ComRes reports a 13% lead in Crewe & Nantwich
May 19th, 2008Updated 2145
CreweTV
By election voting shares - CON 48%: LAB 35%: LD 12%
A ComRes poll taken amongst voters in Crewe and Nantwich for the Independent is showing that the Tories are heading for a 13% lead. This is substantially bigger than the 8% that ICM had in their survey at the weekend for the News of the World.
The first details came from Andrew Grice’s blog .
What could be critical here is the timing of this latest poll. If the fieldwork took place over the weekend, which I assume, then it seems to suggest that things have continued to move away from Labour.
ComRes and ICM are both telephone pollsters operating quite similar methodologies although their processing of the data is different. Quite often ICM carry out the fieldwork for ComRes though I do not know whether that happened here.
A 13% Tory lead compares with the 16.8% margin that Labour had at the general election and if this was to come about would represent a swing of just under 15%. Anthony Wells’s excellent list of Tory target seats only goes up to the first 200 with the final one requiring a swing of just 10.5%. Within that top 200, at place 191, is Steve McCabb’s Birmingham Hall green. Steve is the Labour official leading their campaign in the Cheshire seat.
All this suggests that we could be in landslide territory which could have a dramatic affect on the current domestic political scene - particularly on Gordon’s future.
Mike Smithson
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Squee!
Fangirl noises come to C&N politics.
15% swing = Con majority of 260 on electoral calculus.
… a cup of tea and some biscuits and now it’s TWO new threads with HUNDREDS of comments on.
Gordon, we just can’t go on like this.
Give it up, mate. Let the rest of us go back to our lives.
Whats going on. Every time I post, a new thread appears. Anyways…
“It is finished for Labour. The longer they are in, the lower they shall fall.
The best they can do is resign and rebuild.“
2b rofl not gonna happen, not gonna happen. Con Gain Bootle etc.
repost
“Highly amusing piece on Telegraph blogs about Angela Browning MP posting her mobile through a voter’s letterbox
contained this fascinating snippet
“On a more serious note Labour is in awe of the Tory operation up here. They say that the Conservatives can turn around high quality literature very quickly and get it through doors all within a day.
In contrast Labour’s machinery is more grinding and less swift.
I dare say Lord Ashcroft will again be portrayed as the Bogeyman of the piece. But in short he has presided over the sort of campaign the Tories have never seemingly had the means, motive or opportunity to mount in recent memory.”
THANK YOU, Lord Ashcroft, you are a superstar. It wasn’t money, it was the sheer torrent of volunteers. Ashcroft’s gift to the party is the way he has professionalised campaigning
by Test May 19th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
4 Not a brilliant, earth changing post - but it was a reply to the question asked.
3…our new lives in the House of Commons! right Marcus?
God !!!!!! Mike’s got more threads than Savile Row !!!!!
[From previous thread]
129. That’s slightly unfair. We can’t know what Tamsin thinks about her splendid mum.
However I do think Labour were somewhat tasteless in calling the by-election so quickly - and then they compounded that by presuming, very arrogantly, that the voters would just elect a Dunwoody sprog, out of “sympathy”. Even if the lady lived in Wales.
Surely C&N (IF the Tores win!) will go down as a benchmark: on how NOT to run a by-election.
3 - I replied on the last thread Marcus, but even I find myself a thread behind when I post now…I’m getting on a bit I suppose.
5 - No. Joe Benton hangs on in Bootle with a mere 28% majority
a 15% swing on the 2005 results would be just about the biggest electoral wipeout since the Liberal party collapsed. It would make 1997 for the Tories look like a scratch
I don’t think a 15% swing would be utterly fatal for Brown - but it’ll be an indication that events have degraded since the bye.
Eastbourne helped decide Thatcher’s fate and that was 20%.
15% might be enough.
Have they opened the postal votes yet?
Also, we need to have Eric Pickles canonised.
15 hear hear! We’re not worthy! that’s Lord Pickles to us! eat yer heart out Rennard etc etc
15 Martin. Not too sure that Pickles will fit in a canon ?!?!
Gordon Brown:
CHEERIO CHEERIO CHEERIO
CHEERIO CHEERIO CHEERIO
CHEERIO CHEERIO CHEERIO
CHEERIO CHEERIO!!!!!
etc…………
Anyways, in the Daily Mail, the Labour Traitors are finally talking about some long over due legislation that would resonate with the public.
Discrimination against British soldiers in uniform to become a criminal offence
After we have had immigrants refusing to serve Servicemen in uniform or abusing wounded veterans in NHS hospitals…Airports holding veterans prisoners on aircraft as they land in Britain after serving their country in Iraq and Afghanistan. It wouldnt be a surprise to know that BAA is owned by Johnny Foreigner
It is the least that is due. Perhaps Labour is fearing trials ahead, like members of a Vichy or Nazi regime…
Labour have gone from 4% to 8% to 13% in the space of just over a week. With another couple of days to go until polling day, there position may get ecen worse! :O
What kind of majority would this give the Tories with a 15% swing?
17 …. or a Vicar or a Rector !!!!!!!!!
Eric Pickles can fit in my canon any day, etc.
20 - There could be a tipping point at which Labour voters just decide there’s no point in turning out to cast a “peg over the nose” vote.
Can Labour go down to 0% in the polls?????!
New PPP Primary Poll for Oregon :
Clinton 39% .. Obama 58%
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_Oregon_051908.pdf
24 - lol. Just put in Con 70 Lab 0 into electoral calculus. Somehow the Libs still hang on to 23 seats
5 …..And an even bigger thank you to the tax haven of Belize without which he might have had to pay UK tax!
Is there any substance to the Charles Clarke stalking horse rumour post C and N or is it just PB speculation?
8.”God !!!!!! Mike’s got more threads than Savile Row !!!!!”
Jack, now where have I heard that joke before…..
@26:
LIBERAL DEMOCRATS WINNING HERE
26 LOL - perhaps Jack is right and the LDs ARE difficult to shift!!!
9 What we do know is that her mother is not yet cold and she is doing her best to get her old job - and doing a lot of smiling.
There is something very, very undignified.
I remember in 1990 Bootle when SDP came about 9th with about 46 votes! Can Lab go lower? (Are there 10 candidates??)
31 once the buggers are in, they are difficult to get rid of, as i found out a few weeks ago.
24. I’m wondering if Labour could actually record the first negative rating in an opinion poll - i.e. a figure lower than zero - with less than 0% of the public expressing their support for the government.
Kind of like a Burmese referendum, but in reverse.
There will be two big questions if we win convincingly on Thursday:
1) Who will Labour blame?
2) Whatever happened to the fabled Lib Dem by-election machine?
As I have put on my blog there was a time not long ago when the Lib Dems were the sole beneficiaries of safe Labour seat by elections, indeed it’s not THAT long ago since the Lib dems were winning safe seats from us.
What is happening to them? First they get trounced in the London mayoral elections and then they get stuffed in a seat that by past performance they should have been easy winners in; and now we are told they are targeting Henley?
Henley? Blue Blazer land, the only town in Britain that has a Jaguar dealer at both ends of the high street (not really), that counts Michael Hestletine *and* Boris Johnson as past MP’s.
I used to live in Henley On Thames, in the days when people crossed the road to avoid you if you wore a Blue Rosette Henley remained the one place where you could be sure of a warm welcome as a Conservative; the one place where you could share your Thatcher memories without shame.
Is this a real strategy or an excuse?
20 We should not get too carried away. The first two poll differences are within the margin of error and the third poll was on a similar but different methodology.
29 ChrisD. The old ones are the best !! …. as in most things !!
Jack W is 105.
35 LOL it must be a possibility!!!
Labour appear to have -2 according to this:
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2008/05/19/now-icm-record-record-labour-deficit/
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
You have to wonder how long it will be until the Labour party are in 3rd place in the polls. The economy has far from bottomed out, and the longer Brown clings on, things will only get worse for Labour.
37 - True.
36 - The Conservatives could have probably made a decent fist in any seat which only needed an 8% swing for victory since 2003 - there’s been no really attractive seat since then, allowing the LDs leeway.
27.Roger, meow! Don’t be catty…
Which Scot will get blamed if it goes wrong?
Why is it that if there is any criticism to go around it takes on an even more personal nature if they have a Scottish accent!
19. “Perhaps Labour is fearing trials ahead, like members of a Vichy or Nazi regime…”
Memo to nurse Ratched. Double the dose………
Schadenfreude is a wonderful thing.
@36:
I worry about Henley. We can’t write the yellow peril off. It has all the hallmarks of another Bromley waiting to happen.
Fortunately, this time, we’ll be the ones printing the “Tory Toff” leaflets…
38. Cheeky old sod, age has not dampened your vim and vigour I see.
Sorry to talk US for a second:
Geraldine Ferraro calls Obama ’sexist’ and refuses to back him;
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2008/05/geraldine-ferra.html
What a pleasant woman. Perhaps she can run the next by-election for Labour.
32 Reminds me of the Socialist Joy at winning the Spanish Elections - 3 days after the Madrid bombing and 1 day after the funerals.
Socialists have no soul.
…and I dont mean that in the James Brown sense.
36. That’s an absolutely ludicrous criticism of the Lib Dems. When was the last time there was a by-election in a seat where the Lib Dems were distantly in third but the Conservatives were a lot closer? Ipswich would be a good example: the Lib Dems improved but were still in third.
45 - lol
@43:
I wouldn’t be so sure, Rodge.
You know the first thing we do when we kick your sorry asses out in 2010? An enquiry into Iraq.
And when it becomes clearly how many people Tony’s lies killed, maybe deporting him to the Hague won’t seem such a bad idea.
hopefully this poll is right - now it looks like the stain of the Labour party may be dry-cleaned from the British consciousness at least for a few years it’s time for the Lib Dems to step up to the plate and be the decent honest lefty party.
Given the right approach I think we could see two really different but worthwhile parties in British politics and Labour can go back to peddling socialism to the terminally idiotic. People like Roger shouldn’t have to vote for these nasty incompetents - Roger needs a party that will let him feel worthy and a party that will offer hope to Guardian readers everywhere and an emergency port for softy tories like me who wince at the sight of Nicholas Winterton.
46.Meant to add a wee nudge and a
there. 
Just when it looks like Brown is bottoming out.
It get’s even worse for him.
Kevin Maguire on Sky attacking DC saying he wants to cut taxes. You can see the sheer PANIC in his eyes
54 - Oh deary deary me.
54 hahaha.
36. Rather dangerous to write off the LDs. However recent polls - in particular forced choice questions re whether Cameron/ Brown most acceptable as PM - indicate that anti Tory tactical voting should decrease and there could be some anti Labour tactical voting instead.
At least Friday morning will be a good time to bury bad news if there’s any left!
52 “People like Roger shouldn’t have to vote for these nasty incompetents
As Nurse Ratched will tell you, Roger cant vote.
58 - Maybe it will be just a good day to bury Brown
27 - I assume that as a highly paid Director with principles, you choose not to work through a service company with all its financial advantages, but instead pay more than your fair share of tax though PAYE?
For sheer inepititude,this Labour campaign has to go alongside Bermondsey in early 1983-and we know what happened to Peter Tatchell.I can’t take any more,I’m off for a pint or five.Ciao for now
57 I am not writing them off, just astonished at their myopia.
Their enemy is blue, not red. They can’t help themselves.
36 - There are plenty of by-elections where the LDs have not progressed too much. In recent years Leeds Central, Tottenham and Ipswich spring to mind.
Not winning Crewe does not mean the by-election machine is finished.
60. Shovel is at the ready.
65 - I think there will be a long queue…
64. we achieved a 19% swing against labour in Leeds central from Third place. In 1999 when they still had statospheric national poll ratings.
54 - For Cameron it is an aspiration. For Brown it is, apparently, a reality!
As a Tory PPC, I’m truly delighted that things are so much better for us (I’ve been actively involved only since late 1997 for goodness sake) but am I truly alone in beginning to find the Tory tone on this site a little worrying.
Call me a terrible old pessimist but I think we have to recognise that this is a mid term Government on the wrong end of a down turn that looks (thank God) that it may not be too bad. Clearly Brown has lost a huge amount of credibility and is certainly heavily damaged goods, but the electoral arithmetic is still hugely stacked against the Conservatives come a GE and there’s a whole 2 years to go.
Perspective seems to have become a rare commodity for Tory PBers over the last few days.
67 - OK, my mistake. But there are by-elections where we have not done too much. In fact there always have been. People just assume the LDs to come good in every by-election. It’s not the case.
O/T
OBAMA
That socialist side of Obama may scare a lot of potential, independant voters. It’s the US, after all, not a dhimmi country. I wonder how much impact this kind of We-the-State-Will-Interfere into your life will have in November:
For American does not define “leadership” by finding out what FOREIGNERS want from ‘em and then obeying it. They are not serviable dhimmis!
Furthermore, no self-respecting Americans wanna be told what temperature would aliens like ‘em to keep in their home, and how much they shall eat!
No danger at all to the Conservatives in Henley from the Lib Dems because:
a. The Conservatives are starting off at 53% of the vote, so the Lib Dems will need a sizable swing from the Tories to even get close - there just aren’t enough votes elsewhere to squeeze.
b. There’s no pressing reason to ’stop-the-Tory’, as the Conservatives are proving markedly more popular than Labour nationally.
c. If there was a ’stop-the-Tory’ mood nationally, Henley would be just about the last place it would work.
d. There are plenty of reasons to kick the government by voting Tory, rather than Lib Dem.
e. Usually parties suffer when an MP steps down part way through their term, but Boris has a good reason, and in any case, he wasn’t exactly the sort of backbench MP focussed on constituency matters to the exclusion of all else.
There are probably other reasons, but it will be almost impossible to beat a candidate of either main party in a by-election in a safe seat, when that party is riding high in the polls.
69 GeorgeH, lets face it, your not a Tory are you(?)
Me, I’m not a Tory. It’s too much a lefty term. I’m conservative.
63 I have to say that if Bermondsey in the 80s was anything like it is now, then this Labour campaign would have seen them romp home with an increased majority. Just a shame about the one they actually fought…
69 - Agreed. I think people would do well to remember that by-election polls aren’t exactly known for their stunning accuracy.
69 - George, you are wiser than many Tory posters here. I was 12 when David Steel say “Go back to your constituencies…”. Now I think the Tories are likely to be the largest party next election, but you are right to be on your guard.
Really anyone who thinks the LibDems have any chance in Henley is dreaming. Even if it were analogous as a seat with Bromley, the Conservatives will have learnt from any mistakes made and won’t make them again.
71 - so a swing to the Tories then?
70. I apologise for nit picking but I was there. If we weren’t in the tail end of the Ashdown/Blair love in we’d have won the seat and had a Brent East moment 4 years earlier. Its why I have some sympathy with SeanT’s view of our abusive relationship with labour.
69. Ah, let us have our fun. It’s been tough on the right, these last ten/fifteen years. I think everyone is well aware that a General Election will be a Very Different Matter.
That said, I do genuinely believe Labour has had its own Black Wednesday. The national mood has shifted, in a seismic way. The question is whether the Tories will capitalise on it sufficient to get the majority they need, to do what, deep down, we all want Cameron to do - bring back dogfighting, reintroduce the birch, deport anyone with a name that sounds weird, clusterbomb Peter Mandelson etc.
Is there anything worse than LDs being serious and earnest?
Yes, actually. Tories gloating.
I s’pose, if you want to gloat, its as much your site as mine. But could you do it in small type please?
36 Among its many attractions, Henley has a fine masonic hall.
52 What we really need is a realignment of British politics that sees a party led by Nicholas Winterton alternating in government with a party led by David Cameron, with everything else on the fringes.
Does nayone know the actual figures?Has the Tory vote share gone up since the ICM poll or the Labour vote share collapsedMy guess would be something like Tory 47%,Labour 34%.
rogerh
79 Sensible policies for a better tomorrow!
28. My post on the other thread regarding Charles Clarke moving against Brown was pure speculation. However, I can no longer see that Labour’s vulnerable MP’s have any reason not to support a move that will at least result in a leadership contest and may produce a leader that can limit the GE damage more than Brown evidently can.
Labour under Miliband or Johnson for example cannot possibly me more dishonest, incompetent and vision free as Labour under Brown. A leadership contest would probably be bitter and divisive but Miliband or Johnson might drag together enough unity afterwards to keep Labour togetherish to a GE. Brown just can’t do that.
80 Anything worse than Conservatives gloating?
Yes, desperate Labour Campaigns.
I s’pose, if you want to stir hatred, its as much your country as mine. But could you do it in scotland please?
69. It was Mike wot started it with his comment at the end of his intro: “A 13% Tory lead compares with the 16.8% margin that Labour had at the general election and if this was to come about would represent a swing of just under 15%. Anthony Wells’s excellent list of Tory target seats only goes up to the first 200 with the final one requiring a swing of just 10.5%. All this suggests that we could be in landslide territory which could have a dramatic affect on the current domestic political scene - particularly on Gordon’s future.”
It doesn’t at all suggest landslide territory as by-elections as known for wildly exaggerating the way the national picture looks. If a 15% swing was likely on a national scale, C&N would probably be heading towards a 25%+ swing. Rod’s done the figures, but I’d guess that a 15% swing in a by-election is not far out of line with the current polls, which imply a movement of nearer 9% from Con to Lab. That’s still a lot, but then this is still mid-term.
36/45/64/etc. The Lib Dems will be back. When Labour started big by-election wins in 1994 the Lib Dems could still pull them off in seats where they were the main anti-Tory challenger. Wait for a by-election in the North-East or Manchester or Sheffield or similar and the fabled Lib Dem machine will be back.
O/T
OBAMA
—–
“We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times … and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK,” Obama said.
“That’s not leadership. That’s not going to happen,” he added.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5h-wpxs1Re-8vx2Zk5xnYygW1W67w
—–
That socialist side of Obama may scare a lot of potential, independant voters. It’s the US, after all, not a dhimmi country. I wonder how much impact this kind of We-the-State-Will-Interfere into your life will have in November:
For American does not define “leadership” by finding out what FOREIGNERS want from ‘em and then obeying it. They are not serviable dhimmis!
Furthermore, no self-respecting Americans wanna be told what temperature would aliens like ‘em to keep in their home, and how much they shall eat!
A leadership contest would probably be bitter and divisive but Miliband or Johnson might drag together enough unity afterwards to keep Labour togetherish to a GE.
This is key. I can’t see that happening. If Brown gets slung out, the Brownites will devote the rest of this Parliament (and probably the next one) to taking revenge on the Judases who betrayed them. Brownites are such a powerful group within the party that getting rid of the ministerial Vicars of Bray won’t diminish their power.
86. But this is Crewe. Labour heartland not middle England. Makes it all the more amazing.
86 - I would point out that if the Conservatives made 200 gains from the 198 seats they won at the last election they would have a majority of 146.
90 - No it’s Crewe AND Nantwich.
seanT @ 79
I’m with you. It’s been a dark few years and hellish at times. Of course we should be enjoying it. In fact I took a whole bunch of PB threads to my Association meeting last week and based my speech on the stats and polls just how good things were.
But what I’m hearing now begins to remind me of the braying I used to hear at University all those years ago that so put me off becoming involved right of centre politics.
‘Labour Crewesing for a bruising.’
‘A crewes missile hits 10 Downing Street.’
90 - but not all of Crewe is Labour heartland, which is what makes this bye interesting - if all the seat were like Crewe proper, Labour would probably be coming into this bye with a 25-30% majority.
90. The extent to which it’s Labour heartland is debateable. Yes, it’s been Labour for decades, but very nearly went Tory in the ’80s. It’s the sort of seat that will always be vulnerable on a Conservative landslide - or a by-election held on what for Labour are the wrong terms.
82. The Daily Mail is reporting the figures thusly:
“The survey for ComRes has the Tories on 48 per cent, Labour on 35 per cent and the Lib Dems on 12 per cent, just 72 hours before polling begins”
92. Apologies to the good folk of Nantwich.
@93 just “to show” how good things are. Fat finger syndrome.
93 - I think you’ve got to remember that not all the people on here accused of being “Tories” are actually Tories. They are probably on the right, but their main motivation is anti-Labour.
93 - True. I suspect that a genuine swing voter reading this site (and I expect very few to do so) would be put off, rather than encouraged.
90. Not really. As some pointed out back in late April if the Tories got their act together, which they have, and the national polls then were fairly accurate the Tories should take Crewe comfortably. What is good is that the Tories may for the first time
in a very long time be able to demonstate they can perform well at By Elections and this will be very good for party morale.
93. Dude, it’s only a blog!
Besides, I always say: celebrate the good days, cause there are plenty of bad ones to come.
Some posters may be hoping that humble pie is not on the menu if the polls were wrong.
But surely this is just a by-election. The Newbury, dudley West and Eastleigh by elections were far worse. A 16 % in by election is not a general election swing.
Compare Crewe to the tiory by election defeats which were far worse.
Newbury saw a massive 21 thousand vote defeat from 12,000 majority. Crwere is nothing compared to that.
Alex @ 100. Accepted.
Tangent @101. I’m sure very few come here. You’ve got to have a wardrobe full of anoraks to stick with this as many times a day as I (and I suspect most of us) do. I’ve got to get out more.
What were the swings in Bermondsey and Christchurch?
Holy Cow, I have just been watching the first half of Air crash Investigation where a plane ran out of fuel. I return…. 2 polls and disaster awaits. The parallel if not exact is close/…..
Blimey. This really is incredible stuff. The tories 13% ahead in Crewe and Nantwich! Imagine someone saying this a month ago - they’d have been carted off immediately and locked away forever!
Better start buying more Con seats now (or selling Labour). Just checked Sporting Index - surprise, surprise, they’ve suspended. Probably until tomorrow when they’ll undoubtedly open higher… Glad I sold some Labour at 234 yesterday….
108 - 44% and 35%. Now that’s a silly by-election swing. 15% is peanuts against a very unpopular government. Come on Tories,up your game!
Tories on 48 per cent, Labour on 35 per cent and the Lib Dems on 12 per cent, Daily Mail WOW LDs on 12% just like London. 2 party politics is back:))
105. Correct. Even if the result is a 15% swing - and this is just a by-election poll being reported, not the real result - there were some by-election results in the 1992-7 parliament that would still put that very much in the shade.
The best Tory post-war by-election results were posted on here a few days ago. IIRC, the biggest swing ever achieved in that period was about 21%, so C&N could be up there, but other parties have done considerably better.
88 - Seeing as McCain is seen by many in the GOP as a global warming maniac they could vote for a third party instead (well, maybe not Nader).
By the way, his comments are conservative, not socialist, as Cameron’s (and McCain’s) view of the environment is conservative.
It would be useful if you actually considered policy first rather than ideology, you end up ascribing policies to the wrong ideology, as you have done here, if you are ideology driven.
The daily mail seem to have increased the tory lead with all this nasty party stuff. So much for the daily mail being on labours side.
Ave It 2008 - Still here??
We need something even more over the top than LOL!!
I suggest: Rolling on the Floor Laughing out Loud in Absolute Stitches!!!!!
ROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLISROFLOLIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
another good spot sean t
On the ICM poll, I wonder how much the “spiral of silence” adjustment has helped Labour’s position (obviously I doubt that it would be on the scale of the 12%–>4% and 15%–>8% change to the deficits in the ICM C&N polls). It does work as a “swing dampener”, which tends to be correct at small or medium swings, but when the public mood has changed to a very large extent, I feel that it can overdamp the predicted swing (as in 1997, where the swing was uniquely underreported to a minor extent by a point or two).
Effectively, it seems to boost whoever was ahead at the previous elections (so in 1997, the Tories were overreported by a couple of points, in 2001, Labour were significantly overreported and in 2005, Labour were again overreported by a couple of points). Which could imply that 27% is an overreporting of Labour’s true current popularity …
On the C&N poll, I’d have a tendency to agree with ComRes. The ICM spiral of silence has a trusted pedigree in General Elections, but I view it with suspicion in a by-election. After all, it’s not as if the vote is for a new government, so the option for voters who won’t admit to supporting the unpopular party to just stay at home is a lot stronger a draw than in a GE. Which would produce a consistent 12% (ICM1), 15% (ICM2), 13% (ComRes) Tory lead.
I’d say at this point that a Tory gain actually seems overwhelmingly (95%+) probable in this by-election. Which are words that seem rather strange to type …
141 -previous thread-
The eve-of-poll ICM figures published in the Guardian on 30/4/97 were:
Lab 43 - Con 33 - Lab lead 10
Actual 97 Lab 44 Con 31 - Lab lead 13
Therefore , on that occasion ICM did understate Labour’s performance!
69. I suspect that a swing voter would be put off more by self-confessed tories such as yourself who sound strangely downbeat at the turning of the tide, apparently look gift horses in the mouth and don’t seem particularly enthused at the thought of being in government. And that could be much sooner than anyone thinks. If these sorts of poll figures continue it won’t be two years, it won’t even be one, it could be in as little as 4 months (oddly enough back in Jan. on Guido I posited a GE in Oct. That is now a credible possibility.) But the tory party is going to have to want it to happen and to help events along a bit. Repeating a mantra of “but there’s another two years for things to go wrong” is not productive IMO.
119,
I wonder what the ICM score for the 1997 election would have been without spiral of silence adjustment.
Come to think of it, does anyone know what the theoretical ICM scores for 2001 and 2005 would have been without spiral of silence adjustments?
The Daily Mail article that reveals the Comres results:
http://tinyurl.com/5r2rjo
It seems a bit late for Gordon to wash his hands of the smear campaign to me but thats what it claims. Meanwhile Harman fails to go to C&N but still manages to attack marriage. Labour really don’t get it……..
120
Please explain. I cannot see how we will have a GE in the next 4 months.
88. John F Kennedy engaged pretty well with a groundswell of opinion which captured an American mood for understanding the rest of the world. Mind you, he unveiled most of this after he’d won! There’s plenty theory out there at the moment that America will become increasingly isolated and withdraw from world politics over the next few decades. Obama could possible prevent (or delay) that.
118. There’s still money available for the Conservatives at 1.12 on Betfair - certainly value if you regard a Tory win as at least a 95% shot.
116: HAHAHAHAHAHA to the power of Mark Senior!!!!!
119. Here’s the official parliamentary report.
Labour 43.2. Now in my rounding you round down. So Labour 43 and ICM were spot on……
http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/rp2001/rp01-038.pdf
125. 1.125 with Ladbrokes also at the moment.
If these sorts of poll figures continue it won’t be two years, it won’t even be one, it could be in as little as 4 months (oddly enough back in Jan. on Guido I posited a GE in Oct. That is now a credible possibility.)
Why? Unless Labour actually splits, it’s not going to be forced into an early GE, unless Labour MPs actually want to lose their seats.
On the wider point, complacency doesn’t win voters; attacking the government, and putting over your own positive policies, do (I don’t think this is ideally the best forum for it, but we can’t avoid it here).
127 - No I think polls are GB (ie exclude NI). In that case the GB figure was 44.3%. That is why the Labour share in 2005 is variously reported as 35 or 36%.
bt @120.
Believe me, I’m as excited as anyone about this. I’ve spent the last 10 long years fighting for the Conservatives and sacrificed a career to do it. In fact most of the time at the moment I walk around with an asinine grin on my face.
It’s just that there’s a tone creeping in on this site that feels to me to be exactly what Cameron has spent the last 2 years working to get out of people’s minds.
GeorgeH makes a good point - I was outside City Hall for the night they announced Boris as Mayor, and as well as a sizeable BNP presence the only other easily distinguishable group were late-twenties Tory Boys, straight out of the 1980’s.
It was amazing to see the swagger and the champagne swigging and the braying and the shouting - I wouldn’t begrudge anyone a victory drink, but the reaction of everyone else (even several [newish, I suspected] Tory voters) was somewhere between astonishment and horror. Many of them looked as though they had given their votes to Cameron’s conservatives for the first time, thinking he was different, and here were Gordon Gecko’s acolytes-in-exile being given back the keys of power.
I don’t think they are typical, and I think the Tories really have changed to a large degree under Cameron. However, if there is one thing that will derail his hopes of becoming PM I think it is a certain type of supporter who has not really changed since the heydays of pro-Apartheid “Greed is good” milton-friedman nuke-the-Ruskies Thatcherism. I’m not passing judgement - just saying that the reaction of most people, including many who are considering voting Tory this time, is to find those Tory Boys repulsive.
That is, for me, the biggest danger of derailment Cameron faces.
129
I wouldnt worry about DC attacking the Govt. I think he has enough ammuntion to last 2yrs. and even if he hasn’t , Gordo or his successor will be bound to give him some. The ineptiutude of New Labour knows no bounds. I remember Potillo saying on This Week that the Cabinet was the weakest in history(or words to that effect) He was not wrong.
Are there any odds on how many mobile phones were smashed today???
132. Interesting. Maybe the ‘toff’ campaign had something in it - hopelessly executed, of course…
125,
1.12 - that equates to about 90% chance, yes? Not far off that 95%.
As I’ve mentioned before, I follow the first maxim of gambling: Never bet what you aren’t willing to lose, so I’ve tended to not betting (having been in a poor financial situation). My financial situation is, however, continuing to improve, so I’ll probably be starting my tentative gambling career quite soon and actually finally putting my money where my (large) mouth is - but I’ll want better value than a 5% or so gap in my personal assessment and the implied market assessment, to be honest.
127 Yes - but those are UK figures - distorted somewhat by the inclusion of Northern Ireland which is not normally polled by the main polling organisations because the same party battle does not take place there. The figures I quote relate to Great Britain only- and are derived from the Polling Report site!
131 Glad to see you are saying Conservatives and not Tory.
If you want to troll as a conservative dont sound too much like a leftie.
131. IMO confidence has been lacking in the party and has made the party unelectable. Now it’s back and it should be encouraged but I agree there is a limit and some caution is required….although it is difficult after years of “torybashing”.
123. Government loses key vote followed by a vote of no confidence.
Or
Brown ousted but party in-fighting delivers an obviously weakened leader who cannot command confidence in party or country.
Or
Labour chooses to hold a GE in an attempt to stop the bleeding - either before or after Brown is ousted.
132 - I think election nights are a pretty poor time to take a snapshot of any political party. I have heard of people of all political persuasions going way over the top at counts or upon declarations. Largely alcohol and adrenaline fuelled, I try to take no notice of it.
135. Agree. Betting at prices like 1/8 isn’t great long-term. It only needs to go wrong occasionally - and usually does - at those prices to destory hard-won profits. Obama to be president and Cons to win most seats at the next election, whilst both odds on, do appear to offer value. Best to have a credit account for long-term bets, so you can keep the stake in the bank rather than lend it to the bookie…
137 Don’t be pig or horse ignorant George H is a Conservative PPC and many of us know his full name .
139 - There is no way on earth that Labour would lose a vote of no-confidence, even Major never lost a no-confidence motion and he faced one with no majority in Parliament.
I agree with GeorgeH about the gloating but I can understand it after the depression of the last decade. All those people saying the brand is so tainted it can never recover (where are they now).
Let us not forget last summer though. Nothings won until Dave is walking into Number 10.
140 excpt the BBC where champagne corks were popping. That is worth noting////
It doesn’t matter what the swing is, the tories first by-election gain from this government will be a momentous occasion, although not as important as winning the London mayoralty.
142 Great but why should I listen to you?
@132:
As one of the “twenty-something Tories” that was outside City Hall that night, I have to wonder if it’s really so hard for you to be gracious in defeat. We were *celebrating*. There’s no great crime in that.
As for “braying”, well that’s another one of those stupid class war bullshit phrases your people are resorting to in desperation, like “Tory Boy” and “Toff”. Frankly, it’s undignified.
143. Doesn’t the Lisbon Treaty have to come back from the Lords?
What will the Libdems do when it does?
135. There’s a big difference between 90% and 95%. It is 5% but look at the difference in the return. A successful bet will return double what you believe to be the true value.
Personally, I don’t particularly like going for bets at such short odds (especially now, having come close to losing a fair amount of money last year after laying 2007 for the date of the next election), but if you do, then the returns are very favourable.
147. George is PPC for Meon Valley and has posted on here for a long time.
134 - It was a mistake to run it when Tamsin Dunwoody has not exactly been down the mines, and when Timpson isn’t a classic toff. However, I think this will become a theme, because it is one of the biggest weaknesses Cameron has, even though I think it unjustified.
If I were the Conservatives - I’d stop pretending it doesn’t matter, or complaining that it is inverse snobbery. If people have any tendecy towards class envy, then hearing the better off complain that they are being prejudiced against will not work.
The theme should be ‘yes we are lucky in our backgrounds, and we therefore owe a debt of service’ - ‘we wish to see our experience given to all children’ - just being honest about it will likely win more support than refusing to acknowledge there is an issue.
Some policies concentrating on aggressive equality of opportunity and anti-nepotism wouldn’t hurt either. (eg State funding with no strings attached for full scholarships on merit alone to comprise a third of places at every private school in the country schools )
Like it or not, it is not healthy for only a couple of MPs to know what it is like to live on a less than average wage, or in an undesirable area - there is a genuine danger in having a political class completely removed from the experience of normal people. Pretending it doesn’t matter at all will fail - addressing the issue of differentiated class would be wiser in my view.
the devon loft @ 138. A shrewd comment. Confidence has been lacking for sure.
141 You don’t need much money to make a profit on Betfair just lots and lots of bets . I am all green on C&N £ 76 Conservative £ 2 Labour £ 15 LibDem and £ 212 ANO
Total bets
Cons laid £ 3,296 average 1.25
Lab laid £ 794 average 5.4
LibDem laid £ 157 average 26.4
ANO laid £ 4 at 1000
plus a few bets to win totalling £ 100
Around 13% of all the bets on Betfair in this markwt
Anybody calcuated what 48% 35% 12% would actually mean in terms of a Conservative majority in this seat?
Also, is it not possible that ComRes are overstating Labour (as we saw in the London election, with the phone pollsters) and the real gap will be even bigger?
153 - I disagree, I think the ‘it makes no difference’ line is the better option. I really get more than a little incencsed when I hear people say things like “People should get places on merit not on who their parents are” when what they tend to mean is “Some people shouldn’t get anywhere, even on merit, because of who their parents are”
Marc Ambinder reports another two SD’s for Obama - Cindy Spanyers and Blake Johnson both of Alaska.
……………….
154 George. Nice to see you back posting.
156 - Depends what the turnout is.
148 You dont have to listen to me just admit what we all know that you are a prat
156 - The majority on these figures depends on turn-out.
Yes it is possible the gap will be bigger. It is also possible the gap will be smaller.
139 - I cannot see any situation where Labour loses an explicit vote of confidence: it’d be the end of those MPs’ careers, as they would be immediately expelled from the party and would be unlikely to hold their seats unless the opposition parties decided to support them. Similarly, post-dethronment infighting is unlikely to result in an immediate GE, unless the party is actually on the brink of splitting in an 1931/SDP style (and factional jostling won’t be enough in itself to achieve that). Labour is pretty unlikely, in the current situation, to plunge into a GE unless they’ve got a good reason for doing so.
151,
Yeah, but I’m also a firm believer in margins of error
If I’m out by 5% (and I’m not by any means infallible, as my teenage daughter will not hesitate to point out), I’ll lose the value in the long term.
I believe that it’s 95%+.
So, with my personal fallibility awareness head on, I’d look for odds that reflect (say) an implied probability of 80% or so. Gives me plenty of elbow room for error. And with the size of political markets, these kind of value bets seem to be actually available. Mike’s great at spotting them.
And, as I say, in a month or two, I’ll be in a position to front up for those kinds of bet.
(Sadly, William Hill online don’t seem to have any political bets other than US election/candidates available, which is a shame because I’ve got a small anmount of (free) money in a willhill account and a promise of a “put £10 in and get a £10 free bet” at the moment - and that would be enough to tempt me into a C&N bet.
In fact, a C&N bet would be perfect for (very probably) securing that free tenner.
I don’t suppose anyone here could influence William Hill to put a C&N market online?)
149 - Braying always sounds undignified even if you call it celebrating.
@160:
We try not to, but you have an alarming habit of popping up with your unique band of nonsense regardless.
156 One of the big problems with byelection polls is that there is often a bandwagon effect in the last week .
166 lol does that mean con will win by 50%??????!
149 - Martin.
You’re off base with your defence. I’m not begrudging anyone a celebration just trying to pass on an experience.
The