Australia Decides 2007 – Part 1 Since John Howard asked the Governor-General for an election on Saturday 24 November, we have seen the first two weeks of the 2007 Australian election campaign, and in short – Rudd is retaining his substantial lead in the polls, and he has been the net “winner” of the campaign to date. Since the start of the 6 week campaign, John Howard and Kevin Rudd have released their tax policies (both proposing substantial cuts), and…
Could the “no” to the Trident replacement help him and his party? After a period when the main complaint about the Lib Dem leadership race was that both contenders appeared the same the man who came second last time, Chris Huhne, has put a new issue on the table – should Britain spend the billions on replacing Trident and maintaining its independent nuclear deterrent? In an interview with the Observer Huhne declared it would be ‘ridiculous’ to spend up to…
Are we entering the era of Boat Race politics? The massive monthly face-to-face survey by Ipsos-Mori is out in the Observer this morning and shows that Labour, on 41% have just pipped ahead of the Tories on 40%. The actual figures with comparisons on a telephone survey from a sample of half the size from the same pollster a fortnight ago are CON 40%(-1): LAB 41%(+3): LD 13%(+2). Looking at today’s figures with the last directly comparable poll, Ipsos-Mori’s September…
What’s behind the Lib Dem price rally? If you feed the latest figures from the main pollsters that have reported since the Tory conference into the Anthony Wells commons seat calculator the highest number that you get for the Lib Dems is 21 MPs from the Populus survey three weeks ago. The latest ICM poll makes it 18 seats with both YouGov and Ipsos-Mori showing a bare 11 seat total. Martin Baxter’s Electoral Calculus site is even worse with his…
Tote ‘Ten To Follow’ Competition – A Politicalbetting.com Entry? The Tote’s popular Ten to Follow competition for the jumps season kicks off shortly. As well as being a decent value bet, it provides lots of fun throughout the season and attracts much support from serious and occasional punters alike. The general idea is that you pick out ten horses from the Tote’s list and they score points as and when they succeed in their races during the season. Entry is…
Focus on Wales “Punter†has asked me to comment on the Welsh constituencies on several occasions. As there are 40 Welsh constituencies, then my comments on the likely outcome at the next election must be brief. Wales has been a left-wing stronghold since 1885. Firstly, it was monolithically Liberal, and then, after a period of confusion in the Twenties and Thirties, almost as solid for Labour up till 1979. Even in 1931, Labour won no fewer than 18 out of…
..and a boost for Huhne in his bid for the Lib Dem leadership After the longest period without a national voting intention poll since August 2006 there’s the regular survey from the YouGov panel in the Daily Telegraph this morning which shows no change on the last poll from the firm almost two weeks ago. The headline figures are CON 41% (nc): LAB 38% (nc): LD 11% (nc) What we don’t have from YouGov is any adjustment for likelihood to…
Does a leadership election hone up the candidates’ campaigning skills? Just looking back at how the Lib Dem hopefuls, Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne, performed on Sunday’s Andrew Marr show it struck me what a good training ground for a general election running for the leader of your party is. The normal political dialogue outside election times does not provide the opportunities for the kind of exposure and probing that a leadership election demands and those who have been through…