To throw into perspective just how bad the last Newspoll was for Malcolm Turnbull’s satisfaction rating dynamics, it might be worth comparing Turnbull’s poll result with the historically worse cases of satisfaction rating plummets over the last 20 odd years of Newspoll.
If we take take the monthly average of the satisfaction, dissatisfaction (and consequently, net satisfaction) ratings for Opposition leaders going back to December 1985, we can measure the largest single month changes to see how Malcolm compares. It’s probably also worth having a squiz at the largest changes that occurred over a 2 month period as well – just to see the historical context of how things might pan out.
To start with, we’ll have a look at all of the single monthly drops in the satisfaction ratings for oppositions leaders that were ten points or greater, and we’ll do the same with drops 10 points or greater that occurred over 2 months:
We can also do exactly the same thing for the increase in dissatisfaction ratings of Opposition leaders:
Finally, the one month change in the net satisfaction figures:
Not much really needs to be said there – the charts sort of speak for themselves.
10 Comments
Yep – that pretty much answered my question.
What this says to me is that very few people are any good at being Opposition Leader. I think the art of being in opposition is not comprehended at all by those who are enduring it. They continue to decline in popularity and get rolled by their colleagues. The exceptions are Rudd (who had the job less than a year), similarly Howard in 94 to 96, Hewson’s name doesn’t appear very much, and granted the length of time he was in the post, Beazley Mk I did a fair job, I’d argue.
Arguing like a lawyer (ie arguing that Swan was ultimately responsible for the fake email) only added to the damage he was doing himself. If Turnbull truly wants to put that matter behind him then he will have to ‘front-up’ much more honestly than he has done so far and also explain how he intends to use his leadership from now on. Promising to renew and modernise party policy and practices would be a good first step.
Incidentally, taking off to Afghanistan only added a touch of weirdness to his behaviour.
Unfortunately for Turnbull the poll occurred after an awful time for him in Parliament, self inflicted certainly, but I have no doubt that over time much will be forgotten (A week in a long time in politics), and the polls will return to a more “normal” level of dissatisfaction with his performance.
The Coalition is stuck with him for the time being, unless Costello has a change of heart, but even if he does he has a fair bit of baggage. Still he is a great Parliamentary performer when he puts his mind to it.
Assuming they don’t shoot themselves in the foot Labor is for quite a while I would say.
I don’t think it will be forgotten so much as integrated into the subconscious narrative and context about Malcolm Turnbull. It might even take a lost election and a “Lazarus with a triple bypass” style rise for him to get over it.
Turnbull’s great problem is that the Turnmail-gate affair only served to reinforce already held doubts people held about his character, especially trustworthiness. It wasn’t revealing anything new, just confirming suspicions.
There is not much of a chance he can turn that around other than cashing all his wealth and donating it charity to charity, and maybe even that wouldn’t work.
Oh look Poss, it could be worse for Turnbull he could… ummm not sure how to finish that statement.
….. convert to Islam and declare a jihad on the Australian cricket team while taking a dump on a photo of the Queen and fornicating with a goat as he sets fire to the flag?
Forget about the two party trend – at any federal election where the primary vote for each party is equal and the primary vote for the Greens is between 9 and 12 percent, as it has been for some time, the Coalition would lose by a fair stretch – so it must be a nightmare for the Turnbull class to even contemplate an election where the ALP has even a small primary vote lead AND the Greens vote is between nine and twelve per cent – under those conditions, the Coalition would be annihilated – but arithmetic rarely features in political spin … they just hope that you won’t notice it when assessing the monthly opinion poll results.
cheers David Richards – that’d do it.