We keep hearing that the Conservatives will need a lead of “about 11%†to win – but is this really the case? There has been a bias towards Labour since Major won a majority on a 7.5% lead and the decrease in the hold that the “Big 2†have over the vote and seats doesn’t ease things. But the bias is not a fixed law of Nature. In the first of two guest slots statistician and PB regular Andy Cooke…
CON 39 % (40) LAB 30% (29) LD 20% (21) And it reports the lowest Tory share since May New is just coming in of the latest ICM poll for the Sunday Telegraph which has the lead down to just 9% and will provide encouragement for Brown Central. It means that the last six published polls have all had Labour in the 30s with the last four of them putting the Tories under 40. This does look like a trend….
Betfair Politics The chart above is from the Betfair line market where punters have bets at evens with each other on what the parties will get at the coming election. Once you get used to how it works it’s quite a neat form of betting. As can be seen the past three months have not shown much movement apart from the Tory wobble in the past week following the spate of polls having both them and Labour in the 30s….
How’s the increasing scepticism going to play? One of David Cameron’s early acts in detoxifying the Conservative brand was the increased focus on the environment and combating climate change. That was in a different, pre-recession world and the legacy of those policy decisions could be about to cause the Tory leadership problems. The BBC-commissioned Populus poll reports a significant shift in public attitudes on climate change, with the proportion who don’t think global warming is taking place having increased from…
There’s a new poll out tonight from Angus Reid on voter’s attitudes towards electoral reform – particularly the planned alternative vote system on which a referendum is planned and which MPs will decide upon this month. The survey took place amongst a sample of 2,010 people on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week while Labour’s plans were making the news. What strikes you immediately from the numbers above is how contradictory the response it. That the first question sees the…
CON SPREAD RANGES 340 – 345 Sporting Index 338 – 343 ExtraBet 344 – 347 Betfair Line market LAB SPREAD RANGES 220 – 225 Sporting Index 221 – 226 ExtraBet 215.5 – 221.5 Betfair Line market LD SPREAD RANGES 53 – 56 Sporting Index 54 – 57 ExtraBet 53 – 53.5 Betfair Line market Has the Ipsos-MORI aggregate moved the markets? After a week which saw a dramatic move against the Tories on the spread betting markets things have now…
Please can we discuss this in terms of the political consequences and not get into details of the cases themselves. We are in a very different legal situation and must do nothing that could be seen as prejudicing fair trials. Mike Smithson
Or will they be squeezed out in the Dave-Gord encounter? The general view ahead of the June 2009 Euro elections was that the parties that would gain most from the expenses scandal, which dominated the headlines for the weeks beforehand, would be UKIP, the Greens and the BNP. And so it was. UKIP easily beat Labour for second place in the national vote, the Greens had a good election while the BNP secured two seats at the EU parliament for…