Labour favourite as Hartlepool market opens [normal site updates from September 8]
August 29th, 2004The betting exchange, Betfair, have now opened a market on the Hartlepool by-election. So far there are very few backers and layers but Labour is just favourite over the LDs. Labour are 1/2 while the LD current price is 2/3. This could change quickly.
If I was sitting in front of my computer rather than composing this on my smartphone sitting on a French beach I would be trying to lay Labour at 1/2. There are only 2 parties in it and they are closer than the price suggests.
Although UKIP came 2nd to Labour there in the Euro Elections the LDs came a strong 2nd in the local council poll held at exactly the same time with the same voters.
- If Kilroy-Silk had been candidate UKIP might have had a chance. As it stands the UKIP bubble looks as though will burst in Hartlepool giving some relief to Michael Howard.
The convenional bookmaker, William Hill told us 10 days ago that thiey won’t be opening a market on the “Monkey-town” by-election unti the date is fixed and all the candidates are known. This is a pity because there’s a lot of interest.
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Lab and LDs are close indeed. Type \’Hartlepool by-election\’ into Google, and they each receive four mentions (if LibDemWatch is counted as a Labour site). Respect receives one, while the Tories receive none. The last I heard, the Tories hadn\’t even selected their candidate. I heard a Tory councillor in Hartlepool being asked on the World At One if he thought the Tories had any chance of winning the by-election, and he replied \’No\’.
Going back to those discussions of the left/right divide in the LDs, it\’s not quite as simple as ex SDP v Gladstonian Liberals. Vince Cable, the Treasury spokesman who wants to abolish the DTI (and has criticised increases in the minimum wage), is ex-SDP. As irony would have it, he once worked as special adviser to John Smith at the very department he now wants to abolish, the DTI.
I don\’t think the SDP was straightforwardly the left in the Alliance even before the formation of the Lib Dems. They were certainly much more hawkish on defence, and do you remember Owen endorsing Major in 1992 and telling David Frost (I think_ that he quite fancied serving in Major\’s cabinet? [But without joining the Tory party, because \”Cabinets should consist of people from different parties\”.] I think Major must have decided his cabinet was fully stocked with egos.
Simon Hughes was a Liberal, not an SD, and exemplifies the economic left in the LDs more than most ex-SDP members.
I agree with Richard and book value, many on the right of Lib Dems were former SDP members and the left former Liberals.
Apparently there was a big anti-Mandleson vote in Hartlepool. LibDems need a bigger swing than at first glance.
To be fair in 2001 both the Conservatives and the LibDems… and… er Scargill (lol
) went all out to try and hammer Mandelson and yet they could only knock off a few thousand votes from his majority bringing it down from 17,508 to 14,571… the Labour candidate in the by-election, however is popular for the exact opposite reasons that Mandelson was unpopular, because he is likeable and local and since the exit of Tom Watson has, by all accounts, come into his own.
But unlike in 2001, this is a by-election and all the Party’s can concentrate on the seat, that said 2001 would suggest that Labour’s support in the seat is fairly robust, unlike in Leicester, Brent or Brum HH there is no Muslim community furious with Blair and Labour over the Iraq war, it will be interesting to see how much the LibDems try and use their opposition to the war as a vote getter in this contest.
But it is a by-election and any thing could happen, maybe a punt on a Gus Robinson win could be work it
that said I think, on the balance of probability, Labour will win out in this contest.
And the decline in his majority by a few thousand votes was due largely to the reduced turnout. The swing from Labour to Conservative was a mere 0.54% (compared with a swing of 5% to the Conservatives in Sedgefield, and a nationwide swing to the Tories of 2%).
I don\’t particularly like Peter Mandelson, but - in 2001 at least - it would appear he was rated as at least a reasonable constituency MP by the voters of Hartlepool.
In fact, I remember a BBC fly on the wall documentary shortly after the 01 GE in which Gus Robinson (then the Tory candidate) was left shaking his head in despair (his wife was almost in tears) at having failed to make further inroads in Mandelson\’s majority after the controversy surrounding Mandelson\’s two resignations.
To me the long term winner at Hartlepool could well be the Tories. They will do appallingly in the by- election of course, but if UKIP bomb in a seat where they came 2nd in the Euros that will burst the bubble. Remember it was the UKIP surge ahead of June 10 that caused Howard to falter. Take this away & the Tories might get back to their pre-spring position of 38- 40% in the only anonymous interviewer-free poll that we have at the moment, YouGov.
Why anonymous interviewer-free polls? Because these are the only ones that replicate a secret ballot and have a proven accuracy measuring Tory support - just look at Rasmussen last time and YouGov.
You have got to admire Ben\’s amazing ability to see a silver lining in every cloud for Tony Blair\’s New Labour. Candidates make very little difference at a General Election - just look ar what happened in St Helens last time when Shaun Woodward was foistered on the local party.
Candidates make very little difference at a General Election? Even in the days when there was a relatively nationwide swing, this was disproved in one or two instances. Remember the leap in Tory majority in Amber Valley at the 87 GE when the widely lampooned David Bookbinder stood as Labour candidate (and Philip Oppenheim was a first term incumbent?)
St Helen\’s South in 2001? Remember it well. The Labour vote dropped by 20%, and there was a 14% swing to Mike\’s party. The Socialist Alliance candidate saved their deposit, and the Socialist Labour candidate almost did so too.
Given how quiet things were next door (St Helen\’s North), with a 3% swing from Labour to Tory, the idea that Woodward\’s candidature didn\’t make a difference (and one which may just cost Labour St Helen\’s South next time round).
The same election saw a swing to the Tories of 9% in Romford, where local boy (with all the prejudices of Homus Essexicus) Andrew Rosindell stood for the Tories. Even allowing for the swing to the Tories in south-east Essex which I mentioned in an earlier thread, the swing in Romford was considerably higher than that with which they won Upminster and Castle Point.
Still, I agree with Mike\’s point re. anonymous interviewer-free polls.
Para 3 should have finished \’is misplaced\’.
Another example - the Tories enjoyed a swing of 11% in Cambridgeshire North East in 1992. This was widely recognised as not just a strong personal vote for first-term incumbent Malcolm Moss, but also the LDs having lost the personal vote associated with Sir Clement Freud, narrowly defeated by Moss in 87.
My point about St Helens is that the Labour vote held up remarkably well given the high handed way the party leadership had foistered Woodward on them. The big shock was that there was no big shock.
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