What would happen in each of the parties? For the last hour or so I’ve been lying awake pondering what would happen if there was an unexpected vacancy in each of the three parties. Who would take over and what would be the consequences? The easiest, I think, would be with Labour. If Ed Miliband was suddenly unable to continue in the job then there would only be three realistic choices – Harriet Harman (20/1), David Miliband (5/1) or Yvette…
Can Elwyn Watkins get his 104 Tory switchers? Ex-Tory front-bencher turned professional blogger, Paul Goodman, has been the first to raise what’s said to be a growing feeling amongst Tory MPs that David Cameron would rather like it if the man who brought the case against Phil Woolas, Lib Dem Elwyn Watkins, ends of as winner in Old & Sad. His reasoning is that such a victory would steady the nerves of his coalition partners in the face the poor…
Are any of these bets tempting? William Hills have revived a market that proved popular, and for me profitable, in the run-up to the general election – which leader will be the first to leave his job. The pricing is Cameron 9/4, Miliband 7/4, and Clegg 5/4. Interestingly Clegg was the 5/4 favourite in December 2007 when Hills last put this market up – Brown was at 9/4. Clearly with the polls as they are Clegg is the favourite though…
How will Cameron resolve the control orders row? The latest terror threats could not have come at a worse time for the coalition partners because, as Andrew Rawnsely reports in the Observer this morning, there’s a huge row going on about the future of control orders and extended detention without trial. There’s a report waiting to be published which says that these should continue in a slightly restricted form – something that would be totally opposed by Nick Clegg’s party….
Should EdM be thinking of the wider audience? In his summary of today’s PMQ encounter between Cameron and Ed Miliband the Indy on Sunday’s John Rentoul concluded:- “..Good tactics on Miliband’s part; poor strategy. He succeeded in winding up Iain Duncan Smith, Work and Pensions Secretary, standing at the end opposite the Speaker’s chair, shouting, “Absolute rubbish!†He succeeded in dividing the left-wing of the Liberal Democrats from their colleagues on the Government benches. (Miliband had a good line about…
The Sun How much can we read into the figures? As reported overnight the Sun is carrying YouGov poll figures this morning which suggest that the George Osborne plan to take child benefit away from those paying higher rates of tax is actually pretty popular. It’s hard to argue with an 83%-15% split. But how much can you read into findings like this? For generally pollsters find that people are happy to support tax increases when it doesn’t affect them….
Phrase/word/comment Ladbrokes odds Big Society 1/4 Climate Change 2/1 Florence 5/6 Red Ed 2/1 Trident 4/1 No time for a novice 2/1 Gordon Brown 2/1 Referendum 2/1 Old Labour 3/1 Socialist 3/1 In Europe but not run by Europe 6/1 Quiet Man 10/1 Electoral Pact 20/1 Bigoted Woman 66/1 Get On Your Bike 100/1 Ladbrokes Is tomorrow a chance to make a few bob? Above are the latest prices for this year’s Ladbrokes 2010 PM speech to his party conference…
Guardian Who’ll win the old-Etonian stand-off over Cross-Rail? The big development over Boris that Morus only touched on briefly in the last post was the huge row that’s apparently developing between Johnson (Eton and Balliol College Oxford) and Cameron (Eton and Brasenose College Oxford) over plans by Osborne (St. Paul’s and Magdalen College Oxford) to force a 5% cut to the £16bn London CrossRail project. According to the Guardian, though denied by the Mayor’s office, Johnson has let it be…