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So how did you do? Full results for the competition are available here: Sedgefield & Southall Results In Sedgefield, Ian Catchpole, Tyson, and Stephen Fielding led the way with scores of 2.3, 3.5, and 5.0, while in Southall, Mandroid, Joe Bentley, and Tyson had the best results, with 5.4, 6.8, and 7.4. Finally, on the tie-breaker, Peter Cranie and Stonch both predicted JohnLoony’s vote tally to be 187 against an actual result of 188. If you don’t have Excel, these…

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The Big Issues Don’t Always Sway Elections Even in general elections, matters that are of purely local significance can seriously affect the outcome in any given constituency. The obvious example is hospital reorganisations. Many health service professionals are convinced that closing A & E units in smaller hospitals, and concentrating services on larger hospitals, produces better health outcomes. They may very well be right, but the political consequences can be horrendous for any governing party trying to defend the seat…

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Will today’s news make state funding more likely? With the two by elections having been known for some time is it just a coincidence that the news about the cash for honours investigation not going to lead to charges is coming out at the same time? Is some news management going on here and if so why? Friday, of course, is usually the best time to announce things that you think might be controversial because they are less likely to…

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Please use this thread to continue commenting as events unfold. Double Carpet

Prize competition for the most amusing parody In addition to the election forecast competition I thought I’d do something different. What are we all going to be saying tomorrow morning? What will be the approach that prominent PBC posters will be taking. Now I hope that the following site regulars do not mind but they have all got their own distinctive styles and have been posting here for a long time. So how will they try to explain what the…

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Who’ll have the most to smile about once the results are declared? With 74 entries received before the competition closed, the breakdowns are as follows: Sedgefield Predicted to win: Labour 70, Lib Dems 4, Conservatives 0 Average vote shares: Lab 45.8, LD 27.2, Con 16.0 Southall Predicted to win: Labour 54, Conservatives 10, Lib Dems 10 Average vote shares: Lab 35.3, LD 29.0, Con 26.8 JohnLoony average: 238 votes The full listing of entries is available here: By-Election Predictions If…

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Does Watson’s campaign approach work? This is Tom Watson – the Labour MP for West Bromwich and campaign manager in Ealing Southall who has a very personal approach to campaigning – he gets personal. Rather than focus on policy or issues his big idea is to find what’s perceived as a weakness in the character of the opposition candidate he most fears and then attacks and attacks it. At Birmingham Hodge Hill in July 2004 he sought to destroy the…

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Is everybody taking Blair’s ex-seat for granted? While all the attention has been on Ealing Southall could Tony Blair’s former seat at Sedgefield be the election that causes the biggest surprise tomorrow? With a Labour share in 2005 at more than 58 percent this surely should be a certainty. But therein could lie the ingredients for a shock. For it might be hard to motivate the Labour supporters to go out and vote. At the same time the impression is…

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