The Australian reports the latest Newspoll records a two-party lead for the Coalition for the first time since this term, at 51-49 after a 50-50 result three weeks ago, though both major parties are unchanged on the primary vote, Labor at 31% and the Coalition at 38%. The movement is down to a one-point drop for the Greens to 12% and a one-point increase for One Nation to 7%. Anthony Albanese is down three on approval to 40% and up three on disapproval to 54%, edging out past results in August (41% and 54%) and last November (40% and 53%) as his worst net result for the term. Peter Dutton is respectively up one to 38% and steady at 52%, with preferred prime minister narrowing from 46-37 to 45-37. The poll was conducted Monday to Friday from a sample of 1258.
Lmao FUBAR’s sources are the IDF, printed in Murdoch’s WSJ.
meher:
I’d be starting with immigration and the GST. From there I’d be looking at negative gearing.
And for god’s sake bring Tanya Plibersek back into the inner circle.
Thanks BK too.
VCT & bug1
This is the Samaras Link.
https://x.com/KosSamaras/status/1845569089567399960?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
Unfortunately I don’t have access to the 3 east coast tabloids so will wait until something drops on this site. Kos will probably do a drip feed during the day anyway. The last primaries were 33-38-12-17
If you want a classic illustration of the “fixer” mentality at work in the modern ALP, have a look at the continuing thrashings about of the Miles Government in its death throes.
Unsustainably low fares on public transport, government-run petrol stations, government-run bulk-billing clinics. And today’s offering: free school lunches.
Getting more people to use public transport, stopping price-gouging on petrol, increasing the availability of bulk-billing and ensuring better nutrition for kids from low-income families are all desirable policy goals. But the way to address them is not through a combination of knee jerk reactions and impulse purchases. That’s not how good policy is made.
I am enjoying Steven Miles’ TikToks though. He’s certainly gotten the hang of social media.
bug1 @ #80 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 6:48 am
I agree with this sentiment, would Prefer a Labor majority government but with the help of the Teals I could see a long term future ahead after the next election as I think this is the direction the country wants to go in-socially liberal and economically responsible.
As this article points out:
They may be short on detail, but Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is charging ahead with two flagship policies that may serve Labor and ensure Albanese’s second term as PM. It may well come down to the Teals, writes Michael Pascoe.
https://michaelwest.com.au/peter-duttons-policies-may-swing-teals-to-labor-in-election/
Has Jim Chalmers announced his intention not to stand at the next election yet?
Can’t imagine he’s interested in 10+ years in opposition.
If the coalition get back in it’ll be for a long long time.
Labor will be a basket case for a generation after this.
It keeps getting worse meher.
The LNP in QLD have apparently now sent out texts to everyone about a non existent “patients tax”.
Mind you I didn’t get one.
How is your 19 y.o pusscat by the way, and when does he turn 20.
That is such a long age for a cat.
Fess: “I’d be starting with immigration and the GST. From there I’d be looking at negative gearing.”
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That’s a good list. As I said before, I’d also prioritise primary care/bulk billing (including dental care, as another poster pointed out).
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“And for god’s sake bring Tanya Plibersek back into the inner circle.”
Is she not part of the inner circle? It’s difficult to tell. She’s never been a particularly strong performer, even in important portfolios. She was more or less invisible as Health Minister during the second half of the R-G-R period and has been similarly elusive as Environment Minister under Albo.
She’s beautiful, intelligent, and I have heard through the public service grapevine that she’s an absolute pleasure to work for. But she struggles to “cut through” (to use a term favoured by the press gallery). Perhaps she needs to take a few nasty pills.
Oh, and meher baba, before you pontificate about a Queensland Labor state government policy, maybe you should do some research first?
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/oct/11/the-best-50-cents-you-can-spend-queenslands-ultra-cheap-public-transport-fares-revitalise-travel-for-pleasure
nadia88: “How is your 19 y.o pusscat by the way, and when does he turn 20.
That is such a long age for a cat.”
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Especially for a male cat, I am told.
He only turned 19 a couple of months back, so it’ll be another 10 months or so, if he makes it.
His name is Mischief and he’s a tabby and he’s doing very well. There used to be three cats in our house plus a semi-adopted stray, and he didn’t like any of them. The last of them left us in early 2023 and since then he’s been king of the castle and can sleep where he wants, eat whenever he wants, monopolise the available pats and treats, etc, etc. Thanks to a suite of regular injections and other medicines, he remains surprisingly mobile: he can still climb up on tables and other things, is still happy to go outside for toileting purposes, etc.
He’s definitely living his best life and is in no hurry to leave it. When he does eventually go, his loving parents are going to be devastated. But at least we’ll be able to travel together once again. (There’s no way anyone could persuade my partner to leave him in anyone else’s care. Various kind people, including PB’s very own Fess, have offered to take care of him for a while, but I’m afraid it ain’t gonna happen.)
If only QLD Labor had gone with Cameron Dick, it would have been a different story electorally.
Thanks meher, it’s a lovely story and I could imagine the attachment over 19 years. Literally a part of the family. A cat which has lived under 7 Prime Ministers!
So labor will wait for interest rate cut/s like they have for past six months in vain whilst the world economy past six months have been cutting meaning Australias export economy will kick as it does driving more inflation.
1.1 million people imports too many brought in driving inflation cannot get rid of them quickly as they are appealing will take long after election to meaningfully reduce meanwhile Albo spends billions in WA driving inflation higher in a rental and skills stressed state.
He has a plan geez a interest rate increase a real chance as reserve bank keeps saying.
Marles deputy mired in controversy,Tanya gold mine problem and that leaves Treasurer .
Enough of the rewriting of history regarding the Referendum and federal polling.
If the Referendum was seen as such a great destruction of the Labor Government, its polling would have dropped in October, probably even in September when it was all in the news. Polls dropped against the government in NOVEMBER – AFTER THE INTEREST RATE RISE. Several economists commented at the time that it looked like the economy hit a wall in December.
Two weeks to the September Quarter CPI release.
High Street @ #115 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 8:36 am
People like to rewrite history here a lot.
c@t: If you read my post, I wasn’t criticising the concept of lower public transport fares, but the slapdash, unabashedly vote-buying way in which they were implemented.
The risk of lowering fares in this sort of a way is that the relevant transit authorities will end up being required to cover the impact of the reduced revenue out of their capital and maintenance budgets, which will inhibit expansion to new suburban areas and risk serious systems failures down the track that will be a bugger to fix.
State governments operate on much tighter budgets than the Feds. If you want to reduce fares, then you’re going to have to find savings in other areas to pay for it: which to my knowledge hasn’t happened in Queensland.
Of course, one good area to look at would be employee costs and conditions, which are highly generous in most Australian public transport systems. But that’s too risky an area for governments of any stripe to go near: about the only thing worse than a prolonged transport strike for a government’s reputation is a major jail riot, and there hasn’t been one of those for quite a while.
High Streetsays:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:36 am
Enough of the rewriting of history regarding the Referendum and federal polling.
If the Referendum was seen as such a great destruction of the Labor Government, its polling would have dropped in October, probably even in September when it was all in the news. Polls dropped against the government in NOVEMBER – AFTER THE INTEREST RATE RISE. Several economists commented at the time that it looked like the economy hit a wall in December.
Two weeks to the September Quarter CPI release.
—
To use an old saying: it’s the economy, stupid.
Husic’s $1b quantum computer will turn this around!! Double digit returns!!
nadia88 @ #99 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 8:03 am
It is a Redbridge but mostly on housing affordability.
No voting intentions that I can see, and mentions the newspoll. I guess later so they can have yet another go at the ALP
That’s as may be, meher baba, however I think you need to consider whether the Queensland state government can afford it, a policy that both parties are committed to continue after the election, and it seems as though they can:
Queensland’s $91 billion 2024-25 Budget reveals a hat-trick of surpluses, nation-leading employment, and a positive outlook for the state’s economic growth.
https://statements.qld.gov.au/statements/100536
There’s also another reason why they decided to do it, which we should all support:
Public transport temporary fare reduction
From 5 August 2024, a flat fare of 50 cents per trip will be applied across the state’s public transport network for 6 months. This is estimated to save public transport customers $150 million in 2024–25. In addition to this initiative, the government is also providing half-price tickets on Airtrain services.
Public transport usage remains about 13 per cent below pre-COVID levels. Significantly reducing the cost of public transport will encourage more people to leave the car at home, leading to a reduction in road congestion. A single bus takes 50 cars off the road and a train takes 600 cars off the road.
This is in addition to a freeze on the public transport fare increase in 2024, at an estimated cost of $62.3 million over 5 years.
https://budget.qld.gov.au/overview/cost-of-living/
If you look at the cost of it as well it doesn’t seem that much in the scheme of things and the greater Budget cost.
Plus, as the article in The Guardian outlined, there are psychological benefits for the community and that is also something we should all support.
Also, meher baba,to say that the lower Public Transport fares was a vote buying exercise, well, it seems as though it was a pretty cheap one in the scheme of things, if that’s what it really was, and an unalloyed Public Good. So, the criticism is unwarranted, I reckon.
meher baba says:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:11 am
If you want a classic illustration of the “fixer” mentality at work in the modern ALP, have a look at the continuing thrashings about of the Miles Government in its death throes,
Unsustainably low fares on public transport, government-run petrol stations, government-run bulk-billing clinics. And today’s offering: free school lunches.
————-
These are good ideas by Miles, public transport is already heavily government subsidised (as are roads for that matter) might as well reduce fares to increase uptake and provide people a close to free option and more people on PT means less clogged up roads, everyone wins.
If the govt is seeking to ensure people are not getting ripped off by companies then it’s not an unreasonable solution that that they become a competitor to these companies and run state owned petrol stations or enter into other markets. They don’t need to run many outlets to have a big impact.
People increasingly distrust the neoliberal “private sector is always best” dogma.
Diogenes @ #119 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 8:44 am
Not much foresight in this comment.
Diogenessays:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:44 am
Husic’s $1b quantum computer will turn this around!! Double digit returns!!
—
This reminds me of people ridiculing the telephone and the Internet in their respective infancies.
What policy changes and new policies are the Dutton LNP taking to the next election in 2025 ?
Refreshing honesty.
Goodness me the old Far Left Far Right Tag Team Slagathon is in full flight today.
Plenty MOE where that came from!
Bandt’s Plan to destroy Labor is sort of rebounding: yet another 12 score the Merrie Band.
Husic is the future. Albo is from the past. Labor should rebuild and install Husic as leader.
Clem Attlee says:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 7:42 am
Albanese…hopeless
Well probably, but no more hopeless than the last 10 PMs…
At least he’s not corrupt as the last 3 Tory PMs.
The real problem is the expectation that a PM or executive government should be expected to govern well especially when executive government is a contradiction to democracy & the parliamentary process. Why bother voting for a parliamentary member when no policy or legislation is actually generated on the floor of Parliament.. just vote for your dictator instead.
laughtong 8.47am
[It is a Redbridge but mostly on housing affordability.
No voting intentions that I can see, and mentions the newspoll. I guess later so they can have yet another go at the ALP]
If it we much different to the “trend” Redbridge would be on the roof tops !
Don’t get me wrong: I’m a huge fan of public transport. I have spent significant periods of my adult life without a car.
Most people who weren’t already getting public transport at a concessional rate are commuters to jobs. Of course it’s nice for them to pay less, but I reckon that there would be dozens of significantly higher priorities for any state government, eg: more public housing, access to a computer for every secondary school kid, more teacher’s aides to allow the teachers to occasionally direct their attention away from the disruptive kids and towards those who are trying to learn, etc, etc. And, as I have already stated, expanding, upgrading and maintaining the existing public transport networks.
Of course, there are a disproportionate number of swinging voters among commuters to the outer suburbs. And I guess that’s politics.
Rex Douglassays:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:56 am
[Husic is the future. Albo is from the past. Labor should rebuild and install Husic as leader.]
Unrefreshingly dishonest !
Thanks for nothing Rex Douglas.
Rex: “Husic is the future. Albo is from the past. Labor should rebuild and install Husic as leader.”
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Nope. I was a big fan of Husic and saw him as a potential future leader until he got onto the front bench, where I reckon he has struggled a bit.
He has the potential to improve, but he needs much more experience before he could be considered for any sort of a leadership role.
If the idea is to replace Albo with a westie from the right faction, then it simply has to be Bowen IMO. He’s genuinely smart and would be a significant improvement on Albo, but his reputation both within and outside the party was badly damaged by his role as Shadow Treasurer in the 2019 election and I’m not sure that it will ever recover.
If it can’t be Bowen (and IMO it can’t), then best stick with Albo. I don’t rate any of the others (bar Wong, who is not in the race).
Arky says:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:08 am
I don’t think the Voice referendum campaign helped at all, but the movement of the polling does not at all support the idea that it was the failure of the Voice that turned people off Albo.
________
Have to disagree. See https://www.pollbludger.net/fed2025/bludgertrack/leaders.htm?
That looks like a clear biphasic trend on Albanese satisfaction to me. Downwards to the referendum and relatively flat since. Dutton relatively flat throughout. We can quibble at the margins 🙂
Albanese and Labor need to continue their good old boringly dependable, honest and reformative government.
If the proletariat feel a need to have nuclear energy, corruption, nepotism, unequal wealth, environmental vandalism, higher taxes, lower wages and a fight with China go ahead and vote the leftovers back into government at the next election.
If you think about it though more people using public transport means people get around more efficiently, people are then happier and less stressed which combined pays for itself and more in increases in productivity and then there is also less need to spend on upgrading road infrastructure with fewer cars on the road.
Thks laughtong.
Looks like we’ll get a drip feed of data as the day proceeds.
Per the newspoll, there was a bit of chatter last night, but most of you have worked out that the 2PP only changed because the Greens went down a tick and PHON went up. There were actually no changes to the major primaries, which seems to have been overlooked by most.
The PM’s netsat is at a term negative high, but on the flip side, Dutton is exactly the same. They’re both on minus 14. This isn’t good for Albo, but it’s hardly delightful for Dutton either.
The 3 polls early last week all showed an uptick for Labor. And last nights Newspoll (as mentioned) showed no change in the major primaries.
I’m hoping we’ll get some figures during the day on Redbridge. Last time they teamed up with Accent Research, they produced a sample > 2000.
We’ll have the latest Roy Morgan Murder this evening.
The Freshwater poll is also due. I thought last night, but it will turn up when it turns up, via the AFR.
YouGov is also due. Will be a busy week for poll crazies like me
Bludgertrack was updated last night too presumably with the Newspoll figures.
Still showing 49.9% ALP.
Thomas and Cat
Wake me up when quantum computing starts making a profit. They can power it with cold fusion.
UNIFIL is supposed to be a neutral player.
Anyone who believes that UNIFIL actually did its job (yes, our taxes by way of Australia’s substantial UN contributions at work) and kept Heshbollah, and all its military works, north of the Litani River for the last three decades as per the last Peace Agreement Interruption in the Forever War is doing cult-style thinking.
Where were all the press releases criticizing Heshbollah’s breaking the Agreement? Where were all the UN condemnations of Heshbollah’s military preparations in what was supposed to be the equivalent of a DMZ? Where were all the massive responses and protests and campaigns from peace-loving groups in western countries? Where were all the articles in the west’s MSM complaining about this massive and repeated breach of the Agreement? Most of all, where was First Dag on the Moon when we really wanted some bite to the usual yapping?
After Oct 7 Heshbollah followed up all its war preparations both south and north of the Litani River with massive air assaults as well as troop incursions into northern Israel. Did these Heshbollah troops somehow levitate from north of the Litani River?
Civilians were killed and injured. 100,000 Israelis were forced from their homes. They are still not back.
That UNIFIL is now squawking ‘Unfair!’ shows how very badly UNIFIL, and indeed the UN as a peacekeeping organisation, is compromised.
And before the various slavish supporters of one or other of the fundamentalist religious nut job mobs do yet another personal spray in my direction, I find the combined behaviours of the absolutist-religion-based genocidal maniacs to be right up there with the half dozen or so worst incidents of mass human insanity since world War 2.
I would jail all the leaders for life if I possibly could.
High Street says:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 8:36 am
Enough of the rewriting of history regarding the Referendum and federal polling.
If the Referendum was seen as such a great destruction of the Labor Government, its polling would have dropped in October, probably even in September when it was all in the news. Polls dropped against the government in NOVEMBER – AFTER THE INTEREST RATE RISE. Several economists commented at the time that it looked like the economy hit a wall in December.
Two weeks to the September Quarter CPI release.
_______
The Labor lead in 2pp declined over the referendum campaign as well and the rate of decline increased in June 2023. I don’t have time to superimpose referendum polling.
PageBoi says:
Monday, October 14, 2024 at 6:59 am
Griff,
Agree with your comment that Albo needs to do something bold to turn things around, but I don’t think infrastructure will work. He can’t, because all the state infrastructure is already crowding out housing construction, and a major federal infrastructure push would only make it worse , and housing is killing them. The continued mine approvals don’t help for construction workers either….
For mine it needs to be health. If the government could restore bulk billing for all, maybe by a huge increase to standard Medicare rebates in the short term and then a larger package of reforms to make it sustainable into the future (including measures to make GP more attractive to me medical graduates)
Would probably require some tax measures to pay for it though
_________
Health is worth a look. An increase to the Medicare Levy to fund? But healthcare is tough. Many governments have had a go and struggled. OC would be able to tell you about that 🙂
What policy changes and new policies are the Dutton LNP taking to the next election in 2025 ?
They won’t have Albo, Tanya, Ed, Marlesy, Bowen, either King or Tony Burke running Australia?
That would be a winning formula, imo.
Morning all. Thanks for the roundup BK. The economy is a mixed bag at present. Lots of external negatives but some good local responses. And lots of spin, which identifies the bias of the spinner more than any actual fact.
Housing is the main problem. Labor’s solution is necessary but not sufficient. It is being punished for that.
Despite the criticism of Albo, it is the Greens vote that has dropped. The Greens have only themselves to blame. They had a bad week. Faced with a historically unpopular PM and LOTO, the Greens spoiling tactics and dubious candidate choices are not winning friends.
So if present trends continue and there is a May 2025 election, Labor will end up in minority and rely on the Teals. They could do a lot worse. If Labor is having trouble getting along with the Greens then they had better learn to deal with the Teals.
Diogenes @ #138 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 9:08 am
Did you say the same thing when the first EV was released?
First-term governments almost always get a boost during the honeymoon but end up with a swing against them when the next election comes around. The current government seems perfectly standard in that regard.
Looking for triggers that started the decline is pretty pointless.
Unifil was first deployed to ensure Israel’s withdrawal from Southern Lebanon after the 1978 invasion. It was to monitor and report but not prevent further Israeli incursions of Lebanese sovereignty. It has been spectacularly successful in doing so and has noted Israeli invasions in 1982, 2006 and 2024 just to name a few.
When the US is your sugar daddy, the term “International Law” has a limited meaning.
Remember “big data “for about a decade recently that was the go to for internet start ups to make billions promising blue sky via nasdaq etc.
A dud now many have moved on and are doing Artificial intelligence and a MIT academic said recently only 5 Percent of jobs will be lost due to AI.
Big call he’s saying it’s hype.
Blockchain,cold fusion,big data and quantum has had huge money thrown at it as well.
AI maybe the one though Wong the guy in charge of Nvidia knows his shite.
Even Musk has caught the hype bug last week..
Seven AI companies have 33% of the value of the S&P 500.
Quantum computing companies have 0.00%. And Husic decided to go with quantum.
Diogenes @ #148 Monday, October 14th, 2024 – 9:34 am
Because, guess what? Quantum Computing is going to transform computing the way desktops did. As I said, you don’t seem to have much foresight. Also, are not familiar with the bidding war over that particular company. Which Australia won. America tried very hard to keep them. Is that because they’re such a dud, Dio?
Meher Baba
What are your thoughts on Jason Clare as leadership material.
He’s been quite impressive to me the few times he’s fronted the media, particularly during the last election.