My guess is that the British media will be fully crashing out for the next month because of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s successful Australian tour. They’ve already begun to create an alternate reality where “many Australians weren’t interested” in Harry and Meghan, or that “everyone” is outraged that Meghan is collecting commissions from promoting Aussie designers. The Times of London even devoted a staff editorial to complaining about the “my trauma, my truth, my merch” tour. Well, if you thought these deranged people would just be content to hyperventilate on-air and write huffy op-eds, you would be mistaken. They commissioned an emotional-support poll to show how Harry and Meghan are terribly unpopular in Australia. You guys… don’t believe your lying eyes, only believe the rants coming from deep within the padded cell.
Opinions have varied about the success or otherwise of Prince Harry and Meghan’s Australian tour. The Sussexes’ team say it was a triumph; their critics say it was a flop. But now we have something more than vibes: hard data. And it is brutal.
Roy Morgan, Australia’s oldest and best-known independent polling and market research company (founded in 1941, headquartered in Melbourne, with more than 80 years of continuous operation tracking Australian public opinion on everything from voting intentions to consumer confidence) interviewed a representative cross-section of 1,767 Australians aged 18 and over about Harry and Meghan’s visit.
These are not Twitter impressions or cherry-picked crowd shots. This is the real thing: a properly conducted, nationally representative survey from the country’s most established pollster.
First, the good news for the Sussexes: Australians knew they were there! More than 82 percent of the adult population — some 18.1 million people — were aware of the visit. The tour certainly got attention. What it did not get was approval.
Of those Australians who knew about the visit, a crushing 81 percent said it had not improved their opinion of the couple. Only 19 percent said it had.
Asked whether the trip would help Harry repair his relationship with the King, 87 percent said no. Asked whether the tour had shown them a more positive side of Meghan, 75 percent said no. Asked whether Harry and Meghan had been treated unfairly by the Royal Family, 69 percent said no. These are not marginal numbers.
The Sussex operation has been insisting that the tour was, in fact, a roaring success. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, the Telegraph’s Victoria Ward, who followed the couple throughout the tour, reported that the Sussexes’ team argues there is a disconnect between “the negative commentary and the reaction on the ground,” and that in person they have been greeted with “open arms.” One can see why they might believe this, from inside a bubble of curated events and hand-picked audiences.
Yes, we should not believe all of the Australian people who went on the record and on camera about how much they loved seeing Harry and Meghan, how much their visit meant to them, how meeting H&M was the highlight of their week and a memory they will cherish. Nevermind about the life-changing “Meghan Effect” felt by Australian designers who immediately saw increased sales and a spike in traffic. Nevermind about the hundreds or thousands of people who followed them around and swarmed the Sussexes on Bondi Beach. LOOK AT THIS POLL!! The poll says Australians don’t believe the tour will help Harry’s relationship with the king!! Why in the world are they polling Australians about that again? And who said that any of those push-poll questions were the goals of the Sussexes’ tour again? Harry never said “I’m going to Australia to repair my relationship with my dad!”
It also strikes me that all of the royalists live an alternate reality about the left-behind Windsors too. The Windsors are the ones who can’t draw a crowd, they’re the ones getting protested and heckled everywhere, they’re the ones too lazy and afraid to undertake royal tours, they’re the ones fighting off tumbleweeds as they walk into events. But the left-behinds magically always have great numbers in their emotional-support polls. These people are such pitiful little propagandists.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.
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- Melbourne, AUSTRALIA Prince Harry & Meghan Markle attend Swinburne University in Hawthorn, Melbourne. Pictured: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle BACKGRID USA 16 APRIL 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Sydney, AUSTRALIA Prince Harry and Meghan Markle visit Bondi Beach Life Guards and greet the public at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia. Pictured: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle BACKGRID USA 17 APRIL 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Sydney, AUSTRALIA Prince Harry and Meghan Markle visit Bondi Beach Life Guards and greet the public at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia. Pictured: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle BACKGRID USA 17 APRIL 2026 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- The Duke of Sussex with memorial representatives and Indigenous veterans, including Lieutenant Colonel Joseph West (left) at the Australian War Memorial site in Campbell, Canberra, on day two of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex with memorial representatives and Indigenous veterans, including Lieutenant Colonel Joseph West (left) Where: Canberra, Australia When: 15 Apr 2026 Credit: Jonathan Brady/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke of Sussex lays a wreath during the Last Post Ceremony at the Australian War Memorial in Campbell, Canberra, on day two of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex Where: Canberra, Australia When: 14 Apr 2026 Credit: Jonathan Brady/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke of Sussex talks to young advocates during a visit to Batyr, a mental health engagement programme, at Swinburne University of Technology in Hawthorn, Melbourne, Victoria, on day three of the royal trip to Australia Featuring: Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex Where: Melbourne, Australia When: 16 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke and Duchess of Sussex leave the Bondi Surf Bathers’ Life Saving Club after meeting volunteer first responders, during a visit to Bondi Beach, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Volunteers from the organisation, founded in 1907, played an integral role in protecting beachgoers and saving lives during the terrorist attack at Bondi Beach on December 14 Featuring: Prince Harry, Meghan Markle Where: Bondi, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: Jonathan Brady/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke and Duchess of Sussex hold a dog at the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia, after taking part in a sailing event with members of Invictus Australia in Sydney Harbour, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex Where: Sydney, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke and Duchess of Sussex after taking part in a sailing event with members of Invictus Australia in Sydney Harbour, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex Where: Sydney, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Veteran Joel Vanderzwan presents the Duke and Duchess of Sussex with flip-flops with the inscriptions ‘G’ day Hazza’ and ‘G’ day Megs’ as they take part in a sailing event with members of Invictus Australia in Sydney Harbour, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex Where: Sydney, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke and Duchess of Sussex pose for a selfie photo with wellwishers at Man O’War Steps, next to the Sydney Opera House, before taking part in a sailing event with members of Invictus Australia in Sydney Harbour, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex Where: Sydney, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- A wellwisher presents the Duke and Duchess of Sussex with a framed photograph of Harry with her mother Daphne Dunn, as they arrive at the Man O’War Steps, next to the Sydney Opera House, before taking part in a sailing event with members of Invictus Australia in Sydney Harbour, on day four of the royal trip to Australia. Featuring: Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex Where: Sydney, Australia When: 17 Apr 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
The polls ALWAYS pop up when Harry/Meghan make moves. There was also a poll about the current popularity of the Monarchy. A few months back a DIFFERENT poll by the same company, YOUGOV, said the complete opposite of this latest poll. I think the approval for the Monarchy was at like 49% and now they want us to believe that despite what we see, Charles, William, Camilla being heckled, that support for the Monarchy, in light of Andrew is up? Nah.
I also cant believe the Palace is so fragile to have to cling to what they know are lies.
The Australia tour showed up the Royals BIG TIME and we ALL know Harry/Meghan are winning.
Did you not read the memo? Here goes:
Up is down, down is up, green is black, and the earth is flat!
Who needs facts or logics? You people just love to pi$$ on the derangers parades with y’all facts and logics. Ugh!
I’m sorry but these polls are just embarrassing in their bias at this point… the trip was a complete success.. the clothes Meghan wore are selling out, they made a lot of stops and highlighted many beautiful things about Australia and spent time with the Australian IG veterans so for the Sussex’s it was a complete success. This trip had nothing to do with the leftovers or Britain but they sure want to make everything the Sussex’s do all about them.
They really need to stop at this point. The press and palace have lost. It’s done. That family is boring, losing steam and influence everyday and the press are psychotic. Harry and Meghan will never return and don’t care about the criticism anymore. There are really trying to manifest a reality that does not exist and it seems to be pissing them off that it’s not working. It’s just noise and trolling at this point.
i want to know how they collected the sample. And also, the way the questions are framed is manipulated to get the answer they want.
Do you think more highly of Harry and Meghan?
Well, if you already thought extremely highly of them, you could theoretically answer no, but that wouldn’t mean something negative.
Anyway, I digress.
I just can’t imagine being a whole, literal king and king in waiting and being such an insecure POS. The level of pathetic is off the charts.
Thank goodness Harry and Meghan and their children are gone from that sunken place.
These were my first thoughts, too. Tell us more about your sample and weighting. Tell us more about the questions, were they something like “has the BRF been too patient with the Sussexes, or are they striking a good balance with the wayward son and his black American wife?” I don’t know anything about Aussie polling companies and whether this one is as respected as Sykes says.
And 🎯, it’s hard to “improve” your opinion if it’s already high.
Anyway, why isn’t Sykes writing about the QEII centenary or something? Yes, I know the answer.
Yeah Sykes tried it with talking about how old the guy is or whatever but I’m sure it’s just as legitimate as the British yougov polls. Which is to say, not at all scientific or meaningful. Just a bunch of deranged basement dwellers pounding away on their keyboards.
It was definitely a push poll with questions framed to elicit responses that can be framed negatively.
A 4 day trip is unlikely to change most people’s opinions positively or negatively but if 19% of people now see you more positively isn’t that good. Most people’s opinions are unchanged. How is that bad?
I fail to see how any of these results are bad for Harry and Meghan. Most people haven’t changed their opinion but some people obviously like them a lot because they came out to see them.
Is Sykes really that stupid that he thinks this poll with its leading questions is ‘brutal’. It doesn’t prove anything other than most people don’t change their opinion of celebrities after a 4 day visit.
I didn’t read the article at all but if it’s yougov, they don’t poll in Australia. Also yougov polls are entirely fictional unless they’re specifically about elections. It’s in their how we conduct polls. Basically, 99% of their polls are answered by bots. Who is moronic enough even think this crap has validity. They did not “poll” Harry and meghan in Australia. Grow the fuck up people. Stop believing everything you read. I fear for millennials, I do. Such a gullible generation.
It is not YouGov.
That was my same response to the questions. If I had been asked, I would have said it did not change my opinion of H&M, or caused me to see Meghan in a more positive light – because I already have a pretty high opinion of them, see her in a positive light, etc. And I would not expect this trip to improve his relationship with Charles, because it has nothing to do with Charles.
Anything can be manipulated. Those crowd sizes don’t lie. sorry sykes.
On its website, Roy Morgan calls this “a special Channel Seven-Roy Morgan SMS Pulse Poll.”
Meaning, it’s a pop-up poll of conservative viewers who watch Channel Seven or visit its website. Maybe after watching one of Channel Seven’s negative reports on the visit. Google says Channel Seven is right-of-center, so this says nothing about how left-of-center Australians feel.
Still, agree that 19% is good. You can’t change years of hate with a four-day visit.
Well what a way to “flop”. Very large crowds. People interviewed saying they like the Sussexes. Everywhere they went people came to see them. The derangers try very hard to make flop happen but pictures of the reality say very big SUCCESS!!
That’s why calling them “emotional support polls” is perfect and says it all. From the way the BM repeatedly act, I sometimes think these people have their own Five Stages of Grief cycle similar to Elizabeth Kubler Ross:
First, the outraged reaction on finding about an upcoming Sussex event.
Second, endanger their lives by leaking sensitive locations.
Third, preemptively belittle the event.
Fourth, the obsessive coverage even at the expense of the leftovers’ events.
Fifth, administer “therapy” with a soothing poll or story of a dead royal “rolling over in their grave.” (Rinse and repeat).
Spot on @Debby. They do all these things then have the nerve to call Meghan a narcissist. The call is coming from inside the palace.
Again, Meghan and Harry, why are you allowing your comms staff to engage with British media? This is the result you get, which you understood so clearly when you left Salt Island. There is nothing your staffers can say that will turn those vipers around. So please stop and make everyone stick to your original plan which at least made then crazy from being shut out. Unfortunately, if you are now back in the nameless briefing game, it means you are getting splashed with the same mud the leave behind swallow in every day.
This is QUITE the assumption to make. The Sussexes’ staff speak on the record, with their full chests, every single time. Just like their principals. They have stuck to their statement that they will not engage with the tabloids they are suing, and have in fact not engaged with any of the royal rota, regardless of whether they work with tabloids or broadsheets.
And you choose to blame THEM for the lying British media making sh*t up about “Sussex sources” to give their lying narratives credibility? UK reporters have been claiming “sources close to the Sussexes” ever since Prince Harry pointed out how the palaces’ and media’s “royal sources” machinery works. So they stopped using that and began to pretend that the sources were “friends of Harry” and “people who work with the Sussexes”. Lies. And people are swallowing them.
The “sources” card is being played by the media precisely because they were called out and precisely because they want to pretend that the Sussexes are playing the game that the left-behind royals are playing. That’s it. There’s no “both sides” here.
Read Victoria Ward’s comments again.
@GMHQ how does reading Victoria Ward’s comments again change what @ Magdalena is saying? Victoria Ward does not have one named source.
@GMHQ Victoria Ward, the lying hack from The Times who, uninvited, flew all the way to Australia to spout bile about the Sussexes and attempt to insert the British media’s poisoned narratives into Australian reporting every chance she got, even though she got no follow-up, and who, despite grudgingly acknowledging that the tour was an unqualified success, still continued to spout fiction to craft the narrative she and the rota rats wanted? And who could barely hide her bitterness at how well the Sussexes’ visit was going? No thank you.
As @Bum says, I’ll trust named sources over unnamed sources spouting Opposite Day pipe dreams.
I’m not sure what this push poll is trying to prove! Harry and Meghan don’t need to be liked by the majority of Australians as long as the Australians that do like them invite them and come out to see them then the trip is a success.
If 19% of Australians have a more favourable view that’s good. If most Australians haven’t changed their opinion (we don’t know whether that opinion was positive or negative to start with) that’s to be expected. Is a whole country going to massively change their opinion of you because of one trip? Unlikely.
If Harry and Meghan were hated in Australia they would have got push back when they were out and about and they didn’t.
Sykes has really lost the plot…
All derangers and bots voted feverishly and a few times. Then they brag see they are not popular and the poll goes on the premise they are not popular
Has there ever been an unsuccessful tour in Australia? Given the general good nature of Australians and the picture postcard environment, I don’t know of any visit, official or otherwise, that wasn’t considered a success.
King Charles and queen consort Camilla would beg to disagree – see their last tour of Australia, which was NOT considered a success by any measure.
Like clockwork. Forget what you saw and heard directly in interviews, this event or trip went terrible. It makes me wonder why they expend so much energy trying to ruin trips before they even go if they’re just going to pretend that the outcome they wanted happened in any case regardless after they leave.
This doesn’t matter though. Harry and Meghan aren’t working royals or politicians. They don’t need everyone to love them to maintain their position. If enough people who are loyal support you, that’s fine. For business and other endeavors.
This is the consistent problem they have. They don’t know how to cover them as private citizens so they think opinion polls matter. You think Kim Kardashian cares about where she ranks in opinion polls? As long as people keep buying Skims, who cares.
Next we’ll start to see reporting saying they received ” mixed reviews” on the success of the tour. And how it’s ” controversial” and ” unpopular”.
@Dee you are correct. Every time the Kardashian’s are polled they are more disliked than liked. The YouGov tracker has Kim on about 14% popularity in the UK and 20% in the US. She has managed to turn those numbers into a billion dollar brand because people are interested in her. I maintain it is more important how much interest you generate than how many people like you for a celebrity. Only elected politicians need to worry about polls.
That 19% figure for those who now have a more favorable opinion of the Sussexes is a really big takeaway. And 25% saw a more positive side of Meghan. Despite what Sykes wants to see, these are big numbers.
Obviously years of tabloid and palace lies aren’t going to be reversed overnight. But in the whole hideous scheme of years of hate briefings, 19% seems like a really huge improvement. Add that to the folks who *already* had a good opinion of the Sussexes and it’s potentially a big number who now have a positive opinion.
What Sykes isn’t reporting is how many now have a favorable opinion of the Sussexes. Wonder if the poll asked, or if Sykes just doesn’t want say. If I have time today, I’ll see if I can dig that figure out, if it exists.
Found it. https://www.roymorgan.com/findings/10193-harry-meghan-australian-visit-april-2026
Just 7 questions, and three are really weird. Who GAF if some Aussie thinks the late Queen would have approved? And like Kaiser said, Harry didn’t go to Australia to win Charles over. And that question about the Sussexes moving to Australia?
And they didn’t ask (or are not reporting) the most important question: the pct of Aussies who now like Harry and Meghan (those who already did and the 19% this new poll says are now more favorable to them). Maybe the closest is that question about welcoming the Sussexes if they moved to Australia—and 41% said they would welcome them—which is HIGH!
Does Sykes not understand that as private citizens Harry and Meghan don’t need the majority of Australians to like them? If the people who do like them want to invite them and come out to see them that’s enough. If kids at a children’s hospital get a boost from meeting them, if women at a homeless shelter feel seen, if fashion designers get a boost why does it matter if 19%, 39% or 89% of Australians like them? The ones that do like them got a boost from the visit so these polls are meaningless.
The poll results are not quite the diss these people imagine. Australians are saying Charles is a d*ck and nothing Harry does will ever satisfy him.
Wait… I thought they said “most Australians did not care and didn’t even know that they were there”? And now it’s a whopping 81% knew? They’ll contradict themselves repeatedly just to create a favourable narrative for the leftovers. 😀
Did Sykes pay for this poll to be done? The bottomline is the British press told us that the Australians would not welcome Harry and Meghan and they would be booed and protested. None of that happened. Like with the docuseries and Harry’s book the British press can delude themselves into believing that the visit was a flop but we all know the truth.
If you need a poll to tell you whether you’re popular, you’re not popular. If you need a poll to tell you someone else *isn’t* popular, then logic would dictate that, odds on, they are more popular than you are. But it’s hard to measure anything so ephemeral. The whole point of the monarchy is that it doesn’t *need* to be popular. And a secure man would not be competing with his own son. Or brother. Much less DIL / SIL. Good lord.
We saw the reception, the UK saw the reception, nothing they come up with will change what the world saw. Just give it up.
In my experience whoever orders and pays for the poll usually gets the outcome they want. Let me give you an example. We were working on an ad campaign for a P&G bleach. The product development department told us the number one stain that the bleach is effective on is sour cherry. However, none of the housewives we spoke in focus groups considered sour cherry stain a priority. Their number one stain problem was tomato, because kids loved ketchup and most home cooked meals were tomato sauce based. P&G ordered a poll with IPSOS, a very reputable company and IPSOS delivered a poll result with sour cherry stain as the winner. We shot the commercial, aired it and sales were horrible. You cannot poll your way out of people’s reality.
No brand appeals to all. Harry and Meghan are happy with the community that share their values. At this point they are fine not being accepted by everybody. The rest is sour cherry stain.
💯
How are the results of this poll with ridiculously framed questions negative for Harry and Meghan?
19% of people now see then more favourably, 25% of people saw a more positive side of Meghan, 41% of people would welcome them if they moved to Australia, 49% think Elizabeth would have approved of the tour. After only a 4 day visit isn’t this all hugely positive.
It shows most people’s opinions didn’t change (did we expect they would?) but a significant number did in a positive direction. If I was Harry and Meghan’s team I would be pleased with these results because as others have said they don’t need everyone to like them.
Sykes doesn’t understand how to interpret data.
One would feel sorry for these sad unfortunate souls but I don’t . It’s clear to me that reality doesn’t reach where these delusional demented morons live on their alternative universe
Just looked into that RoyMorgan poll a little. On its website, Roy Morgan calls this “a special Channel Seven-Roy Morgan SMS Pulse Poll.”
Meaning, it’s a pop-up poll of conservative viewers who watch Channel Seven or visit its website. That clocks with the yes/no voting format (survey had none of the polling industry-standard “don’t know” or “somewhat agree/disagree” options).
Google says Channel Seven has a “right-of-center editorial stance, often perceived as aligned with the right wing of the Liberal Party.”
Meaning, the poll sheds no light on how Australia as a whole–including left-of-center Aussies–feels about the Sussexes. Given the polls finds that 41% would welcome the Sussexes moving to Australia, and almost half think QEII would have supported the Sussexes’ visit, these results from Channel Seven’s right-of-center viewers even seems surprising.
The poll does shed some light, such as it is, for a ridiculously limited and deliberately biased push poll:
The most positive results reported were from those who identify with the ALP (liberal left) and Green (center-left) parties.
So people taking a poll from a Conservative station, but who are left-leaning, like M&H best.
When are they going to do a poll that asks if William and Kate are earning their Sovereign Grant and duchy money?
How about one asking if Charles is right to support his pedophile brother?
Or one that asks how relevant the monarchy is to people’s lives?
This was a ridiculous poll, written and conducted by amateurs! The questions in this poll were poorly written and the answers open to a selective interpretation, so it is a very bad poll and a worse interpretation of the results.
For example, perhaps many of the people who said the tour did not improve their perception of the couple answered “No” because they already had a very high impression of them and felt it could not be improved.
Also, the question about the tour not improving Harry’s relationship with his father could have received a lot of negative responses because many of them thought his father was stubborn and the failure of an unimproved relationship was due to his father’s attitude, not anything Harry or Meghan did or could have done!
Basically, the poll assumed that the Australians already had a very poor impression toward Harry and Meghan, and that their relationship with the royal family was the fault of the Sussex’s instead of it being the fault of the royal family. We also did not know who was polled and how they were chosen for this fairly small sample that were polled.
I think the poll must have been to bolster the sanity of the left-behinds and the question asked was, “Would it make you feel better to know the Sussex tour of Australia was a failure?” Of course the answer is yes, so the poll has “proven” that the Sussexes’ trip to Oz failed.