May 09 2007
Idle speculation: budget edition
None of this actually has anything to do with the budget, but you know how it is …
• The ALP’s national executive, which was empowered by the recent national conference to select candidates for 25 New South Wales seats, announced the candidates for 10 seats on Saturday. In the western Sydney seat of Blaxland, sitting member Michael Hatton has been dumped in favour of another member of the Right, Transurban executive and former Bob Carr staffer Jason Claire. Hatton has held the seat since replacing Paul Keating at a by-election held in the wake of the 1996 election defeat. Others who had designs on Blaxland included constitutional expert George Williams, Bankstown mayor Tania Mihailuk and Electrical Trades Union chief Bernie Riordan. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Mihailuk had been “likely” to win, possibly explaining Hatton’s decision to lodge disciplinary charges against her for “failing to properly manage her branch affairs”.
• The national executive has also chosen Penrith mayor David Bradbury (said by Brad Norington of The Australian to have “historical links” to the Transport Workers Union) to make his third successive run against Jackie Kelly in Lindsay. Joe Hildebrand of the Daily Telegraph reports that Bradbury’s win has greatly displeased the National Union of Workers, which had thrown its weight behind 23-year-old school teacher May Hayek. Others to get the nod in Coalition-held seats included human rights lawyer George Newhouse, who will run against Malcolm Turnbull in Wentworth (where the redistribution has cut Turnbull’s margin from 5.6 per cent to 2.6 per cent); former ministerial staffer Greg Holland, who will make his second run against Danna Vale in the long-lost seat of Hughes (which fell in 1996, and now has a post-redistribution margin of 8.8 per cent); Belinda Neal, former Senator and wife of state Industrial Relations Minister John Della Bosca, who will attempt to unseat Jim Lloyd in Robertson (margin now 6.9 per cent); and ambulance officer Tim Arneman, who suffered a 68-vote defeat in Port Stephens at the state election, and now faces Bob Baldwin in Paterson (6.8 per cent).
• Two incumbents have emerged from the national executive process unscathed: Julia Irwin in Fowler and Jennie George in Throsby. A highly fancied bid by former national party president Warren Mundine to unseat Irwin fell foul of the party’s affirmative action targets, after a number of defeats by female candidates in other seats. The irony of an indigenous candidate being squeezed out on affirmative action grounds was widely noted. The Australian Jewish News reports that both Rudd’s office and Melbourne Ports MP Michael Danby told the paper to keep quiet about the challenge to Irwin, a vocal critic of Israel, the former saying that “the best way to ensure her survival is for you guys to cover it”. According to Kerry-Anne Walsh of the Sun-Herald, Jennie George’s endorsement followed a “faction deal made between the Left and Right” that would “raise eyebrows”.
• Mark Davis of the Sydney Morning Herald reports that affirmative action supporters in the New South Wales ALP’s Left have revolted against the factional leadership’s decision to deliver the number two Senate position to Doug Cameron, former national secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union. Seven women have nominated against Cameron for the factional ballot, including management consultant and 2003 state election candidate Imogen Wareing. The first and third positions on the ticket are reserved for the Right; it is anticipated that Ursula Stephens will be demoted from her number one position in 2001 to number three, making way for state party secretary Mark Arbib.
• A factional row has erupted in the New South Wales Liberal Party after its nomination review panel rejected country vice-president Scott McDonald’s Senate preselection nomination. The move safeguarded Left faction member Marise Payne’s third position on the Coalition ticket, behind Helen Coonan and the Nationals’ John Williams (who replaces the retiring Sandy Macdonald). Background to the dispute was provided by Imre Salusinszky of The Australian:
As part of its general reassertion of authority following the years in exile that began under former premier Nick Greiner, the Right has had its eye on the spot occupied by Marise Payne, who hails from the Left faction. Desperate to avoid predictably bad headlines in the Fairfax newspapers and on the ABC about right-wing “extremists” controlling the party, Howard told Heffernan to work the numbers for Payne. Heffernan went at the task the only way he knows: like a bull at a gate. At a fiery meeting last month, he tried to curtail the preselection process entirely and moved that the state executive simply re-endorse the sitting team. When this failed, Heffernan took the fight to the party’s nominations review committee, of which he is one of three members. The committee threw out the nomination of the Right’s challenger to Payne, state vice-president Scott McDonald. Designed to vet candidates on the grounds of character or ethics, or because their candidacy could damage the party, the committee operates as a “black box” and does not give reasons for its decisions. But it is understood the issue was a conflict of interest, McDonald having already spoken against Heffernan’s motion on the executive. The move has upset the NSW Right like nothing else done in the name of its Dear Leader. Meanwhile, the Left, for once, finds itself supporting Howard and Heffernan.
• Controversial Right faction powerbroker Alex Hawke has thrown his hat in the ring to contest Liberal preselection for Mitchell, where incumbent Alan Cadman proposes to run again despite a universal perception he is past his use-by date. Also in the running are Australian Hotels Association deputy chief executive officer David Elliot and state party vice-president Nick Campbell, described by Irfan Yusuf at Crikey as “the NSW Right’s main number-cruncher”.
• Western Australian Liberal Senator Ian Campbell, who lost his cabinet position in March on the flimsy basis that he had been at a meeting with Brian Burke, has announced he will quit politics in the coming weeks. The party moved quickly to fill the vacancy with Mathias Cormann, who last week defeated incumbent Ross Lightfoot to take the number three position on the ticket for this year’s election. Since the position filled by Cormann does not expire until 2011, the number three position is again up for grabs. According to Robert Taylor of The West Australian, “party insiders said it made sense to shift Mr Cormann into the Senate immediately and search for a strong number three given that Mr Cormann’s dominant presence in the last preselection discouraged many people from nominating”. Names of potential aspirants have yet to surface in the media; however, Campbell last month dismissed speculation that he might be about to resign as “wishful thinking” from those hoping to fill a vacancy, naming Cormann and Nick Bruining, a financial journalist who ran unsuccessfully for the state upper house in 2001.
• The ABC reports a field of nine candidates will seek preselection for the Liberals’ Tasmanian Senate ticket, which will be held “next month in Launceston”. They include two incumbents, John Watson and Richard Colbeck (who were number two and number three in 2001), along with “former state MHA David Fry, former Liberal staffer David Bushby, former political staffer Guilia Jones and Don Morris, the chief of staff to Senate Preisdent Paul Calvert”. The number one candidate from 2001, Senate President Paul Calvert, is retiring.
• In the seat of Newcastle, Labor member Sharon Grierson will face a challenge from David March, president of the party’s Merewether West branch, at a preselection vote to be held on May 26.
• In South Australia, Labor has announced candidates for the Liberal-held seats of Barker (Karen Lock), Grey (Karin Bolton) and Mayo (Mary Brewerton).
May 15th, 2007 at 2:44 am
Shanahan, Price and co at the Oz were in desperate need on some political viagra from Newspoll to satisfy their agenda. They did’t get it, and their impotent, logically flawed and peurile rants in today’s edition are incapable of satisfying anything but their own overblown egos. An F for flacid performance.
May 15th, 2007 at 3:54 am
And indeed this poll IS within the margin of error of the previous one. Still it breaks the run of improvement for Howard. Labor has been steady between 57 and 60 in all the polls for two months. I will take that.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:14 am
mark says : what is your proposed solution to our economic woes ?
May 15th, 2007 at 9:52 am
Not only was Latham from the Right faction, but had been described prior to his election as “the most right-wing MP in the caucus”. My experience of him in my area was that his economic policies were very much about liberalisation, and he was generally very much against Labor acting in a socially progressive way on issues like indigenous people, refugees, gays, etc. He compromised on these things when he was elected Leader, and he had some really creative ideas that I found appealing concerning social issues in western suburbs of Sydney and social capital, but have no doubt that Latham was definitely on the right wing of the ALP, both in his politics and his factional allegiance.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:53 am
Matt Price on ABC Radio yesterday made an interesting point: perhaps the populace have stopped listening to Howard, it mightn’t matter how big the bribes are.
Dare I say it - the Libs must be wishing for a terrorist attack on Australian soil, between now and November.
May 15th, 2007 at 10:50 am
Evan, I’m sure the plans are well underway.
Dick Ceeney will look after the rodent.
May 15th, 2007 at 11:20 am
Interesting tidbit relating to the Galaxy poll. Apparently, the IR question was posed along the lines of whether the respondent supported John Howard’s policy which some people say “will cost jobs and cut wages” or Kevin Rudd’s policy which will “give more power to unions and hurt Australia’s economic prosperity”.
Both are lines being run out by the ALP/Coalition - and the result when Rudd’s way, 53-35.
May 15th, 2007 at 12:04 pm
Coota Bulldog - that is interesting and “The Australian” (and its band of “Get Rudders”) are pushing Labor to change their IR policy. What a bloody joke.
The other interesting thing is in the Newspoll. The same people who gave Labor that high first preference vote gave the budget a tick. Doesn’t this indicate they do not feel threatened economically by a Labor government? This economic advantage the government holds may prove to be less of a hindrance to Labor being elected than what is being proposed by the so called experts.
May 15th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
The most interesting of Newspoll’s findings was that 31% of respondents said they thought Labor would have delivered a better budget. That is a good statistic for the ALP as it strives to emphasise its economic management credentials at a time when the pundits are applauding the treasurer’s “masterclass” budget.
May 15th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
There is a theory going the rounds of the Labor Party that with the good economic times rolling, people may be prepared to make that switch in government. Back in 2004, the “rates will be higher under Labor” campaign worked well because there was uncertainty at the time about the economy.
Three years on, well into a commodities boom that continues to roar along, it’s harder to mount the case that the economic clouds are darkening. Note that Costello often talks about the skill needed to manage an economy at “full capacity” with big issues on the horizon.
May 15th, 2007 at 1:58 pm
The fact is if the polls were the other way around no-one would give Labor any chance of turning them around this far out from an election. Yet, according to some betting agencies the coalition are still in with a very good chance. I’m not saying the polls will stay as they are but surely Labor must be now favoured to win the next election, even by a small margin. This type of polling result ie all polls agreeing Labor are a mile in front, must signify something major is happening out there. I suppose that will come in time if the polls don’t move greatly in the next month.
May 15th, 2007 at 2:56 pm
The coalition is still in the game because they are the government. They still have all the powers of incumbentcy, such as the ability to spend millions on advertising, and the ability to use government departments to come up with new election policies. Oppositions just can’t afford to get this far behind because they don’t have the resources to get back into the game at a later stage.
May 15th, 2007 at 3:38 pm
What gets me is that Labor’s IR policy is basically non-existant (the full detail is unknown) and yet people prefer Rudd’s policy. I will make a bold
prediction:
The Howard Government will be returned by a 5 seat majority.
The swing against Howard will be less then 1% in Bennelong.
The high water mark has been reached and Howard will be gone.
Consequently, does anyone know who will be running in my local area, Casey. This is a case in point for Labor, there primary vote in seats such as this is starting off a vary low base, just over 30% in Casey and the Libs over approx 55% I am not quite sure how well people expect Labor to do with such ground to catch up on.
Labors low primary vote is problem for them
May 15th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
Name an Australian government that has been returned after showing the likes of these opinion polls for this length of time this far out from an election.
Adam, name the issues that will turn this election around for the government.
May 15th, 2007 at 4:07 pm
By the way, is that the Adam (May 11th, 2007 at 5:32 am) who said, “I said in February that if Labor was still well ahead at the end of May I would start to get excited, and that is still my view.”? If so what in these latest set of polls has you now saying, “The Howard Government will be returned by a 5 seat majority. The swing against Howard will be less then 1% in Bennelong.”?
May 15th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
For those interested, I’ve been plotting the 2007 Newspoll figures against the 2004 ones at the same time of year:
http://flag.eaglesflyinghigh.com/election/index.php?pg=pollchart.gif
The most obvious thing is how much the graphs correspond, only with a pretty consistent 4% improvement in the Labor polling this time around.
May 15th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
I don’t understand any of Adam’s post, but I’m just a girl and I remember we aren’t welcome here.
May 15th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
jasmine_Anadyr - As far as I’m concerned you are welcome anytime.
May 15th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
Mr Q - thanks for that. What it does show though is that the gap to close is so much bigger than in 2004. I also note that in the last two years of a change of federal government in 1983 Labor’s primary vote was 49.5 and the coalitions 43.6 (TPP - 53.2, 46.8) and in 1996 Labor’s primary vote was 38.75 and the coalitions 47.2 (TPP - 46.6, 53.6). The closer elections were those elections around them where no change took place. So if a change is going to take place it seems it needs to be fairly dramatic and the polls at the moment are quite dramatic. Unfortunately I can’t find the poll predictions for those years.
May 15th, 2007 at 5:51 pm
Adam,
Dympna Beard who was the State member for Kilsyth for a term - narrowly lost last year - is the Labor candidate for Casey, pre-selected late last week.
May 15th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Are there two Adams?
May 15th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
I think there must be two Adams. I just don’t think the adam in Germany would be making such contradictory statements.
May 15th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
# jasmine_Anadyr Says:
May 15th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
I don’t understand any of Adam’s post, but I’m just a girl and I remember we aren’t welcome here.
What makes you say that Jasmine?
May 15th, 2007 at 6:53 pm
Im glad Dympna Beard is the Labor candidate for Casey. Ive met her a few times at various VIC ALP functions and she is a very nice person. Though with Labors spectacular poll standing i suspect the 13% Casey margin will still be impossible to overcome. Theres a change in the air, i can feel it. Like so many tories before him Howard has stayed on too long and is now paying the price
May 15th, 2007 at 6:53 pm
HaHa now i know why you said that Jasmine Adam has done a backflip LOL
May 15th, 2007 at 7:03 pm
Bill I was just referring back to the whole women in politics and poor Julie Bishop sub-plot in a post-stream. Saw her last night on late-line - poor girl.
But the two Adams got me confused …
May 15th, 2007 at 7:06 pm
Adam Says:
May 15th, 2007 at 3:38 pm
What gets me is that Labor’s IR policy is basically non-existant (the full detail is unknown) and yet people prefer Rudd’s policy. I will make a bold
prediction:
The Howard Government will be returned by a 5 seat majority.
The swing against Howard will be less then 1% in Bennelong.
The high water mark has been reached and Howard will be gone.
???? Adam this just aint you
May 15th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Is there two Adams?
May 15th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
This Adam is now in Brussels, and is not the Adam who commented earlier. Other-Adam, please use another name, I was here first. I am still of the view that the election outcome cannot be called. After 1999 in Victoria, I think my view is that no election can ever be called. However, if Labor is still over 55% at the end of May, I will start to become optimistic.
May 15th, 2007 at 7:11 pm
With the way the polls are, Labor doesnt need to fill in any detail on its IR policy. Arrogance or confidance? More detail does need to be provided though, however as long as Joe Hockey is out there selling desperate messages like 2day-why worry. Hockeys performance 2day was just awful, the memory of Gillards stuff ups are well and truly forgotten, which they shouldnt but if the survival of the Howard Govt means anything to people like Joe Hockey-he better buck up soon
May 15th, 2007 at 7:15 pm
I can see the next headline. Idle speculation the Adams. On a serious note this shows a dangerous problem where more than one person can log on with the same name.
Why is it that two polls can have the Greens at 9 and 4 percent. This shows that polls are totally useless. I can believe 1 or 2 percent difference in major parties but 5 percent on a small party is just wrong
May 15th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Yes Bill that’s true: for example, someone has been coming here using your name and trying to discredit you by making all kinds of extreme and silly statements
May 15th, 2007 at 7:42 pm
I think it is far to early to make concrete election predictions. The Australian electorate rarely changes the federal Government at elections and, as far as I am aware, never in a time of economic boom (possible exception 1996). I believe that elections have resulted in a change of government only 6 times since 1914: 1929, 1931, 1949, 1972, 1983 and 1996.
My heart very much says yes but my mind says probably not.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Adam C - I think you’ll find that’s just Bill. LOL. Just joking Bill.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:05 pm
oc: I think you missed the Dismissal Election.
bill: Newspoll is typically fairly good with the Greens figure, Morgan over-inflates it.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:07 pm
Plus Greens voters mostly live in trees and few pollsters feel like climbing up to find them.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:08 pm
oakeshott - hang on, “My heart very much says yes but my mind says probably not”, that’s a prediction isn’t it? I’d be interested in the rationale behind that comment though oakeshott. What do you see will change the polls so dramatically?
May 15th, 2007 at 8:09 pm
I think that a number of conclusions can be drawn from the polls, though I agree with the above commenters that the election outcome is not one of them.
It would be great to see more seat-by-seat polls, though I suspect they would be less heartening from a Labor perspective. As a Victorian, I don’t think Labor is likely to gain any ground here, but should hold onto its marginals, and, in the presence of a very big swing, could perhaps cause a surprise in places like McEwen. Still, as a Scullin-ite, I realise it is useless if an extra 5-10% of my neighbours go back to Labor, and I wonder if some of the good polling is a kind of ‘correction’ on the poor results of 2004, particularly in safe seats.
Labor should, by rights, have done far better in 2004. The basic issues were very similar, with the exception of IR (i.e. economic management, Iraq, interest rates, Iraq, Hicks, ‘trust’, etc).
By way of some tentative conclusions, I would suggest:
1. There is a mood for change, and this has been reasonably consistent over several months. It’s just a question of whether this ‘mood’ felt in the right seats.
2. Howard (and the rest of the front bench) look far less invincible when put under a bit of pressure. This should have been un almost unloseable election for the Libs, but they are doing their best to let Labor in. Howard is no ‘political genius’, and I think people are starting to reinterpret his past success (with the economy, for instance) as being at least partly the result of good fortune.
3. Finally, I think we can say with absolute certainty that whoever is responding to these polls clearly does not read or believe the histrionics in The Australian.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:13 pm
oakeshott - “I believe that elections have resulted in a change of government only 6 times since 1914: 1929, 1931, 1949, 1972, 1983 and 1996.” Given that logic are you suggesting we will never have a change of government again? If not, and I guess I’m just rephrasing the question above here but why shouldn’t this election be the one to have a change given the obvious, unheard of, advantage Labor holds at the moment?
May 15th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
Dr Carr,
Thank God you have found the time to share your incisive and brilliant analysis with us all during your European speaking engagements.
You may yet get your “executive” cubicle!
May 15th, 2007 at 9:01 pm
I am not a fan of Rudd but i think the electorate finds him attractive and appealing.. and whom speaks in a clear, articulate, positve and logical way. I know this may seem simplistic but being catching to the eye helps a great and this is in Rudds’ favour.. and that is why this time next win he will be Prime Minister… unless something like September 11 happened again..
Their is little difference between the parties but Howard will go on from now until election day that he Labor will ruin the economy…and really economies fall apart due to overseas occurrences and the fortunes of time.. If their are differences i think Climate Change and the style of Government we recieve will be differences.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:02 pm
There are in fact few stable democracies in which changes of government are frequent, and they are mostly countries which inflict some form of PR on themselves (Italy, Belgium). France has had only two changes since 1958, Germany only four since 1949, Japan only one brief one since 1945. Britain has had three Labour governments since 1945, New Zealand three since 1949. The US changes more frequently - the White House changing party seven times since 1952. So Australia is only marginally more resistant to change than most long-established democracies, particularly those with electoral sytems which, like ours, encourage stable majority governments.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
whoops ‘helps a great deal’ and ‘now until election day that the Party wil ruin the economy’
May 15th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
The Speaker - I was waiting to see who would fall for it! Malcolm Frazer was the prime minister at that election and was returned with a very large majority.
“probably not” isn’t a concrete prediction like “the government has no chance of getting back from this position”. We are a long way from even the start of the campaign - who knows what the coalition has in store - a terrorist threat?, immigration?, dirt on rudd (what was Alan Ramsey referring to?), even perhaps just a catchy jingle.
In good economic times, despite what the electors say they feel about the tiredness of the government or its policies, precedent shows that when it comes to tossing a government out they rarely do it. When there is an economic downturn it is a different matter.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
To be honest, I can’t see why or where this “mood for change” has come from. I’ll be the first to admit I don’t understand the mind (or lack thereof) when it comes to Aussie punters doing their democratic duty.
There is no GST, no Tampa, IRAQ hasn’t figured in much public opinion, so I wonder if our PM is as confused as us. As much as I have been impressed by Rudd, please don’t tell me it is just because “we are bored with him”???!!
That is as bad as saying a pollie is too fat, no personality, dresses badly or has bad hair. As far as I am aware, such characteristics are scrutinised very carefully during pre-selection to ensure that politicians have as many of these as possible
Why, why, why?? Why are we enamored by Rudd and yawning at Howard. Howard is clever, gives us money and genuinely loves cricket.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:19 pm
BTW with regard to an “obvious, unheard of advantage Labor holds at the moment”. Newspoll had the primary vote at Alp 48/Coalition 35 in March 2001 - within the margins of error of the current poll. Labor lost a significant number of seats at the next election.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:36 pm
‘Why are we enamored by Rudd and yawning at Howard. Howard is clever, gives us money and genuinely loves cricket.’
I don’t think people are in love with Rudd, but I suspect he is credible in the eyes of voters. His approval ratings are far better than Beazley’s. And I don’t thinking people are ‘yawning’ at Howard; rather, they are holding their noses.
The Liberals have the accumulated weight of 11 years worth of scandal dragging them down. Individual issues (like AWB, or Iraq) might not do much to sway many voters, but in sum, they could make the government look rather dodgy, especially when viewed through the lens of Workchoices.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:37 pm
Oakeshott I think you would have to concede that Labor’s poll position is now superior to its position at the equivalent times in 1998, 2001 or 2004. If Howard is to win this election, he will need a bigger recovery, in less time, than he achieved in those years, and without the assistance of Tampa, 9/11 or Mad Mark. It is not impossible, but each fortnight that passes without a significant inprovement in the coalition’s numbers makes it less likely, n’est ce pas?
May 15th, 2007 at 9:40 pm
I suspect the reason is that people are generally fed up with the current government, and I believe this threshold was crossed when the government introduced WorkChoices. WCs is quite a betrayal to those loyal Howard Battlers (or at least is perceived to be), and all Labor had to to was replace Beazley with someone people wanted to listen to. Rudd has delivered this, and IR is not the wedge issue for Labor that, say, refugees were/ are - a belief in collective bargaining is probably the one common value left, so it was relatively easy for Labor to oppose WCs. Luckily for them, this opposition seems to have the majority support of the population.
Of course, if Labor does end up being elected later this year, WCs won’t be the only issue, and by itself it’s not enough, but climate change, Iraq, education, “the future” - these are all issues playing into the Rudd narrative of Labor representing the future. WCs got Labor back into the game, and events have since conspired to sink the government. When the tide goes out, it does so very quickly.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:55 pm
I’m glad that News.com.au has picked on a quote Howard made on The 7:30 Report tonight. Howard said this:
“Ultimately we’ll find out whether it’s not been, you know, an interesting exercise by the Australian public in its innate sense of humour. We’ll find that out on election day.”
Of course Howard isn’t showing any arrogance or hubris, he just thinks people don’t want to vote for his government because of a joke! If Rudd said this Howard would be all over him calling him an out of touch elitist!
May 15th, 2007 at 9:59 pm
Mais qui. But one of the great things about watching politics is that you never know what’s around the corner.
Even when the polls are horribly bad I always watch the results with the hope that a miracle will happen and vice-versa. Statements like “the government can’t recover from here” are both inaccurate and destroy much of the fun of political involvement.
May 15th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
You’re right, of course, Oakeshott, and regardless of the end result, this election is going to be quite a ride. It certainly looks like Rudd is too far ahead, but things can turn around very quickly - he could have his “handshake moment”. Not that Rudd will muscle up like Latham, but some otherwise inconsequential exchange happens that plants doubt about him. Let’s say (as the money flows in to people’s pockets) that the government does get a Budget bounce, and has pulled the 2PP back 5 points by mid-July (which is, after all, still two months away). It’s still quite possible that Howard will see his chace and run to the polls. Come the end of August we could all be talking here about how Rudd lost it.
I’m not saying that will happen, but rather it is meant as a cautionary tale against getting ahead of ourselves (and obviously I’m speaking as a Labor voter here).
However, if Rudd does end up winning, I will look back at being part of the blogosphere who picked the landslide months before the commentariat did.
May 15th, 2007 at 10:55 pm
I’ve been trying to find newspoll results from th may before the 2001 election, but it seems that there were no polls by newspoll in 2001 before october, does anyone know what happened?
May 15th, 2007 at 11:37 pm
I agree with Hugo, there is an element of fate or luck that can’t be predicted or controlled, but some, including Mumble were convinced that Beazley would have beaten Howard and the polling pre him being defeated by Rudd certainly gave him a change.
There was an immediate Rudd bounce that so far has been sustained and so far defies all the waiting for the election to engage, all the ‘delayed affect’ theorems and Howard trick theorems.
Personally I suspect it is a really really out of touch view. I will illustrate with comments of the PM on PM tonight. Where in relation to a 33 million annual salary the PM said that the Govt doesn’t involve itself in caps and then went into Citizen John mode to drool in amazement at the big number.
He forgets and ordinary Australians do not forget that Workchoices is not just a cap it is much more a kneecap. So Government can force largely female workforces in retail and hospitality backwards with a disgraceful and dishonest policy they didn’t bother to outline before the last election but can’t ‘cap’ such a blatant excess. Out of touch.
Finally did Howard or his howardettes think he could give the impression that interest rates wouldn’t rise under him, and the say he never said it when they went up 4 times?
What amazes me most is how long Howard has got away with it, not that Australia’s patience has run right out.
May 15th, 2007 at 11:38 pm
1997: Despite presiding over an economic boom, the British Conservative Party was tossed out of power, after being in office for 18 years.
Tony Blair’s Labour Party won in a landslide.
A parallel with Australia 2007?
May 16th, 2007 at 12:37 am
oakeshott country Says: May 15th, 2007 at 9:19 pm - “BTW with regard to an “obvious, unheard of advantage Labor holds at the momentâ€. Newspoll had the primary vote at Alp 48/Coalition 35 in March 2001 - within the margins of error of the current poll. Labor lost a significant number of seats at the next election.” The “unheard of advantage” refers to more than one poll, not just the voting intention poll and not just by one organisation.
Can you direct me to this poll please? I’ve looked up the Newspoll site and gone through thepolls of that time and cannot find it. While you’re at it, can you show the four months of very strong polling for Labor beginning 2001? Can you also show the other polls taken at the time by other polling organisations showing the same consistently strong figures for Labor? Can you show the preferred PM figures favouring Beazley over Howard as they now favour Rudd? Can you show me the polls showing Beazley’s satisfaction rating as being as high as Rudd’s is now?
I ask this not to be a smart ar.. but to point out that this is a far cry from the 2001 situation.
Do you also remember that the election was held in November that year and in September disaster struck? I know you’ll probably say that that is your point but the chances of this happening again?
May 16th, 2007 at 12:57 am
Just a thought, while I still won’t predict that Rudd will win the election, would people agree that this is clearly the best position the ALP has been in at this point in the cycle (or really any point in the cycle) since Howard came to power?
May 16th, 2007 at 1:21 am
The Newspoll figures can be found by fiddling with this following site on voter intentions. From memory Newspoll did not do a 2pp question until late in 2001. However the primary question showed a labor lead from February onwards- at times getting into double figures. (democrats and Greens combined were polling about 10 -12% - presumably increasing Labor’s 2pp) The change started in late May long before 9/11.
http://www.newspoll.com.au/cgi-bin/polling/display_poll_data.pl?mode=trend&page=select_category
Roy Morgan was showing a 26% 2pp lead to the ALP in February 2001. He even had Labor 9% ahead in November.
http://www.roymorgan.com/news/polls/Trends.cfm?
A C Neilsen had Labor 20% ahead in 2001 in April 2001but by August this was down to 4
http://au.acnielsen.com/reports/documents/ACNielsenPoll2001.pdf
The preferred PM and satisfaction listings are also on these sites Beazley led Howard from March till August on A C Nielsen and from March till June on newspoll. Admittedly his satisfaction ratings were not as good as Rudd’s but that may be related to the length of time he had been leader or to the perception that he was a fat lazy buffoon
May 16th, 2007 at 6:10 am
On the comparative poll position in 2001, 2004 and 2007, the Oz Politics site has a table tracking the comparative position. Go here: http://www.ozpolitics.info/blog/ and scroll down. Labor is currently 6% higher than it was at this point in 01 and 04.
I of course agree with Oakeshott that anything can happen between now and the election, and I’ve been saying all along that no poll in May can guarantee a Labor win in October-November.
But the facts remain: Labor is well ahead of where it was in 01 and 04, and so far neither Howard nor his media running dogs have found a way to damage Rudd’s standing - a sharp contrast with both Beazley and Latham, whose vulnerabilities were well known by this stage in the last two cycles. My clear recollection is that Labor hardheads had already given up on Latham by May 2004.
May 16th, 2007 at 9:58 am
I have a fuller response held up in moderation (all I did was call Beazley a fat lazy buffoon). However the ozpolitics graph isn’t that clear cut, at weeks 17-18 (early May) the comparative difference is about 1% 2007 v 2001- Labor’s primary vote then dived. Yes, Labor is in a good position but it is by no means unassailable.
May 16th, 2007 at 10:05 am
oakeshott country: The Speaker - I was waiting to see who would fall for it! Malcolm Frazer was the prime minister at that election and was returned with a very large majority.
Ah, yes you’ve got me - but I still think it should count as a change of government election, especially for analytical purposes.
May 16th, 2007 at 10:13 am
How far can Rudd fall?
To answer the several questions about how 2007 compares with previous election years, below are the figures for TPP. The poll numbers are averages of at least 3 polling organisations, averaged over 3 periods and so have a sample of about 10,000 and an “error margin” of less than 1%. The “election” for 2007 is my estimate of the nation-wide TPP that the ALP will need to have a majority of 1.
mid-May Election Fall
1998 50.1% 50.7% -0.6%
2001 54.5% 49.4% 5.1%
2004 52.8% 47.7% 5.1%
2007 59.2% 50.8% 8.4%
The only way forward for the ALP is probably down- the above is virtually the ceiling: the rusted-on Coalition primary vote is probably between 31 and 32%, so this could fall further. But the rusted-on TPP for the Coalition is between 40 and 41% and so this can’t fall much further and thus the ALP can’t rise much further.
This is all phenomenological psephology of course, devoid of analysis, but the statistics are pretty robust because we have 15 years of fortnightly polls of some 2,000 people from each of at least 3 pollsters to work with.
May 16th, 2007 at 11:59 am
Oakeshott,
The reason many of us disagree with your cautionary analysis is that you have selected a one-off comparison with 2001.
Any version of moving averages/multiple polling companies makes the 2001-2007 comparison more favourable for Labor this time around.
In addition the fact that the Government is now much more damaged goods, and the obvious superiority in vote-winning potential of Rudd compared to Beazley makes it very easy to suggest the high probability of a change of government.
I also reckon that the economy was going OK in 1972 when the change of government occurred, and in any case, 1969 (when the economy was unequivocally booming) was the effective first stage of that victory, with a 7.5% swing to Labor off the very low 1966 (Vietnam election) base.
May 16th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Thankyou Geoff Lambert for these figures. Were these falls immediately after the budget and did Labor recover any lost ground before the up coming election in any of those years?
I never thought I would ever say this but the significant change surely must be Rudd’s popularity in the preferred PM poll and his high job satisfaction rating. These have been consistently high, unlike Latham and Beazley. This presents a whole new set of problems for the coalition when it comes to combating Labor this time around.
I agree also with Peter Fuller (May 16th, 2007 at 11:59 am).
May 16th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Don’t get me wrong, I agree that Labor is in a better position and the Coalition in a worse position than 6 years. My argument is that it is a big leap to call the election result from opinion polls 6 months out. I very much hope the polls will be vindicated
“Staggering Stagflation” is the headline I remember from 1972. The quote was from Lance Barnard. All these things are relative but the long post war boom was beginning to tire and inflation and unemployment levels were up. One of Labor’s ads had a picture of Newcastle and suggested that under Billy McMahon unemployment might get to 300,000 - the size of Newcastle at that time - how aweful. Of course the first oil shock made this all look like minor stuff. It should be remembered that, despite a brilliant campaign and after 23 years of a very tired government led by someone picked from the bottom of the barrel, Gough’s majority was single digit (?9 without looking it up).
May 16th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
oakeshott country - thankyou for supplying the poll information. I’ve learnt something now about the newspoll site - very handy. I think we share the same wish for the election outcome and I do understand your reluctance to allow yourself to think this will happen this time, anything can happen. I must admit though I’m getting this feeling that people have stopped listening to the government and are seriously looking for a change.
May 16th, 2007 at 12:52 pm
does anybody out there know when the state by state breakdowns are going to appear?
May 16th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
They appear quarterly, Blackburnpseph, so I would say some time in July.
May 16th, 2007 at 1:50 pm
Slightly off topic. The talk of 1972 made me look at Adam’s site for the results of the 1974 double dissolution senate results. Whitlam was doomed when (amongst other results) a liberal posing as an independent one the last seat in Tasmania. What impressed me was that the quota was just over 19000!!!. Crikey, more people have been known to turn up at a Rooster’s home game than this and yet Michael Townley and his senate colleagues were able to launch Australia into its worst, so far, constitutional crisis.
May 16th, 2007 at 1:50 pm
won ,sorry
May 16th, 2007 at 4:58 pm
I was wrong when I said that The Australian would have an editorial on Tuesday that would “attack teacher unions and point out how parents want standards and school autonomy and how the astute John Howard recognises this, while the ALP is unable to because it is in the pocket of the teacher unions, stuck in the past, etc.†It was delayed until Wednesday.
It’s about time for another “I love my AWA†article in The Australian to play tag-team with the “The sky will fall in with Labor’s IR policy†articles of the last few days. We do need some balance after all.
May 16th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
There is one good thing about “The Australian” though, hardly anyone bothers with it. I read some of it on line only because I need a good laugh in the mornings.
May 16th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
# Adam C Says:
May 15th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Yes Bill that’s true: for example, someone has been coming here using your name and trying to discredit you by making all kinds of extreme and silly statements
# Gary Bruce Says:
May 15th, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Adam C - I think you’ll find that’s just Bill. LOL. Just joking Bill.
I love you guys !
May 16th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
Also Beazley was faced with 9/11 and Tampa. My assessment is if Rudd is running evenly with pre-Tampa Beazley, he’s on track to win.
May 17th, 2007 at 11:10 am
Any of you Aussie political junkies interested in Fred Thompson?
http://www.fredthompsonnews.com
May 17th, 2007 at 11:49 am
I’ve always thought Howard would have won in 2001 regardless of 911 and Tampa mainly due to the return of the One Nation voters to the coalition fold. I have no real evidence to support this but the polls were already heading his way.
Another little theory of mine that I haven’t researched is that One Nation distorted the 1998 2PP result to make Labor look better than they actually were because of Labor receiving half the One Nation preferences in safe-safe-safe coalition seats.
May 17th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
I too am heartened by the polls, but I stick to my initial claims:
- WorkChoices is what is toxic to the government, like nothing else (except maybe power plants in your backyard) and Howard can’t fix it (damned if he changes, damned if he doesn’t).
- It is almost impossible for Rudd to win, and I think it is a two election task. The fact people are seriously talking about him winning is a pretty impressive achievement by itself!
- Even if Labor win, the Coalition will still control of the senate.
May 17th, 2007 at 5:49 pm
I’m not sure if that specifically was the cause of Labor’s swing, but I’m sure that One Nation’s existence majorly helped Labor out in 1998.
May 17th, 2007 at 7:27 pm
dembo Says: It is almost impossible for Rudd to win,
Why?
May 17th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
Ben,
‘majorly’?! At least I won’t have to explain ‘my bad’ to you.
May 18th, 2007 at 5:02 am
Oh don’t start with grammar fascism. It’s so annoying.
May 18th, 2007 at 9:42 am
Ben,
You’ve missed my point and you’ve missed TooBee’s point on the other thread. Your irony radar is not working. If it were, I’d make a joke about the inflection in “so”.
May 18th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
bill weller, I say it is nearly impossible because a %5 swing is an awful lot!!!
May 18th, 2007 at 5:01 pm
dembo are you aware that in the 1969 poll Labor achieved a 6.4 per swing after preferences and gained 17 seats, although it lost the election . Kevin Rudd needs a 4per cent uniform swing and 16 seats.
May 18th, 2007 at 8:41 pm
dembo - in 1996 the coalition managed a 5 percent swing towards it to win that election. When the swing is on, it’s on.
May 19th, 2007 at 9:05 am
Sure Rudd could lose the next Election but for Howard to survive it would go down as one of, if not the greatest turn around in history.
I don’t think Howard can do it for if the Liberal heartland is angry then there little hope, remember if you can’t keep the heartland, what chance do you have.
Rudd needs to keep on message, yes he might be seen as nerdy, but the Liberal heartland likes a person to be smart and considered.
The Economy is the only ace going right for the Liberals at present, so while there daylight there is hope, but the Sun is fast setting.
May 19th, 2007 at 11:50 pm
Chris,
Maybe it was ironic, but I wouldn’t have noticed it because people in the past have complained about that perfectly seriously.
May 20th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Ben,
Every word ever used was once used by someone for the first time. I suspect “majorly†arrived in Australia in Clueless, but that is only a guess. Because I was a teacher, I was able to keep up with some changes in expression and thus able to enlighten those who had no idea what The Speaker was saying when he posted “my bad†instead of “I’m sorryâ€. Adding “ly†to “major†is not bad grammar at all – it is rather the application of the normal rule for making adverbs to an adjective that had not in the past been formed into an adverb. It is an example of Valleyspeak (a word I just made up – some will get the meaning, while others will not). Thus language progresses.
The choice of “TooBee†as a screen name seems to be a play on the verb, “to beâ€, as in Shakespeare’s “To be, or not to be – that is the questionâ€. The teacher’s version is “2B, or not 2B. Oh no! I have got 2B.â€
About 25 years ago, students started to refer in their work to authors of letters to the editor and the like by their what were then called Christian names. I would always correct this undue degree of familiarity, yet here we are today as people who have never met addressing each other by what are now called first or given name). I saw a transcript of an interview of Malcolm Fraser by Virginia Trioli. She called him “Malcolmâ€. (If you watched West Wing, you would have heard that most of the script was “Yes, Mr Presidentâ€, “No, Mr Presidentâ€, “Thank you, Mr President†even when the president should have been doing the thanking. Even the vice president told someone off for using his name instead of calling him “Mr Vice Presidentâ€. In fact in the final of the series, the new president kept getting addressed as “Mr President-Elect†before his inauguration. It’s worse than royalty.)
We all make mistakes in spelling, grammar and punctuation. I do not pick people up on them, except for teacher-bashers who had better be perfect in the spelling, grammar and punctuation of their own invective. I was certainly not having a go at you, because you in fact made no mistake.
I do, however, think it is disrespectful of other posters if anyone doe not make the effort to use correct English, and the “I was typing quickly†excuse does not wash with me. (The use of a quotation as an adjective, as I have just done, is not part of the English I was taught, yet it seems perfectly understandable and I accept it as grammatically correct.)
Language changes. It’s hard to know when new words and ways of expression pass from unacceptable to acceptable.
AFAICS IMNSHO, the use of txt detracts from clear meaning.
May 20th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
Chris Curtis, it’s interesting to consider what constitutes “correct” grammar - it is not fixed by anyone or anything and it changes over time.
I have noticed that on many US TV shows, people say phrases such as “You did brilliant”, or “You did good” instead of “You did brilliantly”, or “You did well”. I don’t know if this is a recent phenomenon, but if it is, language in the US is changing before our eyes. It’s very interesting! Does anyone know how this change was initiated?
May 20th, 2007 at 10:05 pm
Sacha,
The ‘ in words replaces the “e†in the “es†which used to be there to indicate the possessive. I don’t know who first dropped the “e†and how it became acceptable to do so, but somebody did. Wednesday is Woden’s day. We’ve kept the “e†in the spelling, but we do not bother pronouncing all the syllables any more. I guess in time dropping “ly†from adverbs, as in “he did brilliantâ€, will become acceptable.
I accepted American spellings such as “color†from students. After all, in this case, the American spelling is the original, the “u†being added to English to be more like the French.
As for the political implications, there are possibly none in these examples, but the word “reform’ is the most misused in the English language, and “Choices†(always a lie) has gone from “WorkChoicesâ€. Labor is in on the act too with its decision to replace the neutral term “Industrial Relations Commission†with “FairWorkAustraliaâ€. Who first decided it was okay not to leave gaps between words? I’d hazard a guess that it was someone from computing, not Apple though.
May 20th, 2007 at 10:38 pm
Thanks Chris - I didn’t know the derivation of “Wednesday” - I’m reading up on the derivation of all the day names - very interesting.
May 20th, 2007 at 11:06 pm
Jasmine
Long delay on your post but, Howard’s classic statement about interest rates in 2004 was “Interest rates will always be lower under a coalition government than they will under a Labor government”. This statement was first made on the 30th of August 2004, on the radio national AM program with Catherine McGrath.
As I heard the sound bite in the loungeroom that night I said two things to my wife a) That is one of the shrewdest political comments I’ve ever heard an Australian politician make and b) They’ll be misquoting this one for years.
How true it has turned out to be. Latham took the worm and misconstrued the meaning as, variously:
a) There would be no rate rises
b) That interest rates would remain low under the coalition
c) That coalition governments tend to lower interest rates
None of which JWH actually said. To compound it, the ALP picked up on this in 2006 and drove a truck around with Howard and his long “lying” nose about rate rises, with Beazley claiming (this part, correctly) 8 rate rises since the 2004 election. Actually, this campaign was the lie and the ALP was absolutely aware of what was actually said.
The reason that this is a beautiful piece of politics is:
a) You don’t have to define what “low” means
b) You can’t have parallel realities.. we didn’t have a Labor government at the same time, so we’ll never know how they would have been different
c) It plays into both fear and mistrust of Labor governments with people’s mortgages, the biggest debt they carry and the primary reason they go to work.
Great piece of politics that he may still be paying for but we’ll never really know whether this statement was the one that got him over the line for a fourth term!
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Comment 143 by Mad Dog on Tuesday 22 May 2007 at 1:28 pm
This site
way2bet.com.au/odds_comparison…
shows a continuously updated record of the various bookies’ odds.
Here is way2bet’s assessment of the situation as at 20 May.
way2bet.com.au/news/article/au…
Sportingbet Australia CEO Michael Sullivan said punters were reacting to the polls and continuing to back Labor who have shortened again today to be a clear $1.80 favourite with the Coalition drifting to $1.95.
“We simply can’t ignore these polls. We were happy to play it safe with the Government until the budget rolled out but the punters continue to pour the money on Mr. Rudd and the ALP,†said Mr Sullivan.
“In the past two elections, the ALP has looked good in the polls but the punting money simply didn’t arrive.â€
“This year the punters just can’t get enough of the ALP and the budget has not dented their confidence at allâ€.