Campaign Countdown April 5th

Campaign Countdown April 5th

Politicalbetting “Balance of Money” prediction: Labour majority 54 (-4) The overnight polls have, as expected, led to movement on the spread-betting markets away from Labour causing us to revise our “Balance of Money” election prediction. Each day during the campaign we are taking the average mid-point Labour price from the two spread markets that we feature to project a General Election result based entirely on how political gamblers are risking their money. Yesterday it was at 58 seats – today’s…

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The Battle for Number 10 Begins

The Battle for Number 10 Begins

Poll boosts for the Tories and Lib Dems as the campaign opens With Tony Blair due to announce the election date today four new polls this morning show that the race could be much tighter than was being forecast. All of them show Labour leads over the Conservatives to be on the decline and one has Michael Howard’s party five points ahead. The polls are with changes on the last surveys from each pollster are:- NOP in the Independent has…

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Will the postal voting fraud case affect the election?

Will the postal voting fraud case affect the election?

Could Labour suffer after the judge’s stinging attack on minsters? The judge in the postal vote-rigging trial has strongly attacked the government’s attitude to the problem accusing minsters of being not only complacent, but “in denial” about the failings of the system. According to BBC Online Richard Mawrey QC was speaking as he ruled there had been “widespread fraud” in six Birmingham council seats won last year by Labour and his comments come as more voters than ever are preparing…

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YouGov – Labour averaging 36% since the start of the year

YouGov – Labour averaging 36% since the start of the year

Does the Telegraph’s survey tell us anything we don’t know? Under the undramatic headline “Election campaign starts tomorrow but swing to Tories will not oust Blair” unusual polling results of a YouGov online survey of nearly 22,000 people since the beginning of the year are featured in the Telegraph this morning. Unlike normal polls which have a very tightly defined survey time but a much smaller sample this covers a very large number of people over a long period. The…

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Camapaign Countdown April 4th

Camapaign Countdown April 4th

Will punters be more accurate than the pundits or the pollsters? Each day here during the campaign Politicalbetting will take the average mid-point Labour price from the two spread markets that we feature and project a General Election result based entirely on how political gamblers are risking their money. It will be interesting to see whether the balance of money being risked is a more accurate predictor of the result than the opinion polls or other forecasting methodolgies. For while…

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Can Blair beat Martin Baxter again?

Can Blair beat Martin Baxter again?

How Michael Howard could be a winner on votes but a big loser on seats The main way of trying to work out what specific vote shares will mean in terms of Commons seats is to use the calculator created and maintained by the ex-Cambridge, and now City mathematician, Martin Baxter. His approach, available to all online, is to take projected vote shares and to apply them in terms of a uniform national swing to each constituency in Great Britain….

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Campaign Countdown – April 3rd

Campaign Countdown – April 3rd

A daily feature: Throughout the the election we will be producing a daily Campaign Countdown here with the key numbers from the latest reported polls, our polling averages, Commons seat spread betting figures, and main betting odds from the conventional betting markets. We are hoping to have live betting price feeds as we get closer to the day. New Opinion Polls Reported: One new opinion poll this morning – from Communicate Research in the Independent on Sunday where the surveying…

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Communicate Research – Labour lead down by 6%

Communicate Research – Labour lead down by 6%

Tories up in spite of Flight sacking row In the first national poll to be carried since the sacking of the Arundel MP, Howard Flight, there been a big improvement in the relative position of the Conservatives. The survey, by Communicate Research for tomorrow’s Independent on Sunday shows a significant drop in the Labour lead compared with last week’s survey that had Tony Blair’s party doing substantially better than at the 2001 General Election. The figures are with changes on…

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