7/21 Election Polls

Highlights of day four July 21, 2010 at 12:07 PM A summary of yesterday’s events that didn’t get posted overnight due to internet trouble. • The election debate will be held from 6.30pm and 7.30pm on Sunday, an hour earlier and half an hour shorter than normal. The reason on both counts is to avoid a conflict with the final of MasterChef on Channel Ten. David Speers of SkyNews will moderate, and the leaders will face a panel consisting of Malcolm Farr from the Daily Telegraph, Chris Uhlmann of ABC News 24 and Laura Tingle of the Australian Financial Review. • Christian Kerr in The Australian reports the Liberal campaign headquarters that will belatedly commence operation today is believed to be at 90 Collins Street, Melbourne, but “sources said the location was even being hidden from campaign workers who are expected to begin work there today”. • Julia Gillard spent yesterday in the western Sydney and hinterland seats of Macquarie and Greenway. Matthew Franklin and Sarah Elks of The Australian note this is of a piece with an apparent campaign strategy to favour set-piece photo opportunities over less easily manageable appearance in public places. Tony Abbott on the other hand remained in Melbourne – less than a target-rich environment as far as marginal seats are concerned – which included a public appearance in marginal Labor Deakin. David Crowe of the Australian Financial Review made the following observation yesterday: In a pre-emptive strike against Prime Minister Julia Gillard, the Coalition has begun a below-the-radar campaign in regional Queensland to woo voters in key areas that could decide the federal election … Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey launched the effort late last week – a move that focused on local media and local campaigns rather than participation in the blanket national media coverage of the election, when it was called on Saturday. The strategy ensured the Coalittion had senior figures campaigning in cities such as Townsville and the highly marginal seat of Herbert before Ms Gillard headed to the area yesterday (Monday) morning. Beginning last Wednesday, Mr Hockey travleled from Gladstone to Mackay, Townsville, Innisfail and Cairns over five days to campaign for Coalition candidates”. For all your campaign movement needs (not just the leaders), note Crikey’s excellent Election Tracker feature. • Labor’s candidate for the Melbourne hinterland seat of Flinders, held for the Liberals by Greg Hunt, has apologised for suggesting Tony Abbott’s conservative social positions were “influencing people to take their own lives”. • Simon Canning of The Australian notes Labor is “expected to keep its hands clean in the election marketing war by allowing the union movement to carry the can and send out ads attacking Liberal leader Tony Abbott and the threat of a Coalition government”. The Australian Workers Union’s Addams Family ad is cited as a case in point. • Tony Koch and Sean Parnell of The Australian consider the impact of the government’s restitution of programs to engage indigenous people with the electoral process, which had been cut by the Rudd government. The main marginal seats with high indigenous populations are Leichhardt in far north Queensland and the Darwin-based seat of Solomon. • The Liberal National Party has come up with an odd arrangement whereby its newly preselected candidate for Kevin Rudd’s seat of Griffith, Rebecca Docherty – herself a substitute for dumped former Liberal Democratic Party figure John Humphreys – will make way for an unspecified “high-profile” candidate should Rudd have a late change of heart about remaining in politics. • Discussing Newspoll and Galaxy results in the Financial Review, Andrew Catsaras calculates the “market share of swinging voters” – 17 per cent of the total – at 29 per cent for Labor, 35 per cent for the Coalition and 31 per cent for the Greens. I presume he’s done this by comparing the totals to some measure of the parties’ bedrock levels of support. If we’re lucky he might enlighten us in comments. • The Daily Telegraph has published details of a poll on climate change conducted for lobbyist firm Parker and Partners by “online polling company Pureprofile”, showing 82 per cent of respondents favouring “strong or moderate action immediately”.

7/20 Elections Poll 2010

Highlights of day three July 20, 2010 at 2:51 AM Peter van Onselen offers the following on internal polling in The Australian: The Australian understands that Labor’s track polling shows its support is lifting in all states except Queensland, where the combinations of the toppling of Kevin Rudd (a local boy) and the deep unpopularity of the state government and Premier Anna Bligh are stifling support. The numbers suggest Labor could lose a host of seats in the Sunshine State. Attempts to arrest the decline include efforts by candidates to localise campaigns, along with sending Julia Gillard to Queensland for the early part of the campaign to break down the growing angst against her for tearing down an elected prime minister. Labor sources point out the irony is that during Rudd’s leadership, Queensland had been a problematic state where dissatisfaction with the job he was doing was high. Perhaps surprisingly, the dip in support for Labor in Western Australia has been contained and a small upsurge has occurred. The same results have been seen in NSW on the strength of Labor’s changed border protection policy under Ms Gillard. The Coalition is facing financial constraints and is not doing anywhere near the amount of expensive track polling it did at the last election, or as much as Labor is doing now, according to one senior Liberal source. But the quantitative research the Coalition has done is said to have buoyed Tony Abbott and Brian Loughnane about their chances of a competitive result or even an upset victory. The Coalition is apparently tracking better in key marginal seats than published polls with wider samples such as Newspoll might suggest. Around the grounds: • Labor and the Greens have confirmed a preference deal in which the latter will receive Senate preferences across the country, and the former will get lower house preferences in 44 of 50 marginal seats. The Sydney Morning Herald reports local Greens in six seats have refused to abide by the deal: Lindsay and Gilmore in NSW, Herbert, Blair and Dawson in Queensland, and Sturt in South Australia. • While Tony Abbott was having a rough ride in Melbourne, Julia Gillard spent the first weekday of the campaign targeting the Townsville seat of Herbert, where Liberal member Peter Lindsay is retiring and redistribution has nudged the seat from super-marginal Liberal to super-marginal Labor. Gillard spent the visit spruiking the Better Regional Cities policy which was unveiled the on Sunday, which will commit $200 million to affordable housing in regional cities. • The Australian’s Samantha Maiden and Dennis Shanahan have both written today of a slick and efficient early campaign performance from Labor’s media unit that is leaving the opposition in its wake. According to Maiden, “media organisations are being carpet-bombed by an ALP campaign unit on steroids that is racing out media alerts, audio files of Coalition gaffes and interview transcripts via the social networking site Twitter”. The Sydney Morning Herald reports the Liberal campaign headquarters will not be operational until today. • The ABC reports police have ruled out a firearm being responsible for damage to the home and campaign office of Brent Thomas, Labor’s candidate for Hughes, with a slingshot deemed more likely. Newspoll: 55-45 to Labor; Galaxy: 50-50 July 18, 2010 at 11:56 PM Whom to believe? The first two polls conducted during the election campaign proper have turned in wildly different results. Newspoll has Labor with a lead so overwhelming that The Australian describes it as “solid”. On the primary vote Labor holds the lead for the first time since mid-April, with their own vote steady on 42 per cent and the Coalition down two points to 38 per cent. That translates into a landslide-winning two-party preferred split of 55-45, compared with 53-47 at the previous poll three weeks ago. We are told that Julia Gillard now holds a 30 point lead as preferred prime minister, up from 24 per cent last time. Galaxy on the other hand has turned in its second poll in as many days, this one conducted on Saturday night from a sample of 800 (yesterday’s poll, which had Labor ahead 52-48, was conducted in the last days before the election was called), and it has the two parties tied on two-party preferred, with Labor’s primary vote down a point to 38 per cent and the Coalition up two to 44 per cent. However, Julia Gillard maintains huge leads on attitudinal questions, in particular “more in touch with voters” (56-28). Both polls have the Greens on 12 per cent. The margins of error are about 3 per cent for Newspoll and 3.5 per cent for Galaxy. UPDATE: Full results from Newspoll here and Galaxy here. Newspoll has sought personal ratings on Julia Gillard for the first time, which have her at 48 per cent approval and 29 per cent disapproval. Tony Abbott’s ratings have sagged heavily: approval is down six to 36 per cent, disapproval up 10 to 51 per cent. Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened from 53-29 to 57-27. Both polls also ask voters to identify the best party to handle the economy, climate change and asylum seekers/border security. Oddly, Labor gets better results on items two and three (and the same on item one) from Galaxy. Other news: • According to Sid Maher in The Weekend Australian, Coalition polling in the Brisbane area has it “12 points clear of Labor in one marginal seat, and Labor sources concede that the party’s primary vote remains below 40 per cent in some key areas”. Discussing internal polling in Queensland on Insiders yesterday, Dennis Atkins of the Courier-Mail spoke of “seats that are next to each other, one which has got a 5, 6 per cent swing against Labor, the other one hasn’t budged, no swing whatsoever”. He also related that “even the Liberals are saying they can’t make it in Herbert”. • Phillip Hudson of the Herald-Sun reports leaked party research indicates Labor has been focus group testing television advertisements featuring Julia Gillard attacking Tony Abbott on health, education, broadband and WorkChoices, unified by the theme: “Don’t let Tony Abbott take us backwards”. • The Daily Telegraph reports police are investigating what appear to have been gun shots fired into the home and campaign office of Brent Thomas, Labor’s candidate for the marginal Liberal seat of Hughes. • Two men have been reported for allegedly assaulting a Liberal volunteer who was on the campaign trail with Jassmine Wood, candidate for the marginal Labor Adelaide seat of Hindmarsh. The incident reportedly followed a dispute over the Liberals’ policies on asylum seekers. • Drew Warne-Smith of The Australian reports GetUp! will take the Australian Electoral Commission to court over its determination that it would not accept enrolments placed through its OzEnrol.com.au website, which sought to facilitiate online enrolment by having the required signature filled out through a mouse of trackpad. • Malcolm Mackerras has tipped a slightly increased majority for Labor, of 85 seats to the Coalition’s 65. UPDATE 2: Essential Research, conducted from Tuesday to Sunday, concurs with Newspoll at 55-45. This is the same result as the previous week, with the Coalition up a point on the primary vote to 39 per cent, Labor steady on 41 per cent and the Greens steady on 13 per cent. Julia Gillard is up on both approval (four points to 52 per cent) and disapproval (three points to 30 per cent), while Abbott’s three point gain on approval (40 per cent) comes out of a lower disapproval. Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened from her debut from 49-29 to 53-26. Also featured are most important election issues, best party to handle them and some hard-to-read stuff on “Australian values”.

Newspoll: 55-45 to Labor; Galaxy: 50-50

Whom to believe? The first two polls conducted during the election campaign proper have turned in wildly different results. Newspoll has Labor with a lead so overwhelming that The Australian describes it as “solid”. On the primary vote Labor holds the lead for the first time since mid-April, with their own vote steady on 42 per cent and the Coalition down two points to 38 per cent. That translates into a landslide-winning two-party preferred split of 55-45, compared with 53-47 at the previous poll three weeks ago. We are told that Julia Gillard now holds a 30 point lead as preferred prime minister, up from 24 per cent last time. Galaxy on the other hand has turned in its second poll in as many days, this one conducted on Saturday night from a sample of 800 (yesterday’s poll, which had Labor ahead 52-48, was conducted in the last days before the election was called), and it has the two parties tied on two-party preferred, with Labor’s primary vote down a point to 38 per cent and the Coalition up two to 44 per cent. However, Julia Gillard maintains huge leads on attitudinal questions, in particular “more in touch with voters” (56-28). Both polls have the Greens on 12 per cent. The margins of error are about 3 per cent for Newspoll and 3.5 per cent for Galaxy.

UPDATE: Full results from Newspoll here and Galaxy here. Newspoll has sought personal ratings on Julia Gillard for the first time, which have her at 48 per cent approval and 29 per cent disapproval. Tony Abbott’s ratings have sagged heavily: approval is down six to 36 per cent, disapproval up 10 to 51 per cent. Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened from 53-29 to 57-27. Both polls also ask voters to identify the best party to handle the economy, climate change and asylum seekers/border security. Oddly, Labor gets better results on items two and three (and the same on item one) from Galaxy.

Other news:

• According to Sid Maher in The Weekend Australian, Coalition polling in the Brisbane area has it “12 points clear of Labor in one marginal seat, and Labor sources concede that the party’s primary vote remains below 40 per cent in some key areas”. Discussing internal polling in Queensland on Insiders yesterday, Dennis Atkins of the Courier-Mail spoke of “seats that are next to each other, one which has got a 5, 6 per cent swing against Labor, the other one hasn’t budged, no swing whatsoever”. He also related that “even the Liberals are saying they can’t make it in Herbert”.

• Phillip Hudson of the Herald-Sun reports leaked party research indicates Labor has been focus group testing television advertisements featuring Julia Gillard attacking Tony Abbott on health, education, broadband and WorkChoices, unified by the theme: “Don’t let Tony Abbott take us backwards”.

• The Daily Telegraph reports police are investigating what appear to have been gun shots fired into the home and campaign office of Brent Thomas, Labor’s candidate for the marginal Liberal seat of Hughes.

• Two men have been reported for allegedly assaulting a Liberal volunteer who was on the campaign trail with Jassmine Wood, candidate for the marginal Labor Adelaide seat of Hindmarsh. The incident reportedly followed a dispute over the Liberals’ policies on asylum seekers.

• Drew Warne-Smith of The Australian reports GetUp! will take the Australian Electoral Commission to court over its determination that it would not accept enrolments placed through its OzEnrol.com.au website, which sought to facilitiate online enrolment by having the required signature filled out through a mouse of trackpad.

• Malcolm Mackerras has tipped a slightly increased majority for Labor, of 85 seats to the Coalition’s 65.

UPDATE 2: Essential Research, conducted from Tuesday to Sunday, concurs with Newspoll at 55-45. This is the same result as the previous week, with the Coalition up a point on the primary vote to 39 per cent, Labor steady on 41 per cent and the Greens steady on 13 per cent. Julia Gillard is up on both approval (four points to 52 per cent) and disapproval (three points to 30 per cent), while Abbott’s three point gain on approval (40 per cent) comes out of a lower disapproval. Gillard’s lead as preferred prime minister has widened from her debut from 49-29 to 53-26. Also featured are most important election issues, best party to handle them and some hard-to-read stuff on “Australian values”.