By John Watson
You wouldn't think it, given recent commentary, but a look at history suggests the government has no reason to panic.
Anyone who takes opinion polls and media coverage of them at face value would think the Coalition is an even chance of winning this year's federal election. ''Rudd takes a battering'', ''Rudd in free fall'', ''Election-losing result'': the headlines paint a picture of terminal decline. Yes, the Coalition has drawn level, and even edged ahead in two recent polls, and Kevin Rudd's approval rating of 45 per cent is a personal low. Think that's bad within six months of an election? Time for a historical reality check.
Illustration: Andrew Dyson
The polls for Tony Abbott and the Coalition are the worst in 20 years for any opposition at this point in the election cycle. Of seven elections in that time, only two changed the government. Six months before John Howard's 1996 triumph, The Age headline read: ''Coalition opens up huge lead on ALP.'' Huge it was: 51 to 35 per cent on the primary vote and 58-42 on preferences. Prime minister Paul Keating's approval fell to 35 per cent; disapproval was up to 58 per cent. With a 52 per cent approval rating, Howard led 49-37 as preferred PM.
In 2006-07, Rudd turned the tables on Howard, although few were game to write off the Coalition. ''PM gains, but Rudd leads'' and ''Inkling of hope for Howard'' do not reflect the gap between the parties after the 2007 budget. Labor, ahead for more than a year, led by an average of 49-38 on the primary vote and 58-42 on preferences in the major polls. Rudd was preferred prime minister by a 51-43 margin. Yet a one-point gain for Howard and a two-point lift in the primary vote were seen as offering hope, as was a dip in Rudd's approval rating to 64 per cent.
Five to six months before the 1990, 1993, 1998, 2001 and 2004 elections, the opposition held clear leads of 7, 14, 4, 14 and 10 points on a two-party basis. It lost each time.
In late 1989, the headline was ''Poll puts Coalition in election-winning lead'', as Bob Hawke faced a 5 per cent swing from the 1987 result. He won in March 1990 with 49.9 per cent of the two-party vote.
The 1993 election was John Hewson's to lose. ''Coalition well ahead'' and ''Labor slips further behind'' were the headlines to successive polls, as the Coalition stretched its ''election-winning'' lead with 5½ months to go. Keating's disapproval rating was 27 points higher than his approval rating. Hewson led 46 to 36 per cent as preferred prime minister. On election day, Keating celebrated ''the sweetest victory of them all''.
The 1998 election, after the first-term Howard government announced the GST, offers the closest parallel to this year. ''GST puts Coalition behind'' was The Age headline on its first post-budget poll. Labor led 52-48 on preferences, nearly unchanged in three months. Kim Beazley's approval rating of 49 per cent was 3 points ahead of Howard, who held a narrow 44-39 lead as preferred prime minister. The Coalition squeaked home, with 49 per cent of the vote.
That escape act appeared to haunt reporters. Age polls in May 2001, headlined ''Federal Coalition claws back support'' and ''PM has a platform on which to build a campaign'', showed Labor extending its double-digit lead. In the first poll, a three-point lift in the Coalition's primary vote led to this analysis: ''The figures are unexpected and ominous for Labor, as the poll was conducted after a week of Coalition turmoil.'' In the second poll, a rise in approval for Howard from a low of 35 per cent prompted the introduction: ''This is not a bad poll for John Howard.'' He was trailing Beazley 48-44 on approval ratings and 44-42 as preferred prime minister, on top of a 14-point deficit on preferences. Still, the government romped home in October.
The 2004 turnaround was equally dramatic. In March, it was ''Latham would win in landslide''. Mark Latham's 62 per cent approval rating was the highest since Hawke in 1983, although Howard's was a respectable 54 per cent and he was preferred prime minister by 47-43 per cent. Yet the first decline in Latham's approval rating, to 57 per cent, suggested his ''honeymoon with voters may be ending''. When a Newspoll showed Labor's lead cut to 53-47, The Australian declared ''Latham's bubble bursts''. So it proved, but Tony Abbott would kill for such a poll.
In a little-remarked decline, Abbott's net approval rating is edging into negative territory. Rudd never fell below 59 per cent approval as opposition leader. Abbott has staked his leadership on opposition to two things: carbon emissions trading, which 58 per cent of voters support and 30 per cent oppose in the latest Age/Nielsen poll; and a mining tax, on which voters are split 44-47 per cent (the post-budget verdict on the GST in 1998 was 38-47). Rudd is preferred as prime minister by 15 points. A rising voter preference for Julia Gillard may have set off media leadership speculation, but this also means Labor has two leaders whose levels of support are 10 points higher than Abbott's.
None of this suggests the Coalition can't win, but Abbott was right to say he would be hailed as a genius if it did. The greatest threat to Labor is probably a protest vote at the failure of the 2010 model of Kevin 07 to live up to the giddy hopes he created.
Regardless of the reasons for Labor's fall in the polls, and for the breathless, ahistorical reporting of this, the government probably benefits from expectations of a close contest. (In fact, federal elections are invariably closer than the intervening opinion polls, with the biggest margin in 30 years being 7 points and half the results closer than 51-49.) It takes less to induce voters to ''protest'' in a passing poll than on the day when it really matters. Polling that confronts voters with the prospect of a change of government discourages such a protest. Current polls count for little, except for persuading people the Coalition can win, and that probably makes the government's job of winning a second term a little easier.
John Watson is an Age senior writer.