Newspoll: No gender bias in Coalition slump

The Coalition has lost ground with both men and women voters since allegations of sexual assault in parliament were first raised.

Scott Morrison during Question Time in the House of Representatives in Canberra on Monday. Picture: Getty Images

The Coalition has lost ground with both men and women voters since allegations of sexual assault in parliament were first raised in February, with no clear evidence at this stage that a loss of popular support for the government is gender biased.

Exclusive Newspoll analysis commissioned by The Australian shows an aggregated slump in the Coalition’s primary vote across the past two Newspolls has been shared among both groups.

A corresponding boost in support for Labor, which on Monday had to confront accusations of sexual and inappropriate behaviour within its ranks, had been shared by both genders but was slightly more pronounced among male voters.

The Coalition this week recorded its worst Newspoll result since the bushfire crisis in January 2020, with Labor leading 52-48 on a two-party-preferred basis.

While Scott Morrison’s approval ratings remained largely unchanged, dropping two points to 62 per cent, the Coalition’s primary vote fell three points to 39 per cent. This was its second-lowest level of support since the 2019 election.

The Newspoll analysis used ­aggregated data of the two polls conducted since former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins’s alle­gations that she had been raped by a colleague in then defence industry minister Linda Reynolds’s office in 2019 and the more historical recent rape allegations levelled against Attorney-General Christian Porter, which he has denied.

This was done to provide a reliable data set and larger sub samples by gender, which was then compared to Newspoll’s December quarterly analysis data.

 

The analysis shows that popular support for the Coalition among male voters had fallen from 44 per cent to 42 per cent while support from women voters had fallen from 41 per cent to 39 per cent.

Support for Labor among men rose from 34 per cent to 37 per cent while its share of women voters rose from 36 per cent to 38 per cent when comparing aggregated data.

While the results show the Coalition has a gender imbalance among its support base in favour of male voters, it is proportionally unchanged since December last year. At the same time, the gap between women voters and male voters supporting Labor narrowed.

The analysis does not include the 7 per cent of uncommitted ­voters.

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce said he believed the historical rape allegation levelled against Mr Porter was having an impact on the government’s standing in the community. “We can see from the polling that it does have a political effect,” he said.

“That’s why it’s beyond just a legal bar. It’s a political bar that you have to jump as well.”