By Gary Morgan, Michele Levine and Julian McCrann

Roy Morgan’s analysis shows three reasons for the greater than expected ‘No’ vote:

• Low turnout – especially among younger people who strongly supported ‘Yes’;
• The high ‘Undecided’ with a large proportion of people only deciding in the voting booth – among those surveyed who had already voted, Roy Morgan found 63% had voted ‘No’ and only 37% had voted ‘Yes’;
• Social desirability – this bias is well-known in research and throughout the campaign, the socially acceptable answer was ‘Yes’. The results of Roy Morgan’s polling on ‘The Voice’ suggest that the large majority of respondents who said they were ‘Undecided’ in fact had largely made up their minds already to vote ‘No’ but weren’t prepared to openly state this.

For the poll watchers:

Roy Morgan polling released over the last month leading into the weekend’s referendum on ‘The Voice’ showed the proposal would fail. Roy Morgan first predicted ‘The Voice’ would fail in polling released on Tuesday September 26: “Roy Morgan predicts ‘No’ will win ‘The Voice’ referendum; ‘No’ (44%) well ahead of ‘Yes’ (39%) as voting set to start.” Every subsequent Roy Morgan Poll showed the same prediction of a ‘No’ victory.

The final Roy Morgan Poll released on ‘The Voice’ on Thursday October 12 with an Australia-wide cross-section of 1,419 Australian electors surveyed showed a similarly split with 40% ‘Yes’, 46% ‘No’ and 14% ‘Undecided’. The ‘Undecided’ were then asked their leaning, after including leaning 44% of respondents were leaning towards voting ‘Yes’, a majority of 51% were leaning towards voting ‘No’, and a further 5% were still ‘Undecided’.

Three days before election day Roy Morgan found those who had already voted were more likely to vote ‘No’

Roy Morgan’s surveying from October 2-12, 2023, showed, of those who had already voted, over three-fifths (63%) said they had voted ‘No’ compared to only 37% who said they had voted ‘Yes’.

Late interviews conducted by Roy Morgan in the week of the referendum were leaning more towards ‘No’

In addition, the late interviews conducted from Monday October 9 – Thursday October 12, 2023, showed support for ‘No’ (52%) higher than in the previous week of interviewing (‘No’ at 50%). Support for ‘Yes’ went from 45% in the previous week to 41% in the late interviews while the proportion ‘Undecided’ also increased from 5% to 7%.

This finding was supported by re-interviewing Roy Morgan conducted with voters who had previously been ‘Undecided’ (those first interviewed from September 25 – October 8, 2023). When being re-interviewed, previously ‘Undecided’ respondents indicated they were leaning towards voting ‘No’ at a rate of ‘two-thirds’ (67%) compared to ‘one-third’ now leaning towards voting ‘Yes’ (33%).

This split of ‘Undecided’ voters of ‘two-thirds’ to ’No’ and ‘one-third’ to ‘Yes’ was used to allocate ‘Undecided’ voters for the final referendum voting poll.

The trend was toward ‘No’

Social desirability bias is well-known in research and throughout the campaign, the socially acceptable answer was ‘Yes’. The results of Roy Morgan’s polling on ‘The Voice’ show that the large majority of respondents who said they were ‘Undecided’ in fact had largely made up their minds already to vote ‘No’ but weren’t prepared to openly state this.

Roy Morgan has observed this same ‘social desirability’ bias before with many people unwilling to commit to a position they believe may negatively impact their social standing and reputation. Other pollsters overseas have labelled this the ‘Shy Tory’ phenomenon – especially in relation to the same observed effect for polling in the United Kingdom.

Roy Morgan’s panel of ‘Undecided’ voters on Channel Seven’s Spotlight program moved towards voting ‘No’ after watching the in-studio debate

On the Sunday night (Sunday October 8, 2023) prior to the vote Roy Morgan measured the reactions of undecided voters in a special program on Channel 7: Spotlight – Voice 2023: The Final Pitch.

The Channel 7 Spotlight – Voice 2023 program brought together an audience of undecided voters selected by Roy Morgan who reacted to a conversation between advocates for YES (TV personality Ray Martin and Labor Senator Malarndirri McCarthy) and those advocating for NO (Country Liberal Party Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe).

Of those in the audience there were 53% who said they would vote ‘No’, 30% who said they would vote ‘Yes’ and a further 17% who were still ‘Undecided’.

If ‘Undecided’ were removed this was a split of 64% ‘No’ and 36% ‘Yes’; almost two-to-one in favour of ‘No’. This result was almost identical to the split in ‘Undecided’ voters seen when later re-interviewed.

How did ‘Undecided’ voters in Channel Seven’s studio audience react to the debate?

Yes: 30%

No: 53%

Still Undecided: 17%

When ‘Undecided’ voters are removed:

Yes: 36%

No: 64%

Source: Channel 7: Spotlight – Voice 2023: The Final Pitch (Broadcast on Sunday October 8, 2023).

See previous releases for detailed tables on the results of our previous surveys on ‘The Voice to Parliament’ conducted in December 2022, April 2023, May 2023, September 2023 & October 2023.

For further comment or more information contact:
Michele Levine 0411 129 093 or Gary Morgan 0411 129 094 or email askroymorgan@roymorgan.com.

About Roy Morgan

Roy Morgan is Australia’s largest independent Australian research company, with offices in each state, as well as in the U.S. and U.K. A full-service research organisation, Roy Morgan has over 80 years’ experience collecting objective, independent information on consumers.