Q. Thinking about the decisions the Labor Government has made over the last few years, do you think the following decisions were good or bad for Australia?
|
|
Total good |
Total bad |
Very good |
Good |
Neither good nor bad |
Bad |
Very bad |
Don’t know |
| Expanding dental health services for people on low incomes |
77% |
5% |
33% |
44% |
14% |
2% |
3% |
5% |
| Increasing the tax free threshold from $6,000 to $18,200 |
75% |
4% |
36% |
39% |
16% |
3% |
1% |
5% |
| Increasing the age pension |
70% |
11% |
30% |
40% |
13% |
7% |
4% |
6% |
| Increasing superannuation from 9% to 12% |
68% |
9% |
27% |
41% |
16% |
6% |
3% |
6% |
| Protecting large areas of Australia’s marine environment in a network of marine reserves |
67% |
8% |
28% |
39% |
20% |
5% |
3% |
7% |
| Introducing the National Disability Insurance Scheme |
58% |
5% |
21% |
37% |
23% |
3% |
2% |
14% |
| Implementing the recommendations of the Gonski report to increase education funding |
54% |
8% |
20% |
34% |
25% |
5% |
3% |
13% |
| Stimulus spending to tackle the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) |
54% |
22% |
22% |
32% |
18% |
14% |
8% |
8% |
| Spending on new school buildings during the GFC |
53% |
22% |
15% |
38% |
18% |
12% |
10% |
6% |
| Paid parental leave |
52% |
20% |
17% |
35% |
23% |
12% |
8% |
5% |
| Introducing a tax on large profits of mining companies |
49% |
25% |
24% |
25% |
17% |
13% |
12% |
8% |
| Implementing the recommendations of the expert committee on asylum seekers including offshore processing |
45% |
15% |
15% |
30% |
28% |
8% |
7% |
12% |
| Building the NBN (National Broadband Network) |
43% |
28% |
17% |
26% |
22% |
14% |
14% |
7% |
| Abolished WorkChoices |
42% |
27% |
23% |
19% |
19% |
17% |
10% |
12% |
| Introducing a carbon tax to tackle climate change |
28% |
51% |
14% |
14% |
15% |
16% |
35% |
7% |
The two most popular decisions of the Labor Government are ‘expanding dental health services for people on low incomes’ (77% total good) and ‘increasing the tax free threshold from $6,000 to $18,000 (75% total good). The least popular decisions were ‘Building the NBN’ (43% total good), ‘Abolished WorkChoices’ (42% total good) and ‘introducing a carbon tax to tackle climate change’ (28% total good).
Of the fifteen decisions put to respondents, the majority of respondents believed that 10 of the 15 decisions were good for Australia. For the remaining 5 decisions, a larger portion of respondents generally regarded the decision to be good for Australia except for ‘introducing a carbon tax to tackle climate change’, where the majority of respondents (51%) believed it to be bad for Australia.
Female respondents were more likely to endorse the dental health reforms (80% total good) compared with male respondents (74% total good).
Increasing the age pension was most strongly supported by respondents aged 65+ (77% total good).
Introducing paid parental leave was more popular with female respondents (57% total good), compared with male respondents (46% total good). Looking at this decision by age, it was most popular amongst respondents aged 25-34 (62%) and 35-44 (62%) whereas respondents aged 65+ were the most likely to regard the decision as a bad one (36% total bad).
Implementing the recommendations of the expert committee on asylum seekers including offshore processing proved to be a very popular decision amongst respondents aged 65+ (65% total good), whereas respondents aged 25-34 were the most likely to regard it as a bad decision (43% total bad).
Female respondents were more likely to regard ‘protecting large areas of Australia’s marine environment’ as a good decision (72% total good) compared with male respondents (60% total good).