Category Archives: Essential poll

Guardian Essential poll: Labor maintains large lead over Coalition despite budget failing to impress voters

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Anthony Albanese records strong approval of his performance, but only about one-third of voters thought the budget would help families

The Albanese government has a commanding lead over the Coalition, 53% to 42% in two-party-preferred terms, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll.

Taken after the release of Labor’s first full-year budget on 9 May, the poll also found that less than one quarter of respondents (24%) think the budget will be good for them personally, although that is up eight points since the same question was asked in November, after the October budget.

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Guardian Essential poll: Indigenous voice retains majority support but sees opposition harden

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No voters to constitutionally entrenched body remain at 40%, while Coalition leader Peter Dutton sees approval drop to 44%

Opposition to the Indigenous voice to parliament is hardening although the proposed constitutional change enjoys majority support with 60% in favour, the latest Guardian Essential poll finds.

The poll of 1,136 voters, released on Tuesday, found those who described themselves as a “hard no” against the voice was up three points to 26%, with “soft nos” down by three points to 14%.

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Guardian Essential poll: support for Aukus and Indigenous voice declines

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Anthony Albanese improves in personal measures, including honesty and vision, despite waning support for major policies

Public support for the Aukus nuclear submarine acquisition and the Indigenous voice to parliament have both declined, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll.

The poll of 1,124 voters, released on Tuesday, suggests Australians are at odds with the Aukus deal, with just one in five voters labelling China a “threat to be confronted” and only one quarter happy to pay the price tag of up to $368bn to acquire nuclear submarines.

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MP gives first speech to parliament – as it happened

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Energy ministers to meet on Friday as regulator updates forecasts

Summer is almost done (according to the calendar) and we managed to get through it without significant electricity shortages. A heatwave building across southern Australia in coming days will add some extra demand.

I mean, yes, in nine months have we fixed every single reliability gap for the next decade? No, there’s more work to do.

Am I pleased with what we’ve done? Yes. Am I yet satisfied? No.

You know that this report normally comes out once a year or so, this is a report which has been put out in a much more rapid timeframe because Aemo has reached the view that the guidance they provided last August is out of date because we’ve seen a lot more investment coming through with renewable.

So the sorts of decisions we are making across the board are making a difference on that sort of a timeframe, I expect Aemo will provide further updates.

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Guardian Essential poll: majority of Australians continue to support Indigenous voice

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With 65% of respondents supporting the change, survey suggests Peter Dutton’s soft no campaign is failing to shift sentiment

A majority of Australians continue to support a constitutionally enshrined voice to parliament, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, including an overwhelming majority of young Australians.

The latest fortnightly survey of 1,000 respondents suggests a soft no campaign by the Liberal leader, Peter Dutton, unleashed over the summer break has, thus far, failed to shift voter sentiment, with 65% of respondents supporting the change, a two-point increase from the percentage recorded last December.

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Guardian Essential poll: Albanese approval rating dips in sign of gruelling political year ahead

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Prime minister’s lowest result since last August doesn’t necessarily mean the end of government’s post-election honeymoon

Anthony Albanese’s approval rating has dropped five points over the summer as Peter Dutton ramped up what Indigenous leader Noel Pearson calls “a spoiling game” on the voice to parliament.

The first Guardian Essential poll for 2023 shows voter approval of the prime minister dipped from 60% in December to 55% in January – which is Albanese’s lowest result since last August. Voter approval of the prime minister had been steady during the last quarter of 2022, ranging between 59% and 60%.

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Essential poll: three-quarters of voters believe cost-of-living crisis will worsen but majority give Albanese thumbs up

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More than 60% also say they support the Indigenous voice to parliament, with the Liberal party at risk of alienating younger voters if it backs the Nationals’ position

Australians are bracing for increased consumer prices, expensive power bills and higher interest rates in the year ahead, but 40% of Guardian Essential poll respondents think 2023 will be better than 2022.

The nascent optimism as the summer break approaches comes ahead of a special sitting of federal parliament on Thursday to pass new legislation capping gas prices, which is the first tranche of an intervention to reduce power bills.

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Interest in Melbourne Cup slips with more than half of Australians uninterested, poll suggests

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Nearly half of those surveyed (45%) believe it promotes ‘unhealthy’ gambling and a third (34%) say it normalises animal cruelty

Australia’s love affair with the Melbourne Cup appears to be waning, with a new survey finding more than half have “low” or “no interest” in the race that traditionally stops the nation.

Amid growing support for the Nup to the Cup movement, the latest Guardian Essential poll also suggests almost half of those surveyed (45%) believe it promotes “unhealthy” gambling behaviour, with a third (34%) saying it normalises animal cruelty.

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Guardian Essential poll: Australians divided on whether King Charles should be head of state

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Survey respondents split 50-50 but women, older voters and Coalition supporters more likely to back new monarch, poll suggests

Australians are divided over whether King Charles III should be the country’s head of state, with the latest Guardian Essential poll suggesting a 50-50 split between those who support the new UK monarch and those who do not.

The survey of 1,075 people, taken after Queen Elizabeth II’s death, gives little hope to the republican cause with fewer than half of the respondents (43%) supporting Australia becoming a republic – a figure that has barely moved over the past five years.

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Guardian Essential poll: 64% of young voters would consider backing independents in NSW and Victorian elections

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After success of federal ‘teals’, about half of all respondents are thinking about a shift away from major parties

About half of voters – and more than two-thirds of young people – are considering backing independents at the upcoming Victorian and New South Wales state elections, in a trend described as the “Uberisation” of politics.

The latest Guardian Essential poll shows 48% of 1,100 respondents in Victoria and NSW are considering voting for an independent if one were to run in their electorate.

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Guardian Essential poll: about half say Scott Morrison should resign over secret ministries

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Poll finds 51% of respondents say the former PM should go, including a third of Coalition voters

About half of voters think Scott Morrison should resign from parliament over his decision to secretly appoint himself to five additional portfolios while prime minister, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, which also finds trust in government in steady decline.

As the former prime minister continues to defend his decision to take on the additional portfolios without informing his colleagues or the public, the survey of 1,070 people found that about half (51%) agreed with the statement that he “should resign from parliament”, including a third of Coalition voters.

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Guardian Essential poll: 40% of voters say Labor doing poor job tackling surging cost of living

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Half of voters surveyed say they can afford household bills but struggle to find anything extra or report feeling under financial pressure

Just one-quarter of voters think Labor is doing a good job of handling surging cost of living pressures, the latest Guardian Essential poll suggests, while a majority of respondents believe the Albanese government can influence the direction of inflation and interest rates.

The results from the latest survey of 1,082 respondents comes ahead of Wednesday’s inflation data which is expected to show consumer prices are running at their highest level since the 1990s.

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Guardian Essential poll: Albanese’s approval wavering as honeymoon fades

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Disapproval of PM’s performance ticks up while 60% think masks should return to stop Covid’s winter spread

A majority of voters favour a return to mask wearing to help slow transmission during the Omicron third wave, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, which also finds Anthony Albanese’s initial honeymoon with voters has moderated.

The latest survey of 1,097 respondents finds more than half of Guardian Essential respondents (56%) continued to approve of the prime minister’s performance (down three points since June), while 24% disapproved (up six points in a month).

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Guardian Essential poll shows NSW Coalition’s primary vote falling below 40%

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About 37% of respondents intend to give the Coalition their first preference vote, while Labor’s primary vote remains the same

The New South Wales Coalition faces a tough road to re-election, with the latest Guardian Essential poll showing its primary vote falling below 40% as it defended the controversial appointment of former deputy premier John Barilaro to a New York trade role.

However, 49% of voters approve of Dominic Perrottet’s performance as premier since he took over the job from Gladys Berejiklian, who resigned amid a corruption investigation last year.

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Guardian Essential poll: Labor loses ground in first week of campaign but remains ahead of Coalition

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Albanese’s disapproval rate rose by five points but over half of all respondents still believe Labor will win the next election

Labor appears to have lost ground in the opening week of the federal election campaign according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, but a majority of respondents still think Anthony Albanese will be Australia’s next prime minister.

The latest survey of 1,020 respondents shows Labor’s standing in the two-party preferred “plus” measure is down three points in a fortnight, and there has been a two point increase in the number of undecided voters. But 55% of respondents believe Labor will win on 21 May.

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Guardian Essential poll: voters mark Morrison government down on flood response

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Separate Australian National University longitudinal survey suggests Coalition primary vote slumps to 32.2% with Labor in election-winning position

Voters are underwhelmed by the Morrison government’s response to recent catastrophic flooding in New South Wales and Queensland, and a majority fear disasters will be worse in the absence of significant action to address climate risks, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll.

The survey of 1,091 voters finds only 26% of respondents characterised the Coalition’s recent flood disaster response as good, while 40% thought poor and 34% said neither good nor poor.

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Scott Morrison’s China gambit is a Hail Mary from a flailing leader trying to galvanise fear | Peter Lewis

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The majority of Australians support a position which is the polar opposite to the government’s current tub-thumping on national security

Scott Morrison’s efforts to politicise Australia’s complex relationship with China seems to be further soiling his own flagging reputation.

Like a bull in the proverbial, he has spent the past fortnight bombarding the airwaves with hastily googled dossiers and cold war-era panics to suggest an Albanese government would become an antipodean branch office of the Beijing Politburo.

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More than two-thirds of voters think Covid vaccines will be rolled out efficiently and safely – poll

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A majority of 58% has confidence vaccinations will effectively stop the virus within Australia, the latest Essential poll suggests

Voters think the Morrison government will be able to manage the rollout of Covid vaccines safely and effectively despite the obvious downside risks, and a majority believes an early election would be an act of opportunism, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll.

The data also suggests that Labor has been broadly competitive with the Coalition over the past quarter, despite some in the opposition fearing their leader, Anthony Albanese, can’t get a grip on Scott Morrison – a morale slump that has fuelled open speculation about whether Anthony Albanese will lead the ALP to the next election.

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Essential poll: most Australians believe there is institutional racism in the US but not Australia

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Almost 80% of those surveyed agree US authorities have been unwilling to deal with racism and that is why incidents continue to occur

A significant majority of Australians in the latest Guardian Essential poll sample believe Americans are correct to demand better treatment for African Americans in their society – but only 30% believe there is institutional racism in Australian police forces.

The latest survey of 1,073 respondents shows the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis at the hands of police – an incident sparking fury that spilled over into mass protests in a number of US cities, including the capital Washington – resonated strongly in Australia.

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Even in its dying days, the government denies the need for climate action | Peter Lewis

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The reckoning for this failure will come at the next election. And it can’t come soon enough

For all the skittishness of Australian politics through the years of the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison governments there’s been one factor that has been remarkably consistent.

Amid leadership coups, cultural offensives and the revolving door of energy policy acronyms, the Australian public has remained steadfast in its belief that more needs to be done to address climate.

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