CANBERRA, May 14 (Xinhua) -- Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has enjoyed a surge in popularity following last week's tax-cut budget, according to the latest polling.
The Newspoll, released on Sunday night, showed that Turnbull's personal rating had hit its highest level since the 2016 election, as he stretched his lead over Opposition leader Bill Shorten as preferred prime minister to 14 percentage points.
The popularity boost on came on the back of the 140 Australian billion dollars (105 billion U.S. dollars) personal income tax-cut plan announced in Tuesday's budget, while Shorten's rating fell by a point following the latest citizenship ruling which has resulted in four Labor MPs losing their seat. It was Shorten's worst result in 2018.
The Newspoll has Labor ahead of the Coalition 51 percent to 49 percent on the two-party preferred measure, which is the same result as a fortnight ago.
Even though the budget was generally well received, the new survey is the 32nd consecutive loss for the Turnbull government.
The Coalition primary vote was up a point to 39 percent; Labor also rose a point to 38 percent, since the last Newspoll, published three weeks ago. One Nation is on 6 percent, the Greens are 9 percent.
Meanwhile, the Labor primary vote in the Fairfax-Ipsos poll, the nation's other major polling organization, was 37 percent (up three points). The Coalition was unchanged on 36 percent.
Post-budget opinion will soon be tested on the ground in five byelections around the country, four of them caused by the citizenship crisis.
The Ipsos poll, published by Fairfax, has Labor with a more commanding lead over the government post-budget, 54 percent-46 percent.
The national poll of 1,728 voters, conducted in both city and country regions, captured the immediate post-budget sentiment, with the bulk of respondents having been surveyed after Shorten's budget-in-reply speech delivered on the night of May 10.
