testing the electorate to see if it

will accept popular deputy Katy

Gallagher as chief minister sooner

rather than later.

It is understood the Labor

Party's primary pollster, UMR, has

been polling in Canberra in recent

weeks asking questions such as

whether people think Chief Minister

Jon Stanhope and the Stanhope

Government are ''arrogant''

and if the gender of a candidate

will change their vote.

While Mr Stanhope said last

night he was looking to be in office

beyond the 2012 election, that has

not stopped scuttlebutt he might

step aside as chief minister to

make way for Ms Gallagher, either

before the October poll or before

the next term is up, particularly if

Labor returns to minority government.

In

a separate development,

sources close to the Liberal Party

campaign have also claimed its

polling shows Mr Stanhope's personal

approval rating has

plummeted to as low as 17 per

cent.

But Mr Stanhope last night

dismissed those figures as nonsense.

He said he was not going

anywhere.

''If I'm elected, I fully intend to

serve the next term and at the age

of 57, I believe I have a lot to offer

and I will be looking to extend my

political career beyond the 2012

election,'' he said last night.

''But that is within the hands of

the people of the ACT, where, of

course, it should be.''

If the claims about the Liberals'

polling are true, Mr Stanhope's

personal approval rating has taken

a dramatic nose-dive from a high

of 84 per cent in 2004 to just 17per

cent in recent weeks.

A scathing Mr Stanhope said if

that was the case, questions about

his future as chief minister would

be academic, because based on

those figures the Government

would have three seats and the

Liberal Party 14 seats after the

October election. ''These are nonsense

suggestions,'' he said.

Nevertheless, Mr Stanhope said

the October election would be

hard for the Government because

of the Hare-Clark voting system.

''Hare-Clark always is. The Government

takes nothing for granted,'' Mr

Stanhope said, adding he was

''determined to work as hard as I can

to win the next election''.

ACT Labor Party secretary and

campaign director Matthew Cossey

said he did not ''confirm or deny

whether we undertake research or

when we undertake it''.

A Liberal constituent in the electorate

of Brindabella has signed a

statutory declaration confirming she

was polled in the past month and

was asked questions about whether

she thought the Stanhope Government

and Mr Stanhope were ''arrogant''.

The

woman believed the company

polling was UMR.

The Liberal Party says the poll is

not theirs.

UMR did not return phone calls

yesterday.

The woman said she was also

asked whether the gender of a

candidate would affect her vote and

if she believed that budget decisions,

specifically the school closures,

would have long-term benefits.

The pollster also asked her

questions about her preferred chief

minister and raised the issue of the

age of Opposition Leader Zed

Seselja, who is 31.

Despite being a voter in Brindabella,

the woman was asked specifically

about Ms Gallagher and Planning

and Education Minister Andrew

Barr, both MLAs in Molonglo. Mr

Barr, as deputy Chief Minister, would

give a balance between his right

faction and Ms Gallagher from the

left. Ms Gallagher is understood to

have the highest approval rating of

any MLA in the Assembly.

But Mr Cossey said there was

''absolutely no question over the

chief minister's leadership''.

''I know Jon has a huge amount of

support,'' he said.

Mr Stanhope has been untouchable

as the Labor leader since he

took on the job of opposition leader

soon after being elected to the

Assembly in 1998 and continuing

through as Chief Minister from

Labor's 2001 election victory.

But there are now suggestions Mr

Stanhope has become a ''lightning

rod'' for discontent about

the way Labor has performed in

majority government in the last three

years.

Mr Cossey dismissed any such

suggestions, saying Mr Stanhope's

leadership was secure.

''He is held in high respect by his

own colleagues, as he is by the

Canberra community, as the man

who is prepared to make the tough decisions and deliver good government,''

he said.

Mr Cossey believed a 17 per cent

approval rating for Mr Stanhope was

laughable.

''That confirms everything I think

about the credibility of the Liberal

Party in the ACT and obviously the

people they use to provide them

research. Seventeen per cent is

above what Zed Seselja would have,

I suspect,'' he said.

Mr Seselja said through a spokesman

last night that he ''declined to

comment on Labor Party internal

difficulties''.