Guardian Essential poll: voters mark Morrison government down on flood response

A majority also believes the government needs to replace coal with renewable energy alternatives (53%). But only 45% of respondents say the Morrison government contributed to the floods by not taking enough action to mitigate the risks of global heating.

The Morrison government and the Perrottet government in NSW were criticised in the immediate aftermath of the floods for moving too slowly with rescue and recovery efforts.

Federal parliament will resume next week for a short session to allow the government to deliver the budget on 29 March. Morrison is expected to call the election within weeks.

At the weekend, the Liberals in South Australia became the first incumbent government to lose an election since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Comparing the result with previous election cycles, just before the 2010 election, Julia Gillard was ahead of Tony Abbott 47% to 35% with 18% undecided.

In 2013, Abbott was ahead of Kevin Rudd 41% to 22% with 37% undecided. In 2016, Malcolm Turnbull was ahead of Bill Shorten 39% to 31% with 30% undecided while in 2019 Morrison was ahead of Shorten 39% to 32% with 28% undecided.

Albanese is currently ahead of where Abbott, Rudd and Shorten were at the same point in the political cycle on this measure.

On Tuesday, the Australian National University will also release the latest data on voting intention from a longitudinal survey of 3,472 voters.

The proportion of undecided voters increased from 4.1% in January 2021 to 5.9% in January 2022, it found.