Oz Politics Blog

Yesterday was the 26th full day in the formal election campaign. There are only fourteen more days (13 sleeps) until the tally for the 2007 election.

The Coalition had no new policies listed on its website.

Labor announced GP super clinics for Cairns and Onkaparinka, and a commitment on Adelaide’s South Road.

ACNielsen on-line: Today’s Age reported ACNielsen’s third on-line poll. If this poll comes from the same panel as the previous polls, it is arguably the most significant poll so far this campaign. The use of a panel for ACNielsen’s on-line polls was reported with the first on-line poll. The advantage of panel based polling is that the movement between polls represents genuine movement within the panel group. Poll-on-poll differences are always significant and not subject to margins of error (although the application of the poll result as a population-wide prediction is subject to both sampling and systemic errors).

The most compelling observation from the latest ACNielsen poll is the absence of movement between polls. If today’s ACNielsen poll is from the same panel as the earlier on-line polls (see table below), it would suggest the election campaign to date has been a fizzer for the Coalition. There has been no narrowing of the gap between Labor and the Coalition during the campaign.

Update at 10am: I was wrong. I have just received this email, “I thought I better let you know that the Nielsen online poll actually draws a sample from their 90,000 Your Voice panel each poll, so the people doing the poll aren’t the same every poll … As nice as it would be to have a true longitudinal poll, unfortunately this aint it ;-)” Oh well, what can I say? I should have re-read the first report more closely before blogging. Anyway, maybe next election one of the polling companies could organise a longitudinal study (just for the period of the election campaign) of (say) 2000 randomly selected voters so that we can follow the impact of the campaign from week to week.

Finally, while I was wrong about the ACNielsen on-line polls using longitudinal panel data, I was probably not wrong on the flat line observation.

Morgan: Morgan released two poll results yesterday. Last weekend’s face-to-face poll of 990 voters yielded the (implausible in my view) headline prediction of 62 to 38 in Labor’s favour on a two-party preferred basis. I suspect Morgan agrees with me on the plausibility of this poll result, as Morgan did not include this data point in its graph at the top of its report. The chart of the longer-term Morgan face-to-face polling follows. You can see that this series is often quite volatile. I reckon the latest result is more likely to be noise associated with that volatility, than a significant population wide change in voting intentions.

Morgan’s Wednesday to Thursday phone poll of 552 voters yielded a prediction of 56 to 44 in Labor’s favour (which showed some statistically insignificant movement on the previous phone polls - see below).

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.

Yesterday, Labor announced a GP super clinic for Modbury and Playford North, support for the Penguin medical centre. and a recycled water plant for Torquay and Armstrong Creek.

The Coalition had no new policies listed on its website.

Mark Latham said it was a Seinfeld election about nothing, with both major parties pandering to middle class greed.

Yesterday, The Coalition made released its policy on employment and workplace relations.

Labor made policy statements on fair prices for farmers and the Adelaide growth corridor.

Interest rates: The Reserve Bank increased the cash rate by 25 basis points. (You may need to hit the refresh or reload button on your browser to see the latest graph).

Betting markets: the latest media release from Sportingbet said, “In an unexpected shift, punters have flocked to the Coalition since this morning’s rate rise with 96% of money bet with Australia’s biggest bookmaker, Sportingbet Australia, going to the Coalition since the Reserve Bank’s announcement was made.”

Polls: The Australian has released another cumulative Newspoll sliced and diced by age, gender, state and city - this time for 26-28 October and 2-4 November.

ERMS has released its latest polling in Tasmanian seats. Since August, “the gap between the 2 parties has narrowed in all electorates except Denison.” The Poll Bludger has a discussion forum on this poll.

Reuters released its latest Poll Trend. It includes the latest Galaxy poll results for the first time.

Yesterday, Labor released statements on access to primary care in Bendigo, weeds, an evocities project for regional NSW, roads projects in northern NSW, veterans, and flooding in Lismore.

There were no new policies on the Coalition web site.

Today, the Reserve Bank will announce whether or not interest rates will be changed. The market is anticipating a rise of 25 basis points in the cash rate, from 6.50 to 6.75 per cent.

The structure of a Labor government: According to the media, a Rudd Labor government would initiate a razor gang review of the public service with a view to significant cutbacks (SMH, Age, CM, Hun).

Over at the Oz, Paul Kelly is predicting that a Rudd Labor government “means a deepening of the prime minister’s powers and a reorganisation of government that is Whitlamesque in its scope and its obsession about process.” According to Kelly, the bureaucrats working on a possible transition to a Labor government “can hardly believe their eyes”.

On the psephological front: Simon Jackman and William Bowe have looked at the accuracy of predictions based on state level swings versus national level swings (and whether they differ for status quo elections and change of government elections). Update: Sol Lebovic discusses the same issues in the Australian.

Newspoll: Today’s Australian contained the best Newspoll for the Coalition all year; 53 to 47 in Labor’s favour on a two-party preferred basis.

In trend terms, all of the pollsters are showing a narrowing of the gap between the parties on a two party preferred basis. With the exception of Morgan, the latest poll results are beginning to suggest a comfortable win for Labor, rather than the landslide win the polls were suggesting six or seven months ago. If the polls continue to narrow at the current rate over the remaining three weeks of the campaign, it could be a close election.

Applying the current trends to Antony Green’s election calculator we get the following seat projections for the House of Representatives.

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.

Yesterday, The Coalition released a policy statement on roads funding in South Australia.

Labor released policies on Indigenous education in the NT, men’s health, NT Health, a GP Super Clinic For The North Central Coast, economic development in Indigenous communities, scallop fishermen, Gippsland Lakes Communities, and the Ipswich Growth Corridor.