On the previous thread PBer Isam wrote that he had just bet on the CON majority for the next general election. He didn’t tell us what odds he got but at the time the party was about a 40% chance on Betfair.

We know that Isam is a serious gambler and his wager will be a significant one. One reason you place a bet of this nature so far ahead is that you believe that the odds will tighten which of course may well happen.

I don’t know what Isam did at the Chesham and Amersham and Batley and Spen by-elections but there was a lot of Tory exuberance at the time with the assumption that these would be easy Tory victories.

But a general election is not a by-election and differing considerations should apply. A worry I have for Isam is that this will be the first post-Brexit election and that previous assumptions about voting behaviour might not apply. We know that there is a lot to suggest that identifying as a Leaver or a Remainer could be more important than traditional party loyalties. While the choice of the former will almost certainly be the Tories that won’t apply so much with the latter.

There is a strong incentive for Starmer and Davey to have an informal understanding that their parties won’t put anything like the same effort into a particular seat if the evidence shows that the other one is best placed to beat the Tory. This is something that didn’t happen at GE2019 when Corbyn’s Labour often put more effort into fighting the LDs in specific seats even though this helped boost the Tory seat total.

My general election betting choice at the moment would be on a hung parliament if the odds were a bit better.

Mike Smithson