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Category: Polls

Brown in free-fall on YouGov tracker

Brown in free-fall on YouGov tracker

How events are changing the public’s perceptions The above chart is adapted from one produced by Anthony Wells for his latest report on the YouGov BrandIndex tracker. It is available in full form from his UK Polling report site here. As we’ve featured before each day the pollster asks 625 people to give their positive and negative impressions of a list of leading politicians. The figures reflected in the chart are net ratings, based on a five-day rolling average and…

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YouGov: Brown falling even further behind Cameron

YouGov: Brown falling even further behind Cameron

Poll for Sun has Tory leader nine points ahead A new YouGov poll for today’s Sun has Gordon Brown falling even further behind David Cameron to the question “If you had to choose – who do you think would make the better Prime Minister – Gordon Brown or David Cameron”. These were the shares with comparisons on the same question just one week ago. Brown 34 (-2): Cameron 43 (+2) The Sun seeks to explain Cameron’s lead by noting “This…

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Is Cameron about to get a polling weightings boost?

Is Cameron about to get a polling weightings boost?

Why are more people “remembering” that they voted for the party? With the brand new Tory logo now published for the first time I thought that this morning might be a good moment to report on a polling trend that could provide a small but significant boost to Cameron’s party. This is a bit complicated to explain but basically in the last 2-3 months there has been a big increase in the proportion of those being interviewed by Populus and…

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Has Labour killed off its electoral “golden goose”

Has Labour killed off its electoral “golden goose”

Can the party even contemplate a fourth term without Blair? For all the excitement now there’s a firm end to the Tony Blair era in sight the uncomfortable question has to be asked – is it possible for Labour to win General Elections without him? Has the pressure from the party that forced his September 2004 commitment not to run for a fourth term and last week’s mid-2007 departure statement meant that Labour has killed it’s Golden Goose? Here’s a…

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Marvels of modern polling? Exit polls, part 2

Marvels of modern polling? Exit polls, part 2

Part 2 of a two-part guest series by Harry Hayfield. Part 1 can be found here. Posted by their confidence at predicting Election 1997 to within an inch of the actual result, the pollsters headed into Election 2001 safe in the knowledge that they couldn’t get the result wrong no matter what the British electorate threw at them and so the BBC announced their exit poll for 2001 with it’s customary 2% margin of error. Labour 44%, Conservatives 32%, Liberal…

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John Hemming’s guest piece: Mosaic and general election betting

John Hemming’s guest piece: Mosaic and general election betting

Lloyd George was a trailblazer in a number of ways. As Chancellor he introduced the old age pension, unemployment benefit and financial support for the sick. As Prime Minister he led the country through most of the First World War. After the war he introduced political funding systems much like those seen today – by selling honours. One of his key areas of trailblazing was to approach politics from the perspective of winning the general election, rather than building a…

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Marvels of modern polling? Exit polls, part 1

Marvels of modern polling? Exit polls, part 1

Part 1 of a two-part guest series by Harry Hayfield. Part 2 can be found here. Exit polls came to fame in 1952 when following a long study of the American electorate, NBC fed the information into a computer and after a few moments said “Eisenhower to win”. As the results came in, the computer was proven right and the sceptics wrong. In our elections, exit polls have only really been around since 1970 when the BBC commissioned a poll…

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Why is Gordon not getting the credit for growth?

Why is Gordon not getting the credit for growth?

ICM find that only 37% think he’s created Britain’s economic success The Guardian publishes more data this morning from its August ICM poll and focuses on the Labour’s record generally, and Gordon Brown’s performance in particular, in running the economy for the past nine and a bit years. In findings that might have an impact on the Labour succession the pollster records that those surveyed split by 37%-52% on whether they thought Brown had been responsible for Britain’s economic success….

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