Tony Abbott has received a small pre-Easter confidence boost, with a new poll showing a slight increase in his rating as prime minister.
The Seven News ReachTel poll of 2,400 people was conducted on Sunday, and showed that 24.6% of respondents rated Abbott’s performance as very good or good, up 3.5 percentage points from February.
The prime minister’s disapproval rating was also down 4.2 points, with 58.5% saying he was either doing a poor or very poor job of leading the country.
Bill Shorten’s rating as the opposition leader was down less than a point to 24.2%, while his disapproval rating held steady from February.
The percentage of people who preferred Abbott as the leader of the Coalition jumped nearly six points to 24.2% since January, but he still trails the foreign minister, Julie Bishop, who sits at 28.7%.
Both were eclipsed by the communications minister Malcolm Turnbull, who leads the preferences with 42.6%.
The percentage of people who preferred both Bishop and Turnbull has dropped by two points in the past month.
There has been very little change in the Coalition’s two-party preferred rating, which is up one point to 46%.
The Liberal party’s primary vote is up nearly a point to 35.4%, while Labor is down by the same margin to 40.5%.
