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Month: December 2006

This morning’s press targets: Luntz and Brown

This morning’s press targets: Luntz and Brown

..why is a Murdoch paper gunning for Gordon? The main highlights from this morning papers are an attack on the US pollster, Frank Luntz, by Nick Cohen in the Observer and a series of critical stories about Gordon Brown in the Sunday Times that, taken together, look as though the paper is turning against him. The Cohen piece under the heading “How a celebrity pollster created Cameron” covers the impact on the Tory leadership contest last year of the famous…

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Blears says Tories can win with a 1.3% swing. Eh?

Blears says Tories can win with a 1.3% swing. Eh?

Is the Labour chair in danger of “crying wolf”? Clearly, and perhaps we should say thankfully, not everybody studies electoral mathematics with the same intensity as visitors to PBC. But you would have thought that Hazel Blears, chair of the Labour party, would have a broad view of the situation when, as she has done this weekend, she sends out a letter to party members. Of course it is her duty to keep the party at large in a state…

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Sean Fear’s Friday slot

Sean Fear’s Friday slot

Focus on St. Albans Arguably, St. Albans ought to be a Liberal Democrat Parliamentary seat. For years, prior to 1997, the Liberal Democrats achieved a clear second place in the seat, and by 1996, held 40 out of 58 seats on the District Council. Boundary changes, in 1996, removed all of Harpenden from the constituency, and with it, a huge proportion of the Conservative majority. The Liberal Democrats were favourites to win in 1997 However, Labour surprised everybody by breaking…

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Will Deborah advise Gordon to go for an immediate election?

Will Deborah advise Gordon to go for an immediate election?

Is this the woman who could help determine the date? This is Deborah Mattinson, joint chief executive of Opinion Leader Research, a pollster for the Labour party for the past two two decades and someone who is likely to play a key role in advising Brown on whether to go for an early general election. In recent months she has been a big critic of one or two surveys that have not been favourable to the Chancellor. Brown will need…

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Will voters elect someone they consider “second best”?

Will voters elect someone they consider “second best”?

What questions give the best measure of views on Cameron and Brown? A few days ago two pollsters that I have a lot of time for, YouGov and ICM reported increased Tory leads in opinion polls they were carrying out at exactly the same time. Yet when the two firms got to asking respondents to rate Brown and Cameron against each other for Prime Minister their findings seemed contradictory. The YouGov sample split 43-34 in favour of the Tories on…

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Could Gordon’s long wait be over in 15 weeks?

Could Gordon’s long wait be over in 15 weeks?

What are we to make of “The Mole’s” prediction? One of the great additions to the UK online media in the past year or so has been the news magazine The First Post. A feature I always look at are the regular articles under the banner “The Mole” who is billed as a “Downing Street Insider. Shortly before the Chancellor rose to his feet to make his pre-Budget statement “The Mole” published a piece suggesting that Tony Blair will be…

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Will Blair be quizzed under caution?

Will Blair be quizzed under caution?

Are the stakes getting higher for Assistant Commander Yates too? According to Independent this morning Downing Street has been pressing hard for Tony Blair to be treated as a witness and not a suspect when Assistant Commander John Yates holds his expected interview with the PM in the next week or so. Everything comes down to whether Yates decides that Blair should be given a caution at the start of the interview – a decision which could have a huge…

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Is there still money to be made on Gordon?

Is there still money to be made on Gordon?

Does the latest price offer value for money? After being sceptical for a long period about Gordon Brown’s chances of making it to Number 10 I changed my view in early October when the price moved to 0.56/1. I got enough on then to cover most of my betting on other contenders when it became clear that nobody else looked able to emerge. As the chart shows there has been a very big change of sentiment since the period after…

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