Communicate Research - Labour gap widens to 8%
January 29th, 2005
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But some good news for Howard and Kennedy
After Friday’s YouGov poll with a Labour lead of just one point a very different picture of the current political climate is shown in the January survey by Communicate Research for tomorrow’s Independent on Sunday.
The figures are: LAB 40 (+1): CON 32 (-2) LD 20 (+1) and mean that the pollster’s Labour total is 2% higher than any other firm.
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But all is not plain sailing for Tony Blair because the poll featured two elements that could undermine Labour’s current strong position.
For the Lib Dems the poll showed that 37% would vote Lib Dem if they thought the party had a realistic chance in their constituency.
For the Tories the poll shows that 71% said the Government did not have the problem of illegal immigration under control and 41% said that the issue might change the way they vote in the election, expected on May 5. Nearly a third of Labour supporters said they might switch on the issue.
All this chimes with the second YouGov poll if the week in the DailyTelegraph. When asked if Michael Howard was right to rise the issue, 71% thought he was, 18% thought him wrong. Only 12% of people thought it was racist of Michael Howard to raise the issue - 79% thought it wasn’t.
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The 8% Labour margin will certainly stall the Tory recovery on the spread-betting markets but the other messages from the CR survey will dillute its overall impact.
The media, meanwhile is taking election betting much more seriously. The Telegraph financial pages will feature General Election odds and spread-betting prices every day between now and polling day.
Mike Smithson
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Mike - the PA report about the Lib Dem question is wrong. Looking at the data tables, the would you vote LibDem if they could win in your consistuency was asked of all 1,008 respondents and 37% said yes, so it is 37% including the 20% who already say they would vote Lib Dem.
Why are the press so monumentally useless at reporting polls?
(Incidentally, looking at the cross tabulations, 15% of people saying they would vote Lib Dem answered No to that question!)
Two Questions. Where would that 17% come from? Presumably most from the labour party, with some from the Tories? Maybe also some from the nationalist parties in Scotland and Wales as well. What would happen if you asked that question about Labour and the Tories? Not being rude but I suspect that you would also find particulary with labour, people saying they would vote for them if they could win and I guess to a smaller degree with the Tories in some city seats.
On another note, there is an interesting story about Chris Smith (the ex Culture Minister) coming out and saying he is HIV Positive. I always thought he was a good politician (free musuems for example and his use of lottery money) and very cogent on the war (even though I disagreed with him) but I now respect even more for having come out and said this, breaking I suspect one of the last taboos in society. It is shame that someone like him is standing down. The House of Commons needs more people like him I suspect.
I am told that THE INDEPENDENT has DECLARED FOR LABOUR!
Can anyone confirm this? I have not seen todays Indie.
Be careful Rik. You might be referring to the Independent on Sunday. The Sunday papers sometimes differ from the weekday and saturday papers. For example the Sunday Times is unlikely to back Labour in the election, whereas the Times will certainly back Labour. On an amusing note the former Liberal MP now Lord Alton is to endorse the Conservative Candidate in Durham which should no doubt infuriate the Durham Lib Dems.
Rik
If that true I’ve heard naught…
That said there have been some interesting opinion pieces in the Indy of late, but it would be awfully early for the Independent to do anything like declare its support for one party or tuother… expect it’s a rumour.
Would Like to believe it was true though
Rik (or anyone else in the know) - was the Indy/Indy on sunday leaning towards the lib dems or something, because this would seem a given (that they declared for labour)
4 I understand the point. I received a msg from a fellow Tory PPC! So it must be true
Andrew M, re. 2
“In the general election I would vote for the Liberal Democrats if they had a realistic chance of winning in my constituency.”
29% of Labour voters agreed, 19% of Conservatives and 33% of all ‘Others’. 15% of Lib Dem voters disagreed.
The overall number is particularly high in Scotland (43%), especially as this is the weakest of CRs regions for Lib Dem voting intention (16%).
As a left of centre floating voter, I don’t find the 15% of Lib Dems saying they wouldn’t vote for a Lib Dem who had a chance of winning all that surprising. Living in a fairly safe Labour constituency (at least until the boundary changes), I have the option of casting a protest vote for the Lib Dems or Greens at the next election. I would also vote Lib Dem tactically if I lived in a Tory/Lib Dem marginal. However, in a Con/Lab, Lab/Lib Dem or 3 way marginal I would most likely revert to Labour.
19% of Tories would switch to the Lib Dems if they thought they could win. That is fairly surprising. I can see why that thought might occur out in Wales and Scotland where the liberals and the Tories have often been fairly similar. But in England that would be surprising. And there was I thinking only the diehards were left.
I may be tired this evening but what about the 15% of Liberals who disagree? Why do they vote Lib Dem. Is it just a protest vote, from labour voters who would come back into the fold if they thought labour might lose the seat. It would though be interesting to rephase that question for the Conservatives and for Labour as well.
Whats the word on the MORI poll in the Observer -
Labour Party 38 percent, Conservatives 32 and Liberal Democrats 22. Just seen this on Reuters
They also report and ICM poll in The Sunday Telegraph putting ‘Blair on 37 percent, against 32 percent and 21 percent for the opposition parties’.
Curious how Reueters reported the Telegraph poll without actually providing figures for the parties which were indeed Lab 38% (-1%), Cons 32 (+1%), LibDems 21%.
The final three paragraphs in the Telegraph story seem to be a clear dig at their sister daily’s use of YouGov:
Nick Sparrow, the managing director of ICM Research, said last night: “The referendum question as the Government has announced it does point people towards a ‘Yes’ answer and uses warm words such as ‘approve’.
Online polling reaches about half the population and they tend to be younger and more affluent people. YouGov uses a panel of people who have allowed themselves to find their website, and they are paid 50p per survey if they complete 100 surveys.
“You might expect that these sorts of people might not be representative of the whole population.”
Meeeoooww!
Further drama in the Sunday Telegraph poll - they report that the ‘no majority on the European Constitution vote has shrunk to just 2% (41-39). They asked precisely the question in the referendum (’do you approve…’) and suggest this makes a difference from the YouGov version (”Would you vote Yes or No”) which showed 2-1 opposed. If such a tiny change in wording produces such a huge change, it suggests the electorate is remarkably volatile on the issue. Otherwise, either one is a rogue poll or YouGov is again displaying different behaviour from the phone polls. Either way, if there’s a betting mkarket on that, if site readers move swiftly they may get some interesting odds.
The Telegraph poll also reports that only 6% of Labour voters are ‘more likely’ to vote Tory because of the immigration issue, while 20% say it’s “less likely” as a result (the low former figure is more significant). [Note as a curiosity that there is known to be intense rivalry between Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph journalists so it’s not that strange that they publish rival and contradictory polls on successive days.]
Meanwhile, the Observer poll shows Mr Howard as the most unpopular opposition leader since Michael Foot in 1983, down at 22%.
None of the Internet sources that I’ve seen indicates the exact sample dates, but they probably all date from midweek.
Overall a slightly larger Labour recovery than I’d predicted after the post-immigration speech dip. Looks as though Howard may have fallen into the Hague trap - saying extreme things that many people sort of like but which they don’t really want to hear from a potential PM.
Nick
14: Update: the IoS poll was taken on Wed-Thur. It includes everyone who said 5 or more on a scale of likehood to vote from 1 to 10. If you only take those who said 10, the Labour lead is marginally lower.
They also asked whether immigration “might affect your vote”, without saying in what way. Labour voters were least likely to say yes to this, but 31% still did (50% of Tories). This is less illuminating, though, since it includes people who will vote against parties that they think too tough on immigration, and it’s too softly-phrased to tell us much anyway.
No sign of an IoS endorsement, and I’d be surprised too - I’d have thought both Indies are bound to go LibDem, probably with some exceptions. But overall a good day for Labour as the clock ticks away: the main real Tory hope is that all the phone pollsters are systematically wrong, and I think the next YouGov poll will discourage that view too.
Nick
“Howard may have fallen into the Hague trap” [Nick @ 13] - but “core votes” may actually work this time, on the assumption that anything over 200 seats will be presented [and accepted by the press] as mission accomplished…
Nick 14 - with only two of the four polls of the past couple of days can you compare with other recent surveys - ICM and YouGov - and both show the Labour lead down 2%. CR’s last survey was six weeks ago and Mori’s was in November. Since mid-December ICM’s Labour lead has moved from 9% to 5%.
The only conclusion is that if you have an interviewer more people say they will vote Labour. Will they? We’ll have to wait until May 5th.
Mike at 16: Well, I don’t want to encourage any false optimism on the Labour side, but if you look at this site’s very helpful list of polls and exclude YouGov, you get a very clear and stable picture: Labour in upper 30s, Conservatives in lower 30s, LibDems in lower 20s. There was a small Labour up-blip before Christmas but we’re now back on trend or marginally above it. This is after two weeks when the Tories had had really quite extensive and generally favourable publicity for two issues that they think are key: tax and immigration, and where Labour kept its powder dry.
There remains the possibility that all phone polls are wrong and YouGov is right. But given the consistency of the YouGov difference, I wonder whether the panel has not turned out to be less representative than they thought.
It is of course true that if the Tories gain say 30 seats they’ll spin it as not too bad, one more heave, etc. Labour supporters will remember all that exactly, with some sympathy.
Nick
Interesting point Nick that the public might not approve of a polician putting forward a nasty policy even though they approve of it themselves. It seems to be born out by Michael Howards time at the Home Office.
I think it’s very ominous that Yougov is so out of kilter with more conventional polls. As I said earlier I don’t believe uncommitted floating voters join a political website (even one that pays 50p a survey). It’s strictly for anoraks. At the moment the breakdown of the YouGov panel seems to be roughly Lab 35, Con 33, L/D 22 and UKIP 5. The only variance seems to occur in the fluctuations of UKIP voters. Sometimes they go Tory sometimes they stay UKIP. Apart from that the only variation is in the particular sample of their panel that they choose for each survey. And as the panel is now so static this change is likely to be negligable
Nick 17. The real pity is that we have such a limited choice of methodologies - four telephone pollsters following very similar procedures and in some cases working hand in hand with each other; Mori - the remaining face-to-face pollster; and YouGov.
I’d love to see another internet polllster and, of course, the return of Rasmussen - the US automated pollster that did the best with the Tories last time.
I’ve got concerns about YouGov which I have voiced here before - but their record compared with the phone interviewers is very good. ICM is untested since 2001 having not been commissioned to do Scottish Election surveys in 2003 or the Euro Elections in 2004. In both those two elections YouGov came out clear winners.
Intersting points on the YouGov panel but did anyone see the AOL survey at the end of last October. A rumour was circulating that Blair might for a Feb election so AOL asked “how would you vote if there was a General Election tomorrow” by 5pm the resluts were 43% Tory 25% Lab and 20% LD. Totally unscientific (but you could not vote twice) and of course it could have included many ineligible voters (under 18’s) but it may re-enforce the view that people might be more inclined to give information to a machine than a person. The other point is which Party has supporters with the highest level of computer users?
Sorry about the typos (missing “go” and results)
#20 - I thought it would be Lib Dems, since they seem to be the pparty with the youngest set of supporters, and younger people are more likely to use the internet and get involved with an online pollster. The older 65+ ladies that vote for the tory party are probably less likely to appear.
But dont they weigh the answers, so isnt this a moot point?
Roger 18. As someone who has been defending telephone pollsters against Mike’s scepticism I feel I should be fair and point out that their panel is fairly large (20,000 I think) so it is not always the same people. Their claim is, that they use a very large sample for each survey (2000+) so their figures are bound to remain more stable as they are more accurate. Changes, they say, in figures are more likely to register genuine moves in pblic opinion, rather than sampling error. However, I will concur, as someone who runs panels local authorities that panels do have a tendency to attract the interested (as I have said before, I had one survey that showed that 75% of people had voted in the last local elections, against a real turnout of 24% in that particular area).
Ultimately there are no ‘perfect’ pollsters. Creating a questionnaire that results in a genuine answer of how someone may behave in the future is a very tricky art (even before you get into the vagueries of sampling error etc.) The only way of looking at these things is in terms of trends. At the moment the trend is a slight Tory recovery after a pretty poor Christmas. It is too hard to say whether this is a lift off for them or a ‘dead cat bounce’ to steal a phrase from the City
McHack. Sorry but these internet polls are a load of rubbish. They are the same as the Sun’s phone in polls. They get hijacked all the time by some group or another. There was one for the Mail where 50% thought Charles Kennedy would make the best PM last year.
There may be a debate about which poll of the ‘real ones’ is the most accurate, but they all attempt to make them systematic, scientific and representative.
Update: The Observer poll (38/32/22) was slightly older than the others, namely Jan 20-24. Among other interesting details it shows TB preferred as PM by 39%, to 17% each for MH and CK.
Mike at 19: Yes, it would be helpful to have a different automated panel poll!
McHack at 20: As an AOL user myself I think there is a clear right-wing bias in the sample of those who respond to their polls, and this is (in my no doubt biased opinion) often reflected in the way that AOL headline the news themselves. On any given subject I expect the more right-wing position to get 10-15% more support on AOL than in scientific polls.
The CR details (see the link on this site) do included a finding on internet access by party allegiance. The Conservatives have more, but not much more.
To be fair to YouGov, they don’t keep reusing the same people, and they weight by what people say their previous voting records where, and by demographic details. However, if you claim an unusual profile, such as a young Conservative Liverpool hospital porter, I suspect you will get polled more often, since they need you to balance the sample. (I’m not sure what is so exotic about Mike that he keeps being polled!)
While I don’t expect much public soul-searching before the election, I do wonder at the apparent total satisfaction of LibDems with their position and leadership. As a keen Labour supporter I would not claim that the period since 2001 has been, um, uncontroversial, and there is a very widespread feeling that the Conservatives are not providing much opposition. Yet the LibDems just drifted up to about 25% and have now drifted back to the low 20s. As someone who spends at least 85 hours a week on politics, I’d be hard-pressed to identify large chunks of the LibDem programme (for instance, I don’t know whether their spending on health would be higher, lower or the same), and I think Charles Kennedy is a pleasant man but I have no idea at all what his priorities are. I do know things the LibDems are against (the war, fees, council tax, ID cards), but that doesn’t make an alternative government. And I think the electorate feels all this in spades. Don’t LibDem site posters feel that an opportunity is being missed here? And is there somewhere to bet on the probability of CK retiring after the election?
Nick
Graham. I agree totally that instant polls (internet or phone in) are unscientific but as Tory that has to put up with the BBC and Times/ST rubbishing every forward move we make sometimes its good to have something positve to savour - if only for a few seconds! Seriously though on the doorstep there are not many Labour supporters who have time for Blair but they seem to have a soft spot fro Brown. Is there a market on how many days Blair will last after winning the Election?
AOL polls are VERY good at predicting the winner of reality game shows
A point which no-one seems to have made - are not the people who can be bothered to join and panel proportionately likely to be the same people who go down to the polling station. Therefore although YouGov’s sample is self-selecting so are voters, and the selection mechanism may not be all that different… self-weighting is rather neat really.
Nick. I agree with your views on LD policies but they may have a significant effect on the Election outcome without really having any effect on actual policy outcomes. Going back to 1970 they polled around 18% for 12 seats (without checking this site’s archive again)but now they are polling 20-22% and picking up 65-74 seats. They are allowing Labour to maintain a majority well above the level it should be - which I am sure you are quite pleased about!
Nick 25. As there seem to be no Lib Dem posters up today - lazy b****rs - I will answer your points on their behalf. The Council Tax would be replaced with a ‘local income tax’ that they claim is fairer. They are in favour of a planned withdrawal from Iraq, handing over coalition peace keeping to the UN. As fees are replacing ‘no fees’, then I assume that they are in favour of ‘no fees’ and the same goes for ID cards. I usually think that you are fairly balanced and and fair in your postings, but I suspect that this last bit was a bit of churlish electioneering spin Nick.
As for the rest of their programme, apart from the increase in top rate income tax for (I think it’s £100,000 or more?) New Labour nicked most of it circa 1997 (i.e. independent Bank of England). Sorry for the partly political broadacast, but I think you timed your attack on the poor loves when they weren’t around to defend themselves.
Agree with Nick on relative stability of situation.Av of all polls;
Nov ;Con 31.2 Lab 37.2 Lib 21.7 Oth 9.9
Dec; Con 32.4 Lab 37.2 Lib 20.8 Oth 9.6
Jan Con 32.0 Lab 37.3 Lib 21.5 Oth 9.2
Given differential turnout then on these figures Con and Lab could tie in Vote share
Roger. I am going to stick my neck out here. I think that the polls are closer to the real figure for Labour this time. My feeling is, studying the underlying figures, is that the fly by night Labour supporters who never bother to vote have dropped out entirely into the increasing ‘don’t know’ section of the polls, leaving a much more realistic Labour vote. I reckon if there was a GE tomorrow Labour would get somewhere in the region of 37 - 38% and the Tories about what they are registering. There’s a prediction to get Mike S going!!!
Nick - I am surprised that someone who is involved in politics to your extent could claim not to be aware of LD policies to some extent - your party invests quite a lot of effort in attacking them as well as making a few up.
Maybe that is a function of the fact that your patch is Lab/Con. Echo Graham’s comments - all rather stereotypical I would have expected better from someone who generally tries to be slightly less tribal.
McHack at 26: polls show consistent support for TB among Labour voters, and this is also my experience of most party members: the people who really dislike him have nearly all pushed off. Hence the annual thing at the party conference when the reporters predict he’ll have a terrible reception and he then gets an 15-minute standing ovation before he’s said a word. If we win, he’ll serve most of the term and then we’ll have a leadership election in time for the new person to settle in and then ask the public if they want to give him or her a full period.
Graham at 30: As Vino is the only known constituent on the site and he probably isn’t going to vote LibDem, I’m not really electioneering. I would genuinely *like* the LibDems to become the main opposition party as I think it would encourage a more contructive debate. My point wasn’t that the LibDems don’t have a positive programme, as I’m sure that their web site has any number of details, just that if I’m not aware of their policies on (say) health then I doubt if the wider public is either. The thing that springs to mind when I think about the LibDems is that they are *against* certain things. What springs to mind when I think of CK is simply a vaguely pleasant impression. That beats a vaguely UNpleasant impression, but seems to me to be a missed opportunity to do more. Still, it’s none of my business.
Nick
Graham - about half of the polls are including the “the fly by night Labour supporters who never bother to vote have dropped out entirely into the increasing ‘don’t know’ section of the polls” though - Populus and ICM are factoring them back in through the reallocation of don’t knows, and Communicate have a beefed up squeeze question that probably picks some of them up too.
Nick, Re: 25. If the Lib Dems gain more seats at this election, Charles Kennedy will be our first leader to achieve an increase in two successive elections since Jo Grimond in 1964/66. And it would be the first time our number of seats has risen at three successive elections since - whenever. So of course we are satisfied with our current leader and position !
RE 35 So which poll do you reckon to be the most accurate and more importantly by how much are the polls overstating labour support?
Carrying on with the YouGov theme: I take Jon’s point @ 28, that both panellists and voters who turn out to vote are self-selecting, but I would have thought that the sort of self-volunteering anoraks who can be bothered to register on the site (let alone put up with John Humphrys’ rubbish!) must be a smaller subset of the population than those who vote. And I speak as one who is a member of their panel. It would be interesting to know just how many of the contributors/readers on here are in fact on the YouGov panel.
Also: their methods must raise some other questions, e.g. how does their remuneration system affect their selection of respondents, if at all? This is completely anecdotal, but my experience is that they asked me to respond to a lot of surveys when I first registered, but the closer my total of payments has got to the point where they actually pay out, the fewer they have become - and the larger the proportion of “£500 draw” surveys rather than a hard 50p!
Nick, I have this nseaking suspicion that the good electors of Broxtowe in 1997 knew what they and you were against, without having a firm handle on the details of Labour policy.
I’m sure I’d have voted for you on the basis of our shared views on electoral and Lords reform, on which Labour policy now is…
(I’ll go back into my hutch now.)
Nick. Surely it is the natural position of an opposition to be ‘opposed’ to things they disagree with and it is going to be portrayed that way. So the Govt. took us to war and the Lib Dems opposed that - and now are saying that TB needs to develop a more effective exit strategy. That is not just being ‘against something’ (Robin Cook holds the same basic opinion). The same on ID cards - the Govt wants to introduce them - the Lib Dems say they wouldn’t but would use the billions in investment in the police. That seems like classic ‘push me pull you’ politics whereby you say what you are against and what you would do instead. When I said that you were ‘electioneering’, I meant for Labour in general. I didn’t think that I would end up defending the Lib Dems on this site, but I think you were fundamentally ‘playing politics’ with that statement in as much as I don’t believe that you haven’t understood their positions perfectly well. To be fair, I am not actually sure that any man in the street could tell you either the Govt’s policy on the NHS or the Tory’s. In fact research shows that most people cannot identify the policies of any given particular party. Most people vote on impression / perception not policy
Duncan @ 38, I’m on the YouGov panel, and indeed have just entered their latest £500 prize extravaganza - show me the money!
I’m torn between YouGov and Populus for the most accurate - I’m going to do a post on
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Anthony
January 30th, 2005 at 1:55 pm
re 1
Accepting the press got their sums wrong, does that mean the adjusted figures are Labour 28%, Conservatives 26%, Liberal Democrats 40% and Others 5%? Does that have any impact on assesments of the scale of the unwind?
In terms of the Lib Dem figures, if you add on the 17% who say they would vote for them if they thought they could win then detract the 15% who wouldn’t vote for them if they thought they could win and you get 22% which is roughly what I think they will get in a General Election.
I didn’t think Nick was being churlish. I’m guessing that he thinks that current circumstances offer a real opportunity for a third party breakthrough yet the Lib Dems aren’t taking it. He’s wondering whether CK might be the reason for that failure and is bewildered at the complacent attitude of Lib Dem supporters on this site.
I think he has a point but, unlike him, I remain delighted at the Lib Dems lack of urgency. Rather than a Tory collapse after the next election we will see the LD’s falling backwards and dimly realising the opportunity they have missed.
The comments on the Comm Research “If you thought the LDs could win in your constituency…” question seem to have lost the thread here slightly. The question was: if you thought they could win in your constituency, would you vote for them? To which 37% said yes and 57% said no - so the 37% includes those who have switched from the other parties and excludes those who originally said LD for the main “Who would you vote for?” question but have switched away for this question. To the extent that this kind of question naming only one party is useful (i.e. only a limited extent), it gives some kind of estimate of a maximum possible LD vote, or, put another way, the gap between the vote they are likely to get as things standd and the vote they might get if they were considered real contenders (including allowing for those who only support them AS LONG AS they don’t consider them real contenders).
Re the 15% of LDs who said they wouldn’t vote for them if they had a decent chance in their constituency. Could it possibly be that in response to the agree/disagree option to the statement “In the general election I would vote for the Liberal Democrats if they had a realistic chance of winning in my constituency” that some of the 15% who disagreed were in fact hardcore LDs, who would vote for them anyway, realistic chance or not? Seems a lot more plausible to me…
Is the 15% therefore an expression of unwind where previously LD tactical supporters knowing the their seat was safer reverting to natural persuation?
Hmmm, not sure about that (47). Taking the different replies by party breakdown, the “implied” shares are: Lab 30%, Con 27%, LD37%. If you feed that through the old swing calculator (just for a laugh) you get Lab 338 seats, LD 144 seats and Con 134 seats - which means, interestingly enough, that if the respondents voted in the belief that the LDs could win in their constituency, most of them would still be wrong! If you see what I mean…
I made it 312 Lab 180 LD 121 Con on Baxter (no tactical). But those figures would not be like that in the hypothetical situation, because people’s decisions would be different therefore the previous scores wouldn’t matter as much, therefore you would get a completely different pattern of voting, therefore a different result. Sorry - I wanted to write a sentence that had more ‘therefores’ in than any one else!
What is interesting is that if you interpret the ‘chance of winning’ scores as a tactical decision, which equates as roughly 30% of Lab voters and 20% of Con, having looked at 7 or 8 seats where the third party is Con or Lab, then that equates to about 2.75% Con-LD and 6% Lab-LD. On the input of Con 32% Lab 37% and LD 21% (obviously, just for fun…) then you get an output of Con 169, Lab 379 and LD 68.
My assumption may be completely off the wall: feel free to put me right!
I think I agree with Graham: if everyone really believed that the LDs stood a chance in their seat, which is the hypothesis behind the question, then the whole starting point is different and swing calculations are impossible. Chrisco: I don’t think that’s quite right, because the question is assuming that every respondent - including those in Lab/Con marginals - is allowed the luxury of thinking the LDs can win in their constituency, so your interpretation is then cancelling out the hypothesis.
Apologies to Chrisco: yes, I see what you’re saying now.
Can I just make two points regarding this poll about the Lib Dems. One is as mentioned earlier the need to subtract the 15% who would not vote for the Lib Dems if they thought they had a chance of winning the seat (presumably protest labour voters and possibly some disaffected Tories) from the 17% who would. Two if you asked this question of the other two parties I’m sure you would get some who would respond in the affirmative such as labour supporters in CON-LIB DEM marginals and CON voters in LAB-LIB Marginals and in very safe labour seats.
Andrew. You are being obtuse. 18 Lib Dem voters disagreed (15% of Lib Dems) out of 1008 , about 1.78% - not 15%
Re: 54. I don’t think the 15% and the 17% are directly comparable. The 15% is 15% of the ‘raw’ Lib Dem vote i.e. 15% of 20% = 3% of the total sample. The 17% (37% - 20%) is of the total sample and is net of these 3%. The figure of 37% is therefore made up of (85% x 20% Lib Dem)+ (??% x 40% Lab) + (??% x 32% Con) + (??% x 8% Others).
I think I’ve caught a nasty dose of percentagitis - does anyone know a cure ?
Swift use of the delete key
Alan J is right. The Indy is right. If you were to take all the people who said they would vote Lib Dem if they thought they would win you would get 37%, 30%, 27% (which is strangely very close to the voting intention in Marketing Means’ South West Poll in October - an area where many people do believe the Lib Dems can win).
If all these people would vote Lib Dem if they believed they could win why did they not perform substantially better on the 2nd vote in the Scottish and Welsh elections where every vote counts?
Mindset, all about mindset…
36 Well said ALan J
First time I’ve felt Nick was playing silly politics in his posts on this site.
45 Off message. Want a side bet on the Tories not going above 200s eats and the LDs getting more than 70 ?
Tim
I will do the Tory bet. What price?
I think Max’s point is a killer.. well almost. The reason Lds do so shamefully badly in PR elections is they are absolutely clueless about fighting them. LDs are taught from birth that the law of diminishing returns is a dangerous heresy, so when confronted with a PR election they deliver 8 leaflets in their strong areas and 0 in their black holes.
The result is that their vote goes up by 4% in the target and drops by 15% elsewhere… or something like that. FPTP rots the brains even of those who oppose it.
62 Mike - very very tricky to price that one accurately as I’m sure you know…
To lots of posts: apologies for annoying people - the point about the missed opportunity was not intended to be a partisan wind-up, though it may have read that way. Off Message at 45 represents my intentions correctly, but it was unhelpful of me to use the word ‘complacent’.
Innocent Abroad at 39: yeah, point conceded! But in general terms people think they sort of know what Labour and the Tories are about - Labour is seen as wanting to keep unemployment down and keep improving public services, the Tories are thought to want to cut taxes and slash immigration. Both are rough and ready pictures but people get the drift, and then go on to make judgments on competence etc. I’m not sure they get any particular drift from the LibDems, but if they did I think that the LibDems might now be in second place.
Nick
Nick. Sorry to sound like a LD apologist, but wouldn’t they argue that the media don’t help them. The media (particularly TV) define the way in which the parties are portrayed and perceived more than anything the parties actually say or do. For example, MH got headline news, a large section on Newsnight, front pages etc. for his two latest policy anouncements. CK also made a tax announcement and made a keynote speech on his ‘way forward’ in Iraq and was way down the news agenda. The proof of the pudding etc. and there is no doubt that in terms of opinion - high profile exposure gives the LDs a boost like neither of the other parties gets (see conference season, GEs etc.) - presumably because they already get their coverage.
Still the Lib Dems do not get the negative coverage in the way the Tories often do. They probably out to get more attention from the Beeb though. I would also like to see a couple of debates between the 3 party leaders but unfortunately Blair has turned it down.
Andrew. I am not sure that the Beeb is as anti-Tory as you perceive it. I am sure that Labour did not perceive it as particularly pro them over the whole Iraq leading to Hutton saga. Should the Beeb (and I know what you are going to say) just start trumpeting every new Tory anouncement as a triumph?
No I wasn’t saying the Beeb was totally against the Tories. It isn’t. It is just that the Beeb is straight down the middle on a lot of issues. For example on the European Union, where it has admitted it was guilty of some bias. It also does not play fair on taxation policy in my opinion. It always portrays Tory tax cuts as public service cuts automatically and tax rises as being good for public services. It never bothers to explain how decreases in taxation can benefit the general economy and how increases in taxation could cripple the economy. In my opinion the Beeb is guilty of simplyfying policies down too much. Having said this, I sense that it has improved over the last six months and is now being fairer towards the party. However that just leaves Paxman who seems to want to take the piss out of any Tory leader that dares show up for an interview and CK for that matter.
Andrew, I am not sure I agree. There was a ‘diary’ style piece the other night from some lefty who was complaining that there was no party to vote for. He was going around talking to people from various parties and the major complaint was that the media would not take a social democratic tax and spend agenda seriously, which is why the parties are all heading towards a sort of common ground of private finance, waste cutting pledges etc.
I think as an outside observer that the problem that the Tories face is different from the Lib Dems. The Tories get the coverage but do not use it well - maybe because they perceive that it isn’t going to be well received. The Lib Dems don’t get the coverage.
The Tory criticism of the BBC is that they have a “liberal”, centre-left outlook which regards people who don’t share their general view as extreme and ignorant. It’s not that the Beeb is necessarily pro-Labour, more that it is antipathetic to conservatism with a small c. The Beeb’s attacks on the government (Iraq, tuition fees, Belmarsh)always seem to be from the left.
Yes. One certainly can’t accuse the Beeb of pro-government bias. But its attacks on government policy are usually attacks from the left, rather than attacks from the right.
Is it necessarily left wing to ‘attack’ those issues (if they do indeed do so). There are anti-war tories (Douglas Hurd - I don’t remember the last time he was described as a lefty). The Tories were thinking of coming out against tuition fees. Belmarsh could easily be a libertarian issue (there are right wing libertarians!). I am sorry I don’t subscribe to this anti-tory beeb theory. It seems to me that they give them plenty of opportunity.
Graham at 24: I don’t look at it much now, but I often used to see the daily telephone polls on ITV Teletext (p146 IIRC), all of which showed a strong pro-Tory bias. For example, a few months before the 2001 Election, a poll of voting intentions revealed that 70% of those phoning in planned to vote Conservative. Interesting as a survey of ITV Teletext readers, but completely useless as a prediction of the actual Election outcome!
John B. They probably had a phone in CCO on auto dial! Phone in polls are a real thorn in the side. They give opinion pollsters a worse name than Mike Smithson!
Graham the point is not that opposition to those issues is necessarily ‘left-wing’. The point is that the BBc offers the left-wing critique.
70 - Graham - you are as much of an outside observer as I am - I criticise the LD’s you defend them.
With regard to the BBC they were found guilty of being institutionalised bias on Europe and also suffering from “cultural” bias…and must be made to be more demonstrably impartial.The BBC suggested it was racist to oppose the euro.
Douglas Hurd is definitely left of centre (the Tory centre that is). Look at the Beeb’s correspondents Andrew Marr et al - all lefties. The only token Tory they ever had was Nick Robinson (now with ITV) and he was a member of the Tory Reform Group (famous home of the “wets”). They never seem to have people whose instincts and assumptions are right-wing in the way that they have so many who are of the left. If they ever put someone on who was naturally right-wing they would doubtless sign-post him so everyone could know what a strange throwback he was.
Graham at 70. I believe the diary piece you refer to was the one by John Harris. His new book So Now Who Do We Vote For has been mentioned on this site before.
I only mention this because the website allied to the book includes a which party would you vote for poll. I’m well aware that polls of this kind are utterly unscientific, and at present only 133 votes have been received.
Nonetheless, the book and the website are specifically targeted at disgruntled ex-Labour voters; the fact that the LibDems and Respect are currently topping this poll suggest that it is this demographic casting their votes.
At the time of typing, the LibDems have 33.1% and Respect 31.6%. As the site gets more hits it could be a useful, if very broad, guide to how the anti-Blair vote is breaking down. At present it looks very split, which could be bad news for LibDem hopes in some urban areas.
http://www.sonowwhodowevotefor.net
Ah yes, left-wing bias at the Beeb (whereas ITN is full of Tories I suppose)… in truth the communication professions - all forms of writing and teaching - always have and will attract people who are to the left of centre just as finance does those to the right of centre. Moaning about it is on a par with calling on the government to fix it so that it only rains at night!
IA,
any anecdotal evidence would probably bear out your statement at 80. More interesting would be to understand the reasons why that left/right split occurs. Anyone know of any studies or anything?
Kit - don’t worry I’ve just logged on to John Harris’s site - http://www.loonyleftiesrus.org.eu and multi voted for the Tories - there’s hope for you yet lad
Following on from Kit at 79, the web site at
http://www.sonowwhodowevotefor.net
looks as if it could be related to the Dump Blair campaign, of which Ben was so dismissive recently. Certainly, it has it in for the Blairites, even though it sometimes recommends voting for one, while holding one´s nose.
I wonder if they are planning to make recommendations for the entire country……..
Apologies about the anonymity…….. An oversight.
Graham at 66 and following posts: Yes, I do think that the LibDems suffer from being always presented as a sort of junior player. If they ever start polling consistently in second place, the broadcasters will have a problem - do they allocate time by current size or estimated future size?
We’ve discussed the BBC slant before on other threads - personally I think they are not so much consistently left-wing as oppositionist (Paxman admits it openly). They think it’s good journalism to show why any politician they’re talking to is wrong, and possibly an idiot and deceitful too. If we’d decided *not* to go to war with Iraq, for instance, I’m quite sure that they’d have immediately and prominently featured interviews with the families of victims of Saddam, accusing us of loathsome betrayal, plus interviews of gloating Baathists, etc.
Sometimes you do get a sense that they accept that they’ve slightly overdone something, and you then get a corrective movement for a few days. The coverage of the Iraqi elections has for weeks been almost exclusively from the angle of “How many people will get killed in these failing elections?” In the last few days it’s dawned on journalists that there’s another side: Iraqis actually wanting to vote and being killed for wanting to vote. So we’ve had a few days featuring that. Similarly, I think there was a feeling that Howard deserved a few days to get his message out, and he had a fairly helpful run of stories. I don’t think he can count on this lasting, though: we’ll all be back with “why are these lying bastards lying to us?” line soon.
Nick
Re 78: John Cole was definitely not a leftie. Maybe these things are just cyclical.
I must re-read John Cole’s autobiography again, but didn’t he hail from the Guardian and his own outlook left of centre? I think we have to go back to the admirable, nay, incomparable Peter Hardiman Scott for unimpeachable neutrality.
I don’t think anyone could accuse Andrew Neil of being a leftie!
I saw John Cole interviewed and he definitely said his own leanings were right-of-centre.
Dan at 82.
Click-button internet polls are obviously widely open to abuse, I wasn’t suggesting we should draw any firm conclusions from the poll on that site, merely that it could be another source of information from which we can draw tentative conclusions - in this case about how the left-wing anti-Blair vote may split, especially in those urban areas where Respect are hoping to mount a strong challenge - as long as we temper it with information we get from other sources.
And what makes you think I’m a lad!
Vino 77. I have defended all parties here - For example I argued that the Tories were being strategically clever for their immigration / race card issue. I have argued that Labour have run the economy well and that will win them the election. Unfortunately, I think that the LibDems get more ‘unfounded claims’ made against them than others - so I say so. I also have a vested interest, in that I have a theory that the next election will see the Lib Dems do better than the current zeitgeist says. But that is from a betting point of view.
Nick at 85. It’s a bit chicken and egg isn’t it? If the Lib Dems are always portrayed as the ‘junior partner’, won’t they always be perceived as the ‘junior partner’. So your original question which was ‘are they missing an opportunity’? Yes perhaps. But perhaps it could be said that despite having the media outlets loaded against them, they are ‘keeping their ends up’ quite well.
I agree with you basically, but how do you determine what party gets what coverage? No. of seats? Labour would get all the coverage at the moment. Percentage in the polls - a bit arbitary. Level playing field - We’d have to hear from all parties (BNP, SWP, Respect, the Greens etc. etc.). On the other hand is democracy actually limited by only concentrating on the ‘two big parties’.
The problem in this country is to a certain extent FPTP. By distorting the size of parties to the degree it does, it ingrains the perception that only 1 of 2 parties can be considered the next Govt. so why give coverage to anything else?
Well - this LD supporting poster had a dose of real life intervening this weekend! (Children, in-laws, DIY etc etc)
Some thoughts on verious issues above:
CK/LD policies: personally speaking I think the party needs to devise a slicker more punchy message about what its *for*, but this is very difficult given the nature of the party (very devolved). I think CK will go as leader 12 months after the election, to be replaced by Oaten.
“If you thought they could win” - perhaps I’ve misinterpreted this but isn’t the 15% not 15% of the elctorate, but 15% of LD voters (ie 15% of 22% or 3.3%)
So now who do we vote for? - very simmilar to http://www.tacticalvoter.net in execution, but different aims. I think, having looked at it, that there will be more calls made as people submit constituency profiles.
Meeja: “all publicity is good publicity …” - as aluded to in another thread, negative portrayal can be good publicity. Poor portrayal of MH on the Beeb reinforces the right’s view of a biased BBC, and increases the “Millwall” effect (which I think is what’s trying to be done in this election) - “No-one likes us we don;t care - and will make damn sure we vote!”
PS - email adress valid but not checked regularly.
Steve @ 92; There is no way that oaten will be the next leader of the lib dems he is extremely disliked among the activist base who decide the LD leadership will be. Simon Hughes would be my bet…
BFG - to be honest, until the results of the next election are known its difficult to call. It depends largely upon the strength of the party at Westminster (more MPs, fewer etc), and the relative strengths of the Tories and Labour.
The membership may not like Oaten, but I think they’ve demonstrated at the last two elections an astuteness in terms of who plays well with the electorate. Hughes was defeated by Kennedy last time.
The strongest scenario for Oaten is this:
- Tories flatline in terms of seats (160-170), LDs increase, but not significantly (65-70), but move to second in many more Lab-held seats.
Party strategy then is to strengthen the liberal economics side of the debate to (a) provide distinctive opposition to Labour in the North and (b) appeal to soft One-nation tories in the south who see their own party going nowhere. Oaten would be ideal in that situation, particularly if he has a “good war” during the campaign.
87 and 89: John Cole said in his autobiography that he was a Labour supporter. John Sergeant (in _his_ autobiog) always praised Cole for his impartiality, noting that the only exception to this was on matters relating to Northern Ireland.
A journalist friend of mine said that Robin Oakley was a Tory, though.
Aidan, Thanks. Thought I was correct about Cole’s generally left of centre views…but I too then also thought of Robin Oakley, his successor, who (I think) was recruited from the Daily Mail. Doesn’t Oakley now report for CNN?
As a Labour activist who has often been up against lib dems could I just say that Simon Hughes would be my dream Lib Dem leader.
With Oaten the Lib Dems would be easier to attack but they would also have stronger appeal.
my dream choice for the next LD leader would be either Oaten or Opik
but then I am not a lib Dem fan these days…..:)
Yes I can well imagine Labour and the Tories would enjoy kicking our heads in if Simon Hughes were to become leader. Opik also would be a mistake as we already get all the wacky vote. Evan Harris is too radical much like Hughes. Davey or Oaten if CK quits soon, otherwise I would like to see a woman leader - if she were any good and there are a few good young women who are likely be MPs could really start to broaden our base.
Activists don’t decide who wins thank god, it is the armchair member and they are a lot more sensible.
Don’t think the BBC suffers from anti Conservative bias but it does seem to share the outlook of those who work for it largely younger and urban, this is what leads to its stance on Europe for example. Also I think it is often hard to distinguish from being unbiased and reflecting public opinion so for example the former might lead to a more generous look at Tory economic policies whereas the latter might lead to a harsher presentation of Europe.
However like all the “national” media the BBC has a horrendous London bias!
Depending on how he takes to Westminster, I’d back Nick Clegg as a future Lib Dem leader, though not perhaps CK’s immediate successor.
What about Steve Webb for Lib Dem Leader? Very popular wherever he speaks, but does not get used much by the media except as a Pensions anorak.
Mark - how did the nomination go? Bit of a flying visit hope you got my message. hope to be up again Easter with a bit more time!
Webb has an excellent brain but doesn’t come over as charismatic. (For the same reason I can’t see David Willetts ever becoming Tory leader.) A country in which the phrase ‘too clever by half’ is an insult is not going to take to someone who has been nicknamed ‘five brains’!
Tabman…dont worry …I thought it might be difficult…
Saturday was the first of two hustings and it went better than I expected…the potential is considerable …certainly for the assembly in two years…the key meeting is a week tonight but I clearly have some support already…my opponent is quite good and a fun friendly guy…so dont mind to much if he wins……having thought I would have no chance however I now think it will be close…..
The way Webb speaks interests me - like Enoch Powell, he has an professorial Birmingham accent. Powell, on the other hand, declined to tote his chair (despite having been the youngest Professor in the Commonwealth, at just 25), whereas Webb’s penchant for being called Professor has earned him much media mockery. He’s one of the few LD frontbenchers I’ve got time for - on means-testing, I agree with him more than with my own party.
Willets went to King Edward’s grammar school in Birmingham, and has been described as having an Edgbaston accent, but I can’t detect much trace of it. As for the brains, has he had an upgrade? I thought he was known as ‘two brains’. Precious little charisma.
Professor Webb sounds like a resource for senior academics
Willetts is indeed ‘two brains’; Webb has been known (within Lib Dem circles at least) as ‘five brains’.
I think the best bet for next LD leader would be Nick Clegg. Davey is genial and intelligent (and did politics a service by stopping David Shaw re-entering the House of Commons in 01) but comes over as too much of a backroom figure to be leader.
The Times today says ‘Kennedy plumps for a longer reign’, and compares him to Henry VIII! How long before the Tory and Labour MPs start chanting ‘Who’s been eating all the pies?’
Presumably the chanting will be led by Prescott and Soames respectively?
Plus Clegg has the small matter of actually getting elected. Highly probable but not certain …
I shall keep an eye on the LD and Con signs when I go through Sheffield Hallam on the X18 (it’s not always an accurate guide, but it was in Cheadle last time).
RE Richard: The posters can be a dodgy signpost for a result for two reasons. One Tory voters, who are often very house proud do not like to tarnish their image by sticking a poster up saying who they are voting for. Two most Tory signs get ripped down the night after they are put up (at least they were in Richmond Park last time).
Or bricks get thrown through windows (as happened in John O’Farrell’s Things can only get Better).
The signs were a good guide in Cheadle, Cheshire (ie a very close result), but a hopelessly inaccurate sign in Cheadle Staffs (part of the Stone constituency), where Bill Cash increased his majority.
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