After two days of turbulence in the LAB leadership betting Yvette is the biggest loser
Without published polling punters are flying blind
The charts above are from Betfair and show the movements in the betting price, expressed as a percentage, on the betting exchange. Frustratingly there is no specified time axis but this is the best that’s available.
Unlike prices from the standard fixed odds bookies the betting exchange reflects what is actually happening in terms of the prices that punters are ready to back and lay at.
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Overall the big driver ha been the decision at the weekend of UNITE and other unions to support the veteran left-winger, Jeremy Corbyn who has moved in sharply and there have been predictions that he could make the final two.
What’s been surprising, as can be seen in the charts, is how sentiment has moved away from Yvette Cooper who in mid-June looked as though she might take over from Andy Burnham as favourite. There seems to be little betting support for her from anywhere although currently (0400) she’s just ahead of Liz Kendall.
Given the complexity of the voting by AV and the fact that there is absolutely no previous experience of LAB’s new leadership election system it is hard to draw conclusions.
We do know that there has been at least one YouGov poll of members and other likely voters but my understanding is that this was commissioned privately and that numbers won’t be made public.
YouGov, I’m told from people who were sampled, did probe second and third choices which are likely to be very important.
Frankly it hard to come to any conclusion and my current betting position is all green winning the same whoever gets it. If that sounds like a cop out then it is.
Hopefully we will see some public polling at some stage.