Not raising White flag

Labor leader dismisses poll, won’t give up until last vote cast

OPPOSITION leader Rebecca White has shrugged off another opinion poll suggesting her party is heading toward defeat in Saturday’s state election.

The latest EMRS poll has revealed the governing Liberal party has secured a stunning late favourable swing of 12 percentage points since the last comparable poll in December.

The Liberals are currently enjoying 46 per cent support, according to the poll.

Labor trails on 34 per cent, unchanged from December, and the Greens are down five percentage points to 12.

Support for the Jacqui Lambie Network has halved, from 8 per cent to 4 and independents and others account for 3 per cent of respondents.

A defiant Ms White said her party’s focus was still on winning majority government.

“We saw in 2016, the polls never predicted that Labor would win four of the five seats in that federal campaign, but we did,” she said.

“The polls didn’t predict that we would win the Upper House seats in the Tasmanian parliament, but we did. We can win this election.

“We’re not giving up until 6pm on the third of March when everyone has cast their vote.”

The EMRS polling closely reflects that conducted by the Mercury last week which showed the Liberals on 46 per cent and the Greens on 12 per cent — but the new poll records support for Labor as two percentage points higher than that in the Mercury polling.

The Mercury/ReachTEL poll, which surveyed three times as many people as EMRS, pointed towards a likely result of the Liberals retaining 13 of its current 15 seats, Labor increasing its representation from seven to 10 and the Greens losing one, to have two members in the House of Assembly.

The EMRS poll shows Will Hodgman is the preferred premier, with 48 per cent support, up 13 points since December, with Rebecca White on 41 per cent, down seven points.

Mr Hodgman has reversed the result of the previous poll, in which he trailed the Labor leader.

Poll analyst Kevin Bonham said he believed the result was the largest poll-to-poll gain by a party in EMRS polling history.

“While clipping the wings of any runaway victory idea for the Liberals, the poll otherwise doesn’t say much that we don’t already know,” he said.

“It also says the election is still close enough that a hung parliament remains possible — with the most plausible scenario for that now being a pokies-driven revolution winning Labor three seats in Denison.

“It also confirms that the Greens are struggling to match their 2014 vote.”

Mr Hodgman said the poll result represented Tasmanians’ desire for certainty and stability.

“I attribute the strong show of support for our strong team to the strong plan we have for our state’s future,” he said.

Greens leader Cassy O’Connor said the big boost in support to the Liberals was down to the support of the gambling lobby.

“This is what millions and millions of dollars from vested interests buys,” she said.

The telephone poll of 1000 people was conducted between Saturday and Monday and has an error rate of 3.1 per cent.