Roy Morgan Update December 10, 2024: ALP support down, Consumer Confidence & Business Confidence

In this week's update, we present the latest data on Primary Voting Intention, Consumer & Business Confidence.

Welcome to the Roy Morgan weekly update.

The Coalition, this week, increased their lead on the ALP.

The L-NP is now on 52%, up 1% from a week ago, ahead of the ALP on 48% - on a two-party preferred basis.

If a Federal Election were held now the result would likely be a Coalition Government with a slim majority.

The Albanese Government has had a challenging week – including from abroad. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the Government of taking an ‘extreme anti-Israeli position’.

Netanyahu blamed the arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue – now classified as a terrorist act – on the Government’s failure to call out antisemitism more consistently and firmly.

Compounding the Government’s woes was a major strike at Australia’s largest supermarket chain Woolworths which led to shortages in key goods nation-wide and frustration for consumers battling a cost-of-living crisis.

There was also a weak GDP result showing growth of 0.3% for the quarter and only 0.8% for the year.

Roy Morgan also recorded a decrease in Government Confidence (whether people think the country is going in the right or wrong direction) this week, down 4 points to only 72.5 – well below the neutral level of 100.

A majority of Australians say the country is going in the wrong direction (58%). Only 30.5% say the country is going in the right direction.

Consumer Confidence was also down this week, following the Black Friday sales period, and the weak GDP result.

ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence dropped 2.9 points to 85.5 this week.

The driver of this week’s decline was weakness in relation to personal finances. Now only 22% (down 1%) of Australians say they are ‘better off’ financially now than this time a year ago - and just 32% (down 2%) expect to be ‘better off’ financially this time next year.

Inflation Expectations dropped 0.3% to 4.5% this week. Australians are now expecting annual inflation to be 4.5% over the next two years.

This is the equal lowest Inflation Expectations reading for over three years since August 2021.

And now, Australian Business Confidence,

Remember, Roy Morgan measures Business Confidence monthly and in November it was still in positive territory above 100 at 106.9 – up only 0.2 points from a month ago.

Roy Morgan interviews around 1,500 businesses each month to gauge their views on their company’s prospects as well as their assessment of the broader Australian economy.

In November, while slightly less confident about the broader economy, businesses grew more confident about investing.

Now 46.3% (up 3.4%) of businesses say the next 12 months is a ‘good time to invest in growing the business’ compared to 34.9% that say it’s a ‘bad time to invest’ – a net rating of +11.4% – the highest net rating since February 2022 – before the Albanese Government was elected.

This is good news for Australia, without business investment we’re all in trouble.

Over the two months of October and November, the most confident industries were Financial & Insurance Services and Public Administration & Defence – both with a Business Confidence of 137.5 and Education & Training on 131.9.

At the low end Transport, Postal & Warehousing still has the lowest Business Confidence at only 71, well below Wholesale trade and Information, Media & Telecommunications – both on 93.1.