Politics at home and abroad
Post-budget polls
William Bowe’s Poll Bludger reports on post-budget polls by Newspoll and Resolve Strategic. Primary voting intention, shown in the table below, suggests that Labor has consolidated its post-election lead, while support for the Coalition may have slipped a little.
Bowe also reports a strong TPP lead for Labor, but in view of the low primary support for both main parties, not too much should be inferred from TPP figures.
People’s response to the budget is mixed, with a more positive response from Resolve Strategic than from Newspoll. Bowe draws on Newspoll time series analysis over 26 budgets, revealing that people almost always believe that the opposition could not have done a better job than the government, and that people’s assessment on the budget’s personal impact and the impact on the economy are closely correlated.
The latest Essential Report has three questions on people’s response to the budget.
The first question is about engagement: we have been less engaged with this budget than we were with the Coalition’s pre-election budget, with young people reporting very little engagement.
The second question is about who people believe are the beneficiaries of the budget: “people who are well off”, “the economy overall”, “people on low incomes”, “you personally”. The well-off get the highest score – 42 percent – which is understandable perhaps because of the retention of the stage 3 tax cuts in the budget projections.
Strangely on all four dimensions responses have become more negative over the last four budgets. That suggests that the usual government message that you might have to make some sacrifices now for the benefit of the economy or those who aren’t so well-off is losing whatever appeal it once had.
The third question is about the outcomes delivered by the budget. A small majority (53 percent) believe it places unnecessary burdens on future generations, and only 26 percent believe it will help relieve cost of living pressures. Unsurprisingly Coalition voters are particularly dismissive of the budget.
There is a separate question about how economic conditions in Australia will develop over the next twelve months. We’re a pretty pessimistic mob: the last time we thought the economy would get better was in 2009.
PS – Bowe is running a donation drive.
Brazil – bye-bye Bolsonaro
The Brazilian election was closer than earlier polls suggested, but in the runoff election Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva defeated incumbent strongman president Jair Bolsonaro, 50.9 percent to 49.1 percent.
It would be wishful thinking to see this outcome as a swing to the left. Bolsonaro’s vote is only 6 percentage points down on his win in 2018. That’s in spite of Brazil’s poor economic performance, and its terrible death toll from Covid-19 – the highest of any large country. (Bolsonaro’s policy was to prioritize “the economy” ahead of people’s safety – both suffered.)
In many countries there has been a division between liberal and educated urban voters supporting liberal and progressive parties and poorer, less educated voters supporting right-wing populists, but Brazil ’s divisions have been more along traditional South American lines. Writing in The Conversation Anthony Pereira of London’s King’s College describes Bolsonaro’s support base as an alliance of agribusiness, evangelical protestants, truck drivers, police, the military, and gun owners, while Lula’s support base is in the impoverished northeast regions: Brazil election: victorious Lula faces an uphill struggle – a damaged economy and a deeply divided country.
The election has worldwide significance, not only because Brazil is one of the world’s largest democracies (though falling into the “flawed” classification along with most South American countries and the US), but also because of the importance of the vast Amazon rainforest to the planet’s safety. Lula ran on a strong platform of reversing Bolsonaro’s destruction of the Amazon and slaughter of indigenous people.
Other elections
Denmark – social democrats hold on
With twelve parties in parliament Denmark’s politics are no less complicated than they are portrayed in the TV fiction Borgen. Deutsche Welle reports that in its election, held on Tuesday, the country’s centre-left bloc, formed around the Social Democrats, has held on. Compared with the 2019 election support for the Social Democrats, the largest party, rose by about 2 percent to 27 percent, while support for the conservative Venestre Party fell sharply, from 23 percent to 16 percent. Much of Venestre’s vote seems to have gone to a new party, the Moderates, formed by Lars Lokke Rasmussen, an ex-prime minister, and a former leader of Venestre. They won 9 percent of the vote and 16 seats in the 179-seat parliament.
Turnout was 81 percent – low by Danish standards but astronomical by the standards of most countries with voluntary voting.
To put this into an Australian context, imagine Labor scraping back to office in a minority government, the Coalition suffering a terrible loss, and a new party formed by Malcolm Turnbull making an impressive entry to the scene.
Israel – a swing to the religious right
Israel too went to the polls on Tuesday. There were large gains by parties on the far rightaccording to The Economist, resulting in an almost certain return to office for Binyamin Netanyahu. In comparison with last year’s election, Netanyahu’s Likud Party picked up only 1 percent of the vote and 2 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, but there was a surge of support for the conservative Religious Zionist Party, whose vote went from 5 percent to 11 percent, and who gained 8 seats. Turnout was about 66 percent – high by Israel’s standards.