Hardly a week goes by at the moment without news of more CON MPs announcing that they don’t plan to defend their seats at the general election. Given the polls this is hardly surprising and I guess that we will see many more Tory MPs not wanting to defend their seats. Some might quit before the election thus causing by-elections. Others will just announce that they are not standing. Being a Tory MP fighting to defend your seat in the…
Just a quick reminder that entries for PB Predictions Competition 2024 must be posted by 23:59 on Saturday 6th January at the latest. Most of you will know that TSE has generously offered a prize of £100 in Amazon vouchers to the winner at the end of the year, in addition to which someone will win the kudos of being the Supreme PB Prediction Guru of 2024! We have had had a great response so far, with 65 entries at the…
Coupled with the by-election in Wellingborough this by-election in Kingswood could be the events which could hasten the end of Sunak. At the time plenty of people did say the Tories took all the wrong lessons from the Uxbridge & South Ruislip result. The other day I observed that Starmer is a lucky general, Sunak is the antithesis of that. I’m expecting a Labour gain here. TSE
I love studying history and past polls is a particular area that brings unbridled joy is when we are looking for evidence of swingback. Based on precedent Labour’s lead at the general election could be as low as 4% which make those people betting on no overall majority rather happy. My two key takeaways is that Starmer isn’t doing as well as Cameron & Blair, the only two people in the last forty four years to make the transition from…
I think that Labour has to look again at its messaging here on the election date. The system that was in place for all the Labour majority governments has been that it has been left to the prime minister to decide when general elections are held. Inevitably Sunak is going to hang on until he sees the polls give some indication that things might not be as bad as they appear at the moment. My guess is that he’ll wait…
Last week I advised Sunak to rule out a May election as soon as possible lest he falls into Labour’s trap and be labelled a bottler, as we can see from the above tweets he has just done that. Also he has ruled out a January 2025 election as only the heir to the throne of the kingdom of idiots would hold an election that straddled Christmas and the New Year period. The question is when in H2 of 2024…
By far the biggest political betting market is November’s White House race in the US. As can be seen Trump has lost a little of his betting appeal but he remains favourite. There is a long long way to go and the big question Is how this will look after the first phase of state contests – Iowa, New Hampshire and S Carolina. In the coming weeks, Trump has so many legal cases to contend with, and a huge part…
If a year ago you had told me in 2023 Nicola Sturgeon would resign as Scottish First Minister & SNP Leader and then her husband and later herself would be arrested regarding the SNP finances I would have chastised you for drinking too many eggnogs but that’s what happened. It was a surreal moment when a motorhome became the focus of the investigation (from Winnie Ewing to Winnebago) but the moment of her arrest was seminal. From First Minister to…