Is this the Tory that Labour fears most?

Is this the Tory that Labour fears most?

Will the Tories do disproportionately better in Ashcroft-funded seats ? This is Michael Ashcroft who in this year’s Sunday Times Rich List was placed in position 87 with an estimated wealth of £800m. He has been a major donor to the Tory party and before the 2005 general election, as was reported here, he hand-picked a group of Tory candidates in marginal constituencies and then was responsible for providing extra attention and funding to help them with their campaigns. As…

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Competition: When will Labour lose its poll lead?

Competition: When will Labour lose its poll lead?

Can you predict the date and the pollster? With Labour having established a significant margin in all the main polls since Gordon moved in can you predict when, if ever before the general election, a poll will show Brown’s party to be either level-pegging or with a deficit? In the comment thread below please state, to the day, the actual date when this will happen and as a tie-breaker can you name the pollster? If you think that this is…

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Is this Gordon’s first big test?

Is this Gordon’s first big test?

Could the outbreak close off the possibility of an October election? Six and a half years ago the last outbreak of foot and moth disease caused Tony Blair to move back the general election date as well as the local elections from the first week in May until June. There was even controversy then because the disease was not fully eradicated at the time the poll was called. For months last time the harrowing pictures of livestock being destroyed and…

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PBC breaks the 750,000 mark for the second time

PBC breaks the 750,000 mark for the second time

The by elections help us to another record breaking month July was another record breaking month on Politicalbetting. We had a total of 759,452 hits which was only the second time we have been above the three-quarters of a million mark. The last month when this happened was in May when the total finished up at more than 772,000. Looking at the daily data, parts of which are recorded here, we got a huge boost on the day of and…

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But why are more people saying they will vote Tory?

But why are more people saying they will vote Tory?

Is Labour’s margin really as big as it seems? Now here’s a funny thing – in the three Guardian ICM polls for January-March 2007 the firm was reporting leads for Cameron’s party of 6% – 10%. Yet looking at the raw data FEWER people were telling the pollster then that they planned to vote Conservative than in ICM’s three published polls in July. So for the 2007 Q1 surveys the average number of people saying they would vote Tory was…

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Are we seeing Philip Gould’s “shock and awe” strategy?

Are we seeing Philip Gould’s “shock and awe” strategy?

Is Gordon following the plan of Blair’s former pollster? The revelation in the Daily Mirror this morning of a 2005 paper written by the ex-Blair pollster and major architect of NuLab, Philip Gould, raises the questions – is Gordon following the strategy and, if so, does this provide further evidence that an early general election is on the cards? Certainly what has happened in the past month seems to fit with what Gould was advising two years ago. This is…

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Could Labour suffer if each elector had to register?

Could Labour suffer if each elector had to register?

What do we think of the Electoral Commission’s conclusions? As the BBC is reporting this morning all web and phone voting pilots should be halted according to a report from the Electoral Commission on the voting experiments that took place in parts of England in May 3rd. Then there were a series of trials including internet and phone voting, electronic counting, insisting that voters sign for their forms, and making town centre facilities available ahead of polling day so people…

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The political blogger of the year of Labour

The political blogger of the year of Labour

My nomination – Paul Linford From the moment that West Bromwich MP, the unlovely Tom Watson, visited Gordon, Sarah and family at their Fife home during the first week of September the 2006/07 political year has been dominated by one subject – the Labour succession. For from that meeting Watson went on to resign his ministerial position apparently threatening a whole wave unless Tony stood down. It was unsubtle, it was brutal but it was highly effective. We then went…

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