What could this mean for tactical voting? Detailed data from the November YouGov poll for the Daily Telegraph, has the pollster showing for the first time that Lib Dem supporters prefer a David Cameron Tory government to a Gordon Brown-led Labour one. The views of declared LD supporters run against the trend of the poll where the Tory leader saw a decline in his lead amongst all the sample to CON 43% – Lab 34% to the question “If you…
Why not some smart third party politics? With Maurice Saatchi making coded attacks on David Cameron over “going for the centre ground” and the seemingly extraordinary suggestions about the Tories and Polly Toynbee isn’t it time for some smart opposition tactics from the Liberal Democrats. They should start be recalling one of the early actions the new Tory leadership. At the start of the year Cameron’s team came up with the novel approach of backing the Labour leadership as it…
Surely he’ll still be leader in two years time? After a conference which started with a gloomy opinion poll the Lib Dem leader goes into today’s session in Brighton knowing that he has a fight on his hands over the leadership’s taxation plans. With Lib Dem conferences it is always hard judging how key votes will go but there’s little doubt that the “50% tax” faction has got a fair degree of support and it could be that Ming is…
How LD stand asides could help bring about a hung parliament At the 2001 general election the Lib Dems stood aside in the Wyre Forest seat to help an independent, Richard Taylor, in his single issue campaign of keeping Kidderminster Hospital open. Taylor over-turned a Labour majority of 7,000 and came in 18,000 ahead. There is little doubt that he was aided in this success by the Liberal Democrats’ decision. In 2005 Taylor held onto the seat with a much…
Will Gordon mop-up those who switched in 2005? If the punters, the pundits and the pollsters have got this one right then in a few months time the Chancellor, Gordon Brown, will take over the Labour leadership and start the post-Blair era in British politics. The big question for the Lib Dems is where the changed political environment leaves them? For while the Tories were going through their fourteen year nightmare it’s been Paddy’s, then Charles’s and now Ming’s party…
Past precedent, future Presidents… For those feeling starved of party election contests, the Lib Dems might just have a morsel to stave off the hunger pangs pending the Big One, Labour’s Brown v Someone battle. Simon Hughes (pictured), the current party President, is nearing the end of his first two-year term of office, and is eligible for re-election for one further term. The question is: will he re-stand, and if he does will anyone challenge him? When last the post…
Will my 33/1 bet on Kennedy come good? On March 29th, barely three weeks after Ming Campbell’s election as Lib Dem leader, a betting market opened on who will replace the 65 year old ex-Olympic sprinter. One price stood out as I recorded at the time. “..For a real long-shot Charles Kennedy is priced at 100/1 – which looks like a great value bet. If he could show that he has really conquered his problems he would have a good…
Do “budget” non-voting intention surveys tell us anything? So far we haven’t covered the ICM poll findings that were presented to Ming Campbell in a 25 minute feature on Newsnight on Wednesday evening. The most cruel figures from the new leader’s point of view was a comparison with his predecessor, Charles Kennedy. By 53-26 those surveyed preferred the old leader to the new. Comparing which of the three presumed party leaders at the next election “had the qualities needed to…