Newspoll shows Labor’s lead steady at 52–48
- Written by The Conversation
While last week’s Morgan and YouGov polls had Labor continuing its surge, Newspoll is steady for the fourth successive week at 52–48 to Labor. A Redbridge poll of the marginal seats was again very strong for Labor, while YouGov and KJC seat polls were respectively good and bad for Labor.
A national Newspoll, conducted April 21–24 from a sample of 1,254, gave Labor a 52–48 lead, unchanged from the April 14–17 Newspoll.
Primary votes were 35% Coalition (steady), 34% Labor (steady), 11% Greens (down one), 8% One Nation (up one) and 12% for all Others (steady). The drop for the Greens and gain for One Nation mean this poll was probably better for the Coalition before rounding than the previous Newspoll.
Here is the graph of Labor’s two-party preferred vote in national polls. The fieldwork midpoint date of Newspoll was April 23, three days ahead of the next most recent poll (YouGov). Perhaps Labor has peaked too early.
Analyst Peter Brent wrote for Inside Story that he thought Anthony Albanese performed poorly in the April 22 debate with Peter Dutton. This may explain some shift to the Coalition. But with just five full days left until the May 3 election and early voting in progress, Labor remains the heavy favourite to win.
Albanese’s net approval was steady at -9, while Dutton’s net approval was down two points to -24, a new record low. Albanese led Dutton by 51–35 as better PM (52–36 previously). Here is the graph of Albanese’s net approval in Newspoll, with the plus signs marking data points and a smoothed line fitted.
In this poll, 48% thought it was time to give someone else a go (down five since February), while 39% (up five) thought the government deserved to be re-elected. Meanwhile, 62% (up seven) said the Dutton-led Coalition was not ready to govern.
Labor retains 54.5–45.5 lead in Redbridge marginal seats poll
A poll of 20 marginal seats by Redbridge and Accent Research for the News Corp tabloids was conducted April 15–22 from a sample of 1,000. It gave Labor a 54.5–45.5 lead, unchanged since the April 9–15 marginal seats poll. Primary votes were 35% Labor (steady), 34% Coalition (steady), 14% Greens (up one) and 17% for all Others (down one).
The overall 2022 vote in these 20 seats was 51–49 to Labor, so this poll implies a 3.5-point swing to Labor from the 2022 election. If applied to the national 2022 result of 52.1–47.9 to Labor, Labor would lead by about 55.5–44.5. Since the first wave of this marginal seats tracker in early February, Labor has gained 6.5 points. If this poll is accurate, Labor is likely to win a thumping majority.
Over the five waves of this marginal seats tracker, the Liberals have gone from +1 net favourable to -8, while Labor has moved from -9 to -3. Albanese has gone from -16 to -4 (up one since last week), while Dutton has gone from -11 to -20 (up two since last week).
By 22–14, voters preferred Labor’s housing policy to the Coalition’s, with 38% for neither and 12% for both the same.
YouGov and KJC seat polls
The Canberra Times had YouGov polls of ten regional seats, conducted April 17–24 from an overall sample of 3,000 (so 300 per seat). The primary votes suggest the Coalition would lose the Tasmanian seat of Braddon to Labor, and the NSW and Victorian seats of Calare and Wannon to independents, leaving them with only Dutton’s Dickson out of the ten surveyed.
Labor would be likely to hold all its regional seats, although in the NSW seat of Hunter One Nation would be their final opponent instead of the Coalition. Seat polls are unreliable.
The Poll Bludger reported Saturday that KJC Research had taken seat polls on April 24 from a sample of 600 per seat for an industry group. These polls went against the trend, with the Liberals ahead of Labor by 49–45 including undecided in the Western Australian Labor-held seat of Tangney and 46–41 in the Queensland Labor-held seat of Blair.
In the New South Wales Labor-held seat of Richmond, the Greens led Labor by 39–34. In the NSW Labor-hels seat of Hunter, Labor led the Liberals by 45–41.
Gap narrows, but Liberals still likely to win majority at Canadian election
The Canadian election is on Monday, with the large majority of polls closing at 11:30am AEST Tuesday. The CBC Poll Tracker has the centre-left governing Liberals leading the Conservatives by 42.5–38.7 in national vote share and by 189–125 in seat point estimates (172 needed for a majority). I covered Canada and other upcoming and past international elections for The Poll Bludger on Saturday.
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