Guardian Essential poll also finds Australians are more anxious about both the economy and climate change

Scott Morrison ends an election-winning year with a strong thumbs up from Coalition voters. But voter disapproval of the prime minister has also crept up in the second half of 2019, from 34% in July to 43% in December, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll.

With parliament rising for 2019 and Australians preparing for their summer break, voters were asked in the final poll of the year to rate Morrison’s performance as prime minister compared to their expectations, with 11% of the sample saying he had exceeded expectations, 41% saying he had met expectations, and 47% saying he had fallen short.

While Morrison ends the year beloved of the Liberal and National party base, with 82% of Coalition voters reporting he has either met or exceeded expectations, Coalition voters are more likely than other voting cohorts to express that positive view.

Scott Morrison is no Paul Keating, but he risks a similar fate in 2022 if he’s not careful | Peter Lewis Read more

Anthony Albanese ends 2019 with approval ratings lower than Morrison’s (39% to 45%) but voter approval of the Labor leader has crept up over the past six months (he’s gone from 35% in June to 39% in December). Albanese’s disapproval has also gone from 25% in June to 28% in December.

Albanese’s main problem in the middle of this year was 39% of the sample didn’t know if they approved of his performance or not – reflecting his fledgling leadership of the Labor party. Albanese replaced Bill Shorten after the May election loss. While voters are still on the fence about the Labor leader, the “don’t know” cohort in Guardian Essential is trending down to 33% in the final poll of the year.

Albanese’s voter sentiment compared to expectations yields similar results to the prime minister, with 8% of the sample of 1,035 respondents saying the Labor leader has exceeded their expectations, 48% saying he has met their expectations, and 44% saying he has fallen short.

While 82% of Coalition rusted-ons are pleased with Morrison, Albanese enjoys a smaller premium among the Labor faithful, with 66% saying he’s either met or exceeded their expectations.

As well as reflecting on the performance of the leaders, voters were also asked to reflect their broad thinking over the past 12 months, with a series of questions about the winners and losers of 2019.

Sign up to receive the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

Voters in the sample thought the year had been good for them and their families, and for large corporations.

But people thought 2019 had been a very bad year for the planet (a 10-point drop from the reading captured at the end of 2018) – reflecting increasing community anxiety about the impact of climate change exacerbated by a catastrophic early bushfire season and prolonged drought.

The responses also suggest Australians are worried about the economy. The latest official figures show the economy grew by just 0.4% in the September quarter, with annual growth at 1.7%. There was a large negative swing in Guardian Essential from 2018, with the economy dropping from +6 in 2018 to -13 in 2019.

Voters in the sample remain not particularly enamoured by Australian politics in general, or the government, but the readings for both are more positive then they were 12 months ago in a survey taken shortly after the Liberal party had blasted Malcolm Turnbull out of the prime ministership.

Trade unions are also seen as having a bad year, falling from -2 in 2018 to -11 in 2019.

Voter sentiment is also negative about unions in other respects. Almost half the sample (49%) agree with the observation “overall unions have too much power today”, while 68% agree that union officials should be disqualified for breaching administrative laws such as failing to file annual financial reports – which is part of the Morrison government’s union bill, which failed to clear the Senate in the penultimate sitting week when Pauline Hanson refused to support the package.

Just over half the sample, 51%, also agree that union officials should be disqualified for taking unprotected industrial action such as snap strikes.

City dwellers are more likely than voters in the regions to think unions have too much power, and Coalition voters and people aged over 55 are more likely to be negative about unions that other groups.

But the news is not all good for the government, which will renew efforts to get the legislation passed once parliament resumes in February. More than half the sample, 62%, supports the statement the “government seems to be more concerned about the actions of union officials than the CEOs of banks and other corporations”.

With the Angus Taylor controversy dominating the final two sitting weeks of parliament, voters were also asked to express their perspective on the sequence of events that has led to a police investigation into the use of a dodgy document to attack the Sydney lord mayor, Clover Moore.

What if our personal data is less the ‘new oil’ and more like uranium? | Peter Lewis Read more

Voters were split over whether Morrison should have sidelined the minister for the duration of the police investigation (35%), or stood by him (17%), but mostly they were tuned out, with 48% of the cohort saying they weren’t following the story.

Voters strongly support setting up an independent federal corruption body to monitor the behaviour of politicians and public servants (75% support compared with 82% just over a year ago).

There has been controversy post-election about the reliability of opinion polling, as none of the major surveys – Newspoll, Ipsos, Galaxy or Essential – correctly predicted a Coalition victory on 18 May. The polls instead projected Labor in front on a two-party-preferred vote of 51-49 and 52-48.

The lack of precision in the polling has prompted public reflection at Essential, as has been flagged by its executive director, Peter Lewis.

Guardian Australia is now not publishing measurements of primary votes or a two-party-preferred calculation, but is continuing to publish survey results of responses to questions about the leaders and a range of policy issues.

The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 3%.