Peter Dutton's Coalition takes the lead in Newspoll, surpassing ...

Peter Dutton has plenty to smile about. 

It's not that long ago that reports of his premature death as opposition leader were being greatly exaggerated. 

But with an election now just months away, the Queensland cop turned career politician has suddenly found himself leading a party that has surpassed a psychological milestone. 

The latest Newspoll shows his party ahead of Labor for the first time since the last election. 

On paper, it's the tiniest of margins: 51 per cent to 49 per cent on a two-party preferred basis. 

Anthony Albanese has long pointed to having never lost a Newspoll to the Coalition as prime minister. (ABC News: Keane Bourke)

And while it is just a single piece of data in a sea of polls, it's a poll that the PM closely watches.

Albanese had repeatedly reminded anyone who would listen that his government had never lost a Newspoll to the Coalition on a two-party preferred basis.

That was until now.

Polls offer a snapshot of the past

Before we go on, it's important to put polls into perspective. 

Polls are an indication of the past; they aren't predictive of the future. 

The data can jump around, as anyone riding the US presidential election poller-coaster is reminded on an almost daily basis. 

Put together, polls can show you a trend and, as has largely been the case this year, the trend isn't Labor's friend.

But that doesn't mean Peter Dutton should be measuring up the curtains in the prime ministerial office just yet. 

What did Newspoll say?

Today's Newspoll has Labor on a primary vote of 31 per cent and the Coalition on 38 per cent, the same as it was at the start of September. 

So why has the Coalition only now taken the lead? The short answer is the Greens, who lost 1 per cent on their primary vote, dropping from 13 per cent to 12 per cent. 

Looking just at the primary vote of the parties this year, the picture you get is a flat line. 

Labor, has been stuck at about 32 per cent, apart from twice being higher — initially at the start of the year when the PM changed the stage 3 tax cuts and again after the May budget.

It would shock exactly no-one to hear that Labor performs better in polls when the focus is on its handling of the cost-of-living crisis. The Coalition knows this too, hence why it hammers Labor about borders, visas and Gaza. 

While Newspoll today says the Coalition is in front, for all we know, it might have been in front for months. At the same time, Labor too might be leading. 

Polls have margins of error, which in today's poll was 3 per cent. 

So it might be 51-49 but equally it might be the Coalition leading 54-46, or even Labor ahead 52-48.

Both sides insist they can win majority government but increasingly the odds suggest neither will be governing in majority after the next election.

So will Peter Dutton be prime minister soon?

When voters turfed Scott Morrison and the Coalition from government, Labor came to power with its lowest primary vote since the 1930s.

The 2022 election had Labor on a primary vote of 32.6 per cent, trailing the Coalition on 35.7 per cent. The two-party preferred outcome had Labor winning 52.1 per cent to 47.9 per cent.

On one hand, Labor's primary vote in today's poll isn't far from 2022. But as the Labor strategist turned pollster Kos Samaras recently warned, a drop of 1 per cent with a primary vote in the low 30s could spell disaster.

"Anything can happen to every seat," he said.

"Morrison had a problem at the last election. The Labor front line is much wider than Morrison's. Labor is under threat from the Greens, Liberals and independents."

So will Peter Dutton be prime minister at the next election? Maybe (it's a mug's game to suggest any other answer). 

A wake-up call for the government and voters

Publicly, every politician will tell you the only poll that matters is election day. Privately, they tell a different story.

Within Labor, it's a reminder that it needs to find a way to get the public debate back onto its efforts to ease inflation. 

No shortage of polls have shown that those souring on Labor are in mortgage-belt areas of the major cities, where interest rate hikes have constricted around household budgets. 

Labor too hopes that headlines including the words "Prime Minister Peter Dutton" might send a wake-up call to the electorate, encouraging voters to look under the bonnet of the Coalition, which so far seemingly has little more than a half-baked nuclear-power plan with the price tag scratched off. 

The political orthodoxy says governments are typically behind at this point of the electoral cycle and that voters typically give governments at least two terms. 

But what about 2024 and politics globally says this is the moment to be putting faith in political orthodoxies or incumbency?

The polls are flatlining and Labor's majority government is on life support.

It's not leaving Albanese with much to smile about.