Q. Do you support or oppose the following possible policies that could be announced in the budget, as set out in the recently released ‘Commission of Audit’ report:
|
Total Support |
Total Oppose |
Strongly support |
Support |
Neither support nor oppose |
Oppose |
Strongly oppose |
Don’t know |
|
| Privatise Australia Post |
18% |
54% |
6% |
12% |
18% |
23% |
31% |
9% |
| Privatise Snowy Hydro |
16% |
39% |
5% |
11% |
23% |
19% |
20% |
21% |
| Introduce co-payments for all Medicare services: $15 per service for general patients and $5 per service for concession holders with payments reduced after 15 visits |
25% |
55% |
7% |
18% |
14% |
19% |
36% |
6% |
| Partial or full deregulation of university fees |
17% |
43% |
5% |
12% |
24% |
20% |
23% |
17% |
| Increase interest rates on student (HELP) debt |
13% |
63% |
5% |
8% |
17% |
33% |
30% |
7% |
| University graduates to repay HELP debt once they earn the minimum wage ($32,354). |
50% |
24% |
15% |
35% |
17% |
13% |
11% |
9% |
| Include the value of family home in an assets test for new pensioners, but with a high threshold |
22% |
50% |
7% |
15% |
16% |
21% |
29% |
11% |
| Scrap the national minimum wage in favour of a new Minimum Wage benchmark of 44 per cent of Average Weekly Earnings. |
18% |
35% |
5% |
13% |
25% |
17% |
18% |
22% |
| Single people aged 22-30 without dependents must relocate to high employment areas or lose access to unemployment benefits after 12 months |
44% |
31% |
18% |
26% |
19% |
15% |
16% |
7% |
| Privatise the Royal Australian Mint |
15% |
49% |
5% |
10% |
20% |
24% |
25% |
16% |
| Raise pension age to 70 by 2053 |
18% |
62% |
5% |
13% |
15% |
24% |
38% |
5% |
| Make those under 25 apply for Youth Allowance, instead of Newstart (Youth Allowance is around $100 less per fortnight) |
39% |
31% |
13% |
26% |
19% |
18% |
13% |
11% |
More people opposed than supported each of the policies listed, except for:
The highest levels of opposition were registered for:
Overall, Lib/Nat voters were more likely than the other voting groups to support each of the policies. The only areas (in addition to those listed above) where they were more likely to support than oppose were ‘Introduce co-payments for all Medicare services: $15 per service for general patients and $5 per service for concession holders with payments reduced after 15 visits’ (43% support and 35% oppose) and ‘Partial or full deregulation of university fees’ (28% support, 26% oppose).
The areas of highest opposition for Lib/Nat voters were:
Key differences by gender included:
Females (67%) were more likely than males (56%) to oppose the raising of the pension age to 70 by 2053