Ipsos-MORI Will party ratings move in line with economic optimism? This is the latest Economic Optimism Index from MORI which, as can be seen, has very much turned round and this month reached just -2%. This is the best since Mr Brown become prime minister and perhaps from the Labour perspective is the best indicator that they might just be in with a shout. The index is taken by subtracting the negative number from the positive one and the results…
Have Brown/Darling mis-judged the public mood? It’s perhaps worth reminding ourselves how Tony Blair’s NuLab won his famous victory in 1997. The strategy, executed brilliantly, was to persuade large swathes of electors who had never considered the party before in their lives that it was safe to vote Labour. Blair’s task, admittedly, was made much easier by the Tories who were in self-destruct mode, but it was that “making Labour a safe choice” for the middle classes that won the…
Polling update The first full post-budget voting intention survey is not likely before Friday at the earliest – and I would expect it to be from YouGov in the Daily Telegraph. ComRes should be due at the weekend and we might also see one other survey. Meanwhile it’s now been confirmed that the Sunday Telegraph’s poll by the ICM group company Marketing Sciences was carried out in precisely the same manner as other ICM voting intention polls. The wording of…
Will he regret not consulting first? I have a very cynical view of allowances and payments to elected politicians. When I became a county councillor twenty years ago we got a minimal basic amount but for every half day meeting we attended there was a £9.50 to be pocketed which was doubled plus a meal allowance if it went on after lunch. The result was that there was an incentive for meetings to to be prolonged. This was, of course,…
Does the budget offer the chance of making a few quid? Tomorrow is budget day which has in recent years developed into a great political betting occasion. For some reason the bookies put a lot of interesting markets and smart punters can sometimes do very well. I like the markets on the words and phrases that Darling might say. the reason – well you can can do a quick computer scan on previous Darling speeches and find out whether he…
Does the union have too much influence over the party? Somebody calling themselves “TrueLabour” posted this on LabourHome yesterday:- “If the Conservative party had a single donor called UnitePLC that provided 40% of its donations, provided the CEO of the Conservative party, had its Head of PR setup websites for the Conservatives, hired people like Derek McPoison to run smear campaigns, unfairly influenced the process whereby many of its UnitePLC employees become Conservative MPs through donations and Uniteplc block votes…
CON 40 (-3) LAB 30 (+4) LD 19 (-2) Brown’s party is back in the 30s After the two terrible polls at the weekend Labour strategists must have been fearing the worst from the Guardian’s ICM survey – the longest polling series in the UK. Well those projecting a big collapse got it wrong. The poll points to a Tory lead of just 10 points which is barely enough to produce an overall majority. This is seriously good news for…
Just listen to Nick Robinson on his return from holiday Yesterday I suggested that the West Yorkshire seat of Morley & Outwood might be good for a speculative punt because this had the makings of being the sensation of election night – a bit like Michael Portillo’s defeat at the 1997 general election. This, of course, is the new seat that Ed Balls will be fighting and on the face of it there is a pretty solid Labour majority. But…