The results of the final Newspoll of the year show the Coalition’s primary vote at 35 per cent, Labor’s at 41 per cent and a two-party-preferred split of 45-55, which would equate on a uniform basis to the loss of 21 seats for the government.
Alas for the Coalition, Scummo has decided to let polls get even worse before the election, at Domain:
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has locked in a May election, with government sources saying the Coalition needs to deliver a budget to complete its economic story before going to the polls.
On Sunday, Mr Morrison guaranteed Parliament would return in February, despite the prospect of another challenge to the government’s grip on the lower house of the kind it narrowly avoided last week.
In doing so, he effectively quashed speculation that he could bring forward the election to March. Senior government sources confirmed there was no serious discussion about March, leaving May 11 or 18 as the possible dates.
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal.
He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.
