Could Osborne’s plan cost the Tories votes? The front page of the Daily Mail sets the scene and the tone for today’s big news – the announcement from shadow chancellor, George Osborne that from 2016 the male retirement age will be moved from 65 to 66. This means that many in their late 50s who were looking forward to retirement and their pension in only a few years are going to find they they’ll have to wait a year longer….
BBC Newsnight 16 minutes in And is Darling helping the Tories move on from Lisbon? If you didn’t watch BBC 2’s Newsnight last night then check it out on the BBC IPlayer – 16 minutes in. This is one of the most enjoyable Paxman interviews for a long time and will rank, surely, alongside his famous encounters with Michael Howard and John Reid. The issue, of course, is the Lisbon Treaty and what the Tories would do if on winning…
BBC Why has Darling broken the long-standing convention? Lots of talk tonight about the timing of Darling’s pay freeze announcement and it, apparently, breaking the long-standing convention that governments don’t do things like this during party conferences. It’s comes on the eve of George Osborne’s big speech and the suggestion is that ministers planned it tonight to cause maximum disruption to the Tories. I wondered whether we are seeing a payback for the Sun’s announcement of its change in political…
CON 40% (-1) LAB 27% (-2) LD 20%(+3) And the Lib Dems continue to poll well I assume that this is based on fieldwork that was carried out last night and first thing this morning. To a question of who people thought would perform best in the TV debate the split was: Cameron 49%; Brown 12%; Clegg 15%. So the Tories will be quite pleased that their lead has increased while the Lib Dem will be delighted that once again…
Is this worth a punt? Ladbrokes has put a couple of interesting referendum markets up this morning one of which offers some value. This is the 10/1 shot that there will be a referendum on the Lisbon treat during 2010. The price looks quite tempting. Clearly it requires the Tories to win the election and then to go forward with a referendum plan that happens before the end of next year. As of now the party is only committed to…
Could the Bullingdon attacks still have potency? In her first Conservative Conference week drawing PB’s cartoonist, Marf, touches on an area of potential vulnerability that Andrew Marr sought to bring up in his BBC1 interview with David Cameron yesterday – the perception that the leadership are “toffs” who who don’t really understand so called “ordinary people”. From some of the rhetoric in Brighton last week we can deduce that Labour is toying with how best to use this aspect of…
What about the 7/4 bet that it won’t happen? Long-standing poster, Alex, made what I think was an astute comment on the leaders’ debates on an earlier thread. He wrote: “The leader debates won’t happen IMO. The fact that all three leaders have agreed “in principle†is not a novel occurrence. They often agree in principle, knowing that the legal and logistical minefield is always likely to be insurmountable.” They all want different things. Brown wants “one to ones” starting…
****For discussion on the Greek General Election Click here**** ****This thread for UK Politics only**** What do this pair think of the new system? In view of the heated discussion on the previous thread I thought I would publish comments by Professor Colin Rallings and Professor Michael Thrasher of the University of Plymouth and Co-Directors of the Local Government Chronicle Elections Centre. They are also the academics who produced the Press Association guide to the results of the last election…