politicalbetting.com

Assessing the alternatives to Cameron: 1. Hague

Ths is the first in a series of articles in which I will look at the possible alternatives to David Cameron should, for whatever reason the party find itself choosing another leader.

This is something that I don’t think is likely to happen but it just might. The potential of several figures will be examined before I reveal the identity of the person I have good reason to believe that Labour most fears.

And that person is definitely not the former leader and current shadow foreign secretary, William Hague. His claim has been reinforced by an article from the founder of YouGov and Jeffrey Archer’s former campaign manager, Stephan Shakespeare. He suggested that Rupert Murdoch had decided that he wanted Hague back in the charge and his media outlets might promote such a line.

I don’t buy this. During the recent troubled weeks Cameron has been getting reasonable support from the Sun and its editorial after this week’s PMQs must have been encouraging

If Brown continues to oppose an EU referendum he could see increasing hostility.

The reason why Hague would be a disastrous choice for the Tories is that Labour would be able to paint it as a return to the past. Cameron has shown that he can secure broader appeal for his party which is vital if any progress is to be made. Because Hague’s been there before it would be much harder for him to be seen as a change figure.

Quite simply Hague has got too much baggage. My guess is that Hague, who was very bruised by the 2001 election knows this and would not want to submit himself to the experience again.

Mike Smithson

Can Labour Retain the South?

I wrote some months ago that the Conservatives could not win a working majority without significantly increasing their presence in the North of England. Conversely, Labour cannot retain a working majority without holding onto a significant number of seats in London and the South of England, particularly the South East. It was Tony Blair’s particular skill to be able to win over large numbers of affluent Conservative voters in the South, enabling Labour to win seats it had never held before.

Following the boundary changes, according to Anthony Wells, there will be 29 seats with Labour MPs, where the party’s percentage majority over the Conservatives is 3% or less. These include 11 seats that have notional Conservative majorities, as a result of the changes. Some commentators consider that a number of these remain notionally Labour seats, but all are agreed that the boundary changes have not been helpful to Labour in these seats. In addition, another 4 Labour seats are vulnerable to a similar swing to the Liberal Democrats. Were they all to fall, then Labour would be left without an overall majority.

Out of these 33 seats, 21 are located in London and the South of England. Of those, 14 have Labour leads of under 2% (including notional Conservative leads). In all but two of these, Hastings and Rye and Islington South, Labour have performed very poorly in recent local elections. Labour could retain an overall majority, even if it were to lose all of these Southern marginal seats, but it would be such a small majority as to call into question Gordon Brown’s ability to govern for a full term.

The history of John Major’s last administration suggests that it is better for a government to lose an election outright, than to hold on to power with a very small majority and see its authority sapped through endless backbench rebellions and defeats.

David Cameron seems to appeal to Southern voters far better than to voters in the North and Scotland. Were the overall vote shares of the parties to be largely unchanged at the next election, Labour’s majority would probably fall quite significantly, were the Conservatives to put on votes in the South, and lose them in the North, because the Conservatives have far fewer marginal seats in the North and Scotland than Labour has in the South.

Gordon Brown has demonstrated over the past couple of months that he is no fool. He will be well aware of his party’s vulnerability in the South, and will make every effort to retain these vital seats.

Last night, there was just one by-election in Powys CC, Grungog. Liberal Democrat 234, Independent 143, Independent 98, Conservative 95. Liberal Democrat hold.

Sean Fear is a London Tory

Now YouGov reports a 9% lead

The Telegraphs YouGov survey for July, our this morning, has more good news for Labour and could reinforce the growing calls for Gordon to go to the country early. These are the figures with comparisons on the last poll from the pollster five days ago - CON 32% (-1): LAB 41% (+1): LD 16% (+1)

This is the biggest lead by any pollster for Labour since November 2005 before David Cameron became Tory leader.The last time that YouGov had a margin on this scale was in August 2005.

As well as giving Gordon more confidence if he did decide to risk it the poll could add further to the pressure on David Cameron within the Tory party.

In the betting there are now almost no punters ready to bet against an early election on the Cantor Spreadfair spread market. The latest spread of the number of weeks until the election starting on Gordon’s succession on June 27th is 77 - 83.5

Ladbrokes, meanwhile, is still offering 8/1 on Gordon going to the country this year. That seems like a great bargain that won’t last long and they will only accept a maximum of £25 online.

Mike Smithson

Betfair revive their leader line-up market

One of the great betting markets during the last parliament was Betfair’s leader line-up when you had to predict which of those who had been heading their parties two and a half years earlier would still be there on election day.

So the options then were Blair, IDS and Kennedy; Blair and IDS; Blair and Kennedy; only Blair; only IDS; only Kennedy and none of them. This became a great place to punt as each of the leaders came at one stage or another came under pressure. IDS, of course, was ousted in October 2003.

During the period it operated I had more than 600 separate trades backing and laying on each of the options and came out with a reasonable profit.

Now we’ve got the 2007 version of the market which has just been put up by the betting exchange. The options are with the latest prices:-

All three 0.4/1
Gord and Dave 1.92/1
Gord and Ming 1.7/1
Dave and Ming 9.5/1
Only Gord 9/2
Only Dave 9.5/1
Only Ming 20/1
None of them 9.5/1

There’s very little been put on so far and less than £150 has been traded. But if, say, the pressure does build on Cameron during the summer you could see this being the place where you could bet on him not being there or on him surviving. The same could happen with Ming although and clearly, at the moment, the odds on options including Gordon will remain fairly tight.

Like all these new Betfair markets it only gets interesting when punters start betting and there is some liquidity.

The general principle to follow is that party leaders are usually much more resilient than the headlines might suggest and the time to get the best price is when one of them is attracting a lot of flak

Provided nothing untoward happens to any of them the all three option will remain the strong favourite.

Today on the site. I’m tied up for almost all the day at a family wedding and will endeavour to publish Sean Fear’s Friday slot when I get a moment.

Mike Smithson

Can Gordon risk his poll leads falling off?

Whenever the subject of an early election, perhaps as soon as October, is mentioned people dismiss the idea because of Gordon’s character. The man, they argue, is not a risk taker and why should he chance everything on an early poll.

Fine. But is waiting the risky strategy? As we’ve seen with Cameron and the Tories the opinion polls can move very fast and the longer an election is delayed the greater the chance of something happening that turns the whole political situation round.

The argument for moving quickly while the Tories are in apparent turmoil must be very tempting. Poll leads of 6-7% may not survive much beyond the summer and better to strike while there’s still the novelty of him not being Tony Blair and the media continue their uncritical coverage. Honeymoons, alas, do come to an end.

My general election date strategy looks to produce big profits on a 2007 election; quite good profits with a 2008 one; the possibility of a loss if there’s a late 2009 election and a nice profit if it goes on until 2010.

I’ve sold “Gordon Brown weeks” on the Cantor Spreadfair market at 85.5. I’ve combined this with a covering bet at 7/1 with Ladbrokes on a 2010 election. The spread bet keeps me in profit on anything upto the third week of March 2009. I then have a period of risk until 2010 when my Ladbrokes 7/1 comes in.

I’ve been quite taken by the argument that it will be either early or late.

Mike Smithson

Should the Guardian’s pollster have followed the Mori approach?

Reproduced above is the detailed finding from the Guardian’s ICM poll that was played big by the paper yesterday and which has sent shock waves throughout the Tory party. It also has been covered extensively in other parts of the media and was the main reason why William Hill opened its “next Tory leader” market.

Yet looking at the options that were put respondents were not offered the chance in both cases of saying “I don’t like the leader and I don’t like the party”.

It does not seem plausible that such a high proportion of non-Tory supporters, - a total of 38% of Labour and 39% of the Lib Dems - were ready to say they liked the Tory party but not the leader or that they liked both. This is hard to credit. The proportion is almost the same with Tory supporters when they gave their view of Labour.

Also a massive 68% of Labour voters were ready to say that they either liked Cameron or the Tories or both. This compares with 53% of the Tory voters who were ready to say the same of Labour and Brown. Eh?

There’s no getting away from the fact that the finding from Tory voters is not good for Cameron but it would have been a lot more damaging if the same response had come if the question had been asked with a full range of options.

I cannot recall a similar question being asked before by ICM and the nearest I can find from another pollster is this from Mori two months ago. The pollster did not provide a party break down but as can be seen the option of not liking either the party and the leader was put.

From the way I read this the Mori questioning was a lot more coherent.

Whatever the ICM outcome is not good for David Cameron but the finding would have a lot more credibility, surely, if the pollster had followed the Ipsos-Mori approach?

Mike Smithson