Like 2019, this election is Labor’s to lose — and they look to be going the right way about doing so. New polling shows that Labor are still well ahead, but the momentum is with Prime Minister Scott Morrison. With opposition leader Anthony Albanese still in self-isolation and sidelined from campaigning, Labor strategists must surely be getting worried.
Tellingly, Morrison’s preferred PM polling is at the same level it was over Bill Shorten, at the same point of the 2019 campaign. In case anyone has forgotten, that election was a “miracle win” for Morrison.
Scott Morrison has extended his lead over Anthony Albanese as the preferred prime minister despite a fall in his approval ratings following a period dominated by concerns over the security pact between China and Solomon Islands.
The further swing toward Mr Morrison in the head-to-head contest comes amid a slight electoral gain for both Labor and the Coalition, which have recovered ground against the record levels of support for minor parties and independents.
An exclusive Newspoll conducted for The Australian, bookending the second week of the election campaign, shows Labor leading the Coalition 53-47 on a two-party-preferred basis, consistent with the results of the last two Newspoll surveys.
Based on this poll, Labor would secure majority government.
As numerous pundits have pointed out, the problem with using a nation-wide two-party-preferred result is that that’s not how elections are won. Elections are won seat by seat. The nation-wide “popular vote” very often does not correlate with who wins enough seats to form government.
The poll also seems to show that voters are drifting back to the two major parties, even though both leaders are now on a net negative satisfaction. Call it the “doormat election”.
The small lift for both major parties has come at the expense of both left- and right-wing minor parties, with the Greens falling a point to 11 per cent and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation also falling a point to 3 per cent.
Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party remained steady at 4 per cent while support for other minor parties and independent candidates was unchanged on 9 per cent.
The Australian
The poll followed a week in which Labor tried to capitalise on the Solomons deal with China, accusing the government of a foreign policy “blunder.” But Labor’s shrill hectoring is undermined by their own record on China deals, and especially by their deputy leader’s history of pro-China shilling.
Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles praised China’s record on human rights, credited Xi Jinping with being a “deeply impactful President” and said Australia should stay out of contested disputes in the South China Sea, echoing a sentiment uttered by then senator Sam Dastyari a year earlier.
It’s worth remembering that Dastyari is a “former senator” because he was caught out passing on intel to a suspected China agent.
But if Dastyari was a stooge for the Chinese Communist Party, Marles isn’t sounding much better.
In a video recording of the previous unpublished remarks obtained by The Australian, Mr Marles praised China’s human rights contribution and described it as a “force for good” […] In the speech before his Q&A session, Mr Marles said a starting point to forging a friendship between Australia and China “is to acknowledge China’s considerable humanitarian achievements”.
Well, they’ve stopped openly cannibalising people and murdering them by the millions, so that’s something… I guess.
Marles also made these jaw-dropping claims:
“China is not the Soviet Union. It does not seek to export an ideology, to supplant our political system and replace it with their own,” he said […]
“The Belt and Road initiative, which is very much [Xi Xinping’s] baby – it’s on a gigantic scale in terms of what it is seeking to achieve and there will be a whole lot of good that comes from it, no question,” he said.
The Australian
Bear in mind that, when Marles was making these comments, ASIO had been warning for two years that China was indeed attempting to interfere in Australia’s democracy. Just months later, Clive Hamilton’s Silent Invasion explored in exhausting detail just how thoroughly Chinese influence has infiltrated Australian society, from politics to business and academia.
Labor is already bogged down with a reputation for two-faced chutzpah. In 2019, it was “Shifty Shorten”, now it’s “Each-Way Albo” — and a deputy whose forked tongue on Australia’s most serious security concern in 80 years doesn’t inspire much more confidence.
