Shorten slips to 17 per cent as preferred PM

Labor trails the Coalition at 35 per cent on the primary vote and 48 to 52 per cent on two-party preferred.

Malcolm Turnbull has extended his lead over Bill Shorten as preferred PM, the latest Newspoll shows.

The Labor Leader has picked up the pace in rolling out policy ideas since Turnbull ousted Tony Abbott last month.

Labor’s Jason Clare says Mr Turnbull’s popularity will quickly fade when he actually does something.

“Australians would expect the leader of the government and the leader of opposition to talk on a sensible regular basis and I am going to try and see if Malcolm is interested in that”.

It is Mr Shorten’s worst result since taking on the Labor leadership after the 2013 election. “It’s not in prospect at all”, he said of a leadership change.

He said Mr Shorten controlled factional numbers in the ALP caucus, while the man he beat for the job – Anthony Albanese – had received the majority grass-roots membership vote.

Labor frontbencher Jenny Macklin told ABC radio voters are crying out for more policy and that’s what the opposition is focused on.

“There are tensions in his own party over his social reforming agenda and tensions with the public over his fiscal conservatism”.

He gave a light-hearted response when asked about today’s margin during a media event to announce the new chief scientist, Alan Finkel.

“I know that if Labor keeps working on the right policies then, as I say, the polls will work on themselves”, he said.

He committed to establishing a national redress scheme for the 60,000 estimated survivors of child sexual abuse in the community.