How can we deal with the market definition issues? Yesterday I visited the Thames-side headquarters of Betfair to discuss with the managing director, Mark Davis, and senior members of his time a range of issues relating to political markets – a meeting that had been set up as a result of an earlier session with Nick Palmer MP. Although in terms of its overall business the amount traded on political markets is small the firm is keen to operate in…
Is it best to have your leader not liked or your party? The Ipsos-Mori polling firm has just put up on its website full details of the poll that partly appeared in the Observer yesterday. To me the most interesting new findings are those reproduced above which show vividly the challenges faced by the the Tories and Labour as we enter the new political era. For the Tory brand is still contaminated but Cameron’s party can take some heart from…
David Leyshon looks at the parties and issues Fianna Fail – this is the de Valera party founded in the mid twenties. It won its first election in 1928 (I think). It is the party that has been in power most since. Bertie Ahern is FF. They are republican but havn’t supported the IRA in their various military campaigns. In their modern form they are populist and well organised. It has often occurred to me that New Labour has learned…
Is now the time for a trading bet on Labour? Could the opportunistic call on Andrew Marr’s programme by UKIP’S leader, Nigel Farage, for Tory MPs to defect over the grammar school issue be a foretaste of how things might get very tricky for the Tory leadership in the next few months. Of course there are not going to be any defections to UKIP but the Farage interview does underline the challenges that the leadership faces. Until now the conventional…
David Herdson checks out the runners for the Foreign Secretary job? With Blair as prime minister, being foreign secretary has been something of a thankless task for Cook, and especially Straw and Beckett – he’s done most of the work himself. After he stands down, the Foreign Office must look a more attractive post to cabinet ministers than it does now, and perhaps more attractive than the Treasury should Brown make the move from No 11 to No 10. While…
Is there any value in what Ladbrokes are offering? Tomorrow morning I’ve been invited to meet senior bosses at Betfair to discuss political betting issues in a session that PB regular, Nick Palmer MP, helped to arrange. One of the items on my agenda will be the lacklustre markets that the exchange now offers and to suggest that it might like to run something similar to what Ladbrokes are offering on which of the three party leaders will be first…
Peter the Punter on the betting for the next chancellor Few political markets have offered punters more opportunities than that for the Next Chancellor. The key to it has been the regular price fluctuations. Most of the plausible candidates have varied enormously in price and if you bought high and sold low you may well have engineered an all green position already. Unlike a lot of the markets we bet in, this one is sure to go to the wire….
Is this the first skirmish of the new political era? In a move designed to seize the media initiative Tory leader, David Cameron, has challenged the PM in waiting, Gordon Brown, to a series of TV debates to, as he puts it, “revive interest in politics”. Such debates played a key part in Cameron’s own election as leader in 2005 and if the left-wing challenger, John McDonnell, had found enough MPs to support his bid on Thursday then there would…