The standout finding of a very interesting post-election Newspoll survey of 1125 voters is a question on preferred Liberal leader: 34 per cent responded for Turnbull, just 18 per cent for Nelson and 14 per cent for Julie Bishop, with the optimistic Tony Abbott on 9 per cent. Rudd predictably is streets ahead of Brendan Nelson as preferred prime minister, leading 61 per cent to 14 per cent (91 per cent to 1 per cent among Labor voters).
Reflections on the Miracle of Democracy at Work in the Greatest Nation on Earth
Newspoll: Turnbull 34, Nelson 18
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1,259 Comments
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Boll (194) I use ‘constituency’ in the sense of a bloc of votes sufficient for one or other side of politics to win a majority of seats in the House of Representatives. FG (197) I note the clarification and thank you for your response.
One more thing David Charles, I really don’t put much credence in the view that incompetent state administrations make an impact at the federal level. If incompotent parties brought down their federal counterparts noone would have voted for the Howard Coalition. I know that Wayne Goss blamed the poor standing of the Keating Government for his own government’s demise, but this was just blame shifting. Never before has a government pissed the good will of the electorate up against the wall with such merry abandon as did Mr Goss. If blaming Keating helps him sleep at night, more power to him. Voters have historically made the distinction between state and federal politics and voted accordingly. The NSW government may be badly managed (the same could be said for Qld) but they keep getting returned comfortably because the opposition is unconvincing. The age of mass media has seen the demise of natural constituencies and, as I say, election victories now need to be earned.
Expert comment on the Qld Libs currently working on their little problem:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/04/2109154.htm?section=justin
Still no word on the Qld Lib leadership. What are they up to? Arm wrestling? Pistols at 40 paces? Trial by ordeal?
The QLD Liberals are not being helpful at this point in time. I wonder whether they want to ever be in government with such obnoxious behaviour.
FG (202) says: “Never before has a government pissed the good will of the electorate up against the wall with such merry abandon as did Mr. Goss”.
Please elucidate. Your response could be significant given who was chief of staff for Mr. Goss.
Maybe each state should organise a movement of independents to offer the people an option to the state Labor governments?
Or maybe we should get rid of state governments altogether in favour of regional councils?
Oh well, disfranchised again at the next state election and so much for democracy….
GP, I suspect the Qld Libs will only recover if they can persuade Santo to leave the country.
Goss lost the 1995 election because the Greens preferenced the Nats and Libs.
LOL!
Scaper – there is a loose coalition of independents; Tony Windsor from New England and the late lamented Peter Andren set it up some time ago. It’s rural, though, so probably wouldn’t answer your purposes, though it’s certainly given the Nats a bit of a hurry-up.
Laming just 130 behind and closing in Bowman with 91% counted.
I wondered if you’d pick up on that DC. I’m not sure my response would be significant and it is not clear to what degree Chiefs of Staff contribute to a government’s rise and fall. Goss came to power after 32 years of uninterrupted National Party rule. Corruption was endemic in government and in the police. Goss won in a landslide amidst enormous public support and goodwill. Yet he lasted 5 years and was thrown out (albeit on the casting vote of the independent member for Gladstone who confided that she cast her vote to bring down the Goss government in the confidence motion because “Goss is anti-God”.) All it took was 5 years. Why? The reasons are many. Goss lost the support of the public service (Mr Rudd’s managerial approach may have contributed to that) but more broadly his aloof style lost the support of the general public. His treatment of his own Speaker was indicative of the reasons he was shown the door….but that’s another story.
horatio is channelling the rodent. it’s creepy.
The Liberal lead in Swan is back out to 230, so I think Kim Wilkie is gone, sadly. Flynn is secure for Labor and Robertson almost certainly so. The Libs will probably win Herbert and Dickson. That only leaves Bowman and McEwen is genuinely too close to call.
DC – my response to your previous post is in moderation for some reason. You’ll have to wait to see if you can read it.
All you gambling types could have gotten pretty good odds on Labor winning Dawson but not Herbert. Did anyone do so?
Wilkie ohhh he’s gawwwwwn clean blowed him by Irons.
Laming is looking unlikely but a chance only behind by 130 McEwen looks safer 50.08% ahead with 88% counted but still a few votes left to count anything could happen there.
Adam
I think Labor may just squeak home in Solomon as well.
Still a ways yet to count ruawake in Solomon.
There you go DC – my response has passed moderation – at 213
Mr Jackman’s observation that the last election reverted to a division along income and wealth lines seems well supported.
One thing that confuses me is the conventional wisdom that:
all other things being equal – people with more education tend to vote ALP
all other things being equal – people with more education earn more
all other things being equal – people who earn more tend to vote Liberal
How does that work?
Jenny,
Up here in QLD I believe there is room for another option.
From what I know Bligh is a big improvement on Beattie, but the people deserve a viable alternative or democracy is not served.
I was looking at this idea last year, but have decided that another project is more important.
Maybe I will revisit if that does not get off the ground but honestly, what’s the F****ing use as our grandchildren will be eating rats and cockroaches because of the lack of long term vision on the behalf of ALL the politicians who can only see as far as the next election!!!
Oh well, at least I can hold my head up and at least tried to make a difference to the nation that I love.
scaper…
Ferny – from personal experience posts which include possibly provocative words go into moderation, even from frequent contributors.
I had a post which included the word “J.e.w” put into moderation.
I suspect your (completely legitimate) use of the word “G.o.d” meant your post was moderated.
Any clues as to the list of words William?
Ross Vasta must know something that we don’t.
A look at the booth results in Bonner in all Wynnum booths show his vote as follows:
Wynnum – 41.38%
Wynnum Central – 34.79%
Wynnum North – 37.12%
Wynnum North High – 32.81%
Wynnum West – 35.06%
Albert F,
I won’t go into the statistical details but that is not actually a contradiction.
Correlation is weird like that.
Thanks Analyst – I was feeling a bit self conscious there
There are two types of wealthy people. Wealthy business people still vote very solidly Liberal, particularly if they are “new money” rather than “old money.” Wealthy professional people increasingly vote Labor.
Apparently the Qld Libs have elected Eric Idle as leader. At least the laughs will now be intentional.
The point is that education only provides a proportion of the explanation of why people earn more.
If there is another category of people who earn lots, but have low education AND tend to vote Liberal more often than the average, then you can get that scenario.
Say (for example) that sports stars tend to be uneducated, well-paid and Liberal.
They simultaneous create the relationship that education relates to Labor and income relates to Liberal.
The point is to remember that correlation shows a relationship – not the full explanation.
FG
Sorry you are re writing history. Goss lost the Koala Seats in Brisbane due to the Greens preferencing the Nats/Libs. over land clearing for roads.
Borbidge lasted two years and was dogged by corruption yet again.
Across the nation, thousands of Australians are turning to the AEC’s website, vtr.aec.gov.au to check the counting progress of the recent election.
But, what confidence can we have in the figures?
Take the micro Socialist Equality Party (SEP) which allegedly, polled 1730 of their state’s tally of 3337 votes at the otherwise uninteresting Cairnlea booth at Deer Park Primary School in the seat of Gorton. A simple check reveals that this polling booth, which recorded a total of 2631 House of Reps votes also recorded a whopping 4393 Senate votes. Obviously, these numbers should be same. The difference is almost totally explained by the extra SEP votes. It looks as if this is a keying error by an AEC official, as the ALP vote was 1728 in the Senate and 1733 in the Reps.
Now look at the vote for the micro Senator On-Line (SOL) party which allegedly clocked up a third of its total Victorian vote in the sleepy Frankston High School booth in Dunkley. Did the SOL party really get 1155, or 27.3% of the Frankston HS vote and poll almost the same as Labor and the Liberals? Again, there were 4313 Senate votes and 3154 House votes, the difference being almost totally explained by the extra SOL party votes.
There are potentially errors across the board. Tony Klein’s Group V Independents vote appears confused with the Greens in Thomastown Meadows in Scullin and he SOL vote at the Eildon booth in McEwen looks inflated by about 250 votes too. Note that all of these errors have been made confusing one party with a larger party that is positioned near it on the tablecloth ballot paper.
So, if I can, in an hour, find four genuine and easily observable errors in the AEC’s numbers with a combined discrepancy of over 3000 votes, why could the AEC not pick up these glaring errors before publishing on their website? When Antony Green’s fantastic senate calculator draws numbers from the raw AEC feeds, it makes an assumption that the AEC numbers are correct.
My question for the AEC is simple. When will these errors be resolved? Australian democracy depends on us punters having faith in an independent and accurate election body like the AEC.
Relevant links are:
Cairnlea Reps: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HousePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-46536.htm
Cairnlea Senate: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenatePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-46536.htm
Frankston South Reps: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HousePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-3600.htm
Frankston South Senate: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenatePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-3600.htm
Thomastown Meadows Senate: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenatePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-4864.htm
Eildon Senate: http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenatePollingPlaceFirstPrefs-13745-4320.htm
As the AEC becomes aware of these figures (hopefully) they will change. So have a look at these links quickly to observe their manifest errors.
(apologies for the cross-post to the Vic Senate comments page)
Qld Libs have still not sorted out the leadership after over 5 hours of talks.
It is expected they will continue tomorrow.
I’m glad there’s someone who wastes even more of their time on election statistics than I do.
#203 Bruce Flegg: “It’s only a flesh wound….”
Albert F – re income and education: they don’t always correlate. For example, last time I looked, the lifetime earnings of someone with a PhD were less than those of someone without. (Mainly lost income in early adulthood, but the degree itself isn’t a licence to print money.)
There’s also a big divide within some professions between those with family money, who can buy partnerships, and those without, who can’t and have to spend their lives as employees. In some professions the pay isn’t fabulous, even for highly qualified workers. Employed vets, for example, are lucky to get above $60K, and being employed as a solicitor is hell on wheels. Professional salaries in Australia are a fair way below those elsewhere, which is one reason so many people go overseas.
I know you have all been impatient for prefecture-level figures for the legislative elections in Togo. I have them up now.
http://psephos.adam-carr.net/countries/t/togo/
Maybe the Flegg-ites will join the National Party and Santo’s mob will become a party of four.
Adam are the Rally for the Togolese People conservative?
No 208
Sadly, I agree. Santo Santoro has been a menace to the party in QLD.
ruawake – If Nelson can’t get Santoro out of the party, he doesn’t deserve to stay as federal leader.
Speaking of unpleasant people, Michael Kroger seems to be everywhere in the media at the moment. I wonder if he’s considering making a comeback?
In Togo: “Union des Forces du Changement (Union of Forces for Change)” is doing quite well. Are they union bosses? Fanatics? Will they change everything once they’re elected?
Sacre bleu!
Ruawake – I fail to see how I’m rewriting history. It was Goss himself who said he blames Keating at least in part for his loss – and if he only lost the Koala electorates he wouldn’t have lost government. The disallusionment was very widespread.
No 241
Kroger is the only one talking some sense about the need for internal reform in the Liberal Party.
Who here likes Nelson’s laugh?
FG
It was a hung parliament – if the Greens had not got Koalaitis Goss would have won govt. He only needed one more seat.
No 245
I preferred John’s actually.
RA, Adam,
Thanks for the quick isolation of the missing variable.
This suggest (well to me at least) that the long term demographic trend of increased education flows in the ALP’s favour whereas increased wealth could go either way – depending on what its driven by.
Its no wonder the Lib weren’t that keen on public education.
Where’s the ABC Election site gone?!
Jenny – clearly you are underpaid
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