Essential Research 2PP+: Labor 48, Liberal 46, undecided 7

Essential Research joins in on the tightening race narrative, although it gets there through preferences rather than primary votes. Also featured: many seat polls, one of which has independent Kate Chaney leading in Curtin, and even polls for the Senate.

The final Essential Research poll for the campaign has Labor leading by 48% to 46% on the pollster’s “2PP+” measure, in from 49% to 45% a fortnight ago, with the remainder undecided. However, both the Coalition and Labor are steady on the primary vote at 36% and 35%, the change mostly being accounted for by respondent-allocated preferences. For the minor parties, the Greens are down one to 9%, One Nation is up one to 4%, the United Australia Party is down one to 3% and independents are up one to 6%. Leadership ratings are little changed: Scott Morrison is down one on approval to 43% and up one on disapproval to 49%, Anthony Albanese is up one to 42% and steady on 41%, and Morrison’s lead as preferred prime minister moves from 40-36 to 40-37.

My reading of the state breakdowns is that the results are likely too strong for the Coalition in Victoria and too weak in New South Wales, at least in relative terms — using previous election flows, Labor leads by about 53-47 in New South Wales and 51-49 in Victoria, respectively compared with 51-49 to the Coalition and around 53.5-46.5 a fortnight ago. The Coalition is credited with a lead of about 52-48 in Queensland, a swing to Labor of over 6%, compared with about 50-50 in the previous poll. Sample sizes here would have been about 500 in New South Wales, 400 in Victoria and 300 in Queensland.

The poll was conducted Wednesday to Tuesday from a sample of 1599. It has made little difference to the BludgerTrack aggregate, since it goes off primary votes which are little changed. The more heavily weighted Newspoll and Ipsos polls that are yet to come stand more chance of moving its needle, which they will want to do in the Coalition’s favour if it is to end up with a two-party preferred reading that I personally would think plausible.

Other polling news:

The West Australian today had a poll by Utting Research showing independent Kate Chaney leading Liberal member Celia Hammond in Curtin by 52-48 on two-candidate preferred, from primary votes of 38% for Hammond, 32% for Chaney, 13% for Labor, 9% for the Greens and 3% for the United Australia Party. The poll was conducted on Monday from a sample of 514.

Katherine Murphy of The Guardian reports Labor is “increasingly bullish” about Brisbane and Higgins, and further perceives “opportunity” in Bennelong and Ryan. The report says Labor internal polling has Scott Morrison’s disapproval rating across the four seats at 62%, 65%, 57% and 58% respectively, whereas Anthony Albanese is in the mid-forties in approval and mid-thirties on disapproval.

Samantha Maiden of news.com.au reports on uComms polls for GetUp! of five seats chosen because of the effects on them of fires and floods. These have Labor member Fiona Phillips leading Liberal challenger Andrew Constance by 57-43 in Gilmore, but Liberal candidate Jerry Nockles leading Labor member Kirsty McBain by 51-49 in Eden-Monaro. Labor’s Peter Cossar is credited with a 55-45 lead over Liberal National Party member Julian Simmonds in Ryan, although his primary vote of 27% is not far clear of the Greens on 22%. Labor member Susan Templeman leads Liberal candidate Sarah Richards by 56-44 in Macquarie, and Nationals member Kevin Hogan leads Labor’s Patrick Deegan by 51-49 in Page, which he won by 9.4% in 2019. I have tended to think this pollster’s results have been flattering to Labor due to a limited weighting frame encompassing only age and gender, a notion disabused here only by the Eden-Monaro result.

• Speaking of which, The Australia Institute has a now dated uComms poll of Higgins from May 2 that had hitherto escaped my notice, showing Liberal member Katie Allen will lose either to Labor by 54-46 or the Greens by 55-45. Using the results of the forced-response follow-up to allocate the initially undecided, the primary votes are Liberal 36.9%, Labor 29.8% and Greens 19.9%, in which case it would clearly be Labor that won the seat.

• Redbridge Group has published full results of its poll for Climate 200 in North Sydney which, as noted here yesterday, had Liberal member Trent Zimmerman on 33.3%, independent Kylea Tink on 23.5% and Labor candidate Catherine Renshaw on 17.8%, with 7.5% undecided. The full report has results on a follow-up prompt for the undecided, and much more besides.

Senate news:

• The Australia Institute has Senate voting intention results for the five mainland states, which suggest the Greens are looking good across the board, One Nation might be a show in New South Wales as well as Queensland, the United Australia Party are competitive in Victoria, a third seat for Labor is in play in Western Australia, and Nick Xenophon might be in a tussle with One Nation for the last place in South Australia. With a national sample of 1002 though, there are naturally wide margins of error on these results. The accompanying report also include interesting data on respondents’ levels of understanding of the Senate voting process.

The Advertiser reports an “internal party polling” – it does not say whose – of the South Australian Senate race has Labor on 34%, Liberal on 23%, the Greens on 12%, Nick Xenophon on 6%, One Nation on 4% and Rex Patrick on 3%. I imagine the most likely outcome of such a result would be two seats each for Labor and Liberal plus one for the Greens and one for Nick Xenophon. The poll had a sample of 644, with field work dates not disclosed.

• A joint sitting of the Western Australian parliament has just confirmed that Ben Small of the Liberal Party will fill his own Senate vacancy, having addressed the dual citizenship issue that forced his resignation. Small has the third position on the Liberal ticket at Saturday’s election.

Non-polling news:

Sky News has obtained a voicemail message from 2019 in which Dai Le, who is threatening Kristina Keneally’s effort to use Fowler to move from the Senate to the House of Representatives, stated she still had control of the Liberal Party’s Cabramatta branch despite having been suspended from the party after running as an independent mayoral candidate in 2016. Le has been keen to express her independent credentials in a seat where the Liberal Party has little support.

Samantha Maiden of news.com.au reports Labor focus groups in Bennelong, Deakin and Pearce registered negative reactions to the Liberal Party’s policy of allowing home buyers to make use of their superannuation.

• The count for the Tasmanian Legislative Council seat of Huon has been completed, with the distribution of preferences resulting in a victory for independent candidate Dean Harriss over Labor’s Toby Thorpe at the final count by 11,840 votes (52.55%) to 10,693 (47.45%). Thorpe led on the primary vote, but Liberal preferences flowed to Harriss more strongly than Greens preferences did to Thorpe. This maintains the numbers in the chamber at four Labor, four Liberal and seven independents, although an ex-Labor member has been replaced by one with a conservative pedigree, his father having served in parliament both as an independent and with the Liberal Party.

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.

989 comments on “Essential Research 2PP+: Labor 48, Liberal 46, undecided 7”

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  1. mundo:

    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 8:51 pm

    I rarely view free-to-air TV. If that’s your perception, I accept it. I’m more pleased tonight than this time yesterday though.

  2. “Especially with a big hairy (almost hairless) galoot on top of you.”

    Ok look here. There is nothing wrong with being simultaneously almost hairless and hairy.

    The guy in that picture is just an arse.

    Is he trying to drive the women vote further down? Has he adopted the sporting cliché of “never weaken a strength to strengthen a weakness?”

    I don’t know, but I do know that he’s not fit to be PM.

  3. C@tmomma @ #681 Wednesday, May 18th, 2022 – 8:54 pm

    mundo @ #680 Wednesday, May 18th, 2022 – 8:51 pm

    I had such high hopes for Labor’s ad campaign.
    It has been shit.
    Why?
    Why can’t Labor’s people mount a decent ad campaign?
    .
    No more Morrison.
    Really?

    Thank goodness Toby Ralph (former Liberal advertising director), is in advertising and you aren’t. He said on Gruen that Labor’s ad campaign was the better one this campaign because it gently reinforced its message, whereas the Liberal ad was nonsensical as it alluded to a situation with Labor that hasn’t even happened yet. Plus it was childish and annoying. Maybe that’s why you like it?

    ‘as it alluded to a situation with Labor that hasn’t even happened yet’
    It reinforced a perception.
    You really think the average voter is nuanced enough to get a gently reinforced message?

  4. It was (hopefully still is) the practice for each government department to prepare three briefs before an election: (1) for the existing minister to be returned, (2) for the government to be returned but a change of minister, (3) a new government to be elected.

    In theory at least, new Labor ministers (or someone responsible for that portfolio) could be briefed immediately after the election should Labor appear to win.

  5. Labor’s ads this time, way better than the 2019 campaign ones.
    The Liberal ones are just awful, note too that Morrison does not feature nor is not mentioned in any of them. I wonder too if the female voiceover in the “hole in the bucket” ad is their attempt to pitch towards female voters?

  6. “ That’s exactly the point Gough and Lance held all the ministries. How can you go overseas and not have a sworn minister in Australia? That should be Marles.”

    i suspect that – at least – Albo, Marles and Wong get sworn in on Monday if Labor wins.

    Albo as PM, Wong a Foreign Minster and Marles as Deputy PM (with no announcement at that stage what his substantive portfolio ultimately will end up being). Albo may also have Chalmers as Treasurer and Gallagher as Finance (or Dreyfus as AG) sworn in as well. Then – alla Gough and Lance – have all the remaining portfolios divided amongst that ‘gang of 5’ for a week to 10 days, until the full ministry is announced and then sworn in.

  7. @mundo… if you’re so sure – how about you wait until it happens… THEN go for it?

    Otherwise, if it doesn’t happen, which I’m still pretty confident it won’t… you haven’t looked like a hysterical mess? (apologies for the term)

    @citizen – correct, that’s the approach. But AGAIN – nothing would happen until Morrison resigns.

  8. Mundo you really are the most abject pitiful excuse for a man that I have ever come across…..If you were a commander in any battle your own men would shoot you in the back for defeatism and cowardice in the face of the enemy

  9. “ The Liberal ones are just awful”

    But for all their ascetic awfulness, effective. That annoying ‘earworm’ quality. Really cuts through.

  10. King OMalley Tuesday, May 17th, 2022 – 11:57 pm
    Comment #513
    2022 Federal Election: Required LNP 2PP Vote
    Based on AEC data up to and including 16 May 22

    Results are in the format of: AEF | BludgerTrack

    For LNP to win election
    Current LNP 2PP%: 47.23% | 45.77%
    Required LNP 2PP% of all remaining votes: 53.24% | 53.64%
    Estimated LNP 2PP% daily (linear) increase required from now until election day: 5.84% | 6.26%
    Required election day LNP 2PP% (based on linear 2PP increase): 70.61% | 70.76%

    Best LNP case scenario
    Apply an immediate 2PP campaign bounce (1.00%) then apply the maximum average daily increase in estimated 2PP% achieved in the campaign to date (0.064%) with an extra good last week campaign loading factor (10%).

    Estimated LNP 2PP%: 48.11% | 46.71%
    Seats won: 67 | 63

    Medium LNP case scenario
    LNP 2PP% remains at current level

    Estimated LNP 2PP%: 47.23% | 45.77%
    Seats won: 65 | 57

    Worst LNP case scenario
    Apply an immediate campaign sinkage (-1.00%) to LNP 2PP% then apply the maximum average decline in estimated 2PP% achieved in the campaign to date (-0.051%) with an extra bad last week campaign loading factor (-10%).

    Estimated LNP 2PP%: 46.25% | 44.85%
    Seats won: 59 | 53

    Thanks to king omalley – not sure of the updated figures

  11. Thinking back to 2010, the incumbent PM – Julia Gillard – issued a statement saying she and her ministers would retain their commissions until the GG could be assured that one of the party leaders could command the confidence of the House.

    Which led to the famous Abbott vow that he would ‘sell his arse’ to get the top job. Sadly for him, Oakshott and Windsor turned down his offer.

  12. what will happen to mundo if Labor gets elected? His habitat will be destroyed. This furry creature exists in a unique clime, and in a niche role, collecting cold water and pouring it over the Labor party.

    Vote Liberal. #savemundo.

  13. “Talking of GG is he off with BB at the moment?”

    Yep. Got snarky at the boss one too many times, and about BB’s absence again.

    As you couldn’t have seen, there wasn’t much crying and gnashing of teeth at his removal.

  14. Further to Scomo’s crash tackle, wife saw his plane take off over devo at 5:15. The tackle was at 5:01. It’s a 10 minute drive to the airport at least

    Edit: (The tackle was recorded at 5:01)

  15. If Labor loses from here, any postmortem that finds that the specific content of their ads is the problem will be missing the forest for the trees in terms of the current media landscape. And if they do win, then their explicit strategy of targeting social media over traditional media will be vindicated and the content still won’t really matter.

  16. Zeh says:
    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:14 pm
    Further to Scomo’s crash tackle, wife saw his plane take off over devo at 5:15. The tackle was at 5:01. It’s a 10 minute drive to the airport at least
    ____________________________
    The tackle was scripted?

  17. “1. The ‘It’s not my job’ with the Hawaii holiday reference.”

    ***

    Yeah that is a good one. Fits the whole “doesn’t hold a hose” narrative very well.

    The ad I hate the most is the really long UAP one with their cringey song. Uhhg.

  18. sprocket_ says:
    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:17 pm

    LVT

    Leaving the scene of a crime?
    ______
    Bowling over a kid is probably a good time to call it quits.

  19. Dandy Murray-Honeydew says:
    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:13 pm

    “Talking of GG is he off with BB at the moment?”

    Yep. Got snarky at the boss one too many times, and about BB’s absence again.

    As you couldn’t have seen, there wasn’t much crying and gnashing of teeth at his removal.
    中华人民共和国
    Roger that.

    Well the boss AKA “Dear Leader” should ascend to the lofty heights of “The Great Helmsman” by about this time next week.

  20. JenAuthor at 8.54 re what turnaround Morrison needs…

    It’s actually impossible to tell.

    Traditionally, postal (especially) and to a lesser extent pre-poll votes have skewed towards Coalition, compared with votes made on the Saturday.

    I would agree with the view that polls are running about 53-47 for Labor, but it is quite possible that those who have voted early/postal are not so strongly favouring Labor. Maybe it’s even 50-50, for example.

    What that would mean is that Morrison needs to ‘win’ the most Labor-leaning vote: those who vote on Saturday. This would be unlikely.

    Nobody seems to have done exit polling of early voters, so we have no idea how they’ve voted.

    The turnaround Morrison needs is that the weighted polling average, however it is calculated, has him disastrously behind and it’s Wednesday night. Precious few hours left to turn 47 (LNP) / 53 (ALP) polling into at least a 51/49 actual vote outcome.

  21. Alboanese, Marles and Wong don’t get commissioned until Morrison advises the Governor General he is done and can’t win. Hence it would need to be a clear cut win to get sworn in before the Quad. That’s not Morrison being obstructive it’s just hundreds of years of convention. No GG will act unilaterally in this situation. So this is basically a highly aspirational exercise by Albanese. However, he could by all means attend the meeting, just may not to be PM by then.

    Of course, if it is clear cut Morrison could just concede on the night and say he will be visiting the GG on Sunday to resign. Or say it looks likely that he won’t be in a position to form a government, but linger on for a few days anyway. Up to him, but he is not going to resigning while there is even a tiny bit of doubt there.

  22. Lars Von Trier @ Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:16 pm
    “Zeh says:
    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:14 pm
    Further to Scomo’s crash tackle, wife saw his plane take off over devo at 5:15. The tackle was at 5:01. It’s a 10 minute drive to the airport at least
    ____________________________
    The tackle was scripted?”

    Too cynical? Let’s consult the Crosby Textor playbook about the dead cat strategy.

    Who got the news headlines tonight? Albo @ the NPC? Or Morrison? What were they about?

  23. Upnorth:

    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:05 pm

    [‘Talking of GG is he off with BB at the moment?’]

    I think so lest dear GG would be on fire tonight. And wait for dear
    BB’s return, both of whom have tested dear WB to the limits. In the absence of vitriol, both deserving of their temporary sin-binning?

  24. Yes, i know about 2019, but the chance of it being repeated in such a way is surely remote.

    There is, admittedly, the Teal effect but its impacts will mainly be on the Liberals.

    We will see the next Newspoll.

  25. @Snappy Tom

    I do wonder given the record number of postal votes, how can anyone be sure Saturday night? Like, you’d have millions of votes waiting to be verified and counted.

    This will go back to the question of quad. It’s very likely that we don’t know who won by the meeting in Tokyo. Then… All I can think of is that Morrison goes with a Labor person, maybe not Albanese.

  26. sprocket_ says:
    Wednesday, May 18, 2022 at 9:17 pm
    LVT

    Leaving the scene of a crime?
    _____________________________
    Police matter?

  27. @JenAuthor
    On current TPP estimates, yes. The Coalition effectively have 76 seats to begin with, with a 51.5-48.5 lead. So any drop from this likely means a minority at best. Even at 51.5-48.5, any Lib seats going Independent could make for a minority government too.
    Now of course the swings between different seats will vary, so with luck on their side the LNP could go down to 51-49 and still get a majority.
    It’s all very speculative, but to guarantee a majority I reckon LNP need 52-48, anything less than 51-49 and even a minority government will be tough for them to form

  28. He’s a pretty classy bloke that Simon Holmes A’Court isn’t he. Calling a former Prime Minister “ the angel of death” in some tweet.
    A new low in this campaign. And a putrid stain on the Teals.

    The only putrid stain is that skid mark (on the bed-sheet of Australia) little johnny 😡

  29. Anyways, no major missteps in the Labor camp today. Not seeing a history-making turnaround in play just yet. I shall sleep comfortably again tonight 🙂

  30. True Believer @ 8:01

    Sadly, no I didn’t feel Renshaw was getting many bites at my booth in North Willoughby today. Labor never does well around here though. They didn’t even field a candidate in Willoughby in the state election.

    It was an especially old bunch shuffling through though and as I said, they were pretty keen to vote blue.

    I think the ALP has an outstanding candidate in Catherine Renshaw, but personally suspect if Zimmerman is to fall it will be to Kylea Tink. Hopefully there’ll be plenty of scomo-jaded voters putting Tink and Renshaw in their top two votes.

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