Who’ll win – who’ll lose if the tabloids are constrained? It has struck me over the past 24 hours that the current case involving alleged phone intercepts and the News of the World could have a dramatic and long-lasting effect on British politics. Just look back at what has happened this year that was sparked off by the tabloids and you get a sense of the scale of these papers’ activities. The five people featured in the picture strip at…
Following last week’s guest slot by Tabman raising the question of the possible impact on the Tories if a new UKIP leader seeks to occupy their territory UKIP Insider has written this appraisal of the contenders. Nigel Farage is seen as the favourite to win the UKIP leadership. He will win plenty of support from armchair activists because he is UKIP’s best-known face on television. However, it is by no means certain that he will actually remain in the race…
The Good Week – Bad Week Index: July 28-August 3rd With the next scheduled nation voting intention opinion poll not due until the end of August and almost no council by-elections the best information we have on the public mood is from the the YouGov data from which we can compute the “Good Week – Bad Week Index”. This is the data from the pollster’s daily brand index survey which involves surveying 600 people each day about their perceptions of…
My dilemma over being a punter and writing about it On most days on the site I like to produce a, hopefully, provocative article that’s linked to a political outcome on which people can bet. The problem is that what’s written here can sometimes affect the betting prices themselves and this can lead to suggestions that I’m putting forward ideas in order to line my own pocket. Until now I have always tried to set out what I am betting…
How will the crisis affect Gordon & Dave’s career plans? With Tony Blair returning to London today to a Labour party where he is increasingly isolated how is the crisis going to affect domestic politics? Will it be the platform that Gordon can use to take over the job that he regards as his? And how is it going to impact on David Cameron’s General Election chances particularly after the warning from Tory funder, Stanley Kalms, about the party being…
Although it is the holiday period and things are a bit quieter at the moment one of the big problems we have on the site are the demands on our servers when dozens of users are trying to load and re-load very long discussions all at the same time. This can make it frustrating for users because the site seems very slow and it also means that we are using up a lot of bandwidth repeatedly sending you the same…
Could the UKIP caravan hurt the Tories? The current favourite to succeed Roger Knapman in the UKIP leadership elecrtion which closes on September 7 is MEP Nigel Farage, who stood for the party in the Bromley by-election. The key point that Farage has grasped is that UKIP can no longer rely upon being a single-issue party if it wishes to grow. In his Manifesto, he sets out his view of the Party’s philosophy: We are a unique brand. Nationalist with…
A boost for Ming or the product of the firm’s methodology? The latest poll from Mori in today’s Financial Times has with changes on the last poll at the end of June CON 36 (nc): LAB 32 (-1): LD 24 (+3). – so a big boost for the Lib Dem leader with the biggest share for the party since last September. The poll is quite old. The survey started on July 20th – one day before work began on the…