Essential Report
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Better Prime Minister
Q. Who do you think would make the better Prime Minister out of Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten?
Total | Vote Lab | Vote Lib/ Nat |
Vote Greens | Vote Other | Oct 2013 | Mar 2014 | June 2014 | Dec 2104 | Jan 2015 | Feb 2015 | Mar 2015 | |||
Tony Abbott | 32% | 4% | 76% | 2% | 19% | 41% | 39% | 36% | 31% | 35% | 31% | 33% | ||
Bill Shorten | 35% | 69% | 5% | 62% | 23% | 22% | 33% | 40% | 36% | 37% | 39% | 37% | ||
Don’t know | 33% | 26% | 19% | 36% | 57% | 37% | 28% | 24% | 33% | 28% | 30% | 30% |
32% (down 1% since March) of respondents think Tony Abbott would make the better Prime Minister and 35% (down 2%) think Bill Shorten would make the better Prime Minister.
36% of men prefer Tony Abbott and 36% prefer Bill Shorten – and women prefer Bill Shorten 34% to 29%.

COVID-19 RESEARCH
Read Essential's ongoing research on the public response to Covid-19.
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Two Party Preferred:
Labor
47%
Coalition
44%
In this week's report:
- Performance of Scott Morrison
- Performance of Anthony Albanese
- Preferred Prime Minister
- Federal government response to Covid-19
- State government response to Covid-19
- Confidence in Labor government handling of Covid-19 pandemic
- Satisfaction with speed of Covid-19 vaccine rollout
- Party most responsible for slow vaccine rollout
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