Two polls: 58 to 42 in Labor’s favour

Bryan · Monday 23 April 2007 · 1:28 am

Galaxy and ACNielsen both have polls out today. Both have the same headline prediction: a national two-party preferred vote of 42 per cent for the Coalition and 58 per cent for Labor, were an election held last weekend.

ACNielsen: Two-party preferred vote for Coalition

In terms of the primary vote, both predict the Coalition would get 37, and Labor would get 50 (ACNielsen) or 49 (Galaxy) per cent.

The ACNielsen poll played a little mischief. It found that Labour would do better in a Rudd v Costello contest (with a prediction of 61 to 39) than it would in a Rudd v Howard contest (58 to 42). It’s a finding that should Araldite the Prime Minister to his seat.

It was honest mischief in the Galaxy poll:

When voters were asked who was more honest, 44 per cent opted for Mr Rudd, while only 23 per cent chose Mr Howard.

Even among Coalition supporters, only 52 per cent backed Mr Howard when asked about honesty. “Perceived honesty is not John Howard’s strong suit and even his own supporters recognise he can be economical with the truth,” Galaxy’s principal David Briggs said.

What happens next

I had a software upgrade go horribly wrong over the weekend, and I lost the last six months of betting and polling data. A real pain! But it forced me to re-examine the previous polls. From an ACNielsen perspective, Labor cannot rest on its laurels. In previous election years, it was roughly at the same place it is now at this point in the cycle. In the last three elections, Labor crashed in the first or second week of September. As they say in the classics, it ain’t over until the fat lady sings.

ACNielsen: Labor's TPP predictions for 1998, 2001, 2004 and 2007

It is too early to tell whether today’s TPP movement heralds the beginning of another election year decline for Labor. It may be random noise (with Labor bouncing around in the 58-61 per cent range), or it may be the start of something significant. As always with these things, you want to see a few subsequent data points before coming to a view.

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Galaxy · ACNielsen · Polls ·