Will she be given another seat so she can stay an MP? According to a comment on an earlier thread there are suggestions that Labour is trying to ensure that the Home Secretary, the Oxford-educated Jacqui Smith, is not thrown out of the commons at the next election. Of the leading cabinet members Jacqui’s seat at Redditch has the thinnest majority and stands to be lost with a swing of just 2.3%. This makes it Tory target number 41 and…
Will the disputes be whited out of the bulletins? A key element that stories like the rows over “British Jobs for British Workers” need is a rapid build up of media coverage and continuing a sense of momentum. That’s what happened with the fuel crisis in September 2000 and what, on Friday, looked like happening this morning. Alas while the disputes are still making some headlines the London-based national media has gone crazy for the snow story. This is in…
Meet the front runners for next opposition leader According to weekend reports the race is already on for who should be Labour leader after the likely defeat at the coming general election. And the three who are said to be most actively campaigning are James Purnell (Balliol), Ed Balls (Keble) and Ed Miliband (Corpus Christi). Interestingly they are not the front-runners in the betting but have many thing in common. Two of them are still in their 30s (EM and…
Traffic up more than a third on January 2008 The number of page downloads by PB users in January was 2,043,872 which compares with 1,272,458 in the same month in 2008. PB’s discussion threads continued to be the leading forum on any UK political site. There were 31,067 commentsduring the month taking the total to 925,809 since the site started on March 23rd 2004. We’ll hit the million mark at some stage in the next few months but I don’t…
Will even loyalists waste time over such banalities? The above is reproduced from today’s pages on LabourList and reports on a new feature – a weekly bottle of champagne to the person writing the comment of the week. The prize is not a bad idea of itself and it should get a bit of interest – but just read this week’s winner. That’s hardly thought provoking stuff and if this is the best they’ve got then what does it say…
What would a Scottish election now do for Gordon? With Scottish politics in turmoil following the rejection by Holyrood of the SNP budget last week there’s a YouGov survey for the Sunday Times of voting intentions north of the border which should give heart to Alex Salmond’s party. The poll suggests the following shares comparisons on a similar poll is September October when Labour was doing badly nationally:- Constituency: SNP 38% (-1): LAB 32% (+1): CON 13% (-1): LD 12%…
Is 5/2 on a 2009 exit good value? One bet we have not featured recently is the price on Gordon ceasing to be PM for whatever reason before the end of 2009. William Hill Politics had this down to 5/2 during the day though their UK politics markets are usually only open during office hours. What are the chances? The more I look at him the more I’m coming to the view that it will be his health that will…
…who shall be the ‘glorious sun of York’? The phrase ‘the Winter of Discontent’ is perhaps now better known to describe the political demise of the Callaghan government and subsequent victory of Margeret Thatcher in 1979 than the misquoted opening line of Shakespeare’s Richard III whence it came. It captured, and still does, a deep misery – the feeling of a spiralling towards catastrophe that media pundits are trying to re-ignite in the face of a global depression, wildcat strikes and what…