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So far this year voting intentions barely moved – politicalbetting.com
So far this year voting intentions barely moved – politicalbetting.com
Each month David Cowling, ITN’s former Head of Political Research, issues his polling averages table and as can be seen seen it is hard to discern any real change.
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What leaps out is the Conservatives really need to consider an April or early May election. The summers and Autumns rub their pledges all up the wrong way.
And Mike reiterates again, Sunak to be challenged. Sunak’s dry right wing platform, very much the party of privilege not aspiration, is a problem. They need to tac to the centre, and to do that credibly they will need fresh voices and faces.
Some pollsters stick to timetable, whilst others are random, we havn’t had what was a monthly Kantor for a very long time - if I was doing one I would stick to a set of polls published weekly and monthly, not include every poll in the month.
Another issue is rounding. If Tories were 26.4, this shows as 26, whilst if Labour was 44.6, it shows as 45?
Pollingreport have a current average measurement as live on their site, they currently have LAB 45.7%
CON 27%, LIB DEM 11%
It's not coincidental that those most enthusiastic for yet another PM change are of the Luckguy tendency.
Someone like Mordaunt might just be able to get past the weird selectorate, I suppose.
At the same time as arguing the dangers to the US from Russia and China can be reduced by the US abandoning its western allies, he seems to want to go to war with his immediate neighbours.
A ‘fevered hallucination’: Latin America meets Vivek Ramaswamy
The Republican candidate wants to prioritize the Western Hemisphere, but in ways that worry its leaders.
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/09/03/latin-america-vivek-ramaswamy-00113723
Maybe people have finally twigged that VI polls are terrible predictors of the next general election result until 3-6 months out?
Probably not, for some reason this fact never seems to register.
New tech boosts Dutch drive for sustainable farming
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-66461769
The Netherlands is the world's second largest agricultural exporter - how is that possible ?
Does that involve re-export of imports, or are they just immensely good at it ?
Jan 25 would be political suicide so the election will be in 2024. Either Spring (May/June) or Autumn (October).
I predict that the polls will barely change from now until polling day. People's minds are largely made up. The die is cast.
And does include reexports.
A record number of migrants crossed yesterday and that really riles the last of the Conservative voters.
I think it's bullshit.
See https://oec.world/en/profile/country/nld?depthSelector1=HS2Depth
Records will be broken.
Your friendly pb Seer bids you a good morning. I'm off to stay with my Conservative friend in Surrey for a week. Could be lively!
The Sky News political correspondent keeps going on about Rayner's deputy leadership in question with the reshuffle. I thought that was an elected post so can't be changed by Starmer?
*) What do the Ukrainians want? They want a) their territory back, and b) a reduced, or no, threat from Russia. Memberships of NATO and the EU are nice-to-haves, but those top two are vital.
*) What do we want? Ukraine and Russia to be at peace forever (or at least a very long time). We want to deter other similar wars of expansionist aggression around the world. We want Russia to stop interfering with neighbouring countries.
*) What does Russia want? Eastern Europe to be under its influence, directly or indirectly, and to be seen as a major stronking world power (despite having the 11th largest economy, and shrinking). It wants to destroy the western-based world order and replace it with its own view.
Your idea of a 'peace' deal is nothing of the sort, as it will not prevent Russia interfering in its neighbouring countries, politically or militarily. Putin sees NATO as a weak entity, despite everything that has happened, and he knows it be be divided politically.
Your 'peace' proposal does nothing to dissuade Putin from his imperialist, fascist expansion. He will take a few years off, rebuild his military, absorb Belarus, then go for one of his non-NATO members such as Georgia or Khazakhstan, or break NATO politically and then go for Ukraine again. After all, enough idiots believe the 'Ukrainian NAZI's!!!! rubbish.
We need the Russian government and Putin to realise that this war has been disastrous for them, and that it is not worth doing again. If they *gain* territory - as your 'peace' deal proposes, then they will show that the war *was* successful, and that the business is very much unfinished.
Russia's aggression will have been rewarded.
"solidly independence-minded parts of Ukraine real independence and safety "
You mean, none of it?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Ukrainian_independence_referendum#/media/File:1991_Ukrainian_independence_referendum_results.svg
Nick, I don't know if you've seen the reports that came out of the Donbass after 2014, and the way the public were treated. The same with Chechnya. You are condemning good men and women to similar. The real Nazis, or at least fascists, are the ones your 'peace' deal will hand millions of people to.
One of my biggest bugbears with Brexit is the casual damage it does to the climate through global food importation.
But I'm not an expert in this area so I shall bow out.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Food-Gamble-John-Humphrys/dp/0340770465
This may come back to haunt me, Rogerdamus style, but I don’t think so.
(2) It is much better for global warming that food is grown where it is most efficient to do so, than for us to attempt to force uneconomic production.
(3) Food security, when then security is utterly dependent on the import of fertilizers*, is a chimera. You're just changing dependence on one import for another.
* You need nitrogen, potassium and phosphates.
"Cyclists, please be mindful of your speeds and just how this will effect you in the event of a collision. This group today on Dartmoor observed travelling at near 40mph on a 30mph restricted road. All stopped and offered appropriate words of advice"
https://twitter.com/DC_RPT/status/1698364462552490373
(fx: cackles as he watches.)
Any with driving licences should get treated as if they were car drivers, and get points on their licences and/or fines. Any without driving licences should be able to prove their identity, and then receive a fine. Any who cannot prove their identity should have their bikes impounded.
There's no incentive for him to cut & run.
Erdogan takes grain diplomacy to Putin in Sochi
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/erdogan-takes-grain-diplomacy-putin-034655708.html
Someone else taking your class?
Yes, I need to get my mind out of the gutter.
That should be a popular law change for a Starmer government: make the antisocial pepparami in lycra obey the same laws as us law-abiding motorists...
We are at the "walk away" stage of a toxic relationship, in this case between the Tory Party and the British electorate.
The best is the one that says the police should be reported for speeding behind the cyclists....
So pretty much a wash.
Tories failed to invest in replacement schools. Tories cut maintenance budgets. Tories eviscerated both the economy and the safety net, making schools and so often the teachers themselves financially liable for ensuring pupils aren't hungry and dirty.
And now? Schools falling down. That 'stard Zahawi swept away warnings last summer, didn't want to spend. And now? There Is No Money Left. Already broken school budgets will have to pay for any additional costs as the buildings collapse around the students.
Vote Conservative or Fuck Off.
Round my way, we are regularly seeing electric assisted bikes doing more than 20mph in the new segregated bike lanes. The road is a 20.
There have already been some nasty accidents. The assisted bikes are often delivery bikes with a big box on the back. They seem to be quite good at hitting regular cyclists.
Failing to give way, stop at red lights, drunk in charge etc are all offences for which a fine can be given - and a driving licence endorsed or suspended if you have one. There’s an old story somewhere of a lorry driver who lost his job for cycling home from the pub.
Another wasted year of national decline.
Not that I am optimistic about PM Starmer.
A Probably should - not an emergency call, speeding behind vulnerable road users, and they've got the law wrong.
Shouldn't they be solving burglaries or something?
No new drinking water reservoirs have been built in England and Wales since 1992, while about a fifth of water in pipes is lost to leaks. There has been little of the innovation shown in countries like Israel, which recycles wastewater and use desalination plants.
Now the regional water monopolies are struggling to invest adequately in infrastructure despite the growing population.
Britain is not the only country in Europe to be eyeing its water supplies nervously, but it is the only nation to have sold its water resources — including pipes, reservoirs, boreholes and treatment plants — in England and Wales to private sector owners, now mostly a clutch of sovereign wealth, infrastructure and pension funds.
Those companies — which bought the monopolies with no debt and were handed £1.5bn to make improvements — have borrowed £60bn since 1989. Much of that has been used not for new investment but to pay more than £70bn in dividends to water company owners.
So does Sunak turn up to the cabinet meeting with his wining smile and say "I'm calling an early election?". And do they just accept that when there is the alternative of not doing so?
Likelihood is he will be the next PM. It’s one of the major challenges facing the country. What’s his solution?
I didn't know about speed limits to applying to bikes, but makes sense. There's a 20mph downhill section ok my commute where I must easily clear 20. If there are cars I limit myself to their speed, but absent cars I don't have an on board computer to check speed. Have a GPS tracker app, but that does a lot of averaging/lacks precision to give a real time readout.
Something to be said for getting it over and done with, and clinging to power when unwanted is never a good look.
It should be written in stone that their operating licence for that infrastructure is conditional on them carrying out the agreed strategic provision, maintenance and forward planning of infrastructure to meet their obligations to provide enough water without crippling the environment. Failure to do so can mean enforcement action or confiscation.
Appreciate this example is (mainly) private companies but their tone is anti business across a broad range of items
We see now how much of Thatcherism was financed by the one offs of North Sea Oil and asset sales.
A collectivist party might swallow that, but the Conservatives don't work like that.
Besides, the current iteration of the Conservative party really aren't good at long term thinking.
Motorists who speed, who drive through red lights, who are on their phone while driving and don't bother with a seat belt are dangerous.
Cyclists who speed, drive through red lights, are on their phone while driving and don't bother with a helmet are the same.
The issue isn't car v cycle, it's responsible v irresponsible.
When was the last time this Government sent something to Parliament to do work on.
There's another interesting (to me, at least...) point here. All the cyclists screeching: "The speed limits don't apply to cycles!" are ignoring the morality of it. It may be *legal* to ride your bike at 40MP in a 30MPH zone; but is it the *right* thing to do?
I'd strongly argue no. It's very antisocial.
So if that is the case there's been a double failure of regulations, a failure of water ones and a failure of business ones too. Or something else is the case.
However these bikes do get modified. I saw a Police report on Twitter, or whatever it is called these days, where they had stopped a group with these bikes modified to exceed 20MPH without pedalling.
So they need tax, insurance etc etc.
Speeding offences - Because bikes aren’t fitted with speedometers, cyclists can’t be charged with speeding offences. HOWEVER, if they are considered to be going too fast for the conditions, they could be charges with ‘wanton or furious cycling’ which is a criminal offence under section 35 of the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861 (as amended by the Criminal Justice Act 1948 s1(2))
@PBLawyers - is this right?
https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2022/02/europe/russia-ukraine-crisis-poll-intl/index.html
The idea that Russia *has* to come out of this war with *something* is identical to the “peace deals” of the Yugoslav wars. Because “facts on the ground”.
Which resulted in years of slaughter.
We are short of on-the-ground reports. I'm on the Labour mailing list and their schedule certainly looks punishing - 3 canvass sessions, 7 days a week (each town/village in turn), plus wave after wave of leaflet delivery. The local CLP is small but help is reportedly pouring in from all sides. I've no idea what the others are doing (can others comment?), but I don't think massive Lab->LD tactical voting is very likely in the face of that blitz, so 2.64 still looks short to me (DYOR, though). Objectively I'd think the Tories should be the favourites with a split opposition vote, but will they turn out? Maybe the odds should be more like 2.6/2.8/3.6?
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/politics/market/1.215148472
Proportionally cyclists are at higher risk of death of injury than drivers but for some ridiculous reason unlike Australia where I grew up too many cyclists here don't bother to wear a helmet. Whereas almost all lower risk drivers wear their seat belts.