Wed May 17

Labor maintains large lead in post-budget polls a year after winning election, but Voice support slumps

Written by: Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne

Since the May 9 budget, there have been polls from Resolve, Essential, Morgan and Newspoll. Labor has a large lead in all of these polls. It’s almost a year since Labor won the May 21 2022 election by a 52.1-47.9 national two party margin ^[1], but its honeymoon is continuing, and they have a far bigger lead now than at the election. I covered Newspoll on Monday.

A Resolve poll ^[3] for Nine newspapers, conducted May 10-13 from a sample of 1,610, gave Labor 42% of the primary vote (steady since April), the Coalition 30% (up two), the Greens 12% (steady), One Nation 5% (down one), the UAP 2% (up one), independents 8% (down one) and others 2% (steady).

Resolve does not give a two party estimate until close to elections, but applying 2022 election preference flows to these primary votes gives Labor over a 60-40 lead, a one-point gain for the Coalition since April. Resolve continues to skew to Labor relative to other polls.

By 56-29, voters thought Anthony Albanese was doing a good job ^[4]; his net approval of +27 was steady ^[5]. Peter Dutton’s net approval was up seven points to -21. Albanese led Dutton as preferred PM by 53-20, a slight decrease from 55-21 in April. By 65-29, voters thought Labor had done a good job since gaining power.

Labor extended its lead over the Liberals to 38-29 on economic management from 36-30 in April. Labor’s lead on keeping the cost of living low also increased to 35-23 from 31-21 in April.

In budget questions ^[6], out of 12 proposals canvassed by Resolve, only one was opposed: the $2.8 billion for the Brisbane Olympics and Tasmanian AFL (37-27 opposed).

The strongest support was for $5.7 billion for Medicare to encourage bulk billing (81-5 support). The $4.9 billion in higher welfare payments, such as JobSeeker, was supported by 55-21. Other than sport, the weakest support was for limiting growth in spending on the NDIS to 8% a year (37-17 support).

By 31-26, voters thought the budget would be good for them and their household, by 44-17 they thought it good for the country as a whole and by 36-15 they thought it good for the health of the economy. By 56-14, votes thought it good for the less fortunate and disadvantaged.

Support for the Indigenous Voice to parliament ^[7] in the Resolve poll slumped to 53-47 nationally on a two-answer basis without an undecided option, from 58-42 in April. Initial preferences were 44% “yes” (down two ^[8]), 39% “no” (up eight) and 18% undecided (down four).

There has been a clear national trend against the Voice in Resolve polls since September 2022 when it was at 64-36 support. Historically, referendum polling has crashed as we get closer to votes, and just one of 25 referendums held by Labor governments have succeeded.

Essential poll: Labor leads by 53-42 including undecided

In this week’s federal Essential poll ^[10], conducted May 10-14 from a sample of 1,125, Labor led by 53-42 including undecided (53-41 last fortnight). Primary votes were 35% Labor (up two), 31% Coalition (down one), 14% Greens (steady), 5% One Nation (steady), 1% UAP (down one), 8% for all Others (steady) and 5% undecided (steady).

Although Labor’s primary vote lead increased, their two party lead was slightly reduced. This implies that respondent allocated preference flows were worse for Labor than last fortnight.

Albanese had a 54-35 approval rating ^[11], improving from 51-36 in April; this is his first gain in approval in Essential since November 2022. Dutton’s ratings were nearly unchanged at 45-36 disapproval from 44-36 in April.

By 51-18, voters thought the budget would be good for people receiving government payments, and by 42-28 they thought it good for people on lower incomes. However, it was thought bad for “you personally” by 30-24.

By 46-23, voters thought it likely the budget would create long-term problems that will need to be fixed in the future. By 38-26, they thought it unlikely to help relieve cost of living pressures.

By 59-41, voters supported the Indigenous Voice to parliament (60-40 in April). By vote strength, this was 31% “hard yes” (down one), 28% “soft yes” (up one), 17% “soft no” (up three) and 24% “hard no” (down two).

By 54-46, voters supported Australia becoming a republic. However, this question doesn’t specify the type of republic we would become, and opposition would likely increase once a model was known.

A net +14 thought the treatment of Indigenous Australians over the last year had improved, and a net +7 Australia’s efforts to reduce climate change. However, voters’ personal financial situation had worsened by a net -33.

Morgan poll: 57-43 to Labor

The weekly federal Morgan poll ^[12], conducted May 8-14 from a sample of 1,392, gave Labor a 57-43 lead, a 2.5-point gain for Labor since the previous week. The first two days of this poll were conducted before the May 9 budget. Primary votes are not yet available.

Turkey: Erdoğan very likely to win May 28 runoff

I covered Sunday’s Turkish presidential and parliamentary elections for The Poll Bludger ^[13]. In the presidential contest ^[14], right-wing incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdoğan led the social democratic Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu by 49.5-44.9 with 5.2% for a far-right candidate. As Erdoğan was below the 50% needed to win outright, there will be a May 28 runoff, but Erdoğan is very likely to win.

In the parliamentary election ^[15], Erdoğan’s AKP and their far-right allies retained a majority with a combined 317 of the 600 seats, 16 above the 301 required for a majority. This election was a disaster for the left in Turkey. The article also explained the BBC’s Projected National Share for UK council elections.