Labor has maintained a 52-48, two-party preferred lead in the latest Essential poll, and also received majority support for its carbon policy.
Respondents were told: “The Labor party recently announced their policy to tackle climate change which includes a target of reducing Australia’s carbon emissions by 45% by 2030 (compared to the Coalition government’s target of 26-28%) and introducing an emissions trading scheme”.
When the policy was described in this way, 57% of respondents were in favour and just 21% opposed.
The 52-48, two-party-preferred figure is the same as the last Essential poll released on Wednesday.
But the poll suggests voters prefer the Coalition’s policy on negative gearing, with 43% favouring negative gearing and 36% against.
Voters polled were narrowly opposed to Labor’s policy to limit negative gearing in future to tax deductions for investments on newly-built homes, with 36% in favour and 38% opposed.
Essential noted that the results of both negative gearing questions were much the same as when the question was asked in March.
Asked what they thought the effect of limiting negative gearing would be, most said house prices would grow more slowly (31%), followed by those who thought they would fall (24%). The rest were unsure (31%) or thought prices would grow at the same rate (13%).
Malcolm Turnbull was more likely to be described as a capable leader than Bill Shorten (by a difference of 18%), judged more intelligent (by 17%) and better in a crisis (by 15%).
Shorten was more likely to be described as erratic (by 3%) and aggressive (by 5%).
But Shorten has made gains, with more voters describing him as a capable leader (up 7%), intelligent (up 4%) and understanding of Australians’ problems (up 3%).
Turnbull’s numbers have increased for narrow-minded (up 8%), intolerant (up 8%) and erratic (up 7%).
On 5 April, Labor pulled ahead of the Coalition for the first time since Tony Abbott was replaced as prime minister with a 51-49% result in Newspoll.
