People are pining for Plibersek but Labor just cannot let go of a third-rate Bill Shorten
Labor’s health spokeswoman Catherine King tries to stamp out a leadership coup in Canberra, yesterday:
Reporter: Newspoll this morning showing Labor’s primary vote still stagnating ... and even Labor voters think that maybe some others on your team would make a better leader, is it time for Bill Shorten to consider his position?
King: Well ... what Bill and I ... are absolutely focused on is taking off cost-of-living pressures from Australian families.
There’s nothing Bill Shorten can do. The polls, they toll for thee. Brad Norington and Simon Benson report in The Australian, yesterday:
With the Labor leader facing internal factional turmoil and forced by-elections due to the citizenship crisis, the first Newspoll of 2018 shows deputy leader Tanya Plibersek is the preferred leader among all voters, on 25 per cent, closely followed by Mr Albanese, on 24 per cent. Mr Shorten was narrowly behind on 22 per cent, with 29 per cent of voters uncommitted.
It’s a new survey which tells a very old story. Labor’s Brendan O’Connor on Sky News, May 21 last year:
Peter van Onselen: That ReachTEL poll, Brendan O’Connor, was extraordinary. To have a scenario where after such a successful election campaign for Mr Shorten ... he’s still not even the second most preferred Labor leader in the eyes of voters ...
O’Connor: ... The fact is we were in disarray after the 2013 election and we were demoralised and divided. Bill Shorten has, since that time, as leader brought us together ...
When is the Labor Party going to listen? A Roy Morgan poll on the Labor leadership from May 17 last year:
Plibersek with 26 per cent (up 1 per cent) of electors is once again the clearly preferred Labor leader — for the sixth time in a row since April 2015
The people are calling on Plibersek. Will she answer their plea? The Deputy Opposition Leader speaking to Tasmania Talks, May 17 last year:
We’re all very united behind Bill, there’s none of the infighting that you see in the Liberal Party.
There are reports some people wish Tanya was a little less keen on unity. The Australian online, July 21, 2015:
Ms Plibersek, the party’s deputy leader, is strengthening her claims to the leadership with the symbolic support of former deputy prime minister Wayne Swan in a cross-factional friendship that is raising eyebrows among federal MPs ...
What’s Swanny up to these days? Troy Bramston reports in The Aus tralian, January 31:
Senior Labor figures have canvassed Wayne Swan about running for the position of national president of the party, possibly with the backing of the national right faction, as the search begins ahead of a nationwide membership ballot in May-June.
Not that the Coalition can celebrate. Christopher Pyne on the countdown to 30 Newspolls on the ABC’s RN Breakfast, yesterday:
I would remind you in those days, which seems like a dim, distant past, that the prime minister (Tony Abbott) at the time was also behind Bill Shorten as the preferred PM so we can’t just refer to certain parts of polls and ignore the rest of it
Tough luck. Turnbull has four polls to go. The then communications minister in Canberra, September 14, 2015:
We have lost 30 Newspolls ... It is clear that the people have made up their mind about Mr Abbott’s leadership.