Mark Kenny Chief political correspondent
April 15, 2013
Support for Prime Minister Julia Gillard's government has slumped further since she vanquished her leadership rival Kevin Rudd, a poll shows.
The latest Fairfax-Nielsen poll has revealed only 29 per cent of voters backed Labor, down 2 percentage points, while 49 per cent favoured the Coalition for their first preference vote.
That represents the Coalition's equal highest primary vote since last May at the height of its scare campaign against the carbon tax.
Flatlining
Federal Labor and Julia Gillard have experienced no improvement in the latest Fairfax/Nielsen poll, despite seeing off Kevin Rudd.
This is Labor's first primary vote result below 30 per cent since last June, before the carbon tax began and proved milder in impact than its critics warned. Its primary support had gone as low as 26 per cent the previous month.
After the distribution of preferences, the Coalition would easily have won an election held now with a 7 per cent nationwide swing.
Pollster John Stirton cautioned that the variations on last month's poll were within the margin of error but showed that even on an optimistic reading, Labor's support was not moving.
Trending downward: Julia Gillard. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
"We're running slightly against trend with this poll but it seems clear that the government's support has, at best, remained pretty much static since the beginning of February," he said.
The bad news for Labor comes after Ms Gillard had one of her best weeks in many months before the survey period, securing a historic partnership agreement with Beijing, and announcing a populist-inspired soak-the-rich strategy to tax superannuation accounts worth more than $2 million.
But the superannuation changes have received a mixed response with voters, with 52 per cent opposed despite its application to only 16,000 or so wealthier individuals.
Forty-five per cent support the tax rise, although that increases to 61 per cent among Labor voters exclusively.
Tony Abbott now leads Ms Gillard as preferred prime minister by a solid 8 percentage points, 50 per cent to 42 per cent, entrenching the gain he made in February.
Approval ratings showed a similar slide, with Ms Gillard now on a negative approval rating (the proportion of those who approve minus the proportion who disapprove) of minus 22 per cent, down 2 points since March.
Mr Abbott's net approval remained steady on a less severe minus 10 points.
Ms Gillard also languishes well behind the former prime minister Mr Rudd, whose supporters launched a leadership tilt against her last month, which collapsed spectacularly when Mr Rudd refused to stand in a spill of positions because he didn't have enough support. After that Mr Rudd declared he would never again challenge for the leadership. But he was still preferred Labor leader for 57 per cent of survey respondents, down from 62 per cent in March. Ms Gillard's support was 35 per cent, up from 31 per cent.
Among Labor voters though, Ms Gillard is preferred over Mr Rudd by 54 per cent to 44 per cent.
The poll results will harden fears among Labor MPs of a Queensland-style rout in which the Bligh government was swept from office, leaving only seven Labor seats in the 89-member Parliament.
Labor squeaked home at the federal election in 2010 after securing a micron-thin 50.1 per cent of the national vote compared with the Coalition on 49.9.
But it was Ms Gillard's superior post-election negotiations with the Greens and the independents which allowed her to form a minority government.
Only in Victoria is Labor's vote showing signs of holding up, with 35 per cent of voters backing it on first preference.
In South Australia/Northern Territory, support is down as low as 23 per cent although the margin of error is very high in that breakdown, due to the small sample size
