Polls

The Jamaican Observer reports that:

JAMAICANS are nearly evenly split on the issue of whether or not to cut ties with the British monarchy, with 44 per cent for and 40 per cent against.

The jury is still out on a new survey by Research New Zealand that seems to show a big increase in people who are neutral or undecided about becoming a republic. The survey of 1252 people taken in August last year asked respondents to say whether they strongly agreed strongly disagreed or were neutral on the matter.

The Otago Daily Times reports a  Nielsen Reserve Bank survey released today that found her image was the most disliked part of the design. The survery found 241 (24%) of the 1000 people surveyed did not like the Queen as a symbol. Of those, 41% disliked it a lot.

UMR has released a poll showing a significant drop in support for a New Zealand republic following Friday's Royal Wedding. No surprises there - the question asked was much more direct than ours.

As everyone knows, the outcomes of opinion polls can be partially determined by the question asked. The New Zealand Herald demonstrates this by asking the question:

Do you support New Zealand continuing in the Commonwealth with the Queen as head of state?

This is presented as having something to do with the republic debate. It doesn't. For starters, the addition of the Commonwealth is stupid. The Commonwealth Secretariat agreed in 2007 that if a member state becomes a republic, it does not lose its membership. This had been the case since 1949 (largely thanks to Ireland becoming a republic and the prospect of India doing so, leaving the Commonwealth with no members overtime), however there was a requirement for re-application of membership on attainment of republican status. This requirement was used by both Apartheid South Africa and Rabuka's Fiji to quit the Commonwealth without having to be kicked out for human rights violations.

The Australian Election Study 2010 results are out, and it's good news for supporters of an Australian head of state. Here's the question asked to 2,164 voting-age Australians at the 2010 federal election, weighted by age, gender and socio-economic status:

The BBC (incredibly) reports a poll of 1,006 from November 2010 has found 31% of respondents "couldn't care less" about the Royal wedding on 29 April, and a further 28% were "largely indifferent", a total of 59%.

Hers magazine cover.

According to the Investigate readers survey mentioned here the other day, only 18% of those surveyed support a New Zealand republic. 12.5% are undecided, while 69.5% support the monarchy.

Strangely, this survey has no margin of error, numbers of those surveyed or even a mention about the demographic weighting of its result. We can only conclude that it lacks validity.

Meanwhile, the survey also finds - unsurprisingly given the editors political preferences - that 37% of those surveyed want Winston Peters back in Parliament. Given that there's only one poll that puts New Zealand First over the 5% mark (the much criticised Horizon Poll), it's clear this poll is totally unreliable.