A majority of Australians (57%) say they are either financially struggling or facing serious difficulty, with the final Guardian Essential poll of the year pointing to a gloomy outlook for 2024.
While the last poll for 2023 shows Australians are heavily preoccupied with cost-of-living concerns – the data also reveals trust in institutions has taken a significant hit since a rebound tracked at the peak of the pandemic response in 2020 and 2021.
When Covid-19 was at its height in August 2020, and governments were intervening to save lives and livelihoods, 60% of Guardian Essential poll respondents reported having trust in their state or territory parliament, and 55% in the federal arena.
Now, 51% of respondents believe government has too much power. Only 36% of respondents express trust in the states in the latest survey, and 34% say they trust the federal parliament.
It’s not just trust in government that has taken a hammering as Australians hunker down in the prolonged economic squeeze that has followed the global public health emergency.
Back in August 2020, 69% of respondents said they trusted state and federal health authorities. That’s down to 47% in the latest numbers. Trust in commonwealth public servants has also taken a hit after robodebt and other scandals (officials were trusted by 56% of respondents in 2020, and 39% today), while trust in police, the courts and the justice system has also declined from 64% of respondents to 47%.
The current community pessimism can be tracked on a number of measures. Almost half (49%) of poll respondents say that 2023 has ended up being worse than they expected. Only 13% of voters thought things had been better than expected, and 34% said the year had conformed with their expectations.
Only 26% of respondents believe 2023 has been a good year for themselves and their families. Only 17% say this has been a good year for the country, the economy (16%) and the planet (15%). But 50% of the Guardian Essential sample thinks 2023 has been a good year for big companies – sentiment likely shaped by regular reports of strong corporate profits during the cost-of-living crisis.
When asked for their view about the year ahead, 32% think 2024 will be worse than 2023, 24% think things will be better, 30% say no difference and 14% say they aren’t sure how things will pan out. Australians were significantly more optimistic about the prospects for 2023 in late 2022 than they are now about the new year (40% said things would be better compared with only 24% now).
Significant majorities of respondents believe prices for essentials – power, food and housing – will continue to increase next year, although more respondents last year thought power prices would increase during 2023 (79% in December 2022 compared with 74% this year, looking ahead to 2024).
It’s a similar story with interest rates. A majority (59%) think their borrowing costs will go up during 2024, with the Reserve Bank continuing to increase the official cash rate. But that’s a drop of 19% on this time last year, when 78% of Guardian Essential respondents predicted rates would go up in 2023.
Voters are frustrated with a lack of action on energy prices (77% of respondents say more needs to be done), housing affordability (76%), grocery prices (76%), wages (61%) and climate change (55%). Women are more likely than male respondents to express these views.
This frustration looks to be affecting voter perceptions of the prime minister. At the start of this year, back in February 2023, 47% of respondents rated Anthony Albanese positively, assigning the prime minister a score of between seven and 10. As Albanese enjoys a short pre-Christmas break, that’s dropped to 32% of respondents.
Negative perceptions of the prime minister have increased this year. Back in February, 22% of respondents were negative, and that’s increased now to 37%. Albanese remains ahead of Peter Dutton on this measure, but the gap between the two political opponents has closed significantly. Now, 28% of respondents give the opposition leader a positive rating. Dutton and Albanese’s negatives are level pegging, with both given the thumbs down by 37% of respondents.
While women and men inclined to be positive about the prime minister have largely the same view of Albanese, Dutton faces a 10 point gender gap. Men are more likely to approve of the Liberal leader than women.
The sliding scale of positivity is a different measure in the poll series than the conventional approval and disapproval measures charted for the leaders.
On the more conventional measure, the Guardian Essential survey a fortnight ago confirmed more voters disapproved of Albanese’s performance than approved for the first time in his prime ministership. This was the prime minister’s first net negative Guardian Essential approval since last May’s election victory.
While the consumer price index has eased over the course of 2023, inflation is not forecast to hit 3% until the end of 2025. The Reserve Bank also hiked the official cash rate by 25 basis points to 4.35% last month – a 12-year high.
Dutton has ramped up his critique of Labor’s priorities in the closing months of this year, contending the prime minister has been more focused on his overseas travel commitments and on securing a yes vote in the failed voice referendum than on cost-of-living pressure. Albanese and the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, have said repeatedly dealing with cost-of-living pressure is the government’s No 1 priority.
