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Category: Guest Contribution

Should Labour move swiftly to depose Corbyn?

Should Labour move swiftly to depose Corbyn?

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If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well  It were done quickly. Trading as short as 1/6, let us assume that Jeremy Corbyn wins. Let us also assume that the electoral cause of Labour will be better served by getting rid of him. Elections are won on the centre ground, and Stephen Bush has pretty conclusively shown that non-voters are not, collectively, an alternative viable route to victory. Even if Corbyn does manage to turn out a bunch of new…

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Guest Slot: Social media and shy rightwingers

Guest Slot: Social media and shy rightwingers

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Tissue Price on the polling errors across Europe The inquest into the polling disaster at the UK General Election continues. Matt Singh of NumberCruncherPolitics provided an excellent overview of the pollsters’ initial thoughts last week, ahead of the first meeting of the official BPC/MRS inquiry. Some pollsters think faulty sampling was the principal cause of error, some blame turnout modelling, and one thinks a genuine late swing was the biggest single factor. Dan Hodges channels Emile Zola in accusing the…

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Guest slot: The boundaries of reason

Guest slot: The boundaries of reason

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Antifrank looks at The boundaries of reason: the possible shape of the 2020 election I previously looked back at the impact of demographic changes on party politics from 1992 to 2015.  That’s all well and good, but what changes can we expect for 2020?  To determine that we first need to consider what the new boundaries are likely to look like. It might be thought that the future musings of the Boundary Commissions are imponderable, but we have quite a…

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Holyrood 2016: who will come second?

Holyrood 2016: who will come second?

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Making a tissue on a “Betting Without” market This is a betting thread without a market as yet. However, the best prices on any political market can usually be found within either the first six hours or the last six. So a little forethought as to what you’d be prepared to back – and at what price – can often be rewarded handsomely. Someone launching a “without the SNP” market on Holyrood is only going to be a matter of…

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Searching for a parallel to 2015

Searching for a parallel to 2015

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Parallels from the past can never be as neat as those proposing them might like to hope. For starters, any modern comparison for 2015 could never do justice to the SNP’s triumph, and what happens in Scotland over the next five years could dramatically change the Parliamentary arithmetic in 2020. Regardless, let’s see what we can come up with, focussing on the two main parties. 1992 is a very tempting parallel, and probably the one that offers Labour the most…

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Corporeal suggests that political punters should be rooting against the Pollsters

Corporeal suggests that political punters should be rooting against the Pollsters

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Confusion might be best for those wanting a bet Here at PB we generally like pollsters (especially if they drop by to read and boost traffic numbers). I’m sure many of them are lovely people (a couple have even retweeted me occasionally) but it’s mostly the polls they produce that we like (sometimes with the slight undercurrent of getting a fix supplied). As a site where we mix polling and betting good data on likely outcomes is valuable as well…

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Corporeal asks: Will the dog bark

Corporeal asks: Will the dog bark

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Sex and politics is an explosive mix and one that has driven a lot of scandals in British history, from Parnell’s divorce through the Profumo affair, Jeremy Thorpe, and up to the present day scandals to not even scratch the surface. The most recent rumours (that I happily don’t know enough about to make any troublesome innocent faces) aren’t either as influential or as shocking (the Duchess of Argyll’s divorce case is inexplicably obscure now) as the most infamous historical…

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And now… our inaugural New Year’s Day Crossword

And now… our inaugural New Year’s Day Crossword

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pic.twitter.com/MuKOKDA0Cz — PolPics (@PolPics) January 1, 2014 It is with some considerable trepidation that I step into the estimable shoes of stjohn, who has provided us with splendid Christmas Day cruciverbalism for the last six years.  Fear not, stjohn is merely resting, and may well be setting more puzzles in future.  If this offering gets his famous “nod” then we may even collaborate on a jumbo sometime! Traditionally members have supplied the answers (and explanations of the wordplay) in the…

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