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12 February 2007

Mulrunji Doomadgee

These are the notes used for our on-air analysis with Madonna King on Tuesday 4th February, 2007.

This will be the last What the people want project done with Madonna King's morning program as they have decided to axed our segment. We intend to continue surveying under the What the people want banner and are looking to publish more broadly. Thanks for the support of those who complete our questionnaires, and we hope that you will stick with us.


  1. 511 responses

  2. 58% male, 42% female.

  3. Under-represented under 30. Over-represented 51-60 (which is where many of the men lurk).

  4. Politically, usual lean to left, 23% Greens, 32% Labor, 16% Liberal, 13% National. (More Nats than usual). Political leanings indicate that this is an issue with broad community interest.

  5. Most people appear to have an open mind. When we asked about the coroner’s findings, 43% “neither agreed nor disagreed”, or were unsure. Very low degree of commitment.

  6. Most people were loathe to form an opinion on Hurley’s guilt or innocence – 51% said they weren’t sure about it, and 9% avoided the question altogether.

  7. Most people thought they would be good jurors – 77% said they would be prepared to change their minds, depending on what was presented to them.

  8. Those who thought Hurley innocent were least likely to say they would change their minds, but still 68% said they would, and only 14% said they wouldn’t. The figure for those who thought he was guilty was 79% and 8%.

  9. A total of 38% of the sample agreed with the police union’s stance, versus 51% who didn’t. However, there are some wrinkles here.

  10. Those who voted National (70%) and Liberal (51%) were most likely to support the union. Those who thought Hurley innocent (67%) were more likely to support the action than those who thought he was guilty (27%).

  11. The same patterns were evident in terms of whether respondents thought he would get a fair trial, as well as those who said they would be good jury members.

  12. All these (points 9-11) suggest that major correlations with support for the Police Union aligned with concerns about the quality of the judicial process, and possibly undue stress to Hurley, while opposition aligned with trust in the system, or a concern that Hurley might be evading justice.

  13. This conflicts a little with the reasons that people gave for supporting the union.

  14. Those who supported the union justified it by saying that they
    a. Thought the government had acted politically
    b. That police need better resources
    c. That protest is a basic political right available to everyone
    d. It is the function of unions to represent their members

  15. Those who didn’t support the union cited:
    a. Should be subject to the law
    b. Actions are counterproductive (interest in the matter going to trial)
    c. Waste of resources (better to put them to legal fees).

Quotes:

“Police have to uphold the law and when these incidents happen it is shown how little respect they recive at these places - whay would a policeman want to serve in such a place?????”

“They should be happy to end the conjecture about Hurley with a legal trial.”

To see the tables, you can download them from here (Word Document 131 Kb).

Posted by Graham at 10:15 PM | Comments (14)