PM finds hope in booming Whyalla

WHYALLA was a brokendown old steel town facing an uncertain future before billionaire industrialist Sanjeev Gupta unveiled his grand plans for investment.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison is hoping for a Sanjeev Gupta-type situation of his own as he looks over the final Newspoll for 2018.

It has the Coalition trailing Labor on a two-party preferred basis, while Labor Leader Bill Shorten has narrowed the gap as preferred leader. For the third consecutive poll Labor leads the Liberal-National Coalition 55-to-45 per cent on a two-party preferred basis.

“I’ll take Whyalla as my inspiration,” Mr Morrison said in South Australia yesterday. “I’ve got a keen interest in comebacks, I’ve got a keen interest in the turnaround story we’re seeing here in South Australia.”

Mr Shorten gained two points to 36 per cent as preferred prime minister, while Liberal leader Scott Morrison dropped two points to 44 per cent, according to the poll published in The Australian yesterday.

The Labor leader used his speech at the same event in Whyalla to talk about how a future Labor government would protect jobs and manage the economy through “cooperation, not conflict”.

“In Canberra, we will make sure when we build railways in Australia we buy Australian steel, when we build defence equipment in Australia we buy Australian steel,” Mr Shorten told the crowd. “We dig it up here, we manufacture it here, and we keep the profits and jobs where they belong at home.”

But Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton believes the Coalition can turn around the disastrous polling before the federal election, because he says voters don’t like Mr Shorten.

“People have a real hesitation about Bill Shorten. They think there is something dodgy in his background and that is the case,” Mr Dutton told Sky News yesterday. “I think people will start to second guess whether or not they want Bill Shorten as prime minister of this country and I do believe that we can come back in the 2019 election in May.”

The Coalition’s primary vote is up one to 35 per cent, with Labor’s primary also up a point to 41 per cent. One Nation ended the year with a primary vote of 7 per cent – one point down on the previous Newspoll. The Greens were unchanged on 9 per cent.

I’LL TAKE WHYALLA AS MY INSPIRATION. I’VE GOT A KEEN INTEREST IN COMEBACKS … IN THE TURNAROUND STORY

SCOTT MORRISON