Not-A-Poll: Worst Opposition Leader Of The Past 45 Years: Round 1

For comments on the Braddon poll see Braddon guide.


Admin note: apologies for delays in comment clearing as I am not currently receiving notification emails for comments - this is a global Blogger issue which will hopefully be fixed soon. Also I have had a report that at least one reader can see the old Not-A-Polls but not the new ones.  If anyone else is getting exactly this problem please report it at k_bonham@tassie.net.au , preferably with browser detail + whether you are using a mobile phone.

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Following on from a long-running Not-A-Poll series in which Gough Whitlam was this site's pick for the best Prime Minister of the Last 45 Years, Worst Prime Minister only needed a single round for the knockout.

The left-wing skew of this site's reader-base was again apparent, but the result leaves little room for doubt that Tony Abbott would have won the thing anyway.  He finished almost fifty points ahead of John Howard, a result that barely moved through the time the Not-A-Poll was running. Even with the left-wing skew, Howard's second place might be surprising to those who are accustomed to seeing him rate highly but there is an argument for it out there.  Kevin Rudd eventually managed to beat Julia Gillard among the ALP contenders, while the very miserly totals for Paul Keating and Bob Hawke are interesting.  Keating was reviled as PM during his tenure (not only by the right but by a fair slab of the left as well) but nobody much hates him anymore.

Worst Opposition Leader

I'm now starting a Worst Opposition Leader series that will run for an unknown number of months.  The rules are:

Poll Roundup: Unwanted Records On Both Sides

2PP Aggregate: 52.3 to Labor (last-election preferences) 
51.8 with One Nation adjustment 
Coalition has improved 1.2 points in last eight weeks and now in best position since late 2016
However Labor would still almost certainly win election "held now"

It's been a little while since the last federal poll roundup (highlighting the major issue of Newspoll preferencing changes); I meant to do one in Budget week but was simply too busy with other things.  In the last five weeks the Turnbull government has kept the modest improvements in national polling that it made during April, but there has not been clear evidence of anything more.  Despite a lot of media excitement about the possibility of a quick election off the back of some possible success in the Super Saturday by-elections on July 28, we are so far not seeing anything in aggregated polling to get so excited about.

The recent national polls have been:

* Two Newspolls with headline figures of 51-49 then 52-48 to Labor.  As the previous article notes there has now been official confirmation that Newspoll is using a preference distribution for One Nation that is derived from recent state elections.  My aggregate's headline figure uses last-election preferences, and on that basis I aggregated these at 52.1 and 52.9 to Labor respectively.  The 51-49, as with the previous 51-49, was off primaries that would have normally come out to 52.4 by last-election preferences, but the fact that the published 2PP was 51 again suggested something a bit closer.  (An alternative view is that Newspoll might have changed methods twice, but we can't conclude that reliably off just two polls if so.  Also, this week's difference between the two methods was "only" 0.9).

2018 Braddon By-Election

BRADDON (Tas, ALP 2.2%) 
By-election July 28
Justine Keay (ALP) vs Brett Whiteley (Lib), minor party candidates to be declared
Cause of by-election: Resignation caused by Section 44 ineligibility
Outlook: Historic patterns suggest Labor should retain, though seat polling has been very close and at times strong for Whiteley.

With the far-off date for the Super Saturday by-elections now announced, I've decided that's reason enough to put up a guide post for the Braddon contest.  This article will be updated up til polling day with I may do similar posts for some of the other seats, but if so that will probably be only after credible polling is conducted.  (And no, a ReachTEL seat poll of Longman asking people how they would vote in a federal election rather than a by-election isn't what I had in mind here.)

At the moment many people are talking about the by-election date and whether this is some kind of political stitch-up to harm Labor or whether it is all Labor's fault because its ineligible MPs did not resign or at least arrange to be referred sooner.  By the by-election day the parties won't still be talking about that, at least not if they have the slightest sense.

Cable car catch-up

Not everyone notices when I post links to updates on the sidebar, so for those who read from the top, just a very quick note that I have updated my old article on polling on the proposed kunanyi/Mt Wellington Cable Car following the release of two new polls by groups opposed to the project.

I thought I'd highlight this with a note at the top because I'm actually mildly annoyed about it.  Up til now it has only been the prospective developers of the cable car through time who have engaged in the usual silly commissioned-poll games involving misleading polls with biased preambles.

Now it's both sides.

If you respect the mountain, you should also respect the facts.

EMRS: No Real Change Since Election

EMRS: Liberal 47 (-3.2 from election), Labor 30 (-2.8), Green 14 (+3.7) Ind/Other 8 (+1.2)
Interpretation: Liberal 49.5 (-0.7) Labor 31.5 (-1.3) Green 11 (+0.7) Ind/Other 8
Outcome if election "held now" based on this poll: Liberal majority government (c. 13-9-3)
However it is unlikely in practice Greens would be in a position to regain Bass so quickly.
Poll provides no evidence that any party's support has changed.

The December 2017 EMRS poll, taken three months out from the 2018 state election, proved to be completely unpredictive of the outcome.  It had a 17% swing against the Government (the actual swing in the end was 1%), a 3.2% swing to the Greens (the actual swing was 3.5% against) and an 8% vote for the Jacqui Lambie Network (who in the end got 3.2).  If a poll taken three months out is predictively worse than useless, what can we say of one taken two months into an expected four-year term?

The Expected "Super Saturday" By-Elections

Today's four resignations from the House of Representatives following the Section 44 disqualification of Labor Senator Katy Gallagher is expected to trigger a day of at least five by-elections, or at least a cluster of by-elections close to each other.  The following seats are affected:

Braddon, TAS (ALP, 2.2%)
Fremantle, WA (ALP, 7.5%)
Longman, QLD (ALP, 0.8%)
Mayo, SA (Centre Alliance vs Lib, 5.0%; Lib vs ALP 5.4%)
Perth, WA (ALP, 3.3%) 

See The Tally Room for detailed histories of these seats.  Also see the Poll Bludger thread for Perth.  All seats will be contested on the old boundaries, irrespective of redistributions.

It's possible that given the strictness of the High Court's ruling, other MPs may come under pressure to resign or be referred to the High Court (note: as of Friday the media are suddenly all over the Anne Aly story, which has been known via Jeremy Gans' Twitter comments for months), though the Coalition may not be in any great hurry to hunt down any more and invite more scrutiny of its own remaining unclear cases.  The by-elections are not just a nuisance for Labor, but also for the Coalition, which must either throw resources into contesting them seriously or else chicken out and leave voters wondering what all the fuss was about.

Australia has never had a day with five federal by-elections before, so it would be quite a novelty.  Three were held on the same day in 1981 and 1984.  In 1994 four were held across three weekends following a cluster of resignations, but the resignations came on different days.  At state level, NSW has often held multiple by-elections on the same day.

Legislative Council 2018: Hobart and Prosser Live And Postcount

Hobart: CALLED (7:15) Rob Valentine (IND) retain
Prosser: Howlett (Lib) defeated Lambert (ALP) by 887 votes after exclusion of Mav (IND).

Welcome to my live coverage thread for the 2018 Legislative Council elections for Hobart and Prosser.  After the craziest week in the Lower House in decades, we now come to the voting for two Legislative Council seats - Hobart, where Rob Valentine faces his first defence and Prosser, a new seat created by a redistribution.  The left currently has the numbers in the Legislative Council, care of four Labor MLCs and four left-wing independents, and that's not changing unless the Liberals can pull off a big upset in Hobart.  Indeed, should Prosser go badly for them, the balance will become even worse for the Hodgman government.  By the way, should a party-endorsed candidate win either seat then the party representation will reach a new all-time high (see the chart at Poll Bludger to see how the parties ebbed and flowed in the last several years.)

Comments will follow below the dotted line, scrolling from the earliest upwards. All the seats will be covered together.  I'm leaving this bit of text at the top to try to prevent colours from the heading running into the main text.

Mayhem On Day 1 As Hickey Nicks The Chair!

(NOTE: My very old 25 vs 35 seats article has been updated.)

The opening of the Tasmanian parliament on May the 1st was meant to be a routine affair.  After the election of the new Speaker we were expecting to start off with the ritual parliamentary theatre of a Greens no-confidence motion over the Liberals' failure to disclose any pokies-related donations prior to their re-election in March.  It seems to be the Greens' lot in life lately to have their thunder stolen but in this case they won't mind.  Former Hobart Lord Mayor Sue Hickey has decided that starting her parliamentary career on the backbench was not acceptable, and she's nabbed the Speakership instead.  

That part is by no means unprecedented.  In 1992, Ray Groom's Liberals won 19 of the then 35 seats and they nominated the flamboyant Michael Hodgman (Will's father) as Speaker.  However, Liberal Graeme Page and a colleague voted for Page and Page was elected Speaker with Labor and Green support, 18 votes to 17.  Previous Labor Speaker Michael Polley is generally credited with hatching the plot.  In this case there had been some speculation that the former Liberal Speaker Mark Shelton could do the same thing (if he wanted) but the Greens poured cold water on it.  While I did tweet that this year it would only take one renegade Liberal to repeat the dose, that tweet was better classified as a bit of stirring at Hidding's expense than a serious prediction.