BARRING A BOMBING:

Poll: Labor falls into 'fatal zone' (Dennis Shanahan, October 5, 2004, news.com.au)

THE ALP has fallen into the fatal zone on primary votes and will have to dramatically peg back a Coalition lead in the final days to win Saturday's election.

After a week when both parties unveiled multi-billion-dollar policies aimed at grabbing the grey vote, the Coalition has finished in front for the first time in the election campaign.

Despite a headline-grabbing Medicare Gold proposal for free hospital treatment for all people aged over 75 as its campaign centrepiece, Labor support has not risen.

John Howard's pitch to the older voters, including a grandparent's childcare provision and a $100 grant for pensioners to pay bills, seems to have won more support and put the Coalition in a winning position going into the last week of the campaign.

According to a Newspoll survey, taken exclusively for The Australian last weekend, Coalition support on primary votes rose from 43 to 46 per cent and Labor's dipped from 40 to 39 per cent.

As Labor and the Coalition do battle over saving Tasmania's old-growth forests to gain environmentalists' support, Greens' preferences remain vital for the election outcome.

On a two-party-preferred basis, the Coalition has the narrowest of leading margins, 50.5 per cent to Labor's 49.5 per cent - almost exactly the same as the result at the last election.

Imagine the future of your nation lying in the hands of the Greens?

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 4, 2004 7:28 PM