It seems that this is becoming a reasonably regular occurrence in politics.
IMO, the issue centres largely around the nature of the polling and changes in the"character" of the population.
Firstly, the population. In yesteryear we had roughly 40% diehard Coalition, 40% diehard Labor and 20% undecided. So it made it a bit easier to draw "valid" conclusions from that population.
But this characteristic, IMO, has changed dramatically. There are many more influences on that population.
As such, to be able to draw valid conclusions you need a random sample from the population so that every member of the population has an equal chance ofselection. That will enable you to draw valid conclusions about the entirepopulation based on the sample.
What the pollsters are doing, IMO, is not much better thanpolling people as they pass you in the street, that is, social polling or non-probability polling. Hence you get the "shock result" we saw last night even though anecdotal evidence suggested otherwise!!
