Ukip move into the favourite slot to win most votes at next year’s Euro elections

Ukip move into the favourite slot to win most votes at next year’s Euro elections

Comments 0 Comment

Ukip now odds-on favourite to win most votes at Euro2014.Best price Ladbrokes 4/5. bit.ly/c5gpH6 twitter.com/MSmithsonPB/st… — Mike Smithson (@MSmithsonPB) May 7, 2013 My money would be on the 6/4 LAB bet The multi-member party list electoral system used in the European elections is ideally suited to Ukip where it’s party brands that matter over the individuals who get elected. It is no surprise that in the elections that have been held under these rules that the purples have done well….

Read More Read More

It’s exactly 2 years to go before the May 7 2015 general election: Current chances of a CON majority are put at just 1%

It’s exactly 2 years to go before the May 7 2015 general election: Current chances of a CON majority are put at just 1%

Comments 0 Comment

And Labour’s chances of a majority are put at 81% It’s May 7th which means that it is exactly two years before the before the date laid down in the legislation introduced in October 2010 as the day of the next general election. There are provisions for this to be earlier but as long as the polling suggests that both coalition partners would get a drubbing it’s hard to envisage the circumstances in which this might happen. This extraordinary partnership…

Read More Read More

Introducing the new Times-YouGov leader ratings

Introducing the new Times-YouGov leader ratings

Comments 0 Comment

We were so swamped with reaction to the locals on Saturday that I missed what appears to be a new polling series from YouGov for the Times. Rather than the weekly YouGov “like/dislike” “doing well/badly” ratings the Times questions askes whether people have a positive or negative view if the named leaders. I think this format is a much better guide and it an approach is used quite widely in the US. Let’s hope that the Time/YouGov continues with it….

Read More Read More

Nadine could do Cameron a lot of damage if she switched to Ukip

Nadine could do Cameron a lot of damage if she switched to Ukip

Comments 0 Comment

Tomorrow it will be exactly 6 months since @nadinedorriesmp was suspended as a CON MP. Farage is making overtures. twitter.com/MSmithsonPB/st… — Mike Smithson (@MSmithsonPB) May 5, 2013 It’s starting to appear “nasty” that the whip has not been restored to @nadinedorriesmp . — Lord Ashcroft (@LordAshcroft) May 4, 2013 It’s time to “Free the Mid-Bedfordshire One” In 2008 the county council in Bedfordshire was abolished so it wasn’t one of the traditional shire counties where there was voting last Thursday….

Read More Read More

Henry G Manson on the Ukip challenge to Labour

Henry G Manson on the Ukip challenge to Labour

Comments 0 Comment

Can Blue Labour beat Back the purple onslaught? Two and a half of years ago when the ‘Blue Labour’ group of thinkers in the party first made their mark there was quite a bit of a stir. The ‘blue’ in Blue Labour was ‘small c’ conservativism among working class voters – it was blue collar. But in a party that wraps itself in all things red, even the name raised eyebrows. At its heart, leading proponents Jon Cruddas took to…

Read More Read More

Exactly two years to the day after the AV referendum this is how Rallings and Thrasher project GE2015

Exactly two years to the day after the AV referendum this is how Rallings and Thrasher project GE2015

Comments 0 Comment

The chart is based on Rallings & Thrasher data for today’s Sunday Times which has the pair’s own national equivalent vote share projections based on their detailed analysis of the outcome on Thursday. This has CON 26%, LAB 29%, LD 13%, Ukip 22% The numbers are different from the one’s published on Friday by the BBC and SkyNews because they are based on a different calculation. Two things stand out: the harsh fact for Ukip that by having a vote…

Read More Read More

The revolt of the Shires: Cameron’s last warning

The revolt of the Shires: Cameron’s last warning

Comments 0 Comment

But should UKIP have done even better? Thursday’s elections represented a resounding raspberry to all three main parties.  Indeed, they reinforced that even talking of three main parties is an anachronism.  The Lib Dems did win more than twice as many councillors as UKIP but in all other respects they finished well behind.  In the South Shields by-election, UKIP scored another second place (their fourth in the last five mainland contests) and in the local elections, Nigel Farage’s party came…

Read More Read More