THE Greens’ electoral support has soared to a record high, leaving Labor wallowing at its lowest levels of support in four years, while the leadership ratings of Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott have collapsed to their all-time worst.
The Greens have picked up support as the major parties have lost ground, and Labor would desperately rely on high preference flows from the Greens to hold on to government if an election were held now.
After two weeks of intense fighting among the Rudd government, the Coalition and the mining companies over the proposed resource super-profits tax and attacks on the credibility of both the Prime Minister and the Opposition Leader, the Greens have recorded their highest primary vote: 16 per cent, up four points from two weeks ago.
The drop in voter approval for Mr Rudd and Mr Abbott came as the Opposition Leader yesterday escalated his attack on the Prime Minister for the government’s use of public funds for its advertising campaign on the mining tax.
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According to the latest Newspoll survey, conducted last weekend exclusively for The Australian, both the Coalition and the ALP have lost support, the Coalition dropping from 43 per cent to 41 per cent on primary vote and the Rudd government falling back two points to its lowest support of 35 per cent.
Mr Rudd and Mr Abbott have both been hit by significant falls in voter approval, with the Prime Minister reaching a high of 54 per cent dissatisfaction and the Opposition Leader hitting a dissatisfaction high of 49 per cent.
The rise of the Greens – now up six percentage points in six weeks – offset the Rudd government’s fall to its lowest primary vote of 35 per cent in the calculation of the two-party-preferred vote.
The Greens and “others” – independents and small parties – hold 24 per cent of the primary vote – as one in four voters turns away from the major parties. At the last election, the Greens’ primary vote was 7.8 per cent; “others” had 6.8 per cent.
Based on preference flows at the 2007 election, Labor’s two-party-preferred vote rose from 50 per cent in the previous Newspoll two weeks ago to 51 per cent, while the Coalition’s support went from 50 to 49 per cent. At the last election, the Labor Party had a primary vote of 43.3 per cent and a two-party-preferred vote of 52.7 per cent while the Coalition had a primary vote of 42.1 per cent and a two-party-preferred vote of 47.3 per cent.
Labor’s primary vote has been below 40 per cent since mid-April, before the budget and the release of the proposed mining tax, and when Mr Rudd last had a positive satisfaction rating with the public.
The Coalition’s primary vote has now been at or above 40 per cent since the end of March.
Satisfaction with the leadership of both Mr Rudd and Mr Abbott has fallen to a new low for each, with only 36 per cent of voters satisfied with the Prime Minister’s performance and a new high of 54 per cent being dissatisfied. This gives Mr Rudd a “negative” satisfaction rating of 18 percentage points.
While voters are turning off Mr Rudd, they also continue to turn away from the Opposition Leader, with Mr Abbott’s satisfaction plunging five points to 37 per cent and dissatisfaction rising four points to 49 per cent. Mr Abbott’s negative satisfaction rating is 12 percentage points.
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