Will we know next weekend?
November 23rd, 2007- Sky News commissioning Huhne-Clegg poll
Adam Boulton has emailed me to say that Sky News has commissioned a YouGov Poll of party members on the LibDem Leadership race.
This will be carried out next week and they will have the results to make available ion the evening of Saturday 1st December.
Given that by then a large proportion of members are likely to have voted then at least part of it will be akin to an exit poll. My guess is that this is likely to be more accurate than the privately commissioned polls during the 2006 race. Certainly the YouGov Tory member polls at that stage in the Davis-Cameron clash proved to be very accurate.
In the betting William Hill has reported that there’s been a lot of interest in Chris Huhne and on Betfair his price has tightened to 2.2/1.
Mike Smithson
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As the ballot papers are already out - most votes will probably be cast this weekend. I am swinging more and more to Huhne but still not decided. Tabman - what should I do?
2. Vote Huhne. And vote often.
I’ve really screwed up my betting on this market.
I lose £17 on Clegg and make 60p on Huhne - and that’s WITH cutting my losses - whoppee!!
Idiot.
As this poll is not till next week it is not the same as the Yougov one I took part in yesterday which also had a Clegg/Huhne question .
for Hoonie to win would be a stunning slap in the face for the party’s ruling elite. Are the members capable of doing this? you bet they are! Do they have enough motivation not to do what thay are being invited to do? That’s a much harder question, and if I knew the answer, I’d be as rich as Mike
Icarus
Stick with Clegg. You too, Tabman!
TT depends if you think the party’s ruling elite are its MPs or its activists.
I’m glad Yougov are waiting until next week to poll. I might have actually made my mind up by then.
Ballot paper still sitting in front of me at the moment waiting for its cross. Not normally this indecisive but threes good and bad points about both candidates that keeps me undecided.
Didn’t have this problem last time as Huhne was the only real credible candidate.
re 6. Peter - I recall that you were one of the leaders of the “bloggers for Ming” movement last time. That doesn’t reflect well on your judgement.
The party establishment got it seriously wrong in 2006 so why should we believe it now and many of those MP Clegg supporters are like the Tories who came out for David Davis in the 2005 race. What a load of crawlers? Doesn’t it make you feel ashamed?
All four of my family’s votes went to Huhne
I voted Huhne last time but this time I have been seriously thinking about plumping for Clegg. Well I was until the spat the other day. Now I am watching what they both do/say about policy much more carefully before I put my cross. I like and have met them both but I am comparing the dourer image, but strong policies of Huhne versus the uncertain policy stances, but positive images of Clegg. Tough one.
You’ve got another two weeks yet. Take a bit of time to see how they continue to do.
I’ve already voted for Clegg
There certainly seems to be a bit of a generational cleavage in this race. LDYS are almost all Cleggers, but older activists tend to be more pro-Huhne.
YouGov can’t accurately poll the LD membership for what I would have thought were fairly obvious reasons. Only someone with a membership list could do that.
Still disappointed Steve Webb didn’t stand - so much better than the two candidates left. Clegg has got my vote and I think my wife is leaning that way also.
I haven’t posted on PB.com for a long time but can’t resist commenting on my own party’s leadership election. The YouGov poll should be interesting, my guess is that the race is tight but with Clegg still narrowly ahead… the media however really have no idea about internal Lib Dem politics. They ignore the party most of the times & when they do speculate its usally on the basis of their own anti-Lib Dem prejudices. They completely overestimated Clegg’s lead at that the start, and are simply guessing at the current state of play.
Chris has run a very effective, aggressive campaign. Sometimes he’s been far too negative the accusations of vouchers & filpflopping have been misplaced and damaging to both candidates. None-the-less it has allowed him to claim the radical mantle - however, his programme is actually very conservative. He is not proposing any fundamental changes to policy (his one big policy idea the green tax switch has been party policy for the last year)- his pitch is that control public services should simply be devolved to local councils and that there is no need to give individual users greater control over provision. That’s a perfectly respectable position but its more social democratic managerialism rather than a liberal revolution.
Nick has run a very cautious campaign, he’s acted like a frontrunner defending a big lead, even though in reality things were much closer than they appeared. That was a big mistake - allowing huhne to set the agenda. His campaign has been too defensive, too afraid of being accused of being rightwing he has delayed in outlining his policy manifesto. He is now fighting back and trying to regain the momentum. He has finally started to outline a clearer stance on policy - he is actually far more liberal & revolutionary than Huhne, advocating a much more radical devolution of power not just down to councils but right down to service users as well.
The issue for this election is whether Clegg has left his fight back too late, and allowed Huhne to label him as a vague, flip flopper. I hope not.
Huhne might well be an effective campaigner, but if he wins it will be because he pandered to the activist base rather than face outwards to the electorate. If Clegg does hold on to win then he needs to be true to his instincts - as leader he will need to throw away the caution and push hard for a radical overhaul of party policy and make us a much more genuinely liberal party.