Is Johnson the certainty that the betting suggests?
June 22nd, 2007
But is there still value in a Harriet Harman bet?
If punters have got this right then the Education secretary, Alan Johnson, looks pretty certain to pick up the Labour deputy leader crown when the results are announced this weekend. Our chart, showing prices reflected as implied probabilities, indicates the big swing that there’s been in the past few days.
But surprisingly betting has been very light. Only £74,000 has been matched on the Betfair market reflecting the lack of interest in the election amongst punters and the lack of media coverage. The next Labour leader market, by comparison, has seen more than £1.8m in matched trades on the betting exchange alone.
The complex electoral system might still spring a surprise especially if this gets down to third and fourth preferences. I’ve got a feeling that the value bet is Gordon’s choice, Harriet Harman, who is now at 6.8/1
All the polls showed she was getting good support from women party members and trade unionists and she’ll surely pick up a large part of the Hazel Blears support. My guess is that a large proportion of voters in each of the electoral colleges will have her in their top three in order to show gender balance.
Turnout is likely to have been very low and we might get indications of that during the day. If it is then that might help Cruddas whose supporters were much more motivated to vote than those of the other candidates. What polling there has been took place before the Newsnight debate when he came out well.
Whatever all the attention over the weekend is going to be on Gordon. The deputy race will just be a footnote.
Mike Smithson
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COMPETITION UPDATE
With 55 entries received in the competition (including Nick Palmer’s), the breakdowns are as follows.
Overall winner:
Johnson 35 predictions
Benn 8
Cruddas 5
Harman 5
Blears 2
Hain 0
The average percentage prediction for Johnson was 55.3%.
First preference vote averages:
Benn 20.4
Blears 10.8
Cruddas 18.6
Hain 10.7
Harman 16.4
Johnson 23.3
Double Carpet should have added another question - who will come second? It might be the more interesting
Your idea that HH could come through from fourth in the first round has some strong logic - once you have voted for a boring grey man in Johnson, do you want to vote for another in Benn? She will take a lot of the token woman vote, but I venture not many of Blears. Blears is an ideological vote - after her Johnson is your man.
In the end Johnson plays in all three constituencies and is the “offends people the least” candidate.
Thanks double carpet - although I think Cruddas will do better in the first round but receive poor transfers, I suspect your average is pretty much on the money. Cheers for all your work on this.
‘But surprisingly betting has been very light.’
Don’t forget that Betfair came very late to the party. A lot of money was taken by the bookmakers in the months preceding.
Also, the Betfair market would have been distorted to some extent by those wishing to lay off strong positions, notably in respect of Cruddas, achieved by backing at long odds with the bookmakers.
There is a slow dribble of cash going on now and it is mainly directed at Johnson. This may well be the result of leaks. Normally a well-founded leak would create a surge but in this election nobody can be certain until all the votes are aggregated so even somebody with inside knowledge would be cautious. Also, the volumes aren’t there to exploit even if you have good inside information.
A big thank you to Paul Maggs for his work on the competition. I’ll be surprised if the PB average is not very close.
Ascot update later for those still following my duff tips. Better day yesterday. Broke even.
PTP if you are about, its rare that I get pieces of advice from local yokels but I’ve heard a word about Wyatt Earp in the last at Ascot. Make of it what you will.
have to agree with you here MIke, Johnson is favorite but it is pretty straightfoward to see circumstances where who wouldn’t win. If for example the last htree are Johnson, Harman and Cruddas then Johnson could well struggle because transfers would run strongly between Harman and Cruddas. The folk who have been prepared to offer to lay Cruddas at very long odds ( 500 ) are taking an awful big risk for the potential to make very little gain.
This is word for word for what I wrote on your last betting thread, Mike. And the slagging off I got for writing it too! Brown fixes elections.
I think it’s pretty much down to Johnson vs Harman. Over 90% now that it’s one of those two. Probably over 95%. Remember two things: it’s not only women members who see the case for a women Deputy - if Harriet wasn’t so close to Brown I think she could have been favourite; second, IIRC Cruddas endorsed her as his second choice. Given he’s motivating turnout, that could well matter.
So if you’re after generous odds, I agree with Mike, back Harman. If, like me, the aim is to win even if returns are modest, I recommend laying Benn at
I think it all depends on who goes out 3rd. Blears and Hain are chips in the first two rounds it seems, and I suspect that Johnson will benefit from these. However, if Cruddas goes out 4th as I expect, then I guess his votes will transfer heavily to Benn and Harman. This could leave it incredibly open as to who goes next.
If Benn goes third then I reckon Johnson’s got it over Harman.
If Harman goes out third then Johnson’s got it over Benn.
But if Johnson goes third, then Benn could be looking good.
However if Harman goes third, then I think Benn and Cruddas will pick up most transfers, leaving Johnson vulnerable. Cruddas’ votes will transfer mainly to Benn and he’ll win.
So some Johnson supporters should have been voting for Harman first to ensure she stays in the race longer than Cruddas. But not so many that Johnson falls out early LOL!
re 8 not sure what happened to the end of this…anyway, Benn last traded at 8.6 on Betfair. I reckon laying anything up to 10, 12 or even 15 is very good value.
re 9 I would have thought Johnson is almost certain to make the last two? He’s got a lot of votes bagged. Note that MP/ MEP votes are public, so we are very unlikely to get a repeat of the ridiculous David Davis result, when it turned out he couldn’t deliver all his public pledges.
fair point that if Harman goes third, could be a surprise. But that is a very big IF. Again, she’s starts 2nd in the MPs/MEPs, and - once Blears goes - will be doing well among members.
11. Yes, virtually certain to make last 2, esp if Blears is one of first three out.
I think people are undercalling Benn slightly. He’s not had a good campaign and only has 43/44 MP first prefs, but he did still have a lead in both the union and members sections according to yougov (when wieghted to vote. Putting him at same price as Harman could be high value.
Harman now at 4-1 on Ladbrokes - second favourite
MY POST ON JUNE 15th - How secure is the postal voting system being used? If it’s anything like the general election system, there will be plenty of opportunity for someone to rig the process to bring the ‘required’ result.
What would Broon’s desired result be? Hilary Benn possibly. No possible threat to Broon as a future leader, and another one who’s keen to hand billions over to African dictators like Broon himself. Johnson’s not going to be Broon’s choice as he might become a threat and he’s known to be Blairite. The other possible winner in a rigged vote would be Harriet Harman. Broon would not feel threatened by her, and he’d look good having a woman alongside. Ignoring the genuine voting, and imagining that the whole thing’s going to rigged anyway, it looks like Harman.
by Tapestry June 15th, 2007 at 10:25 am