I think the real significance of last night's byelection is the implications it will have on the 2015 "ground war". Getting so trounced has probably convinced UKIP that it's futile wasting resources on Labour seats, atleast for now. So that means they'll probably be throwing almost all of their resources at southern Tory seats. In turn, the fact UKIP probably won't bother giving Labour much of a fight means Labour can also afford to take all the seats they hold for granted and also focus all THEIR resources on Tory seats too. So the Tories will probably be facing heavy fire on both fronts, and will only have a depleted and disillusioned activist base themselves to try and ward them off.
Danny, UKIP made huge gains into a rotten Labour borough. I doubt they'll be discouraged.
No, Danny is right. The net swing Lab to UKIP was 1.7% (i.e. the Lab vote went up almost as much as UKIP's). Given that UKIP are starting from next to nothing, that's useless to them in terms of getting into close contention in any Labour-held parliamentary seats.
some maybe, not any
What they need is (imo) - almost all the pre-existing Con vote - all the economic swing voter part of the ex LD vote - either a more favorable C2 vs DE split or larger numbers of bitter ex-Labour
No, I stand by my point that a 1.7% swing Lab to UKIP is useless to UKIP in terms of getting into contention in any Lab held parliamentary seat.
Take the Lab held seat where UKIP had its highest share in in 2010 - Dudley North, on 8.5%. That was still 30.2% behind Lab. After a 1.7% swing UKIP would still be 26.8% behind.
well the proof of that will be whether these independent and separately funded anti-Ukip organisations in Labour seats decide to pack it in or not
i half agree in that i think in seats like this the Ukip:Con vote ratio needs to be 3:1 or higher rather than 3:2 ish before they can really be threatening
We think our weather's bad (and the wind is right now destroying the building site to the right of my house) but America is going through its umpteenth hideous snowstorm, killing dozens:
I do wonder sometimes if the global temperature stats have been so fiddled over the last 15 years to hide the decline in global warming that they might have accidentally disguised global cooling but it seems too far-fetched.
The currency is, as I predicted ages ago on these Very Blogpages
You were also hilariously gullible enough to predict Cast Iron Cammie's EU posturing would win the election for him. First the flounce then the EU referendum and now the kippers are stronger than ever so well done you.
"A passenger's died and another's been airlifted to shore after a cruise ship was hit by a huge wave in the English Channel.
The wave hit the Marco Polo cruise ship, operated by Cruise and Maritime Voyages (CMV) as it headed for its home port of Tilbury in Essex at the end of a 42-night voyage.
Reports suggest a wave crashed through a window injuring a number of the 735 passengers, who were mainly British. An 85-year-old male passenger and a woman passenger in her 70s were airlifted off the ship. The male passenger later died, the company said."
Engineers from McLaren and Ferrari are used to going head-to-head on the Formula One race track in order to give drivers the best chance of taking poll position.
But the two racing thoroughbreds are now competing in bobsleigh and skeleton events at the Winter Olympics too as they have both built cutting-edge equipment for athletes representing their home countries – Great Britain and Italy.
McLaren Applied Technologies applied the same technologies used in the F1 world to improve the aerodynamic efficiency and structural integrity of the sleighs, which will give the British team a competitive edge at the Games.
I wondered when you would get around to putting up Ponsoby's long whinge about not getting an interview with the Chancellor yesterday. I was laughing by the end of it, the STV viewers were none the wiser to the content of Osborne's speech or its impact on them if there was a Yes vote. But they were well aware by the end of his report that he personally was nae happy at not getting his own personal interview, bless.
Recent evidence from the most recent BBC Trust commissioned impartiality review appears to support this view. The research, by my colleagues at Cardiff, compared BBC news when Labour were in power (in 2007) with coverage under a Conservative-led coalition (in 2012). The study found, by a series of measures, that ‘Conservative dominance in 2012’ of BBC news was ‘by a notably larger margin than Labour dominance in 2007’ (Wahl-Jorgenson et al 2013: 5).
Beyond the main parties, the study suggested that the BBC is more likely than either ITV or Channel 4 to use sources from the right, such US Republicans or Ukip, and less likely to use sources from the left, such as US Democrats and the Green Party. But it is the imbalance between Conservative and Labour – by margins of three to one for party leaders and four to one for ministers/shadow ministers – that was most striking, especially since the research indicated that this rightward shift was a strictly BBC phenomenon.
The study found no similar patterns on either ITV or Channel 4 (ibid: 83). These were not findings the BBC Trust was especially keen to draw attention to, and – oddly for a review about impartiality – they were played down in the subsequent report. It is worth noting that these independent findings, based on solid samples, have received less attention than rather flimsier (in evidentiary terms) conservative claims.
Of course you were because in your fantasy world your darling Obrowne is popular and the scottish public don't consider him an out of touch toxic tory twit. In your fantasy world there was also a huge scottish tory surge as well so it's not as if reality is anything that's ever bothered you before or ever will in the future.
Currency is rated 8th by the scottish public among their list of priorites for Independence while only 2% of the scotish public think it is most important. That's after Osbrowne and the No campaign have been frantically banging away on it since 2012.
Yet you're actually deluded enough to think Osbrowne posturing away on currency is all the No campaign need to do to win. Wonderful complacency only matched by your chums in scottish labour months before the 2011 scottish election landslide for the SNP when they were ahead by double figures.
Of course you were because in your fantasy world your darling Obrowne is popular and the scottish public don't consider him an out of touch toxic tory twit. In your fantasy world there was also a huge scottish tory surge as well so it's not as if reality is anything that's ever bothered you before or ever will in the future.
Currency is rated 8th by the scottish public among their list of priorites for Independence while only 2% of the scotish public think it is most important. That's after Osbrowne and the No campaign have been frantically banging away on it since 2012.
Yet you're actually deluded enough to think Osbrowne posturing away on currency is all the No campaign need to do to win. Wonderful complacency only matched by your chums in scottish labour months before the 2011 scottish election landslide for the SNP when they were ahead by double figures.
Highly unusual but not impossible (or even almost impossible). It requires the right combination of circumstance, personnel and strategy (and probably, luck).
The piece I wrote the other week envisioning Farage becoming PM was partly tongue-in-cheek but I do think that odds of 66/1 in current circumstances are about right. Maybe Wythenshawe should push that out to 100/1 but it remains at the outer edge of possible, requiring all three other parties to give the voters a reason not to back them, and for the new party to be credible and electorally effective. That's a big ask but as previous polls have shown, the three big Westminster parties have never been so unpopular so that's the first hurdle passed.
I wouldn't be tempted at anything like 66/1. But I agree that UKIP getting a significant chunk of the vote is neither impossible nor even near-impossible.
I've long reckoned that the Leader of The Opposition is always one serious scandal, cock-up or catastrophe away from becoming PM, even if (s)he's the political equivalent of a chocolate teapot. They are the default alternative, after all.
But in the current situation, the Leader of UKIP must have usurped the Cat-Herd in Chief of the Lib Dems for the position of being just two scandals/cock-ups/catastrophes away from power.
The chances of such a double electoral disaster are low, but not as low as the square of the chance of one disaster, since these things are not independent - many of the plausible scenarios would undermine the entire political establishment, both red and blue. It would have been fascinating to see how the polls would have moved if the parliamentary troughing scandal had only broken after the rise of UKIP. As a more thoroughly anti-establishment party they may have stood to gain more than, as it happened, the Lib Dems did. (Potentially ironically given UKIPs own issues with its MEPs!)
I least Ponsonby wasn't reduced to foam flecked puerile insults and name calling, sad.
We all know that you're fine with namecalling as long as it's directed at your political opponents but as soon as anyone dares mock Osborne or Cammie you're always reduced to shrill hysteria. It's not as if that kind of pitiful hypocrisy is unexpected on here by now.
For PB fans of the BBC intro to their F1 coverage over the years. Youtube - Fleetwood Mac - 'The Chain' Live (The Dance 1997) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpVCL00fPAc
The ever-enjoyable Populus weekly cold shower for politics anoraks is out. What do voters recall about this week? Well, 80% do remember there was discussion of the weather. After that, Sochi scores 2.4% Then it's all 1% or below, with Scottish independence battling it out with the late Danish giraffe at 0.7%/0.5%.
Now, over 8% of the sample is Scottish. so even if EVERYONE who recalled the discussion about the £ was Scottish, that's still only 1 Scot in 11. The other 10 weren't listening at all. Sorry, George and Ed. Maybe go back next week and say it again?
Good to know they've still got power in the West Country....I'm worried about Gloucester tho....
Your petulant narrow mindedness is hardly going to stop me posting links and articles from wings dear. Encourage me to post more? Of course.
Joining the Euro for idiots
Britain and Scotland’s journalists have set a high bar for stupid today, but this might take the biscuit. Almost every half-cut hack and so-called expert who talks about the currency options open to Scotland casually mentions that Scotland “could join the Euro”. Whether such people are doing so through ignorance of the rules of the Eurozone or through malicious intent is for observers to decide, but either way, this particular piece of witless misinformation just will not go away.
In purely pragmatic political terms, no party which aspired to win votes in what was left of the UK, if Scotland seceded, could deviate from the line which was taken this week on behalf of the three major parties. Advocating a currency union with Scotland in a post-independence environment would be about as politically popular as advocating membership of the euro already is. That is another, practical reason why the clarification that was offered this week would not be reversed post-referendum.
The ever-enjoyable Populus weekly cold shower for politics anoraks is out. What do voters recall about this week? Well, 80% do remember there was discussion of the weather. After that, Sochi scores 2.4% Then it's all 1% or below, with Scottish independence battling it out with the late Danish giraffe at 0.7%/0.5%.
Now, over 8% of the sample is Scottish. so even if EVERYONE who recalled the discussion about the £ was Scottish, that's still only 1 Scot in 11. The other 10 weren't listening at all. Sorry, George and Ed. Maybe go back next week and say it again?
It was covered extensively in the scottish new and current affairs programmes. Just as it was all the the other times through 2013 and back to 2012 when Osborne first started posturing on it. Yet curiously it's still nowhere near the top of issues the scottish public care about.
@Sausages - the Wyfe of Bath should get out more - most journalists have pointed out the significant difficulties of Scotland 'joining the Euro'.....which I am sure Eck thought about....or not.
Perhaps he got (super secret which no one can ever see because it doesn't exist) Legal Advice?
Good to see you posting. They'd want to be two very juicy scandals to propel Nigel to a position of responsibility!
Cheers Neil. Would have to be huge, which is why I think 66/1 isn't long enough. But assigning probabilities to unlikely events is a tricky one because history is a worse guide.
Looking at British and overseas history, there have clearly been either incumbent parties or candidates that were cruising towards victory before something derailed them. There have been oppositions which have imploded too (though one of the most famous "examples" of that, the Zinoviev Letter, wasn't really*). Times when the two major parties have got taken out, either individually or caught in the same storm, are rarer. But mani pulite and the "Tangentopoli" provide an example of what is possible.
In the British context, where our financial scandals often concern surprisingly trifling amounts of cash, something of that magnitude seems unthinkable. Then again, so was the idea of John Major being a seductive lothario, and had the Edwina Currie thing leaked out at an inopportune time we may well have ended up wiling away many a long evening on PB with our assessments of the prime ministerial legacy of Neil Kinnock. Who knows what surprises are around the corner, and whose closets the skeletons inhabit? In such an event, it seems more likely that UKIP would be the beneficiary than the LDs, which is why I take David Herdson's assessment quite seriously even if I disagree on the odds.
* This is at a tangent to my point, and I've run out of parentheses (I recall Avery has threatened before that my parentheses should be rationed) but while Zinoviev Letter probably didn't have a major effect on the Labour vote, it provided a useful focus of blame for Labour's failure to reach their own over-lofty expectations. Everybody loves to feel a victim, that they have fought through adversity against the odds, and finally, if they lose, that the cause for their defeat lay in some grave injustice perpetrated against them. In a different context, Par l'argent puis des votes ethniques.
MEMBERS of a commission set up by Alex Salmond to examine currency options were last night divided on what Plan B could be adopted in an independent Scotland after the SNP’s plan to share sterling was ruled out by Westminster.
£7 million marketing campaign launching soon from YesScotland. Be prepared to hear about nothing else for the next 7 months #indyref
Wonder who paid for that then? Accounts been published?
And I'm sure your "Fashion Branding student in Glasgow" is a fine fellow.....but a reliable media source?
LOL
You know who isn't paying for it? Someone linked to Serbian war criminals, Saddam Hussein and massive tax avoidance. Shame that's who No are relying on so heavily.
Twitter ITV News @itvnews 24m Police: Woman has died and a man has been taken to hospital after building collapsed and crushed car http://itv.co/1fFxKuK
£7 million marketing campaign launching soon from YesScotland. Be prepared to hear about nothing else for the next 7 months #indyref
Wonder who paid for that then? Accounts been published?
And I'm sure your "Fashion Branding student in Glasgow" is a fine fellow.....but a reliable media source?
LOL
You know who isn't paying for it? Someone linked to Serbian war criminals, Saddam Hussein and massive tax avoidance. Shame that's who No are relying on so heavily.
Those are all verified facts about the No donor dear. Shrieking "smear" hysterically just because you don't like those facts won't change them. You also have the memory of a goldfish and bags of hypocrisy since the very first thing you did was try to insinuate that the £7 Million Yes warchest was fishy and from someone suspect
You seriously think that's who reported it do you?
That was your source....
Because I knew with absolute certainty your hilariously predictable and petulant reaction. You haven't let me down I have to say.
ROFL
Now try thinking this through. Who do you think was his source? Here's a clue, it's nothing to do with fashion. Don't worry if you just don't understand yet or feel frustrated and "bullied" just because it's self-evidently upsetting you so much. Someone will put you out of your misery tomorrow. Or whenever it's most amusing.
Comments
i half agree in that i think in seats like this the Ukip:Con vote ratio needs to be 3:1 or higher rather than 3:2 ish before they can really be threatening
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heGdCXx_nKI
Chicken George - Hero of the scottish tory surgers and now the No campaigns best/only hope to change public opinion in scotland
ROFL
I do wonder sometimes if the global temperature stats have been so fiddled over the last 15 years to hide the decline in global warming that they might have accidentally disguised global cooling but it seems too far-fetched.
Oh that's right, your next unstable prediction was that a housing price surge would win Cammie the election.
The only constant is you getting things wrong.
*chortle*
The wave hit the Marco Polo cruise ship, operated by Cruise and Maritime Voyages (CMV) as it headed for its home port of Tilbury in Essex at the end of a 42-night voyage.
Reports suggest a wave crashed through a window injuring a number of the 735 passengers, who were mainly British. An 85-year-old male passenger and a woman passenger in her 70s were airlifted off the ship. The male passenger later died, the company said."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26184648
Recent evidence from the most recent BBC Trust commissioned impartiality review appears to support this view. The research, by my colleagues at Cardiff, compared BBC news when Labour were in power (in 2007) with coverage under a Conservative-led coalition (in 2012). The study found, by a series of measures, that ‘Conservative dominance in 2012’ of BBC news was ‘by a notably larger margin than Labour dominance in 2007’ (Wahl-Jorgenson et al 2013: 5).
Beyond the main parties, the study suggested that the BBC is more likely than either ITV or Channel 4 to use sources from the right, such US Republicans or Ukip, and less likely to use sources from the left, such as US Democrats and the Green Party. But it is the imbalance between Conservative and Labour – by margins of three to one for party leaders and four to one for ministers/shadow ministers – that was most striking, especially since the research indicated that this rightward shift was a strictly BBC phenomenon.
The study found no similar patterns on either ITV or Channel 4 (ibid: 83). These were not findings the BBC Trust was especially keen to draw attention to, and – oddly for a review about impartiality – they were played down in the subsequent report. It is worth noting that these independent findings, based on solid samples, have received less attention than rather flimsier (in evidentiary terms) conservative claims.
Currency is rated 8th by the scottish public among their list of priorites for Independence while only 2% of the scotish public think it is most important. That's after Osbrowne and the No campaign have been frantically banging away on it since 2012.
Yet you're actually deluded enough to think Osbrowne posturing away on currency is all the No campaign need to do to win. Wonderful complacency only matched by your chums in scottish labour months before the 2011 scottish election landslide for the SNP when they were ahead by double figures.
Are you the alter ego of this Tim I have been hearing so much about?
I've long reckoned that the Leader of The Opposition is always one serious scandal, cock-up or catastrophe away from becoming PM, even if (s)he's the political equivalent of a chocolate teapot. They are the default alternative, after all.
But in the current situation, the Leader of UKIP must have usurped the Cat-Herd in Chief of the Lib Dems for the position of being just two scandals/cock-ups/catastrophes away from power.
The chances of such a double electoral disaster are low, but not as low as the square of the chance of one disaster, since these things are not independent - many of the plausible scenarios would undermine the entire political establishment, both red and blue. It would have been fascinating to see how the polls would have moved if the parliamentary troughing scandal had only broken after the rise of UKIP. As a more thoroughly anti-establishment party they may have stood to gain more than, as it happened, the Lib Dems did. (Potentially ironically given UKIPs own issues with its MEPs!)
@afneil: You made me laugh. “@JabbaLeChat: @afneil In case you haven't seen this... http://t.co/hobGQopUdd”
Good to see you posting. They'd want to be two very juicy scandals to propel Nigel to a position of responsibility!
One for the scottish tory surgers to enjoy
http://wingsoverscotland.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/osbornesnose.jpg
Youtube - Fleetwood Mac - 'The Chain' Live (The Dance 1997)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpVCL00fPAc
Now, over 8% of the sample is Scottish. so even if EVERYONE who recalled the discussion about the £ was Scottish, that's still only 1 Scot in 11. The other 10 weren't listening at all. Sorry, George and Ed. Maybe go back next week and say it again?
http://www.scotsman.com/news/brian-wilson-salmond-loses-round-of-call-my-bluff-1-3307036
Tick tock...tick tock....
Funny that.
Perhaps he got (super secret which no one can ever see because it doesn't exist) Legal Advice?
Tick tock... tick tock..
Looking at British and overseas history, there have clearly been either incumbent parties or candidates that were cruising towards victory before something derailed them. There have been oppositions which have imploded too (though one of the most famous "examples" of that, the Zinoviev Letter, wasn't really*). Times when the two major parties have got taken out, either individually or caught in the same storm, are rarer. But mani pulite and the "Tangentopoli" provide an example of what is possible.
In the British context, where our financial scandals often concern surprisingly trifling amounts of cash, something of that magnitude seems unthinkable. Then again, so was the idea of John Major being a seductive lothario, and had the Edwina Currie thing leaked out at an inopportune time we may well have ended up wiling away many a long evening on PB with our assessments of the prime ministerial legacy of Neil Kinnock. Who knows what surprises are around the corner, and whose closets the skeletons inhabit? In such an event, it seems more likely that UKIP would be the beneficiary than the LDs, which is why I take David Herdson's assessment quite seriously even if I disagree on the odds.
* This is at a tangent to my point, and I've run out of parentheses (I recall Avery has threatened before that my parentheses should be rationed) but while Zinoviev Letter probably didn't have a major effect on the Labour vote, it provided a useful focus of blame for Labour's failure to reach their own over-lofty expectations. Everybody loves to feel a victim, that they have fought through adversity against the odds, and finally, if they lose, that the cause for their defeat lay in some grave injustice perpetrated against them. In a different context, Par l'argent puis des votes ethniques.
Currency Plan B.....
Tick tock.....tick tock.....
Alex Salmond on currency row: I have always had a Plan B
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/459893/Alex-Salmond-on-currency-row-I-have-always-had-a-Plan-B
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/top-stories/scottish-independence-split-on-currency-plan-b-1-3307194
Osbrowne's speech was on Thursday dear.
Do you really want to know what's coming up? It might upset you, well, upset you even more. No wonder the incompetent fops are panicking.
Never mind.
Perhaps a few old biddies from SCON can arrange a jumble sale and put up a few posters.
And I'm sure your "Fashion Branding student in Glasgow" is a fine fellow.....but a reliable media source?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qftk/episodes/guide#b03tx0zc
1. Denmark
2. Iceland
3. Norway
4. Finland
5. Sweden
You know who isn't paying for it? Someone linked to Serbian war criminals, Saddam Hussein and massive tax avoidance. Shame that's who No are relying on so heavily.
http://nationalcollective.com/2013/04/07/dirty-money-the-tory-millionaire-bankrolling-better-together/
I'm absolutely fine with you not believing it. Far better to let you panic and try to pretend it isn't happening when it does transpire.
ITV News @itvnews 24m
Police: Woman has died and a man has been taken to hospital after building collapsed and crushed car http://itv.co/1fFxKuK
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/jeremy-warner/10640435/If-Scots-vote-for-independence-the-only-realistic-currency-is-the-pound.html Typical Nat (non) engagement with the argument:
Smear the opponent
Rely on the expertise of a Glasgow fashion student (who I'm sure is jolly good in his field)
Shrieking "smear" hysterically just because you don't like those facts won't change them.
You also have the memory of a goldfish and bags of hypocrisy since the very first thing you did was try to insinuate that the £7 Million Yes warchest was fishy and from someone suspect You seriously think that's who reported it do you?
*tears of laughter etc*
Clueless.
I think its a bit mean, picking on a fashion student, but perhaps you are an equal opportunity bully?
Where's Currency Plan B?
In your own time.....
You haven't let me down I have to say.
ROFL
Now try thinking this through. Who do you think was his source?
Here's a clue, it's nothing to do with fashion. Don't worry if you just don't understand yet or feel frustrated and "bullied" just because it's self-evidently upsetting you so much. Someone will put you out of your misery tomorrow. Or whenever it's most amusing.
Where's Osbrowne's Popularity in Scotland?
In your own time...