Is Alex right about the “system bias” towards Labour?

Is Alex right about the “system bias” towards Labour?

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Wikimedia Do the Tories really need a 10 point margin? A couple of weeks ago alex posted this on a thread during a discussion about the much talked about “bias to Labour” in the electoral system – something that has become more relevant with the hung parliament talk. He wrote:-“..the claims for “bias” are based on the theory..that the Conservatives need a 10% lead for an outright majority whereas Labour only need to be about level. Confusing cause and effect….

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Spread punters unimpressed by hung parliament talk

Spread punters unimpressed by hung parliament talk

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SportingIndex CON 352-357 LAB 208-213 LD 50-53 MORI moves the Labour spread by just one seat The immediate reaction of the spread betting firms to the sensational MORI poll suggesting a hung parliament was to suspend trading while they took stock of the situation. We’ll have to wait until later in the day for the latest extrabet spreads but SportingIndex did produce revised figures yesterday afternoon and put Labour up by just one seat. Before the poll came out Brown’s…

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Can Gord now kiss goodbye to a deal with Nick?

Can Gord now kiss goodbye to a deal with Nick?

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Click here to watch today’s interview So it’s the vote winners that matter – not the seat winners? For several years I have been posing the question of whether, in the event of a hung parliament, the Lib Dems would side with the party that won most seats or the party that won most votes – something that has again been brought into focus by the Ipsos-MORI poll. For the party of “fair votes” this was always going to present…

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Two polls, same timing, different outcomes. Eh?

Two polls, same timing, different outcomes. Eh?

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How can we explain both MORI and ICM? One thing you must not do, when you see a shock polling outcome such as the survey for by MORI for the Observer this morning, is immediately to conclude that it must be a rogue or an outlier. The fact is that we don’t know. You can only label a poll like that with the benefit of hindsight and it might be that when we see further surveys that the poll carried…

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Has Labour got a by-election poll boost from MORI? – UPDATED

Has Labour got a by-election poll boost from MORI? – UPDATED

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CON 37% (-6) LAB 31% (+5) LD 17% (-2) OTHERS 15% The delayed survey has the Tory lead down to just 6pts There are reports about that a poll due out tonight is “very good for Labour“. We haven’t seen any numbers yet and this post will be updated when we get some. Which pollster it is I don’t know but the November Ipsos-MORI poll is long overdue. The field-work began a week last Friday in the immediate aftermath of…

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Is Brown staying now free money?

Is Brown staying now free money?

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Is this the best value odds-on bet? Odds-on betting isn‘t always particularly attractive, especially when the bet lasts over several months. A lot can happen in the meantime to upset expectations, it ties up a lot in comparison to the anticipated return and even if it does come in, there’s no great sense of elation, as when picking a long-odds winner – and of course, nothing like the returns either. Even so, that’s not to say there isn’t any value…

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Is Ed Balls more vulnerable than we thought?

Is Ed Balls more vulnerable than we thought?

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Wikipedia Which 2005 “notional” result should we believe? After JackW’s earlier thread I thought I’d have a further look at Morley & Outwood – the seat with new boundaries that the Schools Secretary, the public-school educated Mr. Balls, will try to defend at the coming election. And to my surprise I came up with two rather different projections of what the 2005 election outcome would have been on the new boundaries. Anthony Wells UKPollingReport has this:- LAB 19956 (50.2%): CON:…

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Against The Grain – A Conservative Tsunami ?

Against The Grain – A Conservative Tsunami ?

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Jack W asks: Were you up for Portillo ? It was perhaps the most iconic moment of the 1997 general election as Michael Portillo was defeated at Enfield Southgate by the eyebrow raising fresh faced Stephen Twigg. It was also one of the Conservative defeats that locked in the Labour landslide. A defeat that was was well outside the expectations of both the BBC and ITN exit polls and early results swing of 8-10% Portillo fell off the scale at…

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