The Queen was right to give Tony Blair a knighthood
The most successful LAB leader ever
Liz Truss: the big CON leader betting mover – I’m not convinced
The Betdata.io chart shows the movements on Betfair in the next CON leader betting and as can be seen the big mover has been Liz Truss – who is now Foreign Secretary. You can tell she’s been making waves by just looking at the chart and seeing, as well, leaks about her that suggest that not everybody is happy by the prospect of her succeeding Johnson. The big thing she has on her side has been her strong showing in…
A bit of a CON recovery in the first 2022 poll
What happens in the absence of political news It is always interesting to see the first polling of a New Year because it generally follows a period when there have been very few political developments over the preceding two weeks. Undoubtedly the period leading up to Christmas was dreadful for the Tories including losing a by-election to a party that had been more than 50% behind at GE2019. The question now is will it last. I’ve just had a small…
The trend here should seriously concern Downing Street
The preferred PM/Chancellor team question is not one that gets included much in political polling but it was part of the latest MoS/Deltapoll at the weekend. To put the latest findings in context, I thought it useful to look back at previous Deltapolls where this has been included. As can be seen there has been a huge switch from plus 15% for Johnson/Sunak in September to a deficit of 5% in the latest polling. It should be said that there…
In the betting the money goes on Johnson surviving 2022
After a period last month when the betting was that Johnson will be out in 2022 the money has now moved back to him surviving till 2024 or later. This was a very active market in the run-up to the holidays when there was one development after another, including a massive by-election defeat, that looked bad for Johnson’s survival chances. Over the holiday this has moved back and as can be seen a 2022 exit is now rated as a…
MAYBE BABY: POPULATION POLITICS PART 2
Previously, I examined how conception and maternity rates had changed in England and Wales during the 2010s. Now for the tricky part – should the government seek to alter demographic trends, and if so, why, and how? In September 2021, the Social Market Foundation (SMF) published a briefing paper titled Baby bust and baby boom: Examining the liberal case for pronatalism. I’d recommend reading it in full as it provides a very good assessment of this subject. The paper assesses…
MAYBE BABY: POPULATION POLITICS PART 1
The ONS reported in October 2021 that “the total fertility rate for England and Wales in 2020 fell to 1.58 children per woman, the lowest since records began in 1938.” Contrary to predictions of a baby boom, conceptions during the first COVID lockdown fell and didn’t begin to pick up until after restrictions were eased. What happens to fertility rates post-COVID remains to be seen. As a student of politics, it’s a subject that I’ve always been curious about. To…