More Australians approve of Anthony Albanese as the country’s leader than disapprove of him for the first time in almost 18 months, since the referendum on the proposed Indigenous voice to parliament.
Albanese’s approval rating has increased to 46%, up four percentage points from earlier in March, the latest Guardian Essential poll shows, while his disapproval rating fell to 45%.
The latest poll of 2,256 voters, released Tuesday, marks the highest approval rating for Albanese since October 2023.
The rating came in after a tough month for Australia, with devastating floods in south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales following a cyclone and the Albanese government being unable to secure an exemption from the US president, Donald Trump, from a 25% tariff on aluminium and steel imports.
Meanwhile the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, suffered his highest disapproval rating since polling began tracking his rating in April 2023. His disapproval rating sits at 46%, compared with 41% who thought he was doing a good job.
If the election was held imminently, 29% of voters said they would give Labor their primary vote while 35% would put a one next to Coalition candidates. On a two-party preferred basis, the major parties are neck-and-neck at 47% each, with 6% undecided.
About 18% of those polled said they would vote for minor and independent candidates, with the Greens on 12%.
Dutton has announced in recent weeks that the Coalition supports sending federal bureaucrats back into the office full-time, winding back the flexible working from home arrangements in place since the Covid-19 pandemic.
Voters were somewhat mixed on their support for the proposed direction, with 39% against the idea while 31% said they supported it. However, the gender split showed just 25% of women polled backed a removal of flexible working arrangements, while 37% of men supported it.
Meanwhile, 44% of women were against rolling back work from home arrangements, compared with 33% of men.
Dutton defended the policy decision against criticism that it could disproportionately affect women with caregiving duties in the workplace.
“There are plenty of job-sharing arrangements,” he told 2GB radio this month. “I don’t think it’s unreasonable that people, like in many other workplaces, are asked to go back to work for that face-to-face contact.”
Younger voters between 18 and 34 were also more strongly opposed to the plans compared with voters over the age of 55.
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Australians were not overly positive about Trump’s presidency in the US in relation to the economy. Almost 62% thought Trump’s administration would be negative for the global economy while 61% said it would be negative for Australia’s economy.
On world peace, more than half of voters believed Trump had a negative effect on it, while just 18% believed the second-time US president would do good for climate change.
As Trump signals his belief he can broker a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia after the latter’s land invasion in 2022, like-minded countries are considering their options to ensure peace can be achieved – and maintained – on equal terms.
Albanese has said he would consider any proposals to send Australian peacekeeping troops if requested by a “coalition of the willing” – a group of European countries alongside Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the UK.
Voters polled favoured not sending troops on the ground to Ukraine against Russia, with 40% opposed, while 33% supported the idea.
Climate change was still on the minds of voters, with the latest results showing 35% of voters believe Australia is not doing enough, compared with 34% who believe it is doing enough and 19% who believe it is doing too much.
While it marks a two-point increase since November 2024 in voters believing the country is not doing enough on climate change, it represents a considerable drop since polling in May 2022 at the last federal election, when 47% believed Australia should do more.
