The Scots Tories and Greens are on the decline At the 2010 General Election when the Tories returned to power there was no change in the seats in Scotland. Labour had 41 of the 69 seats and ended up with 41 of the 69 seats Everything changed north of the border following the IndyRef in 2014 when there was a huge move to the SNP in the polls although the referendum itself went with the status quo Since then Scottish…
The voting ID requirement was one of three changes Johnson brought in without going through the normal process on voting system changes of trying to get a consensus with other parties. The first was the introduction of compulsory voter ID for those voting in person and we will see in the local elections how that plays out. The evidence from the trials is that it does reduce turnout but not by that much. Whether it will help the Tories we…
There has been a fair bit of speculation that the likely Tory drubbing that the party will get in the locals will be drowned out in media coverage terms by Saturday’s Coronation. I am sure that’s right but I don’t think that this will help Sunak. Over the long holiday weekend there might not be much in the media but let there be no doubt – the main focus of Tory MPs will be on what the ward results in…
Is Simon Case the new Cressida Dick? The Civil Service has not been declared institutionally misogynist, racist or homophobic. Nor institutionally corrupt. But it has not been well led in recent years. Had Jeremy Heywood lived, he would have had serious questions to answer about the Greensill affair, though it is fair to note that he may have had good answers. Still, that whole episode does not reflect well on anyone involved: not the civil service nor the politicians nor…
Sunak appears to be struggling more than he was
Thanks to David Cowling for compiling the above tables which give a real sense of how the political environment has changed since 2019 when most of the seats up on Thursday were last fought. The fact that there’s a current average 15% lead compared with 4% four years ago suggests that Starner’s Labour should see a considerable number of gains from the Tories. I tend to regard LAB voting intention to signify being anti-Tory and that people will vote in…
Starmer’s approval rating up 5 Starmer maintains his “best PM” position Mike Smithson
Is the WH2024 nomination race now over? The big news in US politics over the past week has been the announcement by Joe Biden that he wants to seek a second term. If he was nominated and won he would be 86 years old at the end of his term. This is very much against public opinion in the US where voters across the board are opposed to such a move. A poll for Forbes found only 26% of respondents…