On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
14.5% said others/didn't know/WNV, so I guess some may vote UKIP
Strange that people who vote in a Euro election would say "WNV" to a GE question
Maybe they regard the Euro elections as the only real elections, and the General Election as an irrelevant side-show - a sort of super village council.
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
If David Cameron offered to resign, half the kippers would post ad nauseam about how he couldn't be trusted to keep his word while the other half would post ad nauseam about how this was nowhere near good enough and how only self-immolation would suffice.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
UKIP received 3.1% of the vote at GE2010. Six months ago I would have regarded tripling that to ~9% to be a triumph, but following the defections of Carswell and Reckless I think that falling short of double figures would be a sign that they had made serious errors in the general election campaign, and thus underperformed.
For all that some innumerate posters with poor reading comprehension skills point to the recent decline in the average UKIP poll share, I think it's worth noting that the last time their average on the Wikipedia graph was below 10% was around the time of the Rotherham by-election, when they were first pushing up above that level. At that time, Labour were polling in the low to mid 40s...
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
14.5% said others/didn't know/WNV, so I guess some may vote UKIP
Strange that people who vote in a Euro election would say "WNV" to a GE question
If they are citizens of another EU state, then that is their only option!
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
14.5% said others/didn't know/WNV, so I guess some may vote UKIP
Strange that people who vote in a Euro election would say "WNV" to a GE question
If they are citizens of another EU state, then that is their only option!
Not if they are citizens of Ireland, Cyprus or Malta!
Pbc, for all your political pedantry needs, all of the time.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
They do seem to have changed their branding since the start of the new year. Just going through old press releases TNS-BMRB figured until December. Now it doesn't.
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
If David Cameron offered to resign, half the kippers would post ad nauseam about how he couldn't be trusted to keep his word while the other half would post ad nauseam about how this was nowhere near good enough and how only self-immolation would suffice.
Oh come off it.
Kippers not posting ad nauseam about immigrants or Muslims.
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
If David Cameron offered to resign, half the kippers would post ad nauseam about how he couldn't be trusted to keep his word while the other half would post ad nauseam about how this was nowhere near good enough and how only self-immolation would suffice.
His supporters would explain how his cast-iron guarantee to resign has to be read in context, and he would tell some rich bloke in America how Her Majesty purred with pleasure on learning that he had reversed his decision.
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
Agreed. There are a lot of Kippers that won't ever come back now, but there are a lot that could be tempted but the Tories keep on doing stuff to piss them off: buckling over the EU negotiation demands, doing the latest big brother extension of state power, calling Farage racist etc.
If, tomorrow, the Conservatives came out and said they'd:
- require judicial warrants for GCHQ searches - an emergency brake of 100k on EU immigration would be a red line in EU negotiations - they've started a national police investigation over street grooming
That would be enough for me to immediately switch back to them. Now none of those things are asking for anything that's inconsistent with mainstream conservative principles, and none of those things would dent their chances of getting re-elected. It's not like asking Labour to privatise the NHS. It's only their own leadership shooting themselves in the foot.
And that's me, one of the most critical posters about UKIP. I'm sure huge chunks of UKIP support could be won back if they really wanted to.
I think TNS-BMRB may be a British subsidiary of the bigger company.
But there's no mention on the PDF - even the logo is a big "TNS"!
"A new poll by TNS UK"
"Commenting, Dr Michelle Harrison, TNS Head of Political and Social said “This latest TNS survey"
"TNS Omnibus interviewed a representative sample of 1,201 adults"
"About TNS "TNS UK advises clients on specific growth strategies around new market entry, innovation, brand switching and stakeholder management, based on long-established expertise and market-leading solutions. With a presence in over 80 countries, TNS has more conversations with the world's consumers than anyone else and understands individual human behaviours and attitudes across every cultural, economic and political region of the world. TNS is part of Kantar, one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy groups."
Well of course the press office from the parent company used the parent company's branding!
Love the anti UKIP rhetoric on here. How about a headline:
4 in 5 ukip voters at the euros will vote ukip at the GE.
That would be inaccurate?
You didn't even look at the pictures* in the post, let alone read the words.
* Advice I once had from a Professor when writing a paper was that it should be understandable just from looking at the figures and reading the figure captions. Does pb.com pass that test?
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
If David Cameron offered to resign, half the kippers would post ad nauseam about how he couldn't be trusted to keep his word while the other half would post ad nauseam about how this was nowhere near good enough and how only self-immolation would suffice.
Tapestry would be posting that the offer was made by a Robo-Cam, the real one having been kidnapped by grey lizards on the orders of the Queen mother.
Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I'm a dog chasing Opinion Polls. I wouldn't know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just... *do* things.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
Socrates said that this meant UKIP would be around "permanently".
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
Socrates said that this meant UKIP would be around "permanently".
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
Poor choice of words. But obviously "UKIP being around as a force until we leave the EU" is a great result for me!
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
Agreed. There are a lot of Kippers that won't ever come back now, but there are a lot that could be tempted but the Tories keep on doing stuff to piss them off: buckling over the EU negotiation demands, doing the latest big brother extension of state power, calling Farage racist etc.
If, tomorrow, the Conservatives came out and said they'd:
- require judicial warrants for GCHQ searches - an emergency brake of 100k on EU immigration would be a red line in EU negotiations - they've started a national police investigation over street grooming
That would be enough for me to immediately switch back to them. Now none of those things are asking for anything that's inconsistent with mainstream conservative principles, and none of those things would dent their chances of getting re-elected. It's not like asking Labour to privatise the NHS. It's only their own leadership shooting themselves in the foot.
And that's me, one of the most critical posters about UKIP. I'm sure huge chunks of UKIP support could be won back if they really wanted to.
You're really going to enjoy a decade of Milliband then!
2005. Turnout 27.15m, 61.4%, implies a registered electorate of 44.22m, including people registered at more than one address.
2010. Turnout 29.69m, 65.1%, implies a registered electorate of 45.61m, also including double registrations.
Could we end up with something like: 2015. Turnout 29.0m, 67%, with a registered electorate of 43.3m, with many fewer double registrations, and some accidentally self-disenfranchised students?
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
Socrates said that this meant UKIP would be around "permanently".
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
Poor choice of words. But obviously "UKIP being around as a force until we leave the EU" is a great result for me!
Surely that depends on the time taken. 40 years of frustration and disappointments would be a pretty depressing existence, even with the solace of posting on politicalbetting.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
Socrates said that this meant UKIP would be around "permanently".
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
Poor choice of words. But obviously "UKIP being around as a force until we leave the EU" is a great result for me!
Do you really think that they would disband if the UK left the EU, splitting back to the Tories, maybe? More likely to rename themselves.
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
I presume that the 29.5% who voted UKIP in the Euros but will be voting "Other" must include Willl Not Vote? Or else the Greens are doing well in mining the disgruntled crumblies vote.....
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
Agreed. There are a lot of Kippers that won't ever come back now, but there are a lot that could be tempted but the Tories keep on doing stuff to piss them off: buckling over the EU negotiation demands, doing the latest big brother extension of state power, calling Farage racist etc.
If, tomorrow, the Conservatives came out and said they'd:
- require judicial warrants for GCHQ searches - an emergency brake of 100k on EU immigration would be a red line in EU negotiations - they've started a national police investigation over street grooming
That would be enough for me to immediately switch back to them. Now none of those things are asking for anything that's inconsistent with mainstream conservative principles, and none of those things would dent their chances of getting re-elected. It's not like asking Labour to privatise the NHS. It's only their own leadership shooting themselves in the foot.
And that's me, one of the most critical posters about UKIP. I'm sure huge chunks of UKIP support could be won back if they really wanted to.
I'm also one of those. A robust EU renegotiation position, cap on immigration and a serious protection of our national defence, and I'd be back.
It's better than having no political force in favour of leaving, which would mean I would be waiting a lot longer than 40 years.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
Miliband merely turns to the cameras in 2020, and says 'look at the other lot squabbling'.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
That's a Twitter embedding. I tweeted the image then clicked the image to get the URL containing the word "status", and cut and pasted that link into PB.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
In-fighting? They'll be too busy governing, and thanking their lucky stars!
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
At present, it feels like a vacuous conviction-free drifter v. a man who poses a clear and present danger to the well-being of this country.
It's better than having no political force in favour of leaving, which would mean I would be waiting a lot longer than 40 years.
The worst case scenario is Labour winning c.300 seats in May.
They'd then have as miserable a time as the Wilson/Callaghan government. I wouldn't be surprised if after a couple years they were running third in opinion polls.
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
Sunil Prasannan @Sunil_P2 · 1m1 minute ago LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
What amazes me is the tories aren't pointing this out.
If Cameron gets his act together he could slaughter Ed in a 1-2-1 debate just by using this stuff.
Nah, he would rather hold out for the Greens......... Madness. Cameron should just arrange 1 or 2 head to heads with Miliband and stop Labour using the chicken route. If the tiny parties complain... let them.
If Cameron had confidence in his own performance, he would happily debate Farage along with Miliband. But he won't, because people will see that Farage speaks more sense.
Farage has two MPs filched from the Tories, why would Cameron want to debate him. he's not going to be any use in coalition building and Cameron would have nothing to gain by debating with him.
He could win over up to 15% of the electorate.That's what politicians are supposed to do - compete for other politicians' votes.
15%? No chance, unless he offered to resign.
Judging by these threads, most diehard Kippers could never be persuaded to return to the Tory fold.
As you might imagine, I know a lot of Conservatives who are sympathetic to UKIP, and UKIP supporters who could be persuaded to vote Conservative.
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
At present, it feels like a vacuous conviction-free drifter v. a man who poses a clear and present danger to the well-being of this country.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
It would get very interesting if Unite merge with PCS and then start to donate to the most left wing party in each area such as the SNP in Scotland.
It's better than having no political force in favour of leaving, which would mean I would be waiting a lot longer than 40 years.
The worst case scenario is Labour winning c.300 seats in May.
They'd then have as miserable a time as the Wilson/Callaghan government. I wouldn't be surprised if after a couple years they were running third in opinion polls.
Third might be considered good in an age of five-party politics, and given what has happened to a broadly similar party like PASOK in Greece.
It's better than having no political force in favour of leaving, which would mean I would be waiting a lot longer than 40 years.
The worst case scenario is Labour winning c.300 seats in May.
They'd then have as miserable a time as the Wilson/Callaghan government. I wouldn't be surprised if after a couple years they were running third in opinion polls.
Third might be considered good in an age of five-party politics, and given what has happened to a broadly similar party like PASOK in Greece.
When people say that, they invariably mean that 'I don't share his views'. He has in fact been very consistent from the start - as I've pointed out before, if you doubt me, just read any of his speeches from the time when he became leader.
He is, quite simply, a pragmatic, one-nation, centre-ground Conservative in the tradition of R A Butler, Macmillan, and Whitelaw. He is not, and never has claimed to be, a BOOer or a right-winger or an extremist of any kind.
Though a 21% chance of an overall majority seems to be on the high side to me. And I'm not sure why they treat Lady Sylvia Hermon as a quasi-Conservative.
@paulhutcheon: New written answer: 60k hospitality bill at Bute House between 2010 and 2013 .@scotgov
@paulhutcheon: Written answer put out on late Friday afternoon: .@scotgov incurred 415k in "hospitality" at Edinburgh Castle btwn 2010-13
Those are Government, not Party, expenditures. Including a number of major public events and so on. Or are the Scots not supposed to do that?
You may recall that Labour wasted a great deal of public money only to find that Mr Salmond had cannily bought his own teabags and biscuits at Bute House to entertain major donors to the SNP.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
When people say that, they invariably mean that 'I don't share his views'. He has in fact been very consistent from the start - as I've pointed out before, if you doubt me, just read any of his speeches from the time when he became leader.
He is, quite simply, a pragmatic, one-nation, centre-ground Conservative in the tradition of R A Butler, Macmillan, and Whitelaw. He is not, and never has claimed to be, a BOOer or a right-winger or an extremist of any kind.
Spot on and still supported by 90% or so of Conservative voters.
On topic, wouldn't it put a more accurate spin on things for the headline to read "Only just over 1 in 5 UKIP voters intend to vote Conservative in May"? UKIP's retention rate of just over 50% of voters looks pretty good to me in the abstract, bearing in mind the importance of the EU elections for UKIP.
At the 2014 EU elections UKIP received 4.38 million votes.
If they retain 53.3% of them for the GE, that is 2.33 million votes. At 2010 turnout levels that would equate to 7.9% of the vote. I think that would now be quite disappointing for UKIP, and would probably lose @isam a fair chunk of money too!
On a vote share, rather than actual votes, basis, it would equate to a UKIP GE vote share of 14.2%, but I would expect UKIP voters to be more likely to turn out to vote at the Euro elections than the supporters of Labour and the Conservatives.
Personally, I'd regard 8% of the vote, a quadrupling of their vote on last time, would be a good result. I think 6% or below would be a real disappointment for me. Anything in double figures would be a huge achievement and mean UKIP are around permanently.
Not if Britain leaves the EU.
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
Er, isn't that rather like those wistful counterfactuals we used to get from the Unionists (UK type)? "If Yes wins, the SNP will disappear ..." - rather missing the point that their key aim is achieved. Rather like arguing that the US Army lost WW2 because it left Europe [which, initially, it did, IIRC, apart from the occupation constabulary, did it not?].
Socrates said that this meant UKIP would be around "permanently".
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
Poor choice of words. But obviously "UKIP being around as a force until we leave the EU" is a great result for me!
Do you really think that they would disband if the UK left the EU, splitting back to the Tories, maybe? More likely to rename themselves.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP, the latter bearing no responsibility for 5-10 years of Miliband'.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
It also depends on Labour. They might render themselves unelectable to the ordinary voter through their own incompetence and inability to govern.
As long as we have FPTP it comes down to a relative choice between the two, more or less.
Although I agree it looks quite plausible, I can't help thinking that they might more simply have just said 'we haven't got a clue how it will turn out'.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP'.
Yes, who can forget those halcyon days of our landslide victory in 2001 and William and Ffion marching in triumph to No 10. A new day has dawned, has it not...
Although I agree it looks quite plausible, I can't help thinking that they might more simply have just said 'we haven't got a clue how it will turn out'.
No more do any of us really.
But note how low the probability of an overall majority now is and how disproportionately high the probability of a Labour-led government is (if we treat the Lib Dem choice when they are kingmakers as 50:50, then a Labour-led government is roughly twice as likely as a Conservative-led government).
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
In-fighting? They'll be too busy governing, and thanking their lucky stars!
Odds of Ukip with their 1 or 2 seats being in any sort of coalition is almost zero.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
It would get very interesting if Unite merge with PCS and then start to donate to the most left wing party in each area such as the SNP in Scotland.
Why on earth would Unite donate to the opponents of Labour?
Miss Cyclefree, because we're accustomed to incompetence and a failure to confront radical Islam.
The fact a man proven to consider non-Muslims as animals [go to Youtube and search 'Mehdi Hasan animals', it should be the top video] can appear all over British media with it only very rarely being even mentioned is a disgrace. Consider if someone had said all Muslims were animals. They'd, rightly, never be invited to discuss anything, let alone Islamist terrorism or freedom of speech.
Then there's Rotherham and other such situations, the de facto blasphemy law (kudos to the BBC which reportedly showed the latest Hebdo cover) many in the media adopt, and rank cowardice from our political class.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
It would get very interesting if Unite merge with PCS and then start to donate to the most left wing party in each area such as the SNP in Scotland.
Why on earth would Unite donate to the opponents of Labour?
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP'.
Yes, who can forget those halcyon days of our landslide victory in 2001 and William and Ffion marching in triumph to No 10. A new day has dawned, has it not...
I think if a future Tory leader (or indeed Dave) came up with policies and priorities that Socrates approved of, the likes of yourself, myself, Scrapheap, DavidL would find it very difficult to remain in the Tory party.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP, the latter bearing no responsibility for 5-10 years of Miliband'.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
It would get very interesting if Unite merge with PCS and then start to donate to the most left wing party in each area such as the SNP in Scotland.
Why on earth would Unite donate to the opponents of Labour?
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP'.
Yes, who can forget those halcyon days of our landslide victory in 2001 and William and Ffion marching in triumph to No 10. A new day has dawned, has it not...
I think if a future Tory leader (or indeed Dave) came up with policies and priorities that Socrates approved of, the likes of yourself, myself, Scrapheap, DavidL would find it very difficult to remain in the Tory party.
One party on course for 310 seats , the other for 2 at most.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
Indeed so. And they would screw it up, judging by experience.
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
Far from impossible. Imagine if Sajid Javid became the new leader and focused on a message of looking out for the less well-off in British society and rolling back the big brother state. This would be done by the following policies:
(1) Reducing the pressures of mass migration by bringing in new limits on non-EU migration (2) Raise the minimum wage (3) Putting immigration and small business regulation at the centre of EU renegotiation (4) Bringing in a meaningful British Bill of Rights, which would require warrants for GCHQ, protect the right to free speech properly, and limit spying by local authorities among other things (5) Expansion of vocational courses at both senior school and further education level (6) Removing those on minimum wage from both income tax and national insurance, paid for by adding extra bands to council tax (7) Refocus NHS spending towards GP services
All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
@paulhutcheon: New written answer: 60k hospitality bill at Bute House between 2010 and 2013 .@scotgov
@paulhutcheon: Written answer put out on late Friday afternoon: .@scotgov incurred 415k in "hospitality" at Edinburgh Castle btwn 2010-13
So that piddling amount in 4 years. Bet Westminster drink that in subsidised champagne themselves in a week never mind the millions Downing street and overseas embassies will be hosing up the wall. If only Westminster could learn something from the SNP.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP'.
Yes, who can forget those halcyon days of our landslide victory in 2001 and William and Ffion marching in triumph to No 10. A new day has dawned, has it not...
I think if a future Tory leader (or indeed Dave) came up with policies and priorities that Socrates approved of, the likes of yourself, myself, Scrapheap, DavidL would find it very difficult to remain in the Tory party.
Sorry, that's nonsense. Socrates voted Conservative in GE2010, as you did. He left because Cameron didn't follow through on his promises and let him down, whilst being dismissive of those like him who were his own natural supporters.
You are creating and reinforcing dividing lines that don't exist to help you define and feel better about your own political position.
Why don't you try and unite and reconcile the centre-right instead?
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
Indeed so. And they would screw it up, judging by experience.
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
Far from impossible. Imagine if Sajid Javid became the new leader and focused on a message of looking out for the less well-off in British society and rolling back the big brother state. This would be done by the following policies:
(1) Reducing the pressures of mass migration by bringing in new limits on non-EU migration (2) Raise the minimum wage (3) Putting immigration and small business regulation at the centre of EU renegotiation (4) Bringing in a meaningful British Bill of Rights, which would require warrants for GCHQ, protect the right to free speech properly, and limit spying by local authorities among other things (5) Expansion of vocational courses at both senior school and further education level (6) Removing those on minimum wage from both income tax and national insurance, paid for by adding extra bands to council tax (7) Refocus NHS spending towards GP services
All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP, the latter bearing no responsibility for 5-10 years of Miliband'.
Your attitude is the whole damn problem. Surely if you have an ideological issue with policy shifts, it's a question of whether they chime with conservative principles, not whether they are too much like UKIP. And the answer is that the policy suggestions I have made are all perfectly consistent with Conservative principles and would win you vote. But you don't care about that. Because it's not a matter of philosophy for you, it's a matter of hatred of UKIP and hatred of doing anything that could be seen as "UKIPish". It's madness.
@paulhutcheon: New written answer: 60k hospitality bill at Bute House between 2010 and 2013 .@scotgov
@paulhutcheon: Written answer put out on late Friday afternoon: .@scotgov incurred 415k in "hospitality" at Edinburgh Castle btwn 2010-13
So that piddling amount in 4 years. Bet Westminster drink that in subsidised champagne themselves in a week never mind the millions Downing street and overseas embassies will be hosing up the wall. If only Westminster could learn something from the SNP.
By responding you have fallen into Scott_P's clever trap.
@paulhutcheon: New written answer: 60k hospitality bill at Bute House between 2010 and 2013 .@scotgov
@paulhutcheon: Written answer put out on late Friday afternoon: .@scotgov incurred 415k in "hospitality" at Edinburgh Castle btwn 2010-13
So that piddling amount in 4 years. Bet Westminster drink that in subsidised champagne themselves in a week never mind the millions Downing street and overseas embassies will be hosing up the wall. If only Westminster could learn something from the SNP.
By responding you have fallen into Scott_P's clever trap.
Neil , Scott and clever are polar opposites. His constant lying has to be challenged regardless.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
Indeed so. And they would screw it up, judging by experience.
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
Far from impossible. Imagine if Sajid Javid became the new leader and focused on a message of looking out for the less well-off in British society and rolling back the big brother state. This would be done by the following policies:
(1) Reducing the pressures of mass migration by bringing in new limits on non-EU migration (2) Raise the minimum wage (3) Putting immigration and small business regulation at the centre of EU renegotiation (4) Bringing in a meaningful British Bill of Rights, which would require warrants for GCHQ, protect the right to free speech properly, and limit spying by local authorities among other things (5) Expansion of vocational courses at both senior school and further education level (6) Removing those on minimum wage from both income tax and national insurance, paid for by adding extra bands to council tax (7) Refocus NHS spending towards GP services
All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
Much the same as Cameron proposes.
LOL
I suppose the difference is he proposes but doesn't do anything about it.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Tories and Kippers were at their own and each others throats for at least 5 years, rendering themselves completely unfit to govern, and unelectable in the eyes of the ordinary voter.
An absolute certainty.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it - They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
Roughly translated 'The Tory party must turn into UKIP'.
Yes, who can forget those halcyon days of our landslide victory in 2001 and William and Ffion marching in triumph to No 10. A new day has dawned, has it not...
Disappointing post from you JohnO. I fought in all those elections under Hague and IDS, and voted for Cameron in 2005. I understood the need for reform.
So, if you'll forgive me, that's a little dismissive and patronising. Neither of us wants to be in the position where we feel we can no longer support the party we've backed our whole lives.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
Indeed so. And they would screw it up, judging by experience.
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
Far from impossible. Imagine if Sajid Javid became the new leader and focused on a message of looking out for the less well-off in British society and rolling back the big brother state. This would be done by the following policies:
(1) Reducing the pressures of mass migration by bringing in new limits on non-EU migration (2) Raise the minimum wage (3) Putting immigration and small business regulation at the centre of EU renegotiation (4) Bringing in a meaningful British Bill of Rights, which would require warrants for GCHQ, protect the right to free speech properly, and limit spying by local authorities among other things (5) Expansion of vocational courses at both senior school and further education level (6) Removing those on minimum wage from both income tax and national insurance, paid for by adding extra bands to council tax (7) Refocus NHS spending towards GP services
All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
Much the same as Cameron proposes.
Let's go through them:
(1) No announcements for the next election. It's been dropped as a major election theme. (2) Sort of being done, but not a big focus (3) He's surrendered on immigration, dropping the "points system", dropping the "emergency brake" and now dropping "job requirement" too. (4) Not only has he done nothing to require judicial warrants for GCHQ, he wants to expand warrantless searches to new areas. On free speech, he's done nothing to roll back New Labour's illiberalism. (5) Somewhat done (6) Has made some steps in this direction, but not up to minimum wage level, and NI hasn't been changed (unless I'm mistaken). (7) GP funding has been reduced.
When people say that, they invariably mean that 'I don't share his views'. He has in fact been very consistent from the start - as I've pointed out before, if you doubt me, just read any of his speeches from the time when he became leader.
He is, quite simply, a pragmatic, one-nation, centre-ground Conservative in the tradition of R A Butler, Macmillan, and Whitelaw. He is not, and never has claimed to be, a BOOer or a right-winger or an extremist of any kind.
I agree.
He's also the leader of a centre right party in coalition government with a centre left party.
Something he has handled brilliantly.
Could any other leader have steered the government with such little antagonism between the two parties?
It's certainly been less of a turf war between the Tories and the Lib Dems over the past five years than it was between Brownites and Blairites from 2002 onwards.
It all depends on how the Tories respond to a loss:
Indeed so. And they would screw it up, judging by experience.
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
Far from impossible. Imagine if Sajid Javid became the new leader and focused on a message of looking out for the less well-off in British society and rolling back the big brother state. This would be done by the following policies: (1) to (7)................... All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
Comments
I think UKIP will struggle to remain a coherent entity post-Brexit.
For all that some innumerate posters with poor reading comprehension skills point to the recent decline in the average UKIP poll share, I think it's worth noting that the last time their average on the Wikipedia graph was below 10% was around the time of the Rotherham by-election, when they were first pushing up above that level. At that time, Labour were polling in the low to mid 40s...
Pbc, for all your political pedantry needs, all of the time.
Kippers not posting ad nauseam about immigrants or Muslims.
I can't see it.
http://www2.tnsglobal.com/l/36112/2015-01-15/2yj4th/36112/71176/BIF_datatables_16Jan2015.pdf
Like I said, I always add them as "TNS" to the Wiki table!
Some of the pollsters' full names is amusing
ICM is in fact Independent Communications and Marketing Research Unlimited
Communication Research are ComRes
IMO, there are a lot of them who are very unhappy with the prospect of a Milliband-led government, and who might just be persuaded to give a grudging vote to the Conservatives this time round.
Yet TNS see it fit to drop the BMRB bit!
4 in 5 ukip voters at the euros will vote ukip at the GE.
If, tomorrow, the Conservatives came out and said they'd:
- require judicial warrants for GCHQ searches
- an emergency brake of 100k on EU immigration would be a red line in EU negotiations
- they've started a national police investigation over street grooming
That would be enough for me to immediately switch back to them. Now none of those things are asking for anything that's inconsistent with mainstream conservative principles, and none of those things would dent their chances of getting re-elected. It's not like asking Labour to privatise the NHS. It's only their own leadership shooting themselves in the foot.
And that's me, one of the most critical posters about UKIP. I'm sure huge chunks of UKIP support could be won back if they really wanted to.
Dropping the BMRB is unpatriotic.
Therefore PB shouldn't cover their polls. Unless they have the Tories ahead.
You didn't even look at the pictures* in the post, let alone read the words.
* Advice I once had from a Professor when writing a paper was that it should be understandable just from looking at the figures and reading the figure captions. Does pb.com pass that test?
You know what I am? I'm a dog chasing Opinion Polls. I wouldn't know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just... *do* things.
1 in 2 ukip voters at the euros will vote ukip at the GE.
53% of UKIP Euro voters have yet to see the light about the stupidity of voting UKIP
Somewhat ironically, the only circumstances where UKIP would be around permanently, would be if the UK remained in the EU permanently .
brackets are changes from the last ELBOW of 2014:
Lab 33.4% (-0.8)
Con 32.2% (+0.6)
UKIP 14.9% (-0.5)
LD 7.4% (-0.1)
Green 6.6% (+0.5)
Lab lead = 1.2% (-1.4)
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/556142493004492800
2005. Turnout 27.15m, 61.4%, implies a registered electorate of 44.22m, including people registered at more than one address.
2010. Turnout 29.69m, 65.1%, implies a registered electorate of 45.61m, also including double registrations.
Could we end up with something like:
2015. Turnout 29.0m, 67%, with a registered electorate of 43.3m, with many fewer double registrations, and some accidentally self-disenfranchised students?
LibDem v. Green in ELBOW (Electoral Leader-Board Of the Week) since mid-Oct. 12 Oct = LD 8.1, Grn 4.5; now 7.6 v. 6.4
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/556143460412293120
Journalists cleared in Sun trial
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30855075
I don't believe Ed Miliband will last a decade in power. Unless he gets a majority of more than about 25, he won't even last five years.
@rcs1000
It's better than having no political force in favour of leaving, which would mean I would be waiting a lot longer than 40 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Saints_F.C.
Miliband merely turns to the cameras in 2020, and says 'look at the other lot squabbling'.
The in-fighting of the left over the next five years is going to be so much larger than any UKIP-Tory rivalry. Especially if the Tories replace Cameron with a more consistent conservative.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/weather/11351186/2014-was-worlds-hottest-year-on-record.html
They'd then have as miserable a time as the Wilson/Callaghan government. I wouldn't be surprised if after a couple years they were running third in opinion polls.
I'm fairly certain when you look at the final poll by each firm, ICM were the pollster to be the most accurate pollster on the Lib Dems.
Other firms overstated the Lib Dems a lot more than ICM did.
@paulhutcheon: New written answer: 60k hospitality bill at Bute House between 2010 and 2013
.@scotgov
@paulhutcheon: Written answer put out on late Friday afternoon: .@scotgov incurred 415k in "hospitality" at Edinburgh Castle btwn 2010-13
When people say that, they invariably mean that 'I don't share his views'. He has in fact been very consistent from the start - as I've pointed out before, if you doubt me, just read any of his speeches from the time when he became leader.
He is, quite simply, a pragmatic, one-nation, centre-ground Conservative in the tradition of R A Butler, Macmillan, and Whitelaw. He is not, and never has claimed to be, a BOOer or a right-winger or an extremist of any kind.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B7fBeOpIQAAwAyW.png
Though a 21% chance of an overall majority seems to be on the high side to me. And I'm not sure why they treat Lady Sylvia Hermon as a quasi-Conservative.
You may recall that Labour wasted a great deal of public money only to find that Mr Salmond had cannily bought his own teabags and biscuits at Bute House to entertain major donors to the SNP.
- They can choose a leader that blames for UKIP for "stealing" their votes, and call them racist and nasty and all the rest of it
- They can choose a leader that says the party is responsible for its own performance, and that UKIP voters have many legitimate concerns and they hope to work with the party in areas of agreement in future.
If they chose the second, combined with a few easily done policy shifts, they could easily win the following election.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30855075
To be fair, though, it would probably be impossible not to screw it up.
As long as we have FPTP it comes down to a relative choice between the two, more or less.
But note how low the probability of an overall majority now is and how disproportionately high the probability of a Labour-led government is (if we treat the Lib Dem choice when they are kingmakers as 50:50, then a Labour-led government is roughly twice as likely as a Conservative-led government).
Thankfully.
The fact a man proven to consider non-Muslims as animals [go to Youtube and search 'Mehdi Hasan animals', it should be the top video] can appear all over British media with it only very rarely being even mentioned is a disgrace. Consider if someone had said all Muslims were animals. They'd, rightly, never be invited to discuss anything, let alone Islamist terrorism or freedom of speech.
Then there's Rotherham and other such situations, the de facto blasphemy law (kudos to the BBC which reportedly showed the latest Hebdo cover) many in the media adopt, and rank cowardice from our political class.
Which outcome should you veer towards... ?
(1) Reducing the pressures of mass migration by bringing in new limits on non-EU migration
(2) Raise the minimum wage
(3) Putting immigration and small business regulation at the centre of EU renegotiation
(4) Bringing in a meaningful British Bill of Rights, which would require warrants for GCHQ, protect the right to free speech properly, and limit spying by local authorities among other things
(5) Expansion of vocational courses at both senior school and further education level
(6) Removing those on minimum wage from both income tax and national insurance, paid for by adding extra bands to council tax
(7) Refocus NHS spending towards GP services
All of those are very doable and would simultaneously hit Labour and UKIP.
If only Westminster could learn something from the SNP.
You are creating and reinforcing dividing lines that don't exist to help you define and feel better about your own political position.
Why don't you try and unite and reconcile the centre-right instead?
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/556128335504621569
https://twitter.com/Sunil_P2/status/556127750399225857
I suppose the difference is he proposes but doesn't do anything about it.
So, if you'll forgive me, that's a little dismissive and patronising. Neither of us wants to be in the position where we feel we can no longer support the party we've backed our whole lives.
(1) No announcements for the next election. It's been dropped as a major election theme.
(2) Sort of being done, but not a big focus
(3) He's surrendered on immigration, dropping the "points system", dropping the "emergency brake" and now dropping "job requirement" too.
(4) Not only has he done nothing to require judicial warrants for GCHQ, he wants to expand warrantless searches to new areas. On free speech, he's done nothing to roll back New Labour's illiberalism.
(5) Somewhat done
(6) Has made some steps in this direction, but not up to minimum wage level, and NI hasn't been changed (unless I'm mistaken).
(7) GP funding has been reduced.
So not really.
He's also the leader of a centre right party in coalition government with a centre left party.
Something he has handled brilliantly.
Could any other leader have steered the government with such little antagonism between
the two parties?
It's certainly been less of a turf war between the Tories and the Lib Dems over the past five years than it was between Brownites and Blairites from 2002 onwards.