My rule of thumb for assessing the polls
September 26th, 2007-
What do you think of the “2nd best 2nd worst rule”?
With so many polls showing such different pictures I’ve now adopted my own “rule of thumb” for working out what the big picture is. Basically I take the latest surveys from YouGov, Mori, ComRes, ICM and Populus and take the second lowest share for Labour and the second highest shares for the Tories and Lib Dems.
Where two or more pollsters are showing the same high figure I take that and do the same with the low ones.
The reason for this is that the pollsters have a long-standing tendency to understate the main opposition parties and to overstate Labour. Even though the formula compensates for this it would have over-stated Labour in the past four general elections but not by as much as most individual polls.
One of the issues is that many respondents say Labour when they actually mean “Anti-Tory” - an element that affects ratings for both parties. Also with nearly 10% of all seats in Lib Dem hands there are going to be even more tactical considerations next time, whenever that is.
In 2005 the approach would have produced CON 33% (correct): LAB 37%(+1): LD 23% (correct).
Taking the second highest and second lowest cuts out the odd rogue or old survey.
Based on the latest polls from the five pollsters the current “Second best - second worst” calculation produces CON 34%: LAB 39%: LD 18% - which seems about right.
Mike Smithson
MessageSpace Advertising
erm…’bizarre’ is all i can say to this
how about you take the headline voting figures, as THESE ARE THE POLLS
I agree with your analysis; mind you we are in that stage football clubs get into when they have a match in hand.
You need to look at the post Conservative Conference polling to see the true picture.
If Cameron plays a blinder (and Conference always plays to his strengths) we will emerge with a much smaller deficit, or no deficit at all.
On the other hand in the unlikely event of a ‘quiet man’ oratory we will be in deep doggy doo territory.
Mike, how would that have worked in 2001 or 1997? Are there any “shy Labour” voters out there, as has been suggested over the past few years? Or just “shy Tories”?
Spot on Mike, and why I really don’t believe Gordon will call an election. If you put in to two colums all the pros and cons (from Gordon’s point of view) it just doesnt stack up. I might be wrong of course , but I very much doubt it. Gordon would want to see at least a dozen polls all showing a double digit lead before he had the “courage” to call an election.
The Lib Dems will pick up from this unrealistic low in the latest poll and Labour IMHO will be the one whom they take votes from.
Give it six months and it’ll be 37 37 20 that’s where I think it will end up. 2011 is when the Election will be IMHO, History repeats itself (John Major)
1 - woah, steady on. You touched a nerve there I think, Mike!
My rule of thumb on polls is to ignore them all unless they show a strong Tory lead or personal ratings for Gordon at Michael Foot levels. Early 2007 was a very happy time for me…
2 Marcus, I admire your optimism, but “no deficit at all” would be one of the greatest predictions of all time if it’s right - and I don’t believe even you really believe that
4 2011? That’ll take some doing. Unless you expect a snap election by Nov and another one after four years, with Brown’s annointed successor asking for his own mandate?
6 - he did say “if Cameron plays a blinder”. If he does, and if it is fairly and properly reported, at length and in the same gushing tones as greeted Gordon’s effort this week, then it sounds a reasonable prediction to me.
1 So which headline figures should we take as they are all different ?
mikes desperation to get the lib dems on a ‘respectable’ figure is hilarious. when exactly are his party going to capitalise? the tories have been in opposition for 10 years, and the lib dems still havent made any real ground on them, and a supposedly unpopular labour government is picking up support from them as well!
9. take them as they come, why is there a need to average it all out? you might as well just not do polls if people are going to fiddle with them this much
Mike one factor that may change polls v actual is labour turnout.
in 2005 election Labour share was c 3% below polls vote share (even ICM).This was partly th result of Blair unpopularity amongst Labour voters.
I would suggest that Gordon will get abetter turnout as recent polls on intention to vote suggest.Thus Labour votes in poll should be closer to actual than last time.
For my money Ithink that the closest pollster to actuals is ICM,except for the overestimate of Labour support.
For the Lib Dems share of votes is less important than maximising seats,particularly as balance of powerseems a lilkely result.
I would concentrate all Lib dems resources on 75 seats.
Rogerh
The ARSE rule of thumb for Conservative non believers in our methodology :
http://jeremayakovka.typepad.com/jeremayakovka/images/winston_churchill_victory_1.jpg
Flashman (on last thread). It is not me who writes Cameron’s policies - It is what he has said.
Mike - Bit like me and horses - put it all on No 6!!!
Seriously it sounds a reasonable plan will watch with interest.
11 So next time ICM come out and give LibDems 19/20% we should take that as the gospel . Hope you put your money where your brain is , there are plenty of people here will use some commonsense and take it off you .
2 don’t forget ‘the quiet man’ speech gave an instant (and laughable) 7% boost (at least I think that’s what Mike said)
14. I’m not agreeing with what he’s done - the comment was what I think he SHOULD do. His current standing in the polls may suggest his “safety first” policy is not going to win him a 2007 election.
laptop at 6. I did offer the possibility that Cameron goes pear-shaped at Conference won’t close the gap at all.
You obviously don’t think that is any more likely than I do.
8 “he did say “if Cameron plays a blinder”. If he does, and if it is fairly and properly reported, at length and in the same gushing tones as greeted Gordon’s effort this week, then it sounds a reasonable prediction to me.”
Not sure that the media narrative wants to see it that way - given the way the Mail and DTel are playing it at the moment. The Express doesn’t matter, Times is still pro-Gord and the Sun will be agnostic at best - unless Cam goes bonkers with anti-EU rhetoric which will alienate everyone else. The trouble is that the press scents Cameroon blood and will be looking to shed it. Unfair, but that’s the way it goes. Anything said by anyone that is even slightly critical of DC will be the headline. The Tebbit interview in the Times this weekend is just the start. Not sure how the Tories will cope under that amount of intrusive scrutiny, given the panic we’ve seen so far
Am I the only one depressed by the government’s response to what is happening in Burma.
We need something better lads to keep stoking this one before this thing gets hit by a full on crakdown.
Any substance to the rumour that Cammy is back on the fags due to stress? Tut tut. A defection and a few activists going on the warpath and he’ll be mainlining nicotine by the end of next week.
21 - I think Gordon’s response has been good so far. Much better than another government I could mention in 1988.
What else do you expect him to do? Send troops?
19 I would assume a competent performance - after all, he knows he has to hit the mark and he proved in the leadership battle that he does the set-pieces well.
OTOH, that was a shot to nothing - if he’d blobbed, he’d still have been a front-bencher, and able to come again. This time, if it goes horribly wrong, he’s an ex-leader within a few weeks. Pressure does strange things to people. And in this sort of bearpit, political leaders are in the same boat as football managers.
The only Polls I take are actual votes cast! With so much tinkering about with methodology it has meant that ICM used to show a strong Labour lead and now its least favourable. You Gov used to show a tendacy to favour the Tories now it favours Labour!
It’s Russia and China that continually abuse their position on the UNSC and stop UN action on Darfur and Burma. I really don’t think there’s much the UK can do here except press the two to agree to tougher sanctions against the junta. We already have sanctions against them as does the EU.
21 It was once put to me that Burma was the Balkans of Asia. Once the crazy generals are ousted, there is scope for a truly horrible bloodletting between the ethnic groupings that comprise Burma/Myanmar. I hope those who are stoking the fires to overthrow the regime have a plan to prevent that. Recent precedents for planning for a country descending into chaos (after a central iron fist leadership has been ousted) are not encouraging.
23. How do you describe good?
22. Is Gordon back on his favourite kind of “fags” ?
Actually getting involved with the UN for a start, instead of just doing jack all.
It seems a pretty sensible way to make sense out of the myriad of polls coming in - it’s the same sort of thing I subconsciously sort of work on really.
What would be illuminating would be the polls of the last year or so compared directly with those leading up to 1987 and 1992 - ie the raw figures as opposed to the manipulated ones.
That way we could compare what the people are saying now comapred with way back, and bearing in mind tht they were obviously way out, it would give some form of useful comparison.
ie if the raw figures showed levels similar to c1991/2 then labour could be introuble - but if they are closer to the raw data figures of 1996/7 or 2001 then Labour could be doing well…
This gives a result pretty close to Jack’s ARSE poll of L40 C34 LD16. It seems to me quite clear that: a) Lab lead over Con is about 6%; and b) There is a lot of fuzziness between the edge of the LD vote and Lab vote, with some voters thinking about moving back from LD to Lab.
Remembering that the LDs always put on a few extra % during a campaign because of legal equity of coverage (even in 1992 when the “squeeze” was massive), I would predict a final result of L39 C34 LD19. This would represent a swing to Lab of 1.5%, which with new boundaries and other considerations would give a small gain in majority, but hardly worth the effort to gain just 20 months of longer term…
29 - Gordon wasn’t the one at Eton, remember
31 - I think to be honest its somewhere between the two senarios….
30. Jack all?
Havent you seen the US government’s response days before the UKs?
The polls are all over the place at the moment- and YouGov seem to be consistently at varience with the others, so I think Mike’s rule of thumb is not unreasonable.
As to what may happen next: the wacky comments from Normo Tebbs http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/26/ntebbit126.xml can not have been too pleasant for the clique of Toffs and rumours of defections would probably send anyone back to the ciggies.
John Denham on the radio today:
“You look at the polls and you say to yourself ’what’s happening in the next 20 to 30 Tory seats’.
“On the ground, are we going to win those seats? Because one of the things that the polls would say is we could turn a majority of 60 with two-and-a-half years to run into a majority of 100 with five years to run.
“Those sorts of issues become quite exciting but you need to know what’s actually happening on the ground in those seats.”
A bit of caution that marginal seats could be different to the rest. Any evidence of this?
” The trouble is that the press scents Cameroon blood and will be looking to shed it. Unfair, but that’s the way it goes. ”
Nah, I doubt it. As long as Broon is still winding the entire nation up about an election, they will want to see a fight brewing…
and he won’t say a thing until he’s seen the Tory conference. He always bottles it when considering taking a risk.
I expect a majority of the press will be netural, along the lines of, Cameron is up for the fight… and Cameron ‘ says bring it on as Tories unite’… etc… etc…
No one, expect Labour supporters, want to see yet another boring predictable election. They won’t get one.
Everyone is being mobilised to fight a campaign, which has started in many places already.
GB needs to be careful what he wishes for.
Matt.
20: ‘Not sure that the media narrative wants to see it that way’
Fair point. How many times are we going to read ‘But the Tory leader’s speech was threatened to be overshadowed with the news that X…’ where X is some off-hand grumble about wind farms by a former councillor from east Hampshire, or the frothings of some UKIP mill owner who once donated to the Tories when Douglas-Home was PM?
Well I am sure there will be more Polls out this weekend. Will be interesting to see if Populus and ComRes show any movement as these are the two pollsters that have tended to show Labour in a poorer light!
37 - if that’s what Denham said then it reinforces my view that this is a concerted Govt effort to attempt to spook and unsettle the Tories. If there was really an election imminent why would a Minister go on the radio and make such a comment?
It’s quite disgraceful behaviour for a governing party, which should be getting on with the serious business of running the country not playing games with the opposition. How does this enhance the public’s view of politics and politicians?
35, 30
Burma is of course a clear case of hypocrisy. If we (and more importantly the US) had wanted to do anything we would have done it years ago. It’s all gesture politics.. and the Russians and Chinese know it…We buy all the Generals’ drugs after all or the US does.. (like Afghanistan ).
29. What a disgraceful insinuation to make about a man whose personal commitment to morality is an example to us all.
41 - what utter bull! As if the Tories or ANY political party doesn’t do its fare share of trying to wind the opposition up.
44. I agree completely.
Fixed term parliaments are the cure to all of this waffle and spin. Can anyone come up with a reasonable reason why we don’t have them?
44. But they don’t mess about with the nations finances “to wind the opposition up” as Gordon did at the last budget.
Neither do they obsess about what the opposition are up to with quite so much passion as your lot.
For as much as it irritates me to see it going on, it only proves to me that Brown very afraid of the Tory renaissance.
42. Who cares what it was, its time to do something now.
Secondly the US has purused one of the most aggressive policies over Burma of any nation on earth, much of it under the much maligned George W Bush. Acts in Congress have been passed that are the most wide ranging around. Rather than farting about the State Department realised early that this was a serious move by activists against the regime and was one of the first out of the blocks to show support.
Attempts like that being carried out by the people of Burma require pragmatic, practical support as well as rhetoric. It feeds through to their efforts especially now when things have reached a critical juncture where the government is moving to shut the communication channels.
What has been the response of the UK over the years? ‘Oh your woman, shes very brave isn’t she’.
Think this is just having a pop at Labour? Read the link.
http://www.labourspace.com/campaign.php?whichcampaign=87
Pull the finger out.
41 Sorry Bob, that is rubbish and you know it. It’s politics, it’s tribal, it’s brutal. That’s the way it is supposed to be. And I thought the Tory front bench was calling for an election in June?
Good effort again, Marcus. But if Brown is “very afraid of the Tory renaissance”, then he’s surely just go for it now. The longer he waits, the more likely the Dark Ages PM will be swept away by the Renaissance
To illustrate the effect of weightings and adjustments for likelihood to vote and past vote look at the recent Mori/Sun poll .
Actual poll figures Lab 44 Con 30 LibDem 15 Others 11
With Mori adj taking only those 100% certain to vote
Lab 42 Con 34 LibDem 14 Others 10
Using ICM adj taking those 7-10 on the scale of certainty to vote
Lab 41 Con 33 LibDem 16 Others 10
Add further ICM weighting by past vote would have given something like
Lab 39 Con 33 LibDem 18 Others 10
Populus weighting would have given final figures somewhere between the last 2 sets say 40/33/17/10
One set of raw figures several different final publishable figures depending on methodology .
47 “Brown very afraid of the Tory renaissance”
Nice try Marcus, but this is risible. Gordon has nothing to be afraid of. The Tory front bench are lazy part-timers and the only hard-worker is the boy David.
42 Don’t be silly. Drug dealers buy up Afghanistan’s drugs not the US which expends a great deal of effort trying to disrupt poppy production there.
There’s nothing hypocritical about our stand on Burma. Putin and the Chinese have the charming attitude that Governments ‘own’ their population and should be allowed to do whatever they like with them. Given their appalling records on human rights you can see why.
Well written Mike.
Like several other posters I await the polls after David Cameron will duly galvanise his troops next week.
Sadly a factor to consider is which party will “The Sun” newspaper lend its support to ?
My guess is that David Cameron will surprise “the sheepie”and will narrow the opinion poll gap.
Roll on next week!
To use a phrase from yesterday: rather a hysterical reaction from RedTed to a sober, well argued, bi-partisan, linked to betting,post from Mike.
53. Blue Moon. The problem is that UN action will almost certainly be limited, EU action may well be limited. This country is still an independent one and whilst there is nothing wrong with trying to pursue multilateral lines through the usual institutions it is equally perfectly fair to conclude that whether the rest will follow or not, the UK government will do what it has to do.
What really gets on my goat is that any criticism is seen as anti Labour and the response is a knee jerk oh no its all great. Or indeed its personalised to Gordon….I’m talking about a government response. It just shows the total inability of people to look any further than their own rectums.
This is the sort of nonsense DC is up against. The idea that DC is opposed to ‘talking about’ taxes, crime and immigration is ridiculous but GO’s remarks in The Spectator are written up as Tory ’split’.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=484079&in_page_id=1770
Good to see Red Flump stating that Dave is the Conservatives best card. Hence the sustained attacks on him on all political blogs by Labour trolls pretending to be Tories.
51. all huge labour leads that would translate into GE landslides
52. “Gordon has nothing to be afraid of…”
Nothing encourages me more than the sight of Labour activists on here and elsewhere taking their position -and the electorate- for granted.
We made that mistake, mind you we made it after eighteen years in office, not ten, but the result is the same.
Your confidence is not backed by your actions, either. If you have nothing to fear why is it that there is such unseemly desperation on the Labour side to get to the polls now - before it’s too late?
Yokel The UK does have sanctions of its own on Burma. If you can identify specific areas where the UK could independently be tougher I’d be interested to hear it and Hague should certainly use the argument. GB wrote to Ban Ki Moon some days ago on this issue so I don’t think he can be faulted there.
If there is no election its going to be a right damp squib now !
Tories in a state of panic?
Doesn’t sound that way:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7014445.stm
49: “And I thought the Tory front bench was calling for an election in June?”
Yep, and they still are evidently.
58 and of course as RedFlump reminded us, this site really goes downhill when there’s a lack of serious objective analysis;
all this silly tribal name calling so detracts from the real purpose of PB - to help enrich its readers.
What a pity that posts like post 22 on this thread are allowed to get in the way of the objective comment and betting info.
there is an on-line electoral poll running on the doctors’ web site http://www.doctors.net.uk
The current figures are:
Conservative 73.7%
Liberals 12.3%
Others 9.1%
Labour 4.8%
I put the figures into Baxter (which makes no allowance for “others”)
It gave the following outcome:
Consevatives 627 seat
Liberals 0
Labour 0
It is not hubris or taking the electorate for granted. I am just totally confident that Gordon can take David any time, this autumn or next spring. We have the momentum, the finances and the policies. David has the money, but, well, money doesn’t buy you everything.
60 Valiant effort once more, Marcus. But you’ll doubtless be among the first to call Brown a coward if he doesn’t go now. I get the feeling that the momentum is becoming unstoppable and that Brown will go for it, having looked at the weekend polls. The tone of the Sundays will also determine the mood music for next week. Doubtless one of them - prob the STel - will have a very strong Cameron interview but the others, if they’re left out, might go for him instead and use the Tebbit stuff as the kick-off for that. It is all very messy and difficult for DC. He will need to have a superb week, to restore his authority and also close down the snap option. If he can do that, then we will know he is a serious player, and Brown will too. But it’s a big ‘if’. Even you might accept that…?
59 A 6% lead would not translate into a landslide and that poll was just an illustrative example . I could have given other examples with results giving both Labour and Conservatives leads depending on the methodology .
I still think Labour have done a Chelsea and replaced a Jose Mourhino with an Avram Grant.
52. Do you ever post anything other than sloppy rewrites of the latest Labour spin lines? It really is pathetic to read.
I think another problem facing Brown now is perception of what is an “election victory”.
He’s let this head of steam build up to such an extent that if he goes for a poll and only comes back with the same kind of majority, or even just a slightly increased majority, people will think “well what was all that for, you’ve put us through all that to gain six seats and twenty more months in power etc etc”.
Anything less than a stonking great three figure majority would look worse-than-adequate. Such a middling result would also pierce the PM’s reputation as a brainiac strategist, a political grandmaster…
Yes he’d win, but he might look a lessened figure. And all for an extra two years in power, when he didn’t have to call an election anyway.
This has to be a factor.
Hasn’t Labour allowed speculation to reach such a level that to fail to call an election now will look like running scared? I’m not saying this would lead to catastrophic consequences for Brown, but it would sure look bad. After an extremely impressive 12 weeks, it woudl look as if he’d bottled it. Whatever the polls say, Cameron would be able to claim Brown had chickened out because he knew he couldn’t win. Psychologically, it would look like Labour was running scared, having led their troops 3/4 of the way up the hill, they would have marched them back down again.
Some posters have argued that Labour would probably more or less retain their present majority, but not obviously increase it, so why take the risk….I think this argument is fallacious, not just because of the possibility of being seen to have bottled it, but also because this might be as good as it gets for Labour between now and Spring 2010. Furthermore, anything other than a very significant advance for the Tories would surely spell the end of Cameron’s leadership and a very lengthy period of Conservative in-fighting and navel-gazing.
I’m starting to think that Brown would be crazy NOT to call an election. And I’m starting to believe that he probably will call one.
Mike quoted by Adam Boulton re his idiosyncratic approach to opinion polling!
I recommend people read Fraser Nelson’s interpretation of Ed Balls’ comments on the Coffee House blog. Very interesting.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse
65 - don’t tell Ave It…. He’ll say it’s about right (maybe overstates Labour’s vote a tad…)
If Labour had any other leader then I reckon an election would be odds on. Only Browns legendary “caution” and history of bottling a fight is keeping the odds up.
61. Blue Moon read the above link to labourspace.
Labour opposed an investment ban on Burma. My assumption that it wasnt so much party policy as government policy as 100 Labour MPs did once back an early day motion about an investment ban, but its an area where Britain could actually show a bit of effort oin its own.
http://burmacampaign.org.uk/investment_sanctions.html
You can also take a look at the above and the line from Whitehall….(yeah sorry for the long link) in the Q&A about Britains lack of will to put in a unilateral ban on investment
http://www.fco.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pagename=OpenMarket/Xcelerate/ShowPage&c=Page&cid=1007029394365&a=KCountryProfile&aid=1018965307901
One last thing is a bit and Adam Boulton’s blog that I’ve just found.
http://adamboulton.typepad.com/my_weblog/
The difference in responses to recent events are unintentionally summed up here quite well.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/25/wburma425.xml
71 - seanT,
I quite agree. Last time, Howard quietly whittled away below the surface and turned what looked like a 100+ majority to 66.
Brown can’t really afford that to happen to him in his first election. And as an election this autumn would almost certainly be the most campaign-sensitive election in recent decades (ie the electorate and therefore polls would be unusually sensitive to what actually happens in the official campaigning period), is it a risk he will really take?
Yokel. A gauntlet well and truly picked up . Excellent!
67. It’s difficult sometimes to keep a rational head on this.
As a Tory candidate in a front-line LD marginal I can tell you that the one thing I would love to be doing next month is fighting an election!
And the PR stuff is true, we have all our election material written and ready to go, we have our election plan agreed, audited by COO and we have the money ready in my election fund.
The possibility that I could end up being an MP by Christmas instead of hanging around as a PPC for another 2 or more years is a deliciously tempting prospect for me.
But the head says it just won’t happen. The surest way for Brown to secure total Tory unity right now is to call an election.
53
“Drug dealers buy up Afghanistan’s drugs not the US which expends a great deal of effort trying to disrupt poppy production there.” is utter claptrap….
Afghanistan poppy and opium production is at all time highs.Most of the drugs end up in Britain. (which has no zewro tolerance policy, gort rid of its Drugs Czar, does not arrest models openly taking cocaine or those who admit it..etc)
As I said: hypocrisy..
(and decriminalises cannabis)
Do think that the aftermath in the Con Party of a Lab win would be part of Brown calculations. The bloodletting would surely be even more brutal than after 97 and 01 (and 03, come to think of it), with the “true Blues” demanding the soul of the party be returned and the battered Cameroonies seeking to retain their power-base. Can see Fox being the first to jump over the parapet. One of the highlights for me on 97 (I was working through the night on reaction stuff) was to see the leadership pitch beginning before the polls had closed, although Portillo’s bid was somewhat stymied by Twiggy! If Brown thinks he will win with a majority of 80 or more, then he would expect the fall-out to be so great that it might take another full Parliament for the Tories to be any sort of cohesive opposition. Then again, that was supposed to happen to Labour post 92. Many blamed Smith (and by extension, Brown) for the “Tax Bombshell” yet it didn’t stop him becoming leader and paving the way for what followed. But it did need the ERM debacle to destroy the Tories then.
All data from September 2007
Conservative Range: 36% (4) 35% (1) 34% (3) 33% (3)
Labour Range: 44% (1) 42% (1) 41% (1) 40% (1) 39% (4) 38% (1) 37% (2) 36% (1)
Liberal Democrat Range: 20% (1) 19% (1) 18% (1) 16% (2) 15% (5) 14% (1) 13% (1)
Now looking at that you could say the following with complete justification
Modal: Con 36% Lab 39% Lib Dem 15% : Lab majority of 62
Median: Con 34.5% Lab 39.5% Lib Dem 16% : Lab majority of 96
Mean: Con 34.5% Lab 39.25% Lib Dem 15.91% : Lab majority of 88
In other words Labour with a majority of about 75
82. The odd paragraph would help the flow, dear chap.
84 Agreed! That will teach me to speed-type without spacing properly
Despite that failure, is there any sense in the argument?
81 LOL. If you really believe the US and UK Governments are secretly behind the international trade in hard drugs then I can only say that you’re living up to your moniker.
82 It makes sense to me.
What the national polls miss are regional swings and how, in the electoral system we have, they effect the key marginal seats that either significant party has to win to form an administration.
87
Did I say that? You are reading things into my words I never said.
Since you read too quickly let me repeat it
more simply.
For all the US and UK supposed action on drugs in Afghanistan, drug output is at record levels.. ever.
UK drug taking is at record levels.
So talk of action against drugs is : talk.
Actions etc.. show it is pure bull excrement.
I hope that is simple enough to be understood.
“81 LOL. If you really believe the US and UK Governments are secretly behind the international trade in hard drugs then I can only say that you’re living up to your moniker.”
I thought that was common knowledge.
Re 82 lap top, the fall out depends on the scale of the gap. If the Conservatives get 240+ then that would be progress even if the Lab majority is only down 20, because the LDs would be halved and in a crisis of their own. There is more likelihood of a Lib Dem fall out than one in the Conservatives because of the impact of the losses.
For any party to get from just under 200 to above 300 typically takes two GEs.
Harry Hayfield I think it’s very unlikely that Labour would get a 60 plus majority with a mere 3 point national lead. That’s what they got last time on the old boundaries. With new boundaries you’re probably looking at nearer 40-45. To achieve the same majority as last time ( which I freely accept would be a considerable achievement) Labour probably need a 5 point lead or so, I would have thought.
RedTed @1 - You are cj the guy who tried to hoax us the other night. You are banned. Get off this site.
94
Reminds me of something I was idly wondering last night. I don’t suppose there’s any chance that this latest Yougov poll is the one to which cj was actually referring originally, and that he got the publication date not the numbers wrong?
Just musing really…
51 - LOL - nice work - and most revealing.
Watch out for the armed wing of the Pollvisional Company Council coming your way soon!
82 - Go in to a dark room and put a cold flannel on your head and repeat after me: “I must keep taking my medication.”
92 I was hypothesising (not sure about grammatical correctness) on basis of increased majority, which surely would be the only thought in Brown’s mind if he goes now. No point in going for it in expectation that majority would fall
71
Anything less than a stonking great three figure majority would look worse-than-adequate. Such a middling result would also pierce the PM’s reputation as a brainiac strategist, a political grandmaster…
Would 99 do.
If Gordon wins, seant, perhaps you’d consider packing in this writing and political commentary stuff. You could go back to the family business, sitting on a rock near Falmouth waving a lantern about, you must have thought about, when you saw the rich pickings from the Napoli.
Does anyone have to hand/know the swing that Labour got from SNP during this years scottish election campaign? That swing seems to me to be probably the best swing possible during a modern election campaign and therefore the worst case scenario for Brown if Cameron was to get that swing from Lab in this year’s hypothetical election. Is labour’s current 6 point lead above the point they could be caught by that swing?? - might be what Brown’s thinking.
95:
Probably not because his ‘poll’ stated a fairly large Lib Dem rise.
” For any party to get from just under 200 to above 300 typically takes two GEs. ”
…and we might get one of them out of the way in just a few weeks time…
Matt.
100
I completely disagree.
Any general election this autumn would have the possibility of a bigger swing. That’s because it’d be pretty much a “snap” election. Unlike any general - or local or devolved - election since at least the 1980s, it will take place earlier than expected before either party has carved its niche or fleshed out (m)any concrete proposals.
As a result, there would be the potential for an even bigger swing this autumn. Whether it happened would of course depend upon the relative success of the different parties’ campaigns.
Remember also that there was a surprisingly big swing towards the Tories in 2005 between pre-campaign polls (and indeed most campaign polls) and the final result.
101:
And a small Labour fall and a largish Tory fall - so wrong on all counts.
101: Thanks - I forgot that!
99. Oooh, touchy. Did I drill into a nerve?!
Anyway the Thomases weren’t wreckers. We were smugglers. Kernow bys Vyken!
Apparently it isn’t just Tories…
World Socialist Web-site:
“Gordon Brown’s address to Labour’s annual conference was clearly a General Election speech. As such it demonstrated that, whenever it is held, the coming poll will be a contest between two Conservative parties—one led by David Cameron and the other headed by Brown.”
http://wsws.org/articles/2007/sep2007/brow-s26.shtml
106 - Aye Cornwall Forever, and let’s all vote UKIP
105 Also, the poll was only conducted yesterday.
106:
Yes, seanT you are dazzlingly right, while frumpy-old-man is flounderingly, comprehensively wrong! If Brown can’t better the result his nemesis Blair achieved in 2005 - when the Iraq war had pummelled Labour’s reputation for competence and honesty into the gravel - then he will regard himself (rightly so) as a failure of monstrous proportions. Brown will be a broken man after that - a hunched, shrunken figure burdened with self-doubt and tortured by the sense of squandered destiny. That’s why there won’t be a GE anytime soon. For Brown, the psychological implications of failure are too horrible to contemplate.
103 - fair enough, thanks for the input. Do we know the swing Lab
103 - fair enough, thanks for input. Do we know the swing Lab-SNP though? I seem to remember it being fairly masssive but that might just be my hyperbolic memory (I had money on SNP.)
Afternoon All
I had no idea that some more pointers may be given after tomorrow’s local elections,much more reliable than opinion polls.
I await the results and turnout figures with bated breath and suggest that the LibDems will draw some comfort rom them.
Polling takes place tomorrow in nine council by-elections, with Labour seeking to defend seats in seven of them.
The results will provide a key snapshot of voters’ opinion as Mr Brown ponders the general election date.
The contests are in Cheshire, Chester-le-Street, Dover, Kent, Mansfield, Northamptonshire, Portsmouth and Sunderland.
They include polls in wards in the marginal Commons constituencies of Dover, Corby and Portsmouth North.
112. “Do we know the swing Lab-SNP though? I seem to remember it being fairly masssive but that might just be my hyperbolic memory ”
Constituencies 2007 Scottish Parliament:
SNP 32.93% (+9.16% compared to 2003)
Lab 32.15% (-2.74% compared to 2003)
Regional lists:
SNP 31.02 (+10.16%)
Lab 29.16 (-0.14%)
Polls from Jan 2007 to polling day in constituencies section
ICM
SNP 33/34/32/34/
Lab 31/29/27/32/
Yougov:
SNP 33/35/35/36/37/39/38/37
Lab 31/29/29/27/30/30/30/31
O/T
Seems a racing cert that Boris Johnson will get the nomination to be the conservative candidate for Mayor of London
Former frontbencher Mr Johnson has been made the overwhelming favourite by Ladbrokes at 1/50, with Mr Boff his nearest rival at 10/1.
Boris will take some of the limelight away from Gord.
110. He’ll still be in government with a working majority.
8 he did say “if Cameron plays a blinder”. If he does, and if it is fairly and properly reported, at length and in the same gushing tones
Bob - and just who on the BBC do you suppose will report Cameron’s “blinder” in gushing tones? Answers on the back of a postage stamp please.
110
Forget the pyschology bit.
Gordon does not NEED to have a GE. So he won’t.
His political mantra is “no risk taking”.
A GE is a risk that is totally avoidable.
Simple .
94. You have been outed. And I said you were a sockpuppet the other day.
What a surprise
Bog off you pathetic little weasel.
14 - Brilliant thanks!, ICM and yougov were very different but I guess the gap could have averaged out to about 6% before polling ( which is about the gap we have between Con-Lab now which kind of fits my theory - although it was a bit of an SNP vote collapse rather than much of a swing so my theory doesn’t really work at all, d’oh)
114 - Basically, Yougov are pants when it comes to scotland.
22. Redflump.
Cameron is on the fags?? Wouldn’t you be?!!
Tory leader must be the sh1test job in the world. Personally attacked every day. Working around the clock. Insurmountable mountain to climb. Sniping has-beens. Constant dilemmas. Aggressive media interviews..
What could possibly be MORE stressful?!
103/114
In the run-up to the last GE campaign, I believe ICM/MORI polls had Labour on 39-40 and the Tories on about 33. Yougov was a slight outlier with more like a 36-33 split.
The overall result was 37-33. So the swing was at worst comparable with that over the Scottish campaign (the figures Andrea helpfully provided)
120. “Brilliant thanks!, ICM and yougov were very different”
These are all polls from Jan 2007 to May 2007 for Scotland (including the mytical mruk)
http://www.alba.org.uk/polls/2006polls.html
123 - Ok you’re right, my scotland based theory is a bit pants…
123 ICM had Labour on 38-40%, and Conservatives on 31-34%, and was pretty consistent, apart from giving Labour one 10% lead. MORI was all over the place, putting the Conservatives on 29-39%, and Labour on 34-39%, but usually giving Labour a clear lead. Yougov was the most consistent, putting the Conservatives on 32-36%, and Labour on 36-38%, usually 2% or so ahead of the Conservatives.
Still begs the the question “what’s the largest modern _campaign_ swing”
I wouldn’t differ all the much from Marcus Wood’s assessment. Cameron should make a decent speech, as he usually does on set-piece occasions, and it should narrow the gap somewhat. I’d like an early election, as I personally hope to win (a bird in the hand…), but if I were Gordon I would wait for Sunday week before deciding on the election: it should then be reasonably clear how things stand. If we’re still 7-8% ahead I think we’ll go for it, otherwise we just ignore the inevitable teases and sail onwards.
One thing that strikes me is that the media and a lot of posters here think this is all a lot more off-the-cuff than it really is. I mentioned early this year that MPs were on partial alert, and a few months ago that we’d been asked to start giving help to Tory marginals. At the time, the general view here was that I was making it up, but I don’t post things that aren’t true (just bite my tongue if it’d be unhelpful). There has always been a contingency plan for the possibility that the transition would go smoothly (check), Gordon would go down well (check), and the Tories would look discredited (?).
It was certainly true that 6 months ago we were no more prepared for an election in Tory marginals than in Bulgaria. That’s no longer the case, and to some extent it isn’t the crucial issue. If a ‘give them a mandate’ feelings rolls over the country, it’ll sweep away Tory seats in the same way as in 1997 (remember Stephen Twigg rolling his eyes when he beat Portillo, totally messing up his private life?). There is now IMO a possibility - not yet a probability - of a 97-type landslide.
78. “as an election this autumn would almost certainly be the most campaign-sensitive election”
Agreed. Brown PM for 3 months and Cameron Leader of the Opposition for less than 2 years. Taken together, these must be the shortest periods the 2 main leaders have been in position at any election in memory.
Polls at the moment are a bit like fans having watched 2 new players playing for their football teams in their first 2 or 3 matches of the season. The fans have formed an initial impression but that impression is subject to change.
A GE campaign now would be like the next 4 or 5 matches - every opportunity for people to change their views which are far from being entrenched.
128. With perhaps you in the Portillo role Nick ?
128: ‘There is now IMO a possibility - not yet a probability - of a 97-type landslide.’
I think Mr Palmer must have contracted a small dose of conference fever. Am I the only one to think that people are starting to get a little carried away?
118 - bit like the avoidance of the need for a leadership election then
130 - Were You Still Up For Palmer?
131 - was thinking exactly the same.
Faced with the inevitable Palmer-style landslide, perhaps a masterstroke by Cameron would be to announce a Tory leadership vote in his speech next week - “back me or sack me”. If GB then decided to run to the polls, it would be seen as the most opportunistic political stunt in history, and I don’t think even he’d go for that. And I don’t think Her Maj would consent to dissolve parliament in such circumstances.
It would out-fox the so-called master of cunning political stunts.
I think…
I see that SNP has apparently selected their new candidate for Banff and Buchan…they will reveal it soon, but not immediately (well, actually not when Salmond was asked about who he/she was yesterday)..so does anyone hear anything about this candidate?
Ever since Gordo became leader NP has gone from insight to spin - the jackboot of No 10 seems to be on his keyboard fingers
Nick Palmer, I am disappointed with you. Your years as a valued campaigner for animal welfare should have taught you that it is cruel to tease Tories in the way you are doing. Some of them have feelings, you know.
stjohn & other “2010ers” - I’m now absolutely convinced there will be a GE this year (and my bank manager will be delighted should this prove to be the case), despite this still being a surprisingly odds against bet in the markets. However, as a saver, I’ve just taken Betfair’s limited amount available at 12-1 for 2010, which matches Labrokes’ ridiculously generous odds of a few weeks ago and certainly won’t be seen again should there be any hiccup in the supposed GE plans for 2007.
136. The idea that Nick Palmer has ever posted anything on here which HASN’T been through the spincycle is so preposterous as to be rather touching.
He’s a New Labour MP, for F’s sake. His spin is sometimes insightful, but it is spin, nonetheless.
139 seanT. Would you like to advise PB of the timing of your next retirement from the site ?? ….. we’re think of running a book on the length of the departure.
I think people have a bit of a blue mist descend on them when Nick posts. I have re-read 128 and though it was a considered post from a Labour leaning poster. What is people’s problem?
Its better than the hectoring, capital letter ridden, rhetoric of some
139 Jack W Are you looking for a Glasgow kiss or what?!
I think you may be getting caught up in conference fever Nick. In no way does it feel like 97, and any poll taken in the 24 hours after a leaders speech sin’t worth the paper it’s printed on. If there is an 8%+ gap in the second week of October, i’ll take it all back, but I can’t see it at all.
128 Nick you can fairly say that you speculated months ago that GB’s succession might produce a 6-7 point lead in September and that in those circumstances you were in favour of going for an October GE. Many posters were indeed dismissive of you. But 1997? What are you on up there? Is it a legal substance?
I just wish we could get on with the election right now. All this will he/won’t he speculation is getting so boring now.
Come on Mr Brown, lets gets this party started.
143 Woody - borrowing the link from post 74 above, try reading Frazer Nelson’s “On to Blackpool” piece from yesterday - the Labour Party Conference sounds like an interminable bore:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/
I am trying to find a precedent for a party with a 50+ majority calling an election less than 30 months after the previous one. We’ve had 17 elections from 1945 and not one remotely fits this pattern. So a November election would be interesting new territory. If I were Leader of the Opposition I reckon I could make some advantage from this. But, unfortunately, the Conservatives have got that pl*nker Cameron.
142 Blue Moon. Thank you for the kind offer of a romantic moment in Scotland’s biggest city. However I must demur, Mrs. Jack is a wee bit unhappy about your truly engaging in tonsil tennis with the chaps.
144 Blue Moon again !! ….. a 6-7% lead in a GE will be a landslide for Labour.
I see the BBC - good old Guto Hari in this instance - is pedalling the ‘Gordon’s Conservative’ myth that Mike demolished a few threads back. Hari even spoke of polling evidence that substantiates it. The power Labour can exercise over the media is breathtaking - just invent something and it’s reported as scientific fact.
Meanwhile, even estate agents don’t trust Gordon:-)
http://tinyurl.com/38osu4
140. I’m going to go for the record next time. I’m going to see if I can get angry and depressed, swear never to post again, sign off with a passionate valedictory, flounce out of the door for the very last time - then be back posting again WITHIN THE HOUR.
I think I can do it. I may ask for sponsorship.
151 seanT. “…. I may ask for sponsorship.”
I suppose 10 guineas springs to mind !! …. you’ll need it.
146 And also borrowing from the link, Jon Cruddas’ conference diary, which I found entertaining
http://www.spectator.co.uk/online-edition/columnists/193431/jon-cruddass-conference-diary.thtml
If Nick Palmer is socialising in a similar style, it may explain his optimism
146. Always the same isn’t it. Leftie prigs who don’t know how to enjoy themselves. Tory one is always more fun. (Will probably be my last ever visit to Blackpool)
I’m sorry but why are some folk thinking that the Tories stand a chance in November, hasn’t their share of the vote pretty much flatlined at 33% for quite a while now..
Incidently if you are comparing Majorities in the new Boundary changes a Lab maj of 60 would be the equivalent of 80 (fought in 2005).
Also as some has already said this is new territory and could see Brown doing as equally well or better than 2005….
154 Woody. “Will probably be my last ever visit to Blackpool.”
You’re not defecting to Labour too ????
150. Never mind that, what if the government overshoot their borrowing target by 2-3 billion this year, despite the economy apparently being in great form and bumper tax receipts.
It may not get easier if the tax receipts are not so bumper in the next two-three years.
Spending statements due in a month or so I think, so we’ll see what they plan to do if they a) overshoot and b) expect things to get tight.
Defections. Rats and sinking Ships. A similar theme pre 1997 election and again in 2001.