Would Labour dare risk a by-election in Geoff Hoon’s seat?

Would Labour dare risk a by-election in Geoff Hoon’s seat?

Remember what happened here in the run up to the 1979 election? With suggestions going the rounds that that Geoff Hoon might replace Peter Mandelson as Britain’s EU commissioner in Brussels should we be preparing ourselves for a by election in his constituency at Ashfield in Nottinghamshire some time next year? The 2005 result is reproduced above and certainly with current polling and by election performances the Tories would fancy their chances. In fact a failure to win here would…

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Will Kelly take the gloss off Gord’s big speech?

Will Kelly take the gloss off Gord’s big speech?

Has her timing been designed to deliberately damage the PM? Less than fourteen hours after Gordon sat down at the end of his big conference speech in Manchester there’s a report this morning from Sky News that Ruth Kelly, the former Education secretary and now Transport minister, is to quit. Only two days ago we carried a story here about an Independent survey where Kelly was named as only one of four cabinet ministers not prepared to answer the question…

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Brown’s speech barely moves the betting markets

Brown’s speech barely moves the betting markets

But where are the Labour spread buyers? They might have been cheering in the conference hall in Manchester but the general election betting markets barely moved in response to Brown’s speech yesterday. If the speech was the “game-changer” that Labour hoped it would be then most punters did not notice. As can be seen from the chart above the Labour odds on getting most seats, converted into an implied probability, edged up just one percent in response to the speech…

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Can McCain pull back ground in Friday’s debate?

Can McCain pull back ground in Friday’s debate?

How can he stop the seepage of support? The big trend in recent days from the White House race has been the move back to Obama in the polls after appears what appears now to have been a temporary blip following the Palin pick and the GOP convention aftermath. In the betting the latest Obama price suggests a 62% implied probability with McCain on 38%. Just over a week ago both contenders were heading towards evens. In the polls Obama…

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So will it have made a difference?

So will it have made a difference?

Do Brown’s survival chances look better? Sorry about the site going down in the middle of the speech. We’ve been overwhelmed by traffic with so many wanting to follow the discussion. I found interesting the way he name-checked almost every single cabinet member – that’s a Brown innovation. He very rarely recognises that there is anybody else within his government. Overall I felt there was a surprising lack of passion. I was expecting much more than that. There was also…

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Will this afternoon’s speech change any of these minds?

Will this afternoon’s speech change any of these minds?

Click on the panel to watch Have even Labour-leaners just given up on Brown? The picture above is the final screen-shot form the three-part Frank Luntz Newsnight focus group in Manchester which was shown last night. It shows how those involved responded when Luntz asked those who had just “given up on Gordon” to raise their hands. I didn’t do a count but it appeared that about four-fifths of the participants indicated their agreement – and that in a nutshell…

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Did Deborah tell them about the “Golden Polling Rule”

Did Deborah tell them about the “Golden Polling Rule”

Why Labour should always assume the worst from the polls This is Deborah Mattinson – Labour’s polling advisor who was part of conference session at the weekend on the polls trying to make the case that Cameron has “..yet to seal the deal”. I don’t know about that but the lesson from polling history is that Labour’s default position should be that the most accurate poll is the one with the party in the least favourable position – what I…

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Is this the face of Gordon’s successor?

Is this the face of Gordon’s successor?

The above extraordinary picture is on Ben Brogan’s blog at the Daily Mail and it’s hard to work out what is happening. It was taken at the Labour conference where today Miliband had one of the set-piece speeches. One thing seems pretty certain – the foreign secretary and young pretender, David Miliband, doesn’t look too comfortable. Gord, meanwhile, is beaming and appears happy. Who knows? Mike Smithson