The internet pollster should steady Labour nerves This month’s YouGov poll for the Daily Telegraph has LAB 38 CON 32 LD 21 This goes in the opposite direction of the week’s ICM and MORI polls which is probably explained by the fact that YG do not filter by whether people are likely to vote. So the pollsters that usually favour Labour have shown Tory progress while the normally pro-Tory internet pollster has a different view. Discuss. NOTE I am on…
I am going on holiday tonight and will not be back until a week on Monday which means there will be a limited service on the site over the next ten days. I can just about generate new articles and publish them on my Sony Ericsson 910 smart phone, and have one or two general items in my “store”, but the level of coverage will be reduced. When I return I will be devoting myself full-time, apart from a house…
Mori’s 37% Tory share gives market a boost Today’s Mori poll in the FT has led, inevitably, to money going on the Tories in the spread-betting markets. The shares of LAB 39: CON 37: LD 18 are the best for Michael Howard’s party for years and were only exceeded in the strange circumstances of the 2000 petrol crisis and in the aftermath of David Kelly’s death in 2003. Following on from the improved figures from ICM earlier in the week…
Are Labour’s campaign tactics working? The February MORI poll for the Financial Times has the Tories up 5% to one of their highest levels for a long time. The vote shares with comparisons to the January survey are:- LAB 39: CON 37 (+5): LD 18 (-4). The move to the Tories is in line with the ICM poll on Tuesday and seems partly at the expense of “others” which would appear to be down at 6% – reflecting a big…
Will voters care about today’s Guardian revelations? The extent to which the Iraq war will be a General Election issue could be tested by revelations in the Guardian today that the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith QC, warned Prime Minister Tony Blair less than two weeks before the invasion that military action could be deemed illegal. According to the report, the Government was so concerned that it might be prosecuted that it set up a team of lawyers to prepare for…
Why is Howard beating Blair for female support? With the betting markets moving a notch to the Tories following the Guardian ICM survey further information from the poll, now available, shows the potential big gender gap at the coming election. Interviewees were asked to rate whether a number of leading politicians were “an asset or a liability to their party”. Tony Blair came out with a rating of 45-43 in favour – but there was a huge difference between the…
Is Howard’s campaigning having an impact? The February ICM poll in the Guardian tomorrow shows that Labour’s lead has dropped to 3%. The vote shares with changes on the same poll last month are: LAB 37 (-3) : CON 34 (+3) : LD 21 (n/c). For the Tories this is the best position with ICM since March last year and suggests that Michael Howard’s high-profile initiatives on crime and immigration are making an impact. For Labour the poll will be…
After the poll famine – the feast: we hope! With the opening of the offical campaign for a May 5 General Election only weeks away there’s been a dearth of opinion polls. So far in February there have been just three national surveys and we are now three-quarters of the way through, what is admittedly, the shortest month. Compare that with January when we saw a total of ten polls including five extra surveys beyond the five regular ones that…