CON 40% (40) LAB 31% (29) LD 18% (19) OTHERS 11% Does this make an early election more of a possibility? As was being speculated about earlier the Tory ICM lead in the latest Guardian poll is down to just 9 points – a gap that will send jitters throughout Cameron towers. After a response to the PBR that was almost wholly negative the party must have been hoping that the progress of Labour would have been stalled. Instead we…
CON 41% (37) LAB 24% (27) LD 21%(20) OTHERS 14% (16) Another poll has the Labour deficit at 17 points As the Tory press office has broken the embargo I feel able to reveal the ComRes details as well. The poll for the Indy on Sunday, shows a sharp change in the position from the pollster barely ten days ago. The shares, as can be seen, are almost the same as Friday’s PB/Angus Reid poll which has 40-23-19. There are…
BBC News How will this be viewed in Tory targets 100-150? Well there we have it. Darling’s PBR which will frame much of the political debate as we move into the final months of this parliament. The strategy seemed fairly obvious – defer the pain until after polling day. But is this going to be enough? Will voter’s see through it? How, most importantly, is this going to be viewed in Tory targets 100-150 where the election will be decided….
Follow today’s events as they unfold on PB Alistair Darling is expected to announce a 50% tax on bank bonuses, with a threshold possibly as low as £10,000 – story here. How does the Chancellor plan to halve the deficit within four years, and how will he tread the tightrope between the demands of the markets and the demands of the electorate? 1200 PMQs 1230 Pre-Budget Report Live coverage BBC PBR site BBC Parliament Double Carpet
Will this be Labour’s last Set-Piece before Polling Day? The pre-Budget Report is when the government is meant to set out its spending plans for the year, although it’s more and more taken on the aspect of a mini-budget in its own right. In addition to the economic predictions and expenditure figures, last year’s PBR cut VAT, increased duty on alcohol, tobacco and petrol, and scheduled in increases in Income Tax and National Insurance. If today’s PBR is as active…
O Ye Of Little Faith It’s said in life only two certainties exist – the grim reapers of the Inland Revenue and the ultimate Grim Reaper. In the past year of Britains political life there would also appear to have been two certainties – A majority Conservative government and the Liberal Democrats gaining Watford, the latter still available at excellent odds !! Subsequent to the general election most political analysts have taken for granted Mrs Cameron boiling the eggs in…
The response to the PB polling question The week before last there was a thread in which site users were asked to suggest ideas that can be included in the regular polls that Angus Reid strategies carries out in the UK. There were dozens of different ideas and the following is the one that was chosen with the outcomes:- How will you chose which party to vote for? 29% – I will chose the party that will make me and…
..and Cameron has picked up 20% of them The detailed data from Sunday’s ICM poll is now out and provides another reminder of the massive task and possibly an opportunity for the Prime Minister – winning back those who voted for the party last time. One of the big issues that was always going to face Blair’s successor was to retain the extraordinary coalition that the former leader had created in 1997 when large swathes of middle England were persuaded…