But what did a recovering economy do for Major in 1997? It has been one of the key hopes of Labour that the outcome of the general election will be determined by the economy and how well off voters feel by the time we get to polling day. So there should be delight in Downing Street with some of the new this morning. This is how the main front page story in today’s Guardian by Ashley Seager, economics correspondent, opens:-…
Ipsos-MORI Why do only 2 in 100 voters think that the EU is an issue? The chart above is from latest MORI Issues Index and shows how concern about the Common Market/EU/Europe/EURO continues to be at very low levels – something that now concerns only 2% of those polled. The index has been compiled in the same way for 30 years and involves asking, completely unprompted, what interviewees think are the “most important issues facing Britain today“. There is no…
Did the shadow of Tony determine the historic decision? We are not far away from the second anniversary of what’s likely to go down as the defining decision of the Gordon Brown era – his cancelling in October 2007 of an early election. This is something that will be examined again and again in future years and still dominates our politics. For the polls during the Brown honeymoon had all been going Labour’s way and Brown apparently had a chance…
PaddyPower Is their value on this new market? Overnight, while doing the piece on Irish referendum, I checked the political markets of PaddyPower which I must admit I tend to overlook. This is a pity because they are building a good range of UK general election bets including the above one which I have not seen elsewhere. With the big trend at the moment being the erosion of Labour votes a market on the percentage vote share that they’ll end…
BBC online Is this a way of reconnecting with the voters? The result of the Conservative Totnes primary was announced this lunchtime and the big number that will be looked at is the 24.6% turnout. This puts it on par with what we saw last year in the US presidential primaries and gives the winner a very different mandate from those selected as parliamentary by standard selection procedures. Here it’s almost always in the hands of local parties with, in…
Is tolerating Lisbon the price for power? On Friday October 2nd, just before the Conservatives gather for their last conference before the general election, the Irish vote in their second referendum on the Lisbon EU treaty having rejected it first time round. A NO vote would be brilliant for the Tories because Lisbon would then be rejected with the UK having “clean hands”. But if the betting markets have got this right then the outcome will be a YES and,…
Why was that result so out of line? Just look at the table above showing the change in the actual number of votes cast for Labour in by elections in the current parliament. The list only features those constituencies that the party was defending and the change is compared with the general election. As is generally accepted parties in government do badly in such contests and Labour has lost half of them. But what happened at Glenrothes last November? It…
Have you joined the great Mandelson gamble? The news this morning that efforts are being made to find Peter Mandelson a safe Labour seat in County Durham for the general election has set off a big gamble on the political betting markets. Both Ladbrokes and William Hill have issued press release – the latter now making Mandelson 8/1 to be the next Labour leader. The Ladbrokes prices is a more comfortable 16/1. Ladbrokes say that for every pound at the…