Essential Report, Polling, Qantas, Qantas Dispute
Q. Do you approve or disapprove of Qantas’ decision to ground all planes last weekend?
| Total | Vote Labor | Vote Lib/Nat | Vote Greens | Regular air travellers | |
| Total approve | 35% | 23% | 53% | 24% | 47% |
| Total disapprove | 53% | 66% | 38% | 63% | 47% |
| Strongly approve | 13% | 8% | 21% | 8% | 20% |
| Approve | 22% | 15% | 32% | 16% | 27% |
| Disapprove | 24% | 26% | 20% | 26% | 17% |
| Strongly disapprove | 29% | 40% | 18% | 37% | 30% |
| Don’t know | 12% | 12% | 8% | 13% | 6% |
35% approved of Qantas’ decision to ground all planes and 53% disapproved.
Regular air travellers (those who travel by air at least every few months) were split – 47% approved and 47% disapproved.
Those most likely to disapprove were Labor voters (66%), Greens voters (63%), women (57%) and those on low income (60% of those earning less than $600 pw).
Essential Report, Polling, Qantas, Qantas management, Qantas workers
Q. Who do you think was most to blame for the grounding of all Qantas planes last weekend – Qantas management or the workers?
| Total | Vote Labor | Vote Lib/Nat | Vote Greens | Regular air travellers | |
| Qantas management | 41% | 55% | 25% | 63% | 42% |
| Qantas workers | 20% | 11% | 35% | 8% | 27% |
| Both equally | 31% | 28% | 35% | 23% | 26% |
| Don’t know | 8% | 7% | 5% | 6% | 4% |
41% think Qantas management were most to blame for the grounding, 20% blamed the Qantas workers and 31% think both were equally to blame.
42% of regular air travellers blamed Qantas management and 27% blamed Qantas workers. Apart from Liberal/National voters, all groups were more likely to blame management over workers.
Alan Joyce, Essential Report, fair work australia, Julia Gillard, Labor, Liberal, Polling, Qantas, Qantas Dispute, tony abbott, unions
Q. Did you approve or disapprove of the performance of each of the following in the Qantas dispute?
| Regular air travellers | |||||||||
| Total approve | Total disapprove | Strongly approve | Approve | Disapprove | Strongly disapprove | Don’t know | Total approve | Total disapprove | |
| Julia Gillard and the Labor Government | 30% | 49% | 6% | 24% | 22% | 27% | 20% | 30% | 56% |
| Tony Abbott and the opposition | 27% | 45% | 5% | 22% | 21% | 24% | 28% | 36% | 45% |
| Qantas management | 27% | 57% | 6% | 21% | 28% | 29% | 16% | 37% | 56% |
| Qantas workers | 33% | 49% | 7% | 26% | 36% | 13% | 18% | 35% | 55% |
| The Qantas CEO Alan Joyce | 28% | 58% | 8% | 20% | 22% | 36% | 14% | 37% | 55% |
| Union leaders | 24% | 56% | 4% | 20% | 27% | 29% | 19% | 26% | 63% |
| Fair Work Australia | 55% | 21% | 13% | 42% | 15% | 6% | 23% | 62% | 25% |
Overall, respondents disapproved of the performance of all parties to the dispute except for Fair Work Australia, which was approved by 55%.
More than half the respondents disapproved of the Qantas CEO Alan Joyce (58%), Qantas management (57%) and union leaders (56%).
Regular air travellers were more likely to approve of Qantas management and CEO. However, more than half disapproved of all parties except for Tony Abbott and the opposition (45% disapprove) and Fair Work Australia (25%).
Essential Report, Industrial action, Polling, Qantas, Qantas Dispute
Q. Which of the following is likely to cause the most damage to Qantas’ reputation?
| Total | Vote Labor | Vote Lib/Nat | Vote Greens | Regular air travellers | |
| Qantas’ decision to ground all planes | 59% | 72% | 44% | 77% | 60% |
| Industrial action by Qantas workers over pay and conditions | 32% | 20% | 48% | 18% | 33% |
| Don’t know | 9% | 8% | 8% | 5% | 7% |
59% think that Qantas’ decision to ground all planes would cause the most damage to Qantas’ reputation and 32% think the workers’ industrial action would cause most damage.
Regular air travellers had similar views to less frequent travellers – 60% believed that the plane grounding would cause most damage to Qantas’ reputation.
ABC radio, ABC TV, Blogs, Essential Report, free-to-air TV, Internet, media, News, Newspapers, pay TV, Polling, Radio
Q. Thinking about where you get your news, on an average day which of the following media would you use? (multiple response)
Q. And which one is your main source of news?
| Total used | Main source | Total use (weekdays) Dec 10 | ||
| Daily newspaper | 41% | 13% | 42% | |
| Commercial (free-to-air) TV news | 60% | 31% | 64% | |
| ABC TV news | 32% | 8% | 32% | |
| SBS TV news | 15% | 2% | 12% | |
| Pay TV news | 11% | 3% | 10% | |
| Commercial radio news | 28% | 5% | 27% | |
| ABC radio news | 18% | 5% | 17% | |
| Internet news sites – e.g. newspaper sites, ABC, etc | 59% | 30% | 55% | |
| Internet blogs | 8% | * | 6% | |
| None of them | 2% | 2% | 5% |
The most used media for daily news were commercial TV news (60% use daily), internet news sites (59%) and daily newspapers (41%).
Since this question was last asked in December last year, usage of internet news sites has increased a little (+4%) and commercial TV news decreased a little (-4%).
The main sources of news were commercial TV news (31%) and internet news sites (30%).
Commercial TV news was the main source of news for 38% of those aged 45-64, 36% of women and 44% of part-time workers.
Internet news sites were the main source of news for 43% of those aged under 35 and 36% of full-time workers.
Daily newspapers were the main source of news for 26% of those aged 65+.
Essential Report, media, Newspapers, paywall, Polling
Q. Some newspapers in Australia now require readers to take out a subscription to view all their articles online. This means, while some news and opinion articles are free, readers will have to pay to access all content. How likely would you be to pay a subscription to access news websites?
| Total | Aged
18-34 |
Aged
35-54 |
Aged 55+ | Main source Internet news sites | |
| Total likely | 9% | 14% | 6% | 4% | 8% |
| Total not likely | 88% | 80% | 89% | 95% | 88% |
| Very likely | 2% | 2% | 1% | 2% | 1% |
| Somewhat likely | 7% | 12% | 5% | 2% | 7% |
| Not very likely | 18% | 18% | 17% | 19% | 19% |
| Not at all likely | 70% | 62% | 72% | 76% | 69% |
| Don’t know | 4% | 5% | 5% | 1% | 5% |
Only 9% of respondents said they would be very or somewhat likely to pay to access news websites.
Among those for whom news websites are their main source of news, only 8% said they would be likely to pay for access. Younger respondents were more likely to be willing to pay for access to news websites – 14% of those aged under 35.
2PP, Essential Report, Greens, Labor, Liberal, Nationals, Polling, two party preferred, Voting intention
Q. If a Federal Election was held today to which party will you probably give your first preference vote? If not sure, which party are you currently leaning toward?
Q. If don’t know -Well which party are you currently leaning to?
Sample size = 1,899 respondents
| First preference/leaning to | Election
21 Aug 10 |
4 weeks ago | 2 weeks ago | Last week | This week |
| Liberal | 45% | 45% | 45% | 44% | |
| National | 3% | 3% | 3% | 3% | |
| Total Lib/Nat | 43.6% | 48% | 48% | 48% | 47% |
| Labor | 38.0% | 33% | 33% | 32% | 34% |
| Greens | 11.8% | 11% | 11% | 11% | 10% |
| Other/Independent | 6.6% | 9% | 8% | 8% | 9% |
| 2PP | Election
21 Aug 10 |
4 weeks ago | 2 weeks ago | Last week | This week |
| Total Lib/Nat | 49.9% | 55% | 55% | 55% | 55% |
| Labor | 50.1% | 45% | 45% | 45% | 45% |
NB. The data in the above tables comprise 2-week averages derived from the first preference/leaning to voting questions. Respondents who select ‘don’t know’ are not included in the results. The two-party preferred estimate is calculated by distributing the votes of the other parties according to their preferences at the 2010 election.
corporate interests, Essential Report, Labor, Polling, worker interests
Q. Do you think the Federal Labor Government favours the interests of businesses or workers?
| Total | Vote Labor | Vote Lib/Nat | Vote Greens | |
| Total favour businesses | 28% | 21% | 31% | 40% |
| Total favour workers | 41% | 40% | 50% | 28% |
| Favour businesses a lot more than workers | 13% | 7% | 16% | 18% |
| Favour businesses a little more than workers | 15% | 14% | 15% | 22% |
| Favour workers a little more than businesses | 24% | 32% | 21% | 20% |
| Favour workers a lot more than businesses | 17% | 8% | 29% | 8% |
| Balance the interests of businesses and workers | 14% | 29% | 5% | 15% |
| Don’t know | 17% | 10% | 14% | 17% |
41% think that the Federal Labor Government favours the interests of workers, 28% think they favour the interests of businesses and 14% think they balance their interests.
Labor voters think the favour workers over business by 40% to 21% and 29% think they balance their interests.
Liberal /National voters are much less likely to think they balance their interests – 50% think they favour workers’ interests and 31% think they favour businesses. Greens voters are more likely to think they favour the interests of businesses (40%) over workers (28%).
The only substantial difference across demographic groups is that 20% of older respondents (aged 55+) think the Government balances the interests of businesses and workers.