Oz Labour Party heading for election defeat: polls

Australia’s ruling Labor party is heading for a huge defeat in the upcoming elections in September and Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s popularity is on the wane, according to new national polls.

The latest Newspoll conducted over the weekend gave a strong lift to opposition leader Tony Abbott in the preferred Prime Minister stakes, The Australian reported.

The survey is being dubbed as a complete reversal of fortune for the Australian Labor party from the summer-holiday affected January poll, and a much-needed personal boost for the opposition leader Abbott.

The poll puts Labor’s primary support at 32 per cent, a wipeout of the six-point gain recorded between December and January, as the opposition’s support rose four percentage points to 48 per cent in the past three weeks, the daily said.

The Greens steady on 9 per cent and “others” going from 9 per cent to 11 per cent since the poll in January, the two-party-preferred figure has the Coalition, a group of centre-right conservative parties in the opposition, back with a huge election-winning lead of 56 per cent to 44 per cent, it said.