Galaxy, Newspoll and Nielsen have all come out today showing Malcolm Turnbull has crashed – and it really is Malcolm Turnbull that has crashed rather than the Coalition as a whole.
First up the vote estimates and how they’ve changed since the last poll of each of the three pollsters:
We’re now back in the 56-58 two party preferred territory that Labor has been experiencing for most of the last two and a half years. All of the Coalition’s hard work since April on the debt and deficit argument has been flushed down the toilet in a week. Unfortunately for the Coalition, this is the good news – and it really is good news considering the size of the bad news – the satisfaction/approval ratings of Turnbull himself.
Those numbers are simply incredible.To highlight the change that went on over the last week or two, the net satisfaction charts of Nielsen and Newspoll are worth a squiz. To see the composition of the net satisfaction, we’ll also throw in Turnbull’s Newspoll satisfaction ratings. (click to enlarge).
Malcolm Turnbull’s personal ratings have, quite literally, fallen off a cliff in a way that has never occurred in the modern history of Australian political polling. I’m somewhat surprised that a fall of that magnitude didn’t carry across larger effects into the vote estimates – although that may just be a matter of time.
Last week were speculating that if Ozcar moved the vote around, it would probably be with the female vote. This months Nielsen demographic breakdowns certainly suggest this occurred. Even though the Coalition primary vote among males dropped from 41 in May down to 36 on the weekend, the female vote dropped from 44 in May down to 37 on the weekend! Labor on the other hand picked up zero male vote in net terms, remaining steady on 46, while their female vote increased from 42 to 46.
So while the males moved away from the Coalition, the females ran back to Labor – again, highlighting that issues of trust and honesty are a relatively big thing with female voters as well as demonstrating the on going structural weakness the Coalition has among the fairer sex.
There’s a hell of a lot of polling data today, and we’ll break it all down over a few posts. When Essential Report is released late this afternoon, we’ll also run Pollytrend to see how the trend has changed.
19 Comments
You have been a busy little Possum, haven’t you. Are you going to include Galaxy in this too?
Personally I don’t think Turnbull has bottomed out yet and I agree there should be more flow-on to the Coalition 2PP and Primary to go yet also.
I can’t see how they possibly can persevere with Turnbull now as it clearly is as you show here that he is the primary reason for their woeful circumstances. The worry beads will be getting a good work out by many people in the Liberal Party at the moment.
“I can’t see how they possibly can persevere with Turnbull now as it clearly is as you show here that he is the primary reason for their woeful circumstances.”
Yeah but Scorpio two things – First – Nelson was also “the primary reason for their woeful circumstances”. IMHO if Truffles is replaced they still will only get real traction if they sort out what the heck they stand forand reign the rabble in. Second if Poss is right that females are emotional voters the coalition has another problem with Hockey. My personal reaction to him is “boofhead” not “care bear” and my female acquaintances are split about 60/40 on that axis. I would not vote for a boofhead any more than I vote for someone I do not trust. I think his image is rather more amenable to enhancement than Truffles but still…
Possum, I think you’ll find this very funny. Until The Australian fix it, from their front page they have “POLL: Who should lead the federal Opposition?” and when you click on it you’re taken to our options, which are obviously for a different poll), but nevertheless seem like real options in the light of the Libs/Turnbull’s situation:
Michael Jackson
Elvis Presley
Kurt Cobain
John Lennon
Sometimes even the Ox get it right
That should be “four options” not “our options” – sorry for the typo.
Doh! And it should be the “Oz” and not the “Ox”… oh wait…. nevermind….
Bugger, they just fixed it
Cat
my understanding is that Abbott has always performed badly in the female demographic stakes as well.
I can’t help but feel that the huge drop in Talcom’s satisfaction ratings could partially be a temporary reaction to a busted arse week in politics. I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a ‘bounce’ for Turnbull in the next Newspoll conducted exclusively for The Australian. However, even if this is the case, i’m sure some of this will be permanent. I would also suggest that long term damage has been done either way in that any time Labor want to challenge Turnbull they will relate things back to the shenanigans of this week. It’s all about feeding existing perceptions only this week we saw the creation of a new perception.
But overall, OUCH! That can’t be said enough. Turnbull’s Newspoll net satisfaction downer is a shocker, as are the endless headlines of Turnbull being as stuffed or worse than Latham (esspecially Latham), Crean, Nelson and other known losers.
DAMMIT! in my last comment either side of ‘conducted exclusively for The Australian’ i inserted fake HTML tags of: ironically pompous tone of voice (and an equal one to close) but the comment program took them as real tags and eliminated them. Grrr…
zoomster I have never asked about People Skills as I specifically have about a few others but going on reactions when he is mentioned I suspect the reactions are pretty much the same as mine. I shall put it simply as “not flattering”.
Incredible numbers. I bet there’s some backbenchers shaking and scratching their heads this week. It would piss me off severely to see my leader carry on like such a fool and burn the party so badly.
Libs have to wait and see if the next polls have it blowing over or getting worse as the news continues to roll out. No point jumping now and then in 6 months no one remembers all this.
But re comment #2 – “they still will only get real traction if they sort out what the heck they stand for.” I think they have worked this out – they stand for a surplus budget (and negligible public sector foreign debt) as the highest national priority. That’s what they have chosen to jump on, and that’s their big idea.
Sure, that’s what gave the world the Great Depression, and sure, that will put untold thousands out of work, but that is their big idea, their point of difference from the ALP, and they are sticking to it. As a centrist I want to see this contest of ideas front and centre, and I want to see this economic lunacy exposed for what it is. Congratulations to the PM and Treasurer for not being scared to spend big to save jobs, and I hope that they are vindicated in the court of public opinion, not only in the halls of the IMF and OECD.
Would that be a “dead cat bounce”?
Every bounce associated with Malcolm Turnbull from now on will be a “dead cat bounce”
John, re the economic debate, have you read the comments in the Shanahan column today? The true believers are very much convinced that this is the issue to fight over.
I suspect the public are reacting to the impetuosity/lack of judgement of Turnbull. Defence of his actions by himself and others (not my fault/ he was misled etc) don’t cut through because they are addressing the wrong issue. Leadership qualities was uppermost in the thoughts of those being polled and Turnbull was badly marked down.
Difficult economic times require a leader with a calm head, and if the Libs think their economic credentials are strong enough to stay in the game, then they must have a leader to match Rudd’s steady hand.
Turnbull, it seems, is not that person.
Poss, I was thinking that at least some of the dive in the Coalition’s primary vote might have been due to poll respondents understanding that, not only is Costello no longer an option as leader but he is also no longer ‘in the team’ so to speak.
The high ‘Costello as preferred OL’ result seems like a real smack to the Liberals that most people think they haven’t treated him well enough to keep him – complete sook though he is.
Trubbell,
That’s a good question!
Does Peter Costello carry a personal vote of a few percent for the Liberals – where that vote simply sat with the Coalition under the faint hope that one day he would lead, but no he’s going will dissipate elsewhere?