September 15, 2015 | Graham

First poll says Turnbull can get the blue collar voter

Gary Morgan is the first pollster out with a result, using his SMS methodology. His release is produced below.

Despite my suspicion that Turnbull will have trouble with the blue-collar conservatives, this poll shows him doing very well with Ind/Other supporters – 68% Turnbull to 29% Shorten.

The Liberal vote has also coalesced hard behind Turnbull with 86% favouring him versus 7% favouring Shorten.

Greens give it to Turnbull 57% to 38% and Labor supporters 50% to 44%. Shades of Mike Baird.

Here is the release.

New Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull gets immediate mandate from Australian electors as Better PM: Turnbull 70% cf. Shorten 24%

New Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has received an immediate mandate from Australian electors as Better PM: Malcolm Turnbull 70% cf. 24% Opposition Leader Bill Shorten with 6% of electors indicating either someone else, neither candidate or they couldn’t say according to a special Snap SMS Morgan Poll conducted this afternoon with 1,204 Australian electors.

Turnbull leads all key Demographics

Analysis by Gender

Men: Turnbull 72% cf. Shorten 23%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 49%;

Women: Turnbull 67% cf. Shorten 24%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 43%.

Analysis by Party – Turnbull leads among L-NP, ALP, Greens & Others supporters

L-NP supporters: Turnbull 86% cf. Shorten 7%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 79%;

ALP supporters: Turnbull 50% cf. Shorten 44%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 6%;

Greens supporters: Turnbull 57% cf. Shorten 38%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 19%;

Ind/ Others supporters: Turnbull 68% cf. Shorten 29%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 39%.

Analysis by State – Turnbull leads clearly across all States & Territories

NSW: Turnbull 72% cf. Shorten 19%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 53%;

Victoria: Turnbull 69% cf. Shorten 27%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 42%;

Queensland: Turnbull 69% cf. Shorten 24%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 45%;

WA: Turnbull 76% cf. Shorten 20%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 56%;

SA: Turnbull 67% cf. Shorten 26%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 41%;

Tasmania: Turnbull 65% cf. Shorten 34%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 31%;

ACT: Turnbull 61% cf. Shorten 30%. Lead to Mr. Turnbull 31%.

Gary Morgan says:

“Australian electors have given a massive mandate to new Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on his first day as Prime Minister – preferring Turnbull 70% cf. 24% Opposition Leader Bill Shorten in a special snap SMS Morgan Poll conducted this afternoon on who Australian electors regard as the Better PM.

“Turnbull leads clearly amongst both genders, across all States & Territories and leads Shorten across supporters of both major parties. L-NP supporters have given Turnbull a huge show of support: Turnbull 86% cf. Shorten 7%. Even more remarkably, a majority of ALP supporters say Turnbull is the Better PM: Turnbull 50% cf. 44% ALP Leader Shorten. Greens supporters have also swung behind the new Prime Minister: Turnbull 57% cf. Shorten 38%.

“Today’s result places immediate pressure on Opposition Leader Bill Shorten over the coming few days as electors in the West Australian seat of Canning get set to cast their vote on Australia’s new Malcolm Turnbull-led Government – the Coalition should walk it in in the Canning by-election.

“The new Malcolm Turnbull-led Government must now tell the electorate how they will reverse the recent decline in Australia’s GDP growth (only 0.2% in June Quarter 2015).

“In addition real unemployment and under-employment (a total of 16.6% (2.12 million Australians) are either unemployed or under-employed in August 2015) needs to be significantly reduced while the cash economy, wages rorts (as exposed by the recent 7-Eleven & United Petroleum scandals) and union/employer corruption need to be the top priorities in establishing ‘a fair days pay for a fair days work’.”

View Electorate Reports

 
Posted by Graham at 4:51 pm | Comments (2) |
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September 14, 2015 | Graham

Turnbull will have to redefine Liberal constituency

If Malcolm Turnbull wins the ballot against Tony Abbott, and whoever else might put their hand up, he will need to redefine the Liberal constituency in order to win an election.

Every time I have tested Turnbull as leader against Abbott in one of our polls he has been preferred leader, but by Labor and Greens voters, not Liberal voters.

When he was then put up against the ALP Prime Minister, it was a case of “Thanks, but no thanks, we already have someone to vote for.”

I haven’t tested him against Shorten yet, but my suspicion is it will be the same result.

Turnbull is a centrist and pragmatist, which means he will struggle to carry the hearts, although he may capture the votes, of the grass roots of the Liberal Party.

He is also a plutocrat, and that gives him problems with the non-Green minor party voters, who have demonstrated that while they might loathe Green Labor, they are prepared to give them their preferences, after first preferencing the latest maverick like Palmer or Katter.

Of course some of them have already voted for a plutocrat in Palmer, but Palmer is untidy and the class buffoon, while Malcolm is dux. That creates an entirely different dynamic.

At the moment it is these voters’ preferences that are determining most elections in Australia, and it has been that way almost as long as I can remember. They were Howard’s battlers, and Menzies “forgotten people”.

So if Turnbull is not to be wedged from the right and the left he is going to have to expand the centre.

Is that possible when Shorten has retreated from the left, allowing the Greens to keep that flank for him, and has expanded into the popularist centre right with campaigns against virtually everything?

I doubt it, but am happy to be proved wrong. If Turnbull wins the leadership ballot, time may tell.

He may be our John Key, who seems to have a centrist appeal (but I haven’t polled NZ so could be entirely wrong on that).

The trick for him won’t be polling well in the beltway, it will be out in Western Sydney, the outer suburbs of Brisbane and Melbourne, and further out in the regions, under the Milky Way.

The risk is that having been seduced into wresting the prize for himself he may find the elite electorate’s embrace fleeting and cold.

Posted by Graham at 5:33 pm | Comments (1) |
Filed under: Australian Politics Tags: , ,

September 05, 2015 | Graham

ChAFTA about levelling the playing field

I don’t understand the debate about ChAFTA.

What ChAFTA does is allow Australia more access to China, after we unlitaterally extended that courtesy to China years ago.

It is about levelling the playing field for everyone which will create more jobs all around.

Yet the ALP, true to form under this regime, is only interested in protecting the jobs of a few privileged unionists earning 6 figure sums.

It doesn’t seem to care about the unskilled workers who will win jobs under this agreement, or the unemployed who will have a chance at work and self-respect again.

No, if you aren’t, for example, a CFMEU chippy working on a highrise development and earning twice the salary of a teacher, you don’t matter.

What’s fair about that?

And if you doubt me that Australia unilaterally and dramatically lowered its trade barriers, have a look at the graph below.

Graph from http://www.taxreview.treasury.gov.au/content/FinalReport.aspx?doc=html/publications/Papers/Final_Report_Part_2/chapter_e8-3.htm

As a result of this we already use a lot of Chinese labour. It is embedded in the clothes on our back, the appliances in our kitchens and living rooms, the shoes on our feet, the cars and buses we ride in, the manufacturing inputs in the industries where we still manufacture, and on and on.

What ChAFTA will do is produce jobs in industries where we have an advantage, and can export to China, such as dairy, an industry just recovering after a bout of necessary deregulation.

New Zealand has already negotiated a free trade agreement with China, and the benefits to their dairy industry have been incalculable.It’s one of the powerhouses of their economy.

Investors are already looking for dairying opportunities around aouth-east Queensland, in anticipation of the free trade agreement, which will produce much-needed economic activity here.

But apparently Queensland doesn’t matter either.

NZ has a headstart on us, and we don’t want too many other nations to get a similar headstart or we will miss out on the early adopter advantage.

The Labor position appears to be that unless we get a clear advantage on every part of the trade agreement, then it is not a good trade agreement.

But that’s not the meaning of the word trade. It’s by giving and taking that economic progress occurs in the first place.

It’s not all give, but neither is it all take, unless perhaps you are the CFMEU.

Posted by Graham at 4:19 pm | Comments (2) |
Filed under: Australian Politics,Economics Tags: , , , ,

September 01, 2015 | Graham

Unions must challenge Dyson in Federal Court

Unless the unions challenge Dyson Heydon’s ruling that he does not suffer from apprehended bias they are piling criminality on criminality.

In a statement yesterday ACTU Secretary Dave Oliver said the Trade Union Royal Commission is “terminally tarnished”.

It is a crime to try to bring a Royal Commission into disrepute. Unless Oliver and his mates take Heydon’s ruling to the Federal Court and win, they have no option but to accept the Commissioner’s ruling.

Australia is a country where we believe in the rule of law. There is a legal way to challenge royal commissions, and there is an unlawful way.

Likewise the Federal ALP must withdraw from its intention to move a motion in the Senate that if passed would call on Governor-General Peter Cosgrove to sack the royal commissioner.

The behaviour we are seeing from the federal Labor party and the unions is truly shameful. The Trade Union Royal Commission has uncovered multiple examples of criminality by unions, particularly the CFMEU.

Decent organisations would be moving themselves to clean up this sort of filth. That these organisations aren’t is condemnation enough. That they are trying to destroy the reputation of the organisation that is, is beyond belief.

Australia faces threats from without and within.

In this context the external security threat would seem slim compared to the threat from within.

We used to wonder how criminal classes grabbed hold of whole countries like Argentina and Chile, or Russia. We have a criminal class trying to do exactly the same thing in Australia, and they are up in the polls.

If you have been watching the other royal commission, the one into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, and wondered how institutions could become so corrupted, you are seeing another example before your eyes.

The criminals thrive and prosper because they are supported by their peers for social reasons, or because it is very hard to look someone in the eye who you like, or who is your boss, and tell them that what they are doing is a crime.

But it has to be done.

In the end that might even  mean having to walk into a polling booth, holding your nose, and voting for Tony Abbott, because the polling booth might be the only way of telling them decisively enough.

Not only are the unions tainted with criminality, but in challenging Dyson’s impartiality they have wedged themselves. There is no way that a federal court would find in their favour.

It is about time they did the decent thing, pulled back, and punished the wrongdoers themselves. Otherwise they must be punished themselves.

Posted by Graham at 6:31 am | Comments (6) |
Filed under: Australian Politics,Legal