Best Of

The Green surge is the one that Yougov didn't really explore in this article, perhaps because Polanski only came to prominence mid year.

Its obvious that while Badenoch continues to shed support to Farage, Polanski continues to gain supporters from Starmer. The Greens are where those former Labour voters have gone.

Incidentally Polanski is also the most popular of the party leaders, albeit slightly negative and 49% not taking a view.

I think there will be a lot of attention to the Greens in 2026, particularly they are likely to do well in the May elections in England.

Good morning

The Greens are a problem for the left including the lib dems but anyone who supports Polanski's promises is no better than those supporting Farage

Both are extreme and incoherent

I dont expect The Only Tory in the PB Village to like Polanski or his policies, but certainly the story of the year politically is the Labour to Green swing over the year, which is double the size of the Con to Reform swing.

How much of that is Gaza? Do the Gaza voters come back if there is relative peace?
How much is typical mid term blues?
How much withstands a tactical battle vs Reform?

Feels very volatile to me. Polanski is an impressive communicator for sure, but doesn't have the answers, so the Farage parallel is valid imo.

Some is Gaza, but there is clearly a rejection of Starmerite apeing of Reform policy by those on the left of Labour on domestic economic and social issues too.

Which is why the replacement of Starmer will be someone from the centre-left of the party, not Streeting or Mahmood.

Reform don’t have a domestic economic policy to ape.

Controlling our borders and migration is a sensible thing. The Greens are merely, like Lib Dem’s, open door fanatics. That’s fair enough but to pretend controlling borders and migration is reform lite is wrong, there’s no remigration talk.

Also changing the rules on the years needed to get ILR is absolutely right. The Boriswave was an economic time bomb. As has been discussed previously.

A lot of the more moderate approaches to controlling our borders and migration have already been enacted by Sunak and Starmer, with the consequence that net immigration to the UK is plummeting. It’s not quite “tens of thousands”, but it’s getting closer to that than has been the case for a long time.

So, does that filter through to voters’ perceptions and they reward the incumbent government? Or does anti-immigration rhetoric on social media that is less concerned with reality keep sections of the electorate angry?

Until the boats are stopped this will remain an active and toxic part of our political debate

Certainly Sunak is responsible for the substantial drop in migration to date

It was under Sunak that we saw the massive peak in small boats in 2022 - the biggest year on record. It was under Sunak that the Treasury agitated for massive immigration to fill the jobs vacancies after COVID-19.

I don't understand the motivation for pumping Sunak's reputation. He's not coming back, and I don't get any sense anyone except a couple of PBers want him to.

I am happy to pump Sunak's reputation. He was massively, massively better than the two previous rapscallions the Conservative Party chose to be our prime minister.

Also Starmer is continuity Sunak, so he's not really gone away. Rather he's re-generated Dr Who style.

That’s unfair

Sunak had charm and aplomb

Surely a man with aplomb is never without an umbrella?

I find it amusing when people delight in the imperfection of AI; what kind of natural intelligence is perfect? Were they expecting humans to have invented godlike intelligence immediately?

Thank god that it still requires human surveillance!

I’ve just been discussing my upcoming walk in France with free Google AI. I started by asking it to tell me about it with a link to Google maps of roughly my route. It replied with the distance and a recommendation to look at Mappy for more details

I asked more specific questions, and gave it some more details of me and my holidays, including my holiday motto (Je marche partout, et Je bois comme un trou. Which it loved and told me was original)

The answers became better and better, and more tailored to my previous requests. It gave me the same advice as @kjh has about Arachon Bay

It occasionally tells me obvious nonsense, but politely apologises and gives me seemingly better information when I point out the mistakes

I asked it about possible future extensions to my walk (which it, on its own, calls the Grand Loop) into Spain or Portugal. It gave me interesting beer/wine/food/history/walking information on its three proposed routes

And, unprompted, it came up with possible Spanish and Portuguese idiomatic boozy walking holiday mottos

AI is so useful if one remembers its limitations

I'm not sure whether I should be flattered or insulted that AI gave the same advice as me, but I thank you @BlancheLivermore for the acknowledgement in your post. It is appreciated and gives me a warm feeling that occasionally I might actually be useful.

I wish you well on your walk. It is just more fun on a bike for me.

The Green surge is the one that Yougov didn't really explore in this article, perhaps because Polanski only came to prominence mid year.

Its obvious that while Badenoch continues to shed support to Farage, Polanski continues to gain supporters from Starmer. The Greens are where those former Labour voters have gone.

Incidentally Polanski is also the most popular of the party leaders, albeit slightly negative and 49% not taking a view.

I think there will be a lot of attention to the Greens in 2026, particularly they are likely to do well in the May elections in England.

Good morning

The Greens are a problem for the left including the lib dems but anyone who supports Polanski's promises is no better than those supporting Farage

Both are extreme and incoherent

I dont expect The Only Tory in the PB Village to like Polanski or his policies, but certainly the story of the year politically is the Labour to Green swing over the year, which is double the size of the Con to Reform swing.

How much of that is Gaza? Do the Gaza voters come back if there is relative peace?
How much is typical mid term blues?
How much withstands a tactical battle vs Reform?

Feels very volatile to me. Polanski is an impressive communicator for sure, but doesn't have the answers, so the Farage parallel is valid imo.

Some is Gaza, but there is clearly a rejection of Starmerite apeing of Reform policy by those on the left of Labour on domestic economic and social issues too.

Which is why the replacement of Starmer will be someone from the centre-left of the party, not Streeting or Mahmood.

Reform don’t have a domestic economic policy to ape.

Controlling our borders and migration is a sensible thing. The Greens are merely, like Lib Dem’s, open door fanatics. That’s fair enough but to pretend controlling borders and migration is reform lite is wrong, there’s no remigration talk.

Also changing the rules on the years needed to get ILR is absolutely right. The Boriswave was an economic time bomb. As has been discussed previously.

A lot of the more moderate approaches to controlling our borders and migration have already been enacted by Sunak and Starmer, with the consequence that net immigration to the UK is plummeting. It’s not quite “tens of thousands”, but it’s getting closer to that than has been the case for a long time.

So, does that filter through to voters’ perceptions and they reward the incumbent government? Or does anti-immigration rhetoric on social media that is less concerned with reality keep sections of the electorate angry?

Until the boats are stopped this will remain an active and toxic part of our political debate

Certainly Sunak is responsible for the substantial drop in migration to date

It was under Sunak that we saw the massive peak in small boats in 2022 - the biggest year on record. It was under Sunak that the Treasury agitated for massive immigration to fill the jobs vacancies after COVID-19.

I don't understand the motivation for pumping Sunak's reputation. He's not coming back, and I don't get any sense anyone except a couple of PBers want him to.

I am happy to pump Sunak's reputation. He was massively, massively better than the two previous rapscallions the Conservative Party chose to be our prime minister.

Also Starmer is continuity Sunak, so he's not really gone away. Rather he's re-generated Dr Who style.

That’s unfair

Sunak had charm and aplomb

Sunak is somewhat personable unlike Starmer, agreed. Aplomb, not so much. Excessive peevishness I think, possibly due to a life where he previously had no challenges at all and never had to struggle.

Yes, with you on this. I think Starmer has less charm than Sunak but more aplomb. And very true on the gilded path (Sunak). He'd have been a better PM with more political time and struggle to get there, I think.