(09/30/09) -

Australias ALP in Stable Lead

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) – The popularity of Australia’s governing party has dropped slightly, according to a poll by Newspoll published in The Australian. 43 per cent of respondents would support the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in the next election to the House of Representatives, down one point since late August.

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) – The popularity of Australia’s governing party has remained stable, according to a poll by Newspoll published in The Australian. 43 per cent of respondents would support the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in the next election to the House of Representatives, down one point since late August.

The Coalition of Liberals and Nationals remains second with 38 per cent, followed by the Australian Greens with 11 per cent. Australia’s preferential voting system—where electors indicate an order of predilection for each contender, and the ballots from smaller parties are re-distributed—gives the ALP a 10-point lead over the Coalition.

Australia held a federal election in November 2007. Final results gave the ALP 85 seats in the 150-member House of Representatives. ALP leader Kevin Rudd was officially sworn in as prime minister in December, bringing an end to the 11-year tenure of Liberal leader John Howard as head of Australia’s government.

Howard failed to retain his seat in the Bennelong constituency and stepped down as Liberal leader. Brendan Nelson—a former defence minister—defeated former environment minister Malcolm Turnbull in an internal leadership ballot by just three votes. In September 2008, Turnbull won a new internal leadership race, edging Nelson by four votes.

On Sept. 27, treasurer Wayne Swan criticized Turnbull and opposition treasury spokesman Joe Hockey for rejecting calls by the prime minister to regulate banks and curb banker bonuses, saying, ”We’ve now got leaders and finance ministers from the world’s 20 most important economies all coming together in a historic agreement on excessive executive pay. And at home Mr. Hockey and Mr. Turnbull are out on their own saying ‘the rest of the world and the Australian community have got it wrong – let the obscene pay packets for merchant bankers roll on’.”

Polling Data

If a federal election to the House of Representatives were held today, which one of the following would you vote for? If "Uncommitted", to which one of these do you have a leaning?

Two-Party Preferred Vote

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Source: Newspoll / The Australian
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,150 Australian voters, conducted from Sept.18 to Sept. 20, 2009. Margin of error is 3 per cent.

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