Mirror.co.uk Could my 200/1 bet be a winner after all? A week and a half ago, while I was still on holiday, I picked up on a story that the government is planning to change the law so that life peers can relinquish their position and so be eligible to stand for parliament. Was this, I pondered, a sign that Peter Mandelson – the former Labour press chief who was booted out of Tony Blair’s cabinet twice – might be…
How much of their June 4th publicity is still in place? Unlike most of of the other parties a key part of UKIP’s communications strategy at both the June 4th elections and ahead of last week in Norwich has been the heavy reliance on paid-for billboard advertising. The party did not join the massive leaflet extravaganza in the by-election but invested a lot in creating a presence on the streets through posters and innovative placings such as on telephone kiosks…
CON 42 (+4) LAB 24 (+1) LD 18 (-4) But was it more than just the “Norwich Effect”? This clearly is a very good poll for the Tories who are back in the 40s after five consecutive surveys from the pollster that had them below the magical 40 number including one where they had slumped to just 30%. The field-work started on Friday and went through to Sunday when the party, and particularly Cameron, was getting a lot of favourable…
BedfordToday Or will the BBC give her “special treatment”? During the Norwich North campaign one of the most disgraceful acts by the media was the way that the BBC decided that Craig Murray – the former British ambassador sacked for speaking out against torture – was not a serious candidate. This was despite the fact that he’d held into his deposit standing against Jack Straw at the general election and that he’s built up a campaigning operation on human rights…
What’s an incoming Tory government going to do? Two of what used to be called the broadsheet papers are once again making Afghanistan and the problems for the government their main lead. The Independent focuses on the findings of the first part of its monthly ComRes poll which has 52% wanting troops out straight away with 43% against. By 58% to 31% those sampled believed that the Taliban cannot be defeated militarily and by 60% to 35% of those polled…
YouGov How 732 who identified with the party became 435 The above panel is from the latest YouGov poll that was in The People yesterday and shows the dramatic differences between those who told the pollster in 2005 which party they identified with and who they now say they will vote for. So in the sample there were 732 “Labour identifiers” from May 2005. By late July 2009 that number has become 435 – or just 59%. At the same…
Providing a more structured platform for guest slots Yesterday’s article reflecting on Norwich North from Bunnco and today’s advice on F1 Drivers’ betting from Morris Dancer mark the first stage of a plan to open up PB’s second site to regular contributors who want to publish more considered contributions than standard posts on threads. The mechanics involving providing log-ins for regular posters who would then write their articles and publish them without me or anybody else on the PB team…
CON 40 (-2) LAB 25 (nc) LD 20 (+2) “Others” continue to take a big slice There was a weekend poll after all – in the People which now seems to be doing a monthly survey with YouGov. I did look a couple of times at the paper’s website overnight on Sat/Sun but nothing seemed to be on it. The numbers have not changed that much although the Tories might be a tad disappointed to be down a couple of…