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Might David Milband and Ed Davey benefit from the “Cameron effect”?

One side effect of the emergence of David Cameron for the Tory leadership has been a change on the betting markets for the Labour leadership. The 54 year old Gordon Brown remains, of course, the red-hot odds on favourite but in recent weeks there’s been money going on the 40 year old Minister of State for Communities and Local Government, David Miliband who joined the Cabinet in May.

On the Betfair exchange he’s now at 15/1 which puts him in the second favourite position ahead of “heavyweights” such as Alan Milburn, Charles Clarke and Peter Hain.

Like Cameron, he entered Parliament at the 2001 General Election, and like Cameron, as well, he went to Oxford where he also got a first in Philosophy, Politics and Economics.

There can be little doubt that a Cameron leadership will have an impact on the other parties. The generation aspect is clearly important and Miliband would appear to be in a good position if the mood moved against Gordon Brown.

Unlike Labour, where we know there will be a change before the General Election, the Lib Dems look set to remain with Charles Kennedy. But if there was a vacancy then one of its brightest stars is another Oxford-educated 40 year old, Ed Davey. Like Cameron he leads for his party on Education.

Everything, of course, depends on timing. It’s hard at the moment to envisage anything other than a Brown-Cameron-Kennedy line-up at the next General Election. But if Cameron manages to get some traction into the Tories, and that is a big IF, then the other parties are bound to be affected.

We might yet see the 2009/10 election leaders being three men who were born within a year of each other, who all went to the same university at about the same time and who all read the same subject.

Whatever the political landscape is changing and it will be fascinating to watch.

SPAM-TRAP APOLOGIES. A number of comments have been held up by the spam-trap because they contained the word “Pussy” - as in “Pink Pussy” - which Jeremy Paxman sought to question David Cameron about on Thursday.

Mike Smithson

Betting price set to tighten even further

The heavy betting in recent days on David Cameron winning the Tory leadership should continue this morning after getting a pretty good press following his combative interview with Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight.

In the Times, under the headline “Paxman’s cocktail of rudeness fails to shake Cameron” Ann Treneman amusingly describes the opening when Cameron was asked if he knew what a “Pink Pussy was”. She goes on “…Dave relaxed (always a mistake). “Oh, that’s a drink. And that is all Paxman needed. For these were not just drinks. They were an outrage! Jugs of pink pussy are being sold for £8 in bars owned by a company of which Dave used to sit on the board. London was awash with crime and pink pussies were involved! What did Dave have to say about that? Dave soothed us with a lullaby about how important it was to create safe cities. Paxo interrupted him: “A drink containing white rum, Malibu, strawberry liqueur, grenadine and cream! Dave did not say the obvious thing — i.e. “Pass the sickbag” — but instead demanded: “What’s the question?” And then we knew that we had a fight on our hands. Dave was showing what he was made of. He was standing up to the Big Sneer. “

Andy Smith in the Indpendent reveals that right up to a few hours before the recording that Cameron team was fighting with the programme over where it should take place. They objected to the first planned venue - a hotel - because it was “too baronial” and would play on the idea that their man was “a toff”. Of the discussion itself Smith observes: “The interview revealed he was able to withstand intense questioning. He made a number of good-humoured complaints about Paxman’s continual interruptions. On one occasion he offered a deal: “Let me have two sentences, and then you can interrupt.” But having competed two sentences without interruption, Mr Cameron could not resist adding, “and one more thing, if I may”.

The Telegraph suggests that “Mr Cameron launched a clearly pre-planned attack on Paxman’s aggressive style to counter the interviewer’s questioning” On the drugs issue the report notes “Although there was some ambiguity about the exchanges with the BBC Newsnight interrogator, Mr Cameron, 39, appeared to survive without making an explicit admission and stuck to his line that politicians had the right to keep private their past before entering politics.”

On Cameron’s approach to the interview the Guardian reports “Mr Cameron also turned the tables on Paxman, telling him: “This is the trouble with these interviews, Jeremy. You come in, sit someone down and treat them like they are some cross between a fake or a hypocrite. You give no time to anyone to answer any of your questions. It does your profession no favours at all and it’s no good for political discourse.”

The best Cameron price you can get is 0.08/1 on the betting exchanges. This will tighten today as his victory looks even more certain.

Mike Smithson

Will Cameron survive the “ordeal by Newsnight”?

Six months and ten days after the marathon Tory leadership started the the look on Davis’s face says it all. After being front-runner for so long and then seeing the events in Blackpool turn the contest on its head is there anything he can hope for from the campaign’s final set piece tonight when David Cameron faces Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight?

For if there is going to be a last minute upset then the Paxman interrogation will be the occasion for it to happen. And after putting the label of “shit” to David Davis last week Paxman is not going to pull any punches with the young ex-Etonian who stormed into contention with his speech in Blackpool barely six weeks ago.

Are we going to see much deeper probing of the personal drugs issue which dominated events last month? How is Cameron going to cope with Paxman’s forensic approach to his policy-lite campaign strategy which he seems to have maintained so far. Or has Paxman got an ace up his sleeve that will knock the 39 year old off guard?

With perhaps half the Tory member electors having already sent their completed ballots off it will take a sensational development to change the course of this contest - and Paxman, surely, is the only person who could achieve that.

Given the betting prices on Cameron are so tight - the best you can get is 0.08/1 - it might be worth waiting for the interview before putting money on. If Cameron does slip up then prices could move.

Alastair Campbell says Cameron is the heir to Alastair Campbell. In his rather self-indulgent column in the Times this morning Campbell notes: “…He (Cameron) knows how to craft a line and put it over. He has a feel for what tickles the media’s fancy, what makes a story and how to get it up as a headline, what combination of action and demeanour keeps the photographers happy. He knows how to take a line of attack against him and turn it into a line of attack against his attackers. These are skills all press officers deploy from time to time. And every leader in the media age needs this kind of professional support..There were plenty of times when Mr Blair would take my advice. But not for one second did I ever imagine I could do his job, let alone do it better than he did. I might have thought I did my job better than Messrs Major, Hague, Duncan Smith and Howard did theirs, but I always knew that their job was tougher. I’m not sure that Mr Cameron appreciates the difference. “

With the new register of MPs financial interests several papers this morning look at who has provided financial backing for the two campaigns. The Guardian contrasts the backgrounds of those giving money to the two camps.“..Many of the backers of David Davis are ruthless entrepreneurs, scions of gamblers and shipping magnates, or nightclub owners - and one is a popular thriller writer, Frederick Forsyth.But the backers of David Cameron are more often wealthy philanthropists, stockbrokers, private bankers and media moguls.”

Mike Smithson

What are we to make of the “Blair going” market moves?

The implied probability, based on best betting prices, of Tony Blair leaving by the end of this year - within six weeks - has started rising again following the big surge last week after the 90-day detention defeat. The chart maps how punters have being viewing Blair’s possible imminent departure

Meanwhile the bookmakers, William Hill, have reported taking string of bets from punters who believe an announcement that Tony Blair is about to stand down is imminent. After accepting, amongst others, a bet of £1000 at odds of 10/1 for Blair to step down before the end of this year, Hills cut the odds to 13/2, but then received another bet of £500 at those odds from a Nottingham punter, followed by another client wanting to open an account to place precisely the same bet.

“At the same time we had people ringing us up, placing smaller bets, then telling us that they had been told that a significant announcement about Mr Blair’s future was imminent’ said a Hill’s spokesman.

This morning the Independent ran a story that the Defence Secretary, Geoff Hoon, was calling for Brown to take over the leadership unopposed.

We are not convinced by the rumour. And even if it was true a process would have to be set up to select a new leader and it is hard to see how that could be truncated within the six weeks between now and New Year’s Eve. This would point to a change-over in the first quarter of 2006 - not of it all being resolved this year.

I think we are going to have to get used to stories like this.

Mike Smithson

Mark Warner 8/1 for the Democrat nomination and 40/1 to be President

Every time we’ve discussed the next US White House race in recent months one of PB.C’s most long-standing contributors, Ben, has advised that a key person to watch for the Democrat nomination is the outgoing Governor of Virginian and former cellphone tycoon, Mark Warner.

This always seemed odd because in the regular US polls Warner was not even listed as one of the potential challengers - or was attracting support of just 1%. Until I raised it with them yesterday because I was planning this article Warner was not even in the list of options on Bet365 - one of the few conventional bookies offering prices on who will get the nomination.

They came back with a price of 8/1 - which might be tempting given that on the Betfair betting exchange Warner has now moved to second favourite, behind Hilary Clinton, at 3/1. All this is on the back of an exceptional performance for Democrats in last week’s election for Warner’s replacement.

This is from the latest issue of Time Magazine. “… The man who was the biggest factor in the closely watched Virginia Governor’s race last week wasn’t even on the ballot. And that’s why Democrats are starting to think that outgoing Virginia Governor Mark Warner may finally have figured out what it will take for their party to start winning in the South again. All sides agreed the morning after the election that what carried Lieutenant Governor Tim Kaine to victory–in a state that hasn’t voted for a Democrat for President since L.B.J.–was Warner’s popularity. Part of it is style: Warner won narrowly in 2001 by courting gun owners and working the NASCAR circuit, even though he grew up in the New England state of Connecticut and is worth some $200 million. But the real political miracle is the fact that Virginians have only grown to love him more as he has slashed popular programs and raised taxes.”

For there’s little doubt that if the Democrats are to re-gain the White House they have to find a way of winning in the South - and having a popular ex-governor from Virginia, might fit the bill.

Until now all the focus has been on Hilary Clinton who remains an odds-on favourite and has a very clear lead in the polls. But she is a devisive figure and faced with a serious challenge from someone with a proven track record in the South might be vulnerable.

For the Republicans the ex-Mayor or New York, Rudolf Giuliani, tops the betting and the polls. But moving up is Condoleezza Rice who is 7/1.

Although the 2008 race might seem a long way off possible challengers will need to be declaring themselves within eighteen months. As for the betting the prices do not seem very generous - given the time you would have to wait to pick up any winnings.

For me the best bet is the 40/1 bookmaker price that’s available on Warner to be the next President. Even though it is three years ahead this price makes a small wager seem attractive.

Mike Smithson

How can more people be persuaded to vote?

Tomorrow I’ve been invited to take part in a “power lunch” at the Adam Smith Institute at which at which pollsters, journalists and others with a keen interest in the election process will discuss with Sam Younger, Chairman of the Electoral Commission, ways of boosting voter turnout in UK elections.

And in thinking about the issue it struck me that the decline in turn-out is closely correlated to the emergence of digital television. Until the 1997 election it was very difficult for TV viewers to get away totally from politics during a campaign because the vast majority of people had only only four channels - and each of these was required to show party election broadcasts like the “Brown-Blair love-in” (above) which kicked off Labour’s campaign in April.

Now the plan is for analogue TV to be switched-off by 2012 and the vast majority of households already have access to a minimum of 30 channels - most of them supported by advertising. The days when the public enjoyed a “common TV experience” by watching the same programme at the same time have gone.

Right from the beginning of commercial TV fifty years ago in the UK political advertisements have been banned. The result is that UK elections are totally different from US ones where TV advertising totally dominates.

What is the case for continuing the ban in the digital television era? Surely if we want to encourage more people to be interested in the political process then the full range of communication tools should be available to those who are seeking our votes?

The big argument against is the money - as we’ve seen in the campaign financing debates in the US. But the UK has now got a regime of much tougher reporting and transparency requirement on party funding as all three main parties have discovered in the past few months.

If we want to get the younger generation to be more interested in the political process then the parties should be able to reach them by being able to advertise on the TV channels that they watch. It would make for very different General Election campaigns.

I would be very interested in other ideas about how turnout can be increased so I can feed it in to tomorrow’s discussion.

Mike Smithson