Chief Minister Kate Carnell is well ahead of Opposition Leader Wayne Berry on a range of leadership measures, according to the latest Canberra Times Datacol poll.
Voters were asked to rate the leaders on a scale of one to five for 11 characteristics.
Mrs Carnell is most ahead on the critical questions of “”good communicator”, “”strong leadership”, “”inspiring” and having a vision for the ACT.
The other tests were intelligence, trust, knowledge, care, honesty, dependability and grooming.
Most alarmingly for Mr Berry, Mrs Carnell is ahead on all 11 leadership tests among people who are still undecided as to how to vote and among people giving first preference to minors and independents. Even Labor voters rate Mrs Carnell higher than Mr Berry on the strong leadership and communication factors and rate her close to their own man on several other tests.
Voters’ satisfaction levels of the leaders also put Mrs Carnell well ahead. Seven per cent rated her very good and 14 rated her very bad, whereas 27 per cent rated Mr Berry as very bad and only one per cent as very good. On an averaged scale of one to five is was Carnell 3.07 to Berry 2.25.
Mr Berry’s rating has fallen since the last poll in September last year, when he took over as leader. Mrs Carnell’s is slightly up.
The tables on Page XXX show the details.
TAKE IN BRENDAN
The poll shows also that Mrs Carnell is preferred chief minister by 59 to 24 with 17 undecided. She is approved of by 59 per cent compared to Mr Berry on 25. Mr Berry is disapproved of by 55 per cent compared to Mrs Carnell’s 30.
Once again the alarming thing for Mr Berry is that among undecided voters 63 per cent prefer Mrs Carnell as chief minister over 13 for Mr Berry. The others are undecided.
The voters are much more definite about answering questions on the leaders than about general voting intention. Typically, 80 to 85 per cent give opinions about the leaders; whereas only 60 to 65 per cent give definite voting intentions. It seems the questions for the rest of the campaign are whether Mrs Carnell’s popularity translates into votes for her party colleagues and whether Mr Berry’s lack of popularity damages Labor.
There is some evidence of this. People with a general political allegiance to Labor are straying to the Liberals in double the numbers of the other way and they are straying to minors and independents at one and a half times the rate of Liberal strays. Swinging voters, too, are drifting more to the Liberals.
General political allegiance has remained fairly constant in the ACT over 10 years of polling with Labor on about 35; Liberals on about 20; swingers about 35 and others 7 and don’t know 3. The latest poll ACT-wide shows Labor on 22 per cent is not keeping people who usually give them allegiance; whereas the Liberals on 22 per cent is and some more, despite the Howard factor. Minors and independents on 20 are getting nearly treble the vote that general allegiance would otherwise dictate. Leadership must be a major factor in these patterns.