Mr Unpopular: Dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Tony Abbott rises again

X-RATED tweets on Q&A are the least of the PM’s problems this morning. If he wasn’t worried about his job before, he should be after reading these numbers.

LIBERAL jitters over the coming Canning by-election and Tony Abbott’s leadership have been intensified today by a survey showing the Prime Minister is increasingly unpopular.

And Labor’s primary vote is now slightly higher than the Coalition’s, according to a Newspoll in The Australian.

The primary vote movement is negligible — Labor steady on 39 per cent and the Coalition dropping from 39 to 38 per cent — and the two-party preferred stays put at 54/46 per cent favouring Labor. And a single poll does not fix long-term voting positions.

But the authoritative survey today makes clear Prime Minister Abbott has not rescued his relationship with voters over the past few months.

And the insistence by Government MPs — as instructed by the Prime Minister’s office — that the Cabinet is functioning well and other positive comments have not worked with the electorate.

It is possible the public is tired of the Government talking about itself and not them.

Dissatisfaction with Mr Abbott rose from 60 per cent in mid-July to 63 per cent last weekend. It has not been below 60 per cent since mid-June.

Dissatisfaction with the performance of Opposition Leader Bill Shorten fell from 59 per cent in mid-July to 52 per cent last weekend.

The Liberal Party is expected to win the September 19 Canning by-election where it has a strong candidate in a former SAS officer.

The ballot, following the death of popular local member Don Randall, is in Western Australia, which recently has been unfriendly towards Labor and where the Government has high-profile campaigners such as Foreign Minister Julie Bishop.

The Newspoll indicates a Liberal victory might not be as easy as the Liberals might hope, and that Tony Abbott might not be a vote clincher.

A swing against the Government in Canning could reactivate internal Liberal agitation over Mr Abbott’s leadership. A Liberal loss, considered unlikely, would be disastrous for him.

Further, Bill Shorten has survived attacks on his past career as a trade union leader although his role with the Australian Workers’

Union and Labor’s relations with unions broadly are expected to receive more attention over coming months.

Mr Shorten is waiting for royal commissioner Dyson Heydon to reveal whether he will quit the trade union inquiry or continue with it following claims he had raised an apprehension of bias after an invitation to speak at a Liberal function, which he declined.

Parties represented at the Royal Commission had expected Mr Heydon to tell them his decision Monday and to make it public today. But late yesterday Mr Heydon said, without explanation, he was delaying his announcement.

Originally published as Mr Unpopular: Dissatisfaction with Prime Minister Tony Abbott rises again