Newspoll: 56 to 44 in Labor’s favour
Today’s Australian has the latest Newspoll (a day earlier than expected) and the usual commentary from Dennis Shanahan. Shanahan argued that today’s results point to a later rather than earlier election, and he suggested that the “three-point fall in the Labor leader’s satisfaction from a near-record 65 to 62 per cent” points to a possible dulling in Rudd’s sheen.
I agree with Shanahan on the first point. An election before 24 November is highly unlikely. The first and eighth of December are looking better every day. In the next graph we can see that while 2001 and 2004 showed a narrowing throughout the year, the narrowing in 2007 was less pronounced and ceased in June. Since then it has been pretty much a flat line deep in Labor’s favour. Howard can only hold off and hope the polls narrow further immediately before a late election.
On the second point, I suspect Shanahan is reading a little too much into the stochastic perturbations of opinion polling. In this next graph I have plotted the difference between the net satisfaction rating for the prime minister and opposition leaders in 1996 and 2007. Two key points emerge from the graph. First, the 1996 Keating-Howard gap was smaller than the 2007 Howard-Rudd gap. Second, the Howard-Rudd gap has been trending wider over the past three months. (Note: as currently constructed, the graph assumes a 24 November election).
Today’s Newspoll is the second last poll published for September. (Morgan will be the last). So far, almost 9500 people have been polled this month. September is turning out a bit of a shocker for Howard’s re-election strategy.
The usual opinion poll graphs are here. You may need to hit the refresh or reload button on your browser to see the latest graphs.