Could the polls be so wrong again? Above is a picture of the famous speech by the then Labour leader, Neil Kinnock, at the Sheffield party rally a week before polling day on April 9th 1992. The polls were looking good for the party and it really did seem that the Tory government that had been in office since May 1979 was at last going to be beaten. In the days leading up to the rally two polls from ICM…
Does this make an October election a possibility again? It’s 3am as I write and my first action before starting this piece was to open up my Spreadfair account and buy Labour at the 310 seat level on the general election spread market. The latest Guardian ICM poll is out and shows Labour with their biggest lead from the pollster since September 2005 three months before David Cameron became leader. These are the shares with changes on the last ICM…
How the papers are reporting the crisis Probably the good news for Brown this morning is that most of the tabloids are looking to other than the Northern Rock crisis for their splash headlines. It’s “The police case falls apart” in the Express; “The Tide turns” in the Mirror and “Kate backed by judge” in the Sun. While Brown himself left yesterday evening’s announcement to his chancellor the Times is reporting that “Kate and Gerry McCann go straight to Gordon…
Is the Lib Dem share of 14% down to the firm’s methodology? In the first of four major polling surveys that we will see in the next few days the internet pollster, YouGov, for the Daily Telegraph has the following shares with the changes on its last poll almost three weeks ago CON 33% (+1): LAB 41% (-1): LD 14% (nc). So the Tories will be a touch relieved that like ICM on Monday YouGov is showing a reduction in…
And what do we think of Cameron’s “make-over”? Judging by the comments thread here last night most people thought that the Tory leader performed reasonably well in the first big set piece of the new political year – a long interview on Newsnight. He seems to have adjusted his style to reflect the new more sombre mood created by Gordon Brown and is looking a lot more formal. He also seems to have changed his vocal approach. The voice sounded…
Are “hard-edged” Tory policies what centre ground voters want? These are the front pages of the Telegraph and Mail this morning and show support for the Tory leadership that hasn’t come from these papers in a long long time. The Mail reports the moves in glowing terms and notes that “the focus on crime will delight Tory MPs who have been desperate for their leader to unveil concrete policy proposals on what they see as the leading concern for many…
The Tories up a point on a fortnight ago It’s multi-Gordons once again this morning but only half the number that accompanied the last poll, YouGov’s 10% lead, and one less than when the pollster, ICM, last carried out a survey two weeks ago. The fieldwork for the firm’s August survey for the Guardian finished four days ago on Thursday so is already a little out of date. It won’t have been affected by the Liverpool shooting which has been…
The Guardian’s August ICM survey should be out this weekend After two weeks without any national voting intention surveys – a period which has seen intense speculation about how the main parties are doing in the new political context – I am advised that we should see results from the Guardian’s August ICM “over the weekend”. That’s likely to mean either tomorrow or on Bank Holiday Monday. The paper’s uninterrupted polling series with ICM is the longest running in the…