Is this a market to keep out of at the moment?

Is this a market to keep out of at the moment?

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SportingIndex Could things change during conference season? We have not featured the spread betting prices on the number of general election seats since May 15th because there has been very little movement on the overall result. Then the Tory spread was 355 – 360 seats while today it has moved up just one. So the changes in political fortunes over the past three months have had very little impact on punters who don’t seem ready to back the Tories beyond…

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Could the UNS have exceptions as big as this?

Could the UNS have exceptions as big as this?

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What if Morley & Outwod saw the same swing? The video is the famous one of Michael Portillo’s result at the May 1997 general election. The CON>LAB swing was an amazing 17.1% which was way above the uniform national swing and it was by far the most unexpected result of the night. The victim, of course, was a high profile cabinet minister who was being talked of as post-election party leader. For the thing about the uniform swing is that…

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Is Nick Cohen right – the election will be a “massacre”?

Is Nick Cohen right – the election will be a “massacre”?

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Will his 2009 PB prediction be as good as his 2007 one? In the week of the 2007 Labour conference, on September 28 2007, the Observer columnist and writer, Nick Cohen, made an extraordinary prediction in a comment that he posted here on Politicalbetting when general election speculation was at its height. Nick wrote: “My colleagues think that if Brown backs off after marching his men to the top off the hill the commentariat will turn on him. The press…

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OCT ‘07 FLASHBACK: The end of the media honeymoon

OCT ‘07 FLASHBACK: The end of the media honeymoon

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Did Gord’s honeymoon end with his visit to Iraq? My third extract to help us understand that defining first week in October 2007 is a Newsnight interview between Jeremy Paxman and Bob Ainsworth which took place in the aftermath of Brown’s trip to Iraq and the statement on British troop reductions but before Brown’s famous interview with Andrew Marr. Paxman’s normal manner is aggressive but the core of his case was that there had been some fiddling of the figures…

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How dangerous is this sort of talk?

How dangerous is this sort of talk?

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Spectator Coffee House Is Gordon reconciled to going down with the ship? The Coffee House blog has picked up a fascinating quote from the FT about a Number 10 source which could change the whole dynamic of the next ten months – Brown thinks he’s going to be defeated. It reports: “One Downing Street insider said the prime minister was more relaxed because he now realised that he was certain to lose the next election and was powerless to defy…

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How difficult is it campaigning on your record?

How difficult is it campaigning on your record?

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Is this why going negative is more effective? The YouTube from Labour’s unsuccessful 1970 re-election campaign is pretty feeble by modern standards but highlights a challenge faced by all governments when they seek re-election – how to campaign on their record? For in every general election people are looking forward and reeling off numbers about the past often does to resonate. It can sound tedious and boring and in any case who cares? What voters want to know is that…

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What do we think of Double Carpet’s autumn predictions?

What do we think of Double Carpet’s autumn predictions?

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Millais “Autumn Leaves” (Wikimedia Commons) What will the “season of mists” hold? So what will the “season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” hold for domestic and international politics – and where might you be investing some of your hard-earned cash on the betting markets? The usual caveats of political prediction apply – and as David Herdson rightly reminds us in this morning’s piece on Iran, it’s Macmillan’s “Events, dear boy, events” which are always liable to blow prognostications off course….

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Would a Darling resignation bring down Brown?

Would a Darling resignation bring down Brown?

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Who is the mystery cabinet minister? The following cryptic paragraph from leftward-leaning blogger, Paul Linford, has intrigued me for the past twenty four hours. Talking of, inevitably, the Labour succession, he writes: “..The plan, or so we are asked to believe, is for a leading Blairite Cabinet minister to stage what is being termed a “nuclear resignation” in the middle of Labour’s conference this autumn which would force Mr Brown out within hours.” Just who of the present cabinet could…

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