avoid is to not have a mobile phone

  45. Checked a bit of history

    It took 22 years for the British labour Party to grow stronger than the Whigs and 24 years for them to be formally part of a government.

    This sharp rise coincided with the aftermath of the bloodiest war Europe had ever seen and the fading of the British empire and massive unemployment.

    I cannot see this happening here EXCEPT in the aftermath of some major crisis. A war of any kind might do it (not a skirmish overseas I mean a real war with boats and planes and guns and rationing and war work ( manpower) and digging for victory and knitting socks for the troops etc.

  47. guytaur @ #294 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 3:05 pm

    bemused

    If you had you would have realised I said tracking by mobile phone is more likely to track your movements more efficiently than tracking a train card.

    That the truth not rubbish. The only way to avoid is to not have a mobile phone

    So turn your phone off. Pull the battery out. Or leave it at home.

    Big deal!

  49. While I’m hesitant to quote Blair from the DT, this is interesting:

    I spoke last night at the Liberal Party’s Roseville branch conservative forum:

    Terry {McCrann} and Ian {Plimer} were terrific, of course, but the highlight came when Liberal MP Craig Kelly presented a concluding response. The room – representing about $12,000 of ticket buyers, so they were a committed bunch – erupted. At one point Ian whispered to me that he’d never seen Liberals so obviously furious.

    And it was entirely directed at Malcolm Turnbull.

    https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/blogs/tim-blair/three-billboards-outside-canberra/news-story/c944ba9a82af9573a4236243027366aa

  50. C@tmomma @ #286 Thursday, March 8th, 2018 – 2:54 pm

    Nicholas,
    Do you know who commissioned the Report?

    I have skimmed through the report and found no indications that it was commissioned by any particular group. It was complementary of actions of the Andrews government in places and recognizes the urgent need to do something about traffic options in Melbourne’s west.
    I also looked through the Centre for Urban Research website and found no indications that it was externally funded from RMIT. The report looked to be a typical academic report.

    If anyone knows different I am happy to be proven wrong.
    I am a retired academic and special librarian so well aware that the true backers of the report and the research centre could be hidden.

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