SYDNEY, June 29 — What does it take to turn a political tanker around when it’s sitting at 17 per cent? That’s the question Angus Taylor is now wrestling with, after two polls showed the Coalition’s primary vote stuck in the teens and voters drifting to Labor rather than returning to the opposition. The Opposition Leader conceded the Coalition has “some real work to do” to rebuild trust with Australians, describing the party’s position as akin to a heavy tanker that is no longer in free fall.
He made the comments to 2GB host James Willis, who pressed him on what a record-low primary result of 17 per cent says about his leadership. “Well, we were in free fall, obviously,” Mr Taylor said.
“You still are,” Mr Willis interrupted. The numbers are stark. In both The Australian’s Newspoll and the Redbridge poll published in the Australian Financial Review on Monday, One Nation’s primary vote was pegged back slightly, to 29 per cent.
But voters shifted to Labor — which rose to 33 per cent in Newspoll and 30 per cent in Redbridge — rather than returning to the Coalition. Mr Taylor’s own position is now lower in Newspoll than it was when he replaced Sussan Ley in February.
That timeline matters. The party has been losing ground for months, and the latest figures suggest the bleeding hasn’t stopped, even if the Opposition Leader claims the rate of decline has slowed. The bigger movement, intriguingly, was in One Nation leader Pauline Hanson’s personal satisfaction rating, which dropped 10 points in the Redbridge survey.
That suggests voters may be cooling on the party even as they remain reluctant to return to the Coalition. Mr Taylor said he had “never attacked One Nation voters, and I never would”, but made clear Labor is his primary focus. Shadow minister Maria Kovacic put it more bluntly: the Coalition’s job is “to stop One Nation in the same way it is our job to get rid of this Albanese Labor Government”.
“What Angus Taylor has said there is that he won’t attack One Nation voters and I think that’s a very important distinction because they are Australian voters and it is our job to tell them why we can do a better job and why they should have the,” she said. The mechanics of rebuilding trust are, as Mr Taylor described them, a matter of time, discipline and hard work.
The science behind it is less clear. Voters in the teens don’t usually return to government quickly, and the Coalition’s path back requires winning back voters who have shifted to One Nation and Labor simultaneously. Mr Taylor said the election is still a long way off.
That gives him time, but it also gives his opponents time to entrench their gains. The question is whether the Coalition can stop the drift before it becomes a permanent realignment.
What researchers found, in both polls, is that the primary vote is not just low — it’s stuck. And the movement that is happening is not flowing back to the Coalition. That’s the hard truth Mr Taylor is now confronting, with a heavy tanker to turn and not much wind in the sails.
