Roy Morgan Update September 29, 2026: Federal Vote, Consumer Confidence and Mortgage Stress

In this week's Market Research Update, we present the latest data on Federal Vote, Consumer Confidence and Mortgage Stress.

Welcome to the Roy Morgan Weekly update.

Let’s start with voting intention. If an election were held today, the Albanese Labor government would be re-elected against either One Nation or the Coalition. Labor’s vote is 26%, ahead of One Nation on 25.5%, The L-NP on 22.5 – 20% Liberal and 2.5% Nationals. The Greens are on 14.5% and Independents and Other Parties attract 11% of the vote.

Weve combined two weeks of data to enable a Special State by State analysis.  One Nation is polling best in Queensland at 32.5% of the vote, and Labor polling best in New South Wales, with 28.5% of the vote. The L-NP Coalition record their highest result in Victoria and South Australia with 26.5% of the vote, while The Greens poll best in Victoria with 16.5% of the vote. This is based on interviews with 2,569 electors over the past fortnight.

On a two-party preferred basis, the ALP is ahead of the L-NP Coalition 52.5% to 47.5% and ahead of One Nation 53.5% to 46.5%.

Consumer Confidence was already in decline before today’s Reserve Bank meeting where the cash rate was increased as was widely expected.

ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence was at 70.5, down 1.5 points in a week.

Looking at inflation expectations now. ANZ-Roy Morgan Inflation Expectations were down 0.4% to 5.7%.

This means Australians expect annual inflation of 5.7% in each of the next two years.

And Mortgage Stress in the three months to August was virtually unchanged at 32.3%, down just 0.2% from July, but has increased a large 8.4% since January. In total more than 1.7 million mortgage holders are at risk of mortgage stress, even before today’s rate rise. That’s up 534,000 since the beginning of the year.

And now, let’s cross the ditch for a moment and celebrate the businesses leading the way in the Roy Morgan Customer Satisfaction Awards in New Zealand. There were awards across 25 categories this year.

Importantly, in the sought-after ‘Best of the Best’ Award – judged between the 25 different category winners – it was the ‘Roy Morgan Car Manufacturer of the Year’ Hyundai who took out the award with an average customer satisfaction of 92.5%.

Other winning brands included Mobile Handset Provider of the Year Apple iPhone on 91.8%, International Airline of the Year Emirates on 91.4%, Quick Service Restaurant of the Year Hell Pizza on 87.4% and Hardware Store of the Year Mitre 10 on 86.8% - that filled out the top five positions overall.

For detailed information on all 25 winners of the re-launched New Zealand Customer Satisfaction Awards click below for the special webinar covering all the results.

And finally, a couple of highlights from Roy Morgan’s Annual Agribusiness Research - because the shift in regional Australia over the past twelve months has been remarkable by any standard.

But first, breaking news on the voting intention of Australian farmers. Support for Pauline Hanson’s One Nation has gone from 10.5% a year ago to 45.5% - an increase of 35. How’s that for a scene setter.

At Roy Morgan, we maintain a panel of around 50,000 Australian farmers who are surveyed regularly on their on-farm experience, their challenges and their behaviour, as well as their attitudes and their intentions.

We also take the pulse of Australia's business community through our long-running Business Confidence survey. It asks business decision-makers across every sector — agriculture among them — about conditions in their own enterprise: how they judge things now, what they expect next, and what they intend to do about investment.

Take the long view in agriculture, and two things stand out. Agribusiness confidence reached its lowest point in at least fifteen years in the June quarter of this year. And it’s been in negative territory since the middle of 2022 — four full years in which more farmers have expected things to get worse, not better.

A single poor quarter could be a blip. Four years below neutral is something else entirely: it is a settled expectation. And confidence, remember, is not a measure of conditions. It is a measure of what people believe is coming — and that is precisely what determines whether they plant, buy, hire, or hold back and wait.

The biggest challenge reported by farmers in 2026 is all about costs. The 48% figure for inflation and costs – largely driven by petrol and fertiliser - is the highest figure any challenge has recorded in the survey's five-year history.

 And it’s displaced government policy as the leading concern. Last year government policy concerns dominated - but was less top of mind this year.