Support for Australian govt falls to 2-yr low

Canberra, July 19 (IANS) A new polls has revealed that support for the Australian government has fallen to its lowest level in two years amid coronavirus lockdowns in the country's two biggest cities.

According to the latest Newspoll, which was published on Sunday night, the governing Coalition trails the opposition Labor Party 47-53 on a two-party preferred basis, reports Xinhua news agency.

It represents the Coalition's worst electoral position in the current term of government.

The poll found that voter satisfaction with Prime Minister Scott Morrison's handling of the coronavirus pandemic has fallen nine points since late June to 52 per cent, down from a high of 85 per cent in April 2020.

It was conducted as millions of Australians in the Greater Sydney area and the state of Victoria were in lockdown in response to outbreaks of the Delta strain.

Confidence in the federal government's management of the vaccine rollout fell below 50 per cent for the first time, with just 40 per cent of respondents saying they were satisfied.

As of Monday morning, 35.4 per cent of Australian adults had received at least one coronavirus vaccine dose and 13.6 per cent were fully vaccinated.

Newspoll revealed that overall satisfaction with Morrison fell from 55 to 51 per cent while the portion of respondents dissatisfied rose to 45 per cent.

However, Labor leader Anthony Albanese failed to capitalise on the dip in Morrison's popularity, with his own satisfaction rating among 1,506 participants in the poll falling 2 per cent.