Will party debts and “cash for honours” lead to very different campaigns? A report in the Independent this morning suggests that Labour now has debts of £26m after running at a £14m loss in the last financial year to add to its existing £11.5m deficit. While no one can predict what’s going to happen in the “cash for honours” investigation one thing must be a near certainty – that it is going to be a lot tougher for political parties…
UPDATED 0745 But with Gordon as leader Labour does better than with Tony Blair A new approach in this month’s Populus poll is in the Times, published this morning, provides a better measure of what happens when those interviewed are prompted with the names of the party leaders and their reactions to what they would do if Gordon Brown became leader. The main voting intention from the survey, published yesterday, had CON 36:LAB 34: LD 19 Prompting the respondents with…
Populus shows Tory lead down to two points The seemingly never-ending saga of John Prescott seems to be having almost no impact on the party standings in the latest Populus poll in the Times this morning. These show with comparisons from last month CON 36% (-1): LAB 34 (nc): LD 19% (+1). So the only change being the Tories down a point and the Lib Dems up one. This is in sharp contrast to Sunday’s BPIX poll in the MoS…
And it’s 44-38 on a straight Cameron-Brown choice A new YouGov poll in today’s Daily Telegraph has the following with changes on four weeks ago: CON 39 (+1): LAB 32 (nc): LD 17 (+1). When asked which they would prefer a Cameron-led Tory party or a Brown-led Labour the Tories win 44-38. This compares with a 45-36 lead when asked to choose between a Cameron-led Tory party and a Blair-led Labour. Although these were not voting intention questions but a…
How boundary changes hurt Brown and make “PM Dave” one step closer The Tory price on the General Election seat markets is likely to tighten following a big story in the Times this morning on new research on the impact of the boundary changes. Currently the Betfair price has Labour at 1.04/1 to get most seats slightly behind the Tories at 0.98/1. But the report, by Lewis Baston and Simon Henig for the House Magazine, also underlines the challenge facing…
[Updated 0730] “Nearly one in four Labour supporters want their party to lose” The Observer carries reports this morning of a new Mori poll that shows that amongst those certain to vote – the pollster’s normal way of presenting its headline figures – the Tories had a 7% lead. The online version carries only a few details but those forking out £1.60 for the print edition edition get little extra information for their cash. Although there are fancy colour graphics…
Could he become PM without ever having to face a grilling? One of the hardest things about trying to predict the next General Election is that, extraordinarily, we know so little about Gordon Brown. If, as is his plan, he manages to move into the top job without having to go through the ardours of fighting a leadership election he will have managed to by-pass, yet again, situations where he would have faced fierce questioning. For as both the Tories…
But who is right in the battle of the seat predictors? The latest prediction from Martin Baxter – the ex-Cambridge and now City mathematician who runs the Electoral Calculus site – suggests that the next General Election would produce a Commons with CON 305 (+107): LAB 285 (-71): LD 24 (-38) seats. This would leave the Tories on the current boundaries 19 MPs short of an overall majority. Martin produces his prediction from a “poll of polls” that he maintains…