Abbott or Gillard...?

Abbott or Gillard to win the election ?

  • Tony Abbott

    Votes: 72 57.6%
  • Julia Gillard

    Votes: 53 42.4%

  • Total voters
    125
  • Poll closed .
Hi Thorpey,

Are you saying that gamblers and bookies have inside information on the outcome of the next election...?....evidence..???

Not at all. I'm saying they have the best information and look at it without bias, hence the odds. If the evidence really pointed to a coalition win, they would be favourites.

bye
 
Hi Thorpey,



Not at all. I'm saying they have the best information and look at it without bias, hence the odds. If the evidence really pointed to a coalition win, they would be favourites.

bye

I'm wondering what information/evidence they have....?

Do you think this poll and the Yahoo poll are biased...? How could 68000+ polled online be called biased...?

I knew this would be interesting....:)
 
Shouldn't take long to learn how to talk Kiwi.

Shorten the vowels and tell everyone how you speak "Quinn's" English.

The votes which will matter most though will be those in swinging electorates and those electorates affected negatively by changes to the mining tax.

There is talk that Lindsay Tanner's seat of Melbourne might go to the Greens.

My prediction is that she won't call the election till she's sorted out a compromise with the mining companies - and then can campaign that the super profits tax is all sorted.

Personally I think we, the electorate, will have forgotten how she got in, come election day if my feelings are anything to go by. I felt really sick the day she got in, but I'm "getting over it" LOL!!!
 
Thorpey the poll bias is to do with its audience base. For example:

If you polled within Labor HQ and compared to a poll within Liberal HQ you would get two different results.

The same is the case for yahoo poll. Bias from this poll is secured to people who:

a, Vote in online political polls

b, frequent Yahoo

It might just be saying something about the Liberal Party having more stronger supporters than Labor.
 
Or j
us
t s
tacking the poll if you are allowed to vote more than once. It is uni holidays no? sorry spilled dessert on the keyboard and now it's all sticky and not working properly.
 
Thorpey the poll bias is to do with its audience base. For example:

If you polled within Labor HQ and compared to a poll within Liberal HQ you would get two different results.

The same is the case for yahoo poll. Bias from this poll is secured to people who:

a, Vote in online political polls

b, frequent Yahoo

It might just be saying something about the Liberal Party having more stronger supporters than Labor.

Precisely, you are polling a bunch of capitalist property investors, of course the results are going to lean to the right.
 
Precisely, you are polling a bunch of capitalist property investors, of course the results are going to lean to the right.

Yeah...but aren't you surprised to see so many labour supporters here....?

CJ said:
The same is the case for yahoo poll. Bias from this poll is secured to people who:

a, Vote in online political polls

b, frequent Yahoo

Where is the bias in a and b...?
 
hey - i don't support labor, but i voted for them in this poll because i believe they will get back in will gillard at the helm. especially now that she's come to an agreement with the mining tax.

doesn't mean i'm leaning .... to early for a drink anyhow.
 
hey - i don't support labor, but i voted for them in this poll because i believe they will get back in will gillard at the helm. especially now that she's come to an agreement with the mining tax.

doesn't mean i'm leaning .... to early for a drink anyhow.

She has folded in a way Rudd couldn't - he would have been labelled weak.

Even though she was an architect of his plan she is seen in a whole different perspective. A woman who has resolved it through mediation and flexibility.

Funny how people I speak to think she will bring a refreshing Women's perspective to leadership in Australia.

Just like Mrs Thatcher did .....
 
Are you saying that gamblers and bookies have inside information on the outcome of the next election...?....evidence..???:confused::eek:

C'mon Bill...really....

Actually, you might be surprised to hear that a number of academic studies in both Australia and the US have suggested that betting markets are a more accurate predictor of election outcomes than opinion polls.

"In Australia, election-eve betting markets correctly predicted that the Coalition would win the 2001 and 2004 federal elections. By contrast, a Coalition win was predicted by the election-eve polls of only two out of three major pollsters in 2001, and only two out of four major pollsters in 2004."

Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5995

"Koleman Strumpf, a University of Kansas economics professor who tracks betting trends, believes wagering is an incomparable barometer of an election."

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/keith-thomson/the-most-accurate-electio_b_140181.html
 
Actually, you might be surprised to hear that a number of academic studies in both Australia and the US have suggested that betting markets are a more accurate predictor of election outcomes than opinion polls.

"In Australia, election-eve betting markets correctly predicted that the Coalition would win the 2001 and 2004 federal elections. By contrast, a Coalition win was predicted by the election-eve polls of only two out of three major pollsters in 2001, and only two out of four major pollsters in 2004."

Source: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=5995

"Koleman Strumpf, a University of Kansas economics professor who tracks betting trends, believes wagering is an incomparable barometer of an election."

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/keith-thomson/the-most-accurate-electio_b_140181.html

the bookies have a saying for it 'money talks bulls... walks'
 
I truly hope Labor do not get in.

I'm a woman. I don't mind Tony Abbott. I will be voting Liberal.

I'm already getting a bit sick of the Julia Gillard thing. Not her as a person, but the whole media thing with her being female.
 
Some lessons from past elections

*Long post warning* - so grab your preferred beverage and settle in!

You're right though could be interpreted both ways...but I am clearly after the consensus of who you think will win...and if anybody cares to mention why then that's even more interesting....thanks for looking in

I’ll take a stab at both “who” and “why”, Thorpey….I’ll state my rather tentative prediction upfront – Labor will be returned. The rest of this long post explains why (and if you’re not interested, you can safely skip the rest).

To examine who will win, I’ll look at how the Australian electorate at large behaves (for better or worse). I’ll put aside (as best as I can) who I want to vote for and what I think of the relative merits of the parties (which is one opinion amongst millions). After reading various psephologists (who have much deeper knowledge of electoral history and statistics than me), I’ll put on my very amateur psephologist’s hat. The discussion focuses on Australian federal elections only: different things happen at state elections and in other countries. I’ll also stick mainly to post-1949 elections, as these have more reliable voting figures available.

Factors in favour of the government being returned:
1. Federal governments change rarely: In the 23 House of Representative elections since 1949 (inclusive), there have been just 6 changes in government (1949, 1972, 1975, 1983, 1996, 2007).

2. The government is young: Young governments find it easier to get re-elected, as the electorate tends to be more forgiving of early mistakes. The last one term government was Scullin in 1929-32. Those circumstances – the midst of the Great Depression, mass unemployment, the Labor Party split over the economic remedies – don’t apply now. Retaining government, especially in the shadow of an election, usually means internal disagreements can be papered over and tolerated (at least until after the election). Not being in power is disunifying, hence the reason why oppositions change leaders more often than governments. Governments start dying from the day they are first elected. Once they make their first decision, they make their first enemy. So over the long term, enemies accumulate, and while they may be placated temporarily, eventually the attempts to defy political gravity fail when enough of the electorate gets tired of the government. Hence, elections get progressively harder to win as the government ages.

3. Governments have been in worse positions in the opinion polls and still won: At various times during their terms, Keating (1993), Howard (1998, 2001, 2004) were further behind than Rudd ever was, yet they still won the election. The modern elections where governments actually changed e.g. 1983, 1996, 2007, are where the opposition was consistently ahead (not occasionally ahead), generally by a decisive margin (not a lead like 51-49 which is within the margin of error), and often for periods of months, if not more than a year before the election.

4. Governments tend to win close elections: No federal government that has registered greater than 50% of the 2-Party Preferred (2PP) vote has lost the election. In fact, governments have won with less than 50% of the 2PP vote e.g. Menzies (1954, 1961), Gorton (1969), Hawke (1990), Howard (1998). The lowest such 2PP vote to win was Howard’s 48.9% in 1998. So even if the government is slightly behind the opposition in the opinion polls, it is not a definite harbinger of change. The reason why governments can win with less than 50% of the 2PP vote is that incumbency gives governments greater opportunity and resources to target campaigns at marginal electorates. The more extreme and cynical form of this is “pork-barrelling”.

5. The alternative should look “risk-free” and “promise continuity”: This is the “better the devil you know” idea. Because voting is compulsory, I suspect a lot of voters are quite apathetic, risk-averse and unengaged (relative to Somersofters), hence are reluctant to change governments often. Of course, this is a subjective consideration. Does Abbott come across as risk-free and reassuring to the majority of the electorate in the way that Howard or Rudd portrayed themselves? Outward signs would include: minimising disagreements with the present government (sometimes referred to as “me-tooism” or the “small target approach”), promising policy continuity, non-radical policies, low-key personality etc. This was an approach commonly ascribed to Howard in 1996 and Rudd in 2007 i.e. minimise the perception of difference with the government, except for a few policy areas. Once government is gained, then the former opposition can start changing to suit the situation, but it’s the impression in opposition that counts in getting elected. Whether it is good or not, oppositions proposing radical policies e.g. Hewson with Fightback! in 1993, usually find it much harder to get elected. More “colourful” leaders such as Latham in 2004, also highlight the perception of risk, even though Latham was up against an ageing government at that time.

Factors against the government being returned:
1. Abbott has been opposition leader for less than a year: Timing matters a lot in politics. In these days of the accelerated, ubiquitous media cycle, opposition leaders wear out their welcomes with the public reasonably fast. Precisely because much of their job involves criticism and carping without the capacity to implement policy, then they lack “job security”. Most opposition leaders who were successful, were only in that position for around a year or less:
Examples:
1975: Fraser was opposition leader for 10 months.
1983: Hawke was opposition leader for 1 month! i.e. from the day the election was called
1996: Howard was opposition leader for 14 months.
2007: Rudd was opposition leader for 12 months.
The major modern exception was Whitlam, who was opposition leader for just under 6 years, before his election in 1972.

2. Weakening the advantage of incumbency: The office of Prime Minister bestows natural authority, which accumulates with time, because of the decision-making capacities. Recall, for instance, that John Howard looked more authoritative in his fourth term, rather than at the start of his first term. What dilutes the advantages of incumbency, are the events of a week ago. It’s hard to quantify how the nature of the “transition” plays out with voters generally – talkback radio, online polls and anecdotes aren’t firm foundations for me to make predictions. It will take a little while for Gillard to assert the authority of the office, and time is not on her side. Note that changing a leader in office, need not be fatal to the party’s prospects for the next election. For instance, changing to Keating from Hawke in 1991 did not result in a loss in the 1993 election. However, changing to McMahon from Gorton in 1971 didn’t stave off defeat in 1972. On the other hand, these changes occurred at least a year prior to the next election. Hence, those new PMs had the opportunity to establish their authority. It would be ironic if having changed from Rudd because he was “unelectable” that Labor actually did lose under Gillard. Presently we have the curious situation of “two opposition leaders”, as neither really carries the authority of office yet.

3. Labor is not the natural party of government: This is based on length of incumbency. Since Federation, Labor has spent only one-third of this time in office. They have only formed two governments that lasted more than 3 years. Meanwhile, in the past 95 years all non-Labor governments have lasted at least 3 terms. The most durable of these non-Labor parties is, of course, the Liberal Party, founded in 1944.

4. Labor is in power in all states except WA: The state Labor governments in the more populous states, VIC, NSW, QLD, are all over 10 years old and suffering unpopularity. Unpopular state governments can drag down the vote of the federal incumbents if they’re of the same party. The only Liberal government is in WA, but that government is still quite new and popular.

As an aside, if Abbott loses this election, he is unlikely to lead the Liberal Party to the election afterwards. Politics is unforgiving: no defeated Liberal Party leader has ever led their party to the next election. Successful comebacks are rare but not totally out of the question, though, e.g. Howard’s return in 1995-6, following his first stint in 1985-9, but he didn’t compete at consecutive elections.

A wild card is how the issue of the Resources tax, and for that matter, asylum seekers, is dealt with. Another prolonged battle, especially if accompanied by public evidence of internal division, could be fatal. This is politics – anything can happen!

The Margin of Victory:
Whatever the result, in terms of the 2PP vote it will be quite close. Only twice since 1949 has either party won more than 55% of the 2PP vote (Holt in 1966, Fraser in 1975). I read a study once, that about 33% of the electorate are congenitally disposed to vote Labor, 33% to vote for the Coalition, under pretty much any conditions. Overall 40% consistently prefer one side. This leaves only around 20% whose vote is generally up for grabs, so reasonably competitive elections are more likely. However, while the 2PP vote is reasonably close, given our non-proportional representation electoral system, this can lead to a wide margin in terms of seats won.

As in the 2007 election, NSW and Queensland are the states to watch, with more of the government’s marginal seats in play. While WA would appear to be the government’s weakest state, because they only hold 4 out of 15 seats, they cannot go backwards much further there.

Opinion polls:
Online opinion polls can be an indication of political sentiment, but they are prone to compositional bias. I am not saying that the Yahoo! or Somersoft polls are deliberately rigged, but they are self-selecting polls, and hence may not sufficiently reflect the wider electorate. We just don’t know the demographics of the people who vote on these, and a larger sample does not necessarily guarantee a representative sample of the electorate. For all we know, some of them may not even be Australians, or a higher proportion of Liberal voters use Yahoo! than the general population etc.

More rigorous opinion polls that use reasonably large sample sizes (Newspoll, AC Nielsen, Galaxy, Morgan) do take into account factors such as age, geography, gender and weight their samples accordingly. Sample sizes of at least 1000 are enough to be worthwhile. While sample sizes of 10 000 would be nice, the gains in reducing the margin of error generally don’t justify the prohibitive costs of conducting these at frequent intervals. Opinion polls should be considered in aggregate to allow for possible methodological biases of a particular company. Furthermore, rather than taking a single opinion poll, it is more instructive to look at the trends over time. I’ve attached an article on the evolution of Australian opinion polls. Given file size upload constraints, the resolution is not as high as I would like and you will have enlarge it to read.

Opinion poll questions such as “Preferred PM” or “Approval/Disapproval ratings” are indications. While one can argue that people tend to focus more on the leader in modern times, other factors such as ideology, specific policies, party loyalty, and other less worthy factors etc. are still definitely in play. Making a prediction on election measures such as preferred PM or approval/disapproval is fraught. The key measure is the 2-Party Preferred vote, because that is an indication of voting intention. At the end of the day, it is not just which you party you vote for first, but which of the two major parties you prefer more i.e. if you voted for a minor party first. This is a consequence of our two-party system, with compulsory preferences, single-member electorates, and also the requirement for compulsory attendance at the polling booth.

Opinion polls gain increasing validity the closer we are to an election. In between elections, polls give voters a chance to “vent their spleen”, without having to contemplate actually making a binding judgement on the government.

Concluding remarks:
I’ve outlined what I believe are the relevant factors in making a prediction, but I may have overlooked other factors that change governments or given too much weight to some. As I said, I’m trying to avoid influencing predictions with my personal preferences, because that wasn’t the intent behind the original question. I’m going by my examination of Australian electoral history, rather than a very detailed view of the present issues, so this is very much a “macro” view of politics. It is my feeling that much of the daily flux and “issues” of politics bypasses the notice of the majority of the electorate (which is not an ideal state of affairs). Of course, rules can be broken, and I’m prepared to be wrong by taking such a macro rather than micro view (this is my first attempt at trying something like this).

As former British PM, Harold Wilson, once quipped “a week is a long time in politics.” A week or so ago, a minority would have predicted such a sudden change in PM. The more I observe politics, the more I’m prepared to be surprised (and wrong in my predictions). If Abbott were to defeat a first-term federal government, it would be, in his own words, “a famous victory”. I can only imagine how awful the recriminations in Labor would be. ;)

I’ll repeat my tentative prediction that the government will be returned, mostly driven by the “young governments tend to get re-elected” factor. However, to change the PM so close to an election, is unprecedented in post-war election history, which is why I’m finding this harder to pick. I was much more certain (and correct) about the outcomes in the 2004 and 2007 elections. Hope that goes some way to addressing the question and gives food for thought :).
 

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Hi,

You guys are all looking at it from an intelligent thinking persons point of view.

The majority of voters are rusted on Libs or labours with really only a small percentage that swing and decide who wins.

The largest swinging group are the younger voters, say under 30 years, and they prefer spin over substance. They don't read newspapers, they don't watch the TV news they just skim the headlines and like to vote for the best looking candidate for PM and have no idea who their local member is.

Julia Gillard and Labor will win for sure IMO :(
 
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