Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1011650
12 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 5 AUGUST 2018 MALTATODAY SURVEY CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 The latest survey was held in the week after Magistrate Aaron Bugeja's inquiry conclusions were released, showing how the Egrant story was a fabrication. But the survey findings also spelt more misery for Opposition leader Adrian Delia, who had to contend with internal party strife as a result of his decisions following the Egrant inquiry. The survey straddled the period be- tween Delia's decision to ask for Si- mon Busuttil to suspend himself from the parliamentary group and the PN leader's eventual backtracking after a truce was brokered by party veterans. Running at 14.8%, Delia's trust rat- ing plummeted to its second lowest result since he became leader of the Nationalist Party in September 2017. The trust gap between both leaders stood at a whopping 39 points as De- lia lost almost nine points since the last trust barometer held in June. Muscat trumped Delia across all age groups, all regions, among both men and women and across all education- al levels. Significantly, Muscat enjoyed the trust of 16.3% of those who voted PN in the last election, an increase of al- most 10 points over the June survey. Delia could only muster the trust of 1.6% of those who voted for the La- bour Party, an increase of less than two points over June. Delia's performance continued to be hampered by PN voters who ap- pear unconvinced by his leadership 11 months down the line. Delia only managed a trust rating of 34.3% among those who voted PN in the last election, a drop of almost 21 points since the last trust barometer in June. A significant section of PN voters (28.2%) said they trusted none of the two main political party lead- ers. The numbers painted a differ- ent story on the PL side with 86.7% of those who voted for the party in the last election, saying they trusted Muscat. However, this represented a drop of almost 10 points as more PL voters said they trusted no one. A breakdown of the numbers shows that 7.2% (an increase of almost seven points on June) of PL voters trusted none of the two leaders and 4.2% (an increase of 1.4 points on June) were uncertain. Muscat's trust rating ran highest among those aged 65 and over at 60.6%. Among the young, Muscat enjoyed the trust of 51.5% as opposed to Delia's dismal result of 9.7%. The 18-35 cohort were also among those most distrustful of both leaders with 26.5% saying they trusted none of them. THE Labour Party is looking at an advantage of more than 90,000 votes over its political rival if an election is held now, according to a MaltaToday survey. The findings show that the PL scored an absolute majority even be- fore the results were recalculated to estimate the vote difference with the Nationalist Party. Support for the PL stood at 52%, a massive 25-point lead over the PN, which registered a score of 27%. Raw survey results in Malta very rarely, if ever, give political parties absolute majorities because of the chunk of respondents who say they will not vote or are uncertain of their voting intention. To try and reflect a result that is ak- in to that of general elections, which since 1971 have always, bar once in 2008, delivered winning parties with absolute majorities, pollsters take the additional step of re-calculating re- sults on declared voting intentions. However, the latest survey result showed the PL surpassing the 50% mark even before such an exercise was undertaken. If the results are re-calculated on the basis of declared voting intention by removing those who said they will not vote (10.7%) and those who are not sure (9.7%), the PL could be looking at support levels in the re- gion of 65% and the PN 34%. The gap between the parties would translate into a difference of almost 94,000 votes. While support for the PN appears to have stabilised – it shed less than a percentage point of support since June – the survey recorded a decline of two points in the number of those who said they would not vote or were uncertain. The PN haemorrhage continues Although the survey showed that 9.8% of PL voters in 2017 would now vote PN, this shift was more than compensated by 21.2% of PN voters who said they would now vote for Jo- seph Muscat's party. It appears the PN is still haemor- rhaging votes to the PL at a faster pace than it is winning back the sup- port of those who voted Labour last year. And with nine months to go for the European Parliament election, the PN had to also contend with a higher voter abstention and uncertainty than the PL. Of those who voted PN last year, 11.8% said they would not vote and 11.3% were unsure. The equivalent figures for the PL stood at 2.4% and 4.6% respectively. Support for third and fourth par- ties is almost non-existent, with the Democratic Party failing to make an appearance in the survey despite having two MPs. The longer established Alternattiva With Egrant exorcised, Labour grows stronger Muscat runs at all-time high ALL Voted PL in 2017 Voted PN in 2017 Did not vote TRUST RATING AUGUST 2018 53.9% 14.8% 10.8% 20.5% 86.7% 4.5% 7.2% 16.3% 34.3% 21.1% 28.2% 33.3% 5% 59.7% Muscat Delia Neither Don't know ALL PL 2017 PN 2017 Did not vote 2017 Male Female Aged 18-35 Aged 36-50 Aged 51-65 Aged 65+ Gozo Northern Northern Harbour South Eastern Southern Harbour Western Primary Secondary Post-Sec Tertiary Voting intentions among different categories PL PN AD Patriots Don't know Won't vote Demokratika only managed 0.5% and the relatively new Maltese Patriots Movement got 0.2%. The survey found the PL's strongest support was among the elderly (63%). Among the young (18-35), the PL scored 48.8% against the PN's 23.6%. This age group also had the largest number of people (16.9%) who said they would not vote. In Gozo Labour scored strongly at 54.1% against the PN's 25.7%. Gozo also rep- resented one of two regions where the survey recorded votes for AD, the other being the traditional Northern Har- bour. 52% 27% 9.7% 10.6% 83.2% 9.8% 4.6% 21.2% 55.1% 11.3% 11.8% 11.4% 30.7% 50.7% 52% 25.9% 9.9% 11.2% 51.3% 27.8% 9.6% 10.3% 48.8% 23.6% 8.7% 16.9% 47.7% 26.3% 10.8% 13.6% 50.5% 29.5% 11.5% 8.5% 62.9% 29.5% 7.5% 54.1% 25.7% 6.1% 11.5% 45.5% 25.9% 9.4% 19.2% 45.1% 34.4% 11% 7.5% 59.9% 22.6% 8.2% 8% 66% 17.9% 7.4% 8.7% 45.4% 27.5% 13.7% 13.4% 57.2% 32.1% 10.8% 60.2% 21.9% 8.5% 8.9% 44% 24.5% 8.8% 21.5% 41.7% 33.7% 11.8% 10.5%