@paulwaugh: I'm told on Fri/Sat No10 agreed with bcasters a package of a Paxo iview, a 7-way, a challenger debate and a #bbcqt special. But now in doubt
Ed, anytime, anywhere, anyplace, except April 2nd...
"Then, on 16 April there would be a challengers special involving the SNP, Ukip, Plaid and the Greens. Finally, on 30 April, Cameron, Miliband and Nick Clegg would each have separate half hours in a Question Time-style event with David Dimbleby."
This proposal is a nonsense, UKIP has major party status in England and Wales. If you include Clegg you have to include Farage.
Reading Casino's interesting piece on the Lib Dems it's hard to escape the irony of the party that has been demanding PR (fair votes) should secure almost 30 seats with a vote which is likely to be half that of UKIP who will be lucky to get five.
Perhaps the moral of the story is that by sleeping with the angels for so long at last they are getting a reward.
Casino's model gives the Lib Dems 25 seats (with a fairly broad uncertainty range) on 9% of the vote. 9% of 650 seats is 58.5
It's going to be one of the weird outcomes of this election that UKIP's result will probably make the Lib Dems look like unfair beneficiaries of FPTP, when it is still going to be massively penalising them.
Will English voters reward Labour for working with the SNP?
Judging by the Ashcroft polls, the answer is yes!
Only for as long as it remains an abstract proposal. Within a year of the reality of the situation hitting home, Labour will go into meltdown across England.
Ed has walked into the greatest trap since Caesar let his opponents think they had won at Dyrrhachium only to be thrashed a few weeks later at Pharsalus.
Tim Shipman @ShippersUnbound · 4s5 seconds ago One 7-way debate on Apr 2. Con source "It now appears Labour are trying to unpick that deal. They shouldn't be allowed to get away with it."
Chutzpah is a word that scores highly at Scrabble.
Reading Casino's interesting piece on the Lib Dems it's hard to escape the irony of the party that has been demanding PR (fair votes) should secure almost 30 seats with a vote which is likely to be half that of UKIP who will be lucky to get five.
Perhaps the moral of the story is that by sleeping with the angels for so long at last they are getting a reward.
LDs on 9 per cent ought to get 59 seats in a proportional system.
"Then, on 16 April there would be a challengers special involving the SNP, Ukip, Plaid and the Greens. Finally, on 30 April, Cameron, Miliband and Nick Clegg would each have separate half hours in a Question Time-style event with David Dimbleby."
This proposal is a nonsense, UKIP has major party status in England and Wales. If you include Clegg you have to include Farage.
Simple, they could call it "The Prime and Deputy Prime Ministerial and Leader of Her Majesty's Opposition debates".
Yet more depressing polling news from Ashcroft then. There's not a scrap of evidence out there to suggest DC has much hope of remaining in power in a few weeks time.
Will the Budget and the GE campaign itself change things much? Somehow I doubt it. If anything, people might actually warm to Ed.
He's going to be the next PM, the evidence continues to mount up and time continues to run out for the Tories.
What a massive disappointment Cameron has proved to be as Tory leader and PM.
A Tory Leader, but only ever a Coalition Prime Minister.
It's possible we will never get to see the real David Cameron.
Or equally possible that we have.
What do you think Cameron would have done differently had he won a majority?
Cut a bit harder. Not faffed around with freebie baubles for the LibDems (e.g. school meals for rich kids, constitutional navel gazing, etc) and possibly pushed ahead faster on an EU renegotiation. And have got the boundary reforms through.
Tim Shipman @ShippersUnbound · 4s5 seconds ago One 7-way debate on Apr 2. Con source "It now appears Labour are trying to unpick that deal. They shouldn't be allowed to get away with it."
Chutzpah is a word that scores highly at Scrabble.
Reading Casino's interesting piece on the Lib Dems it's hard to escape the irony of the party that has been demanding PR (fair votes) should secure almost 30 seats with a vote which is likely to be half that of UKIP who will be lucky to get five.
Perhaps the moral of the story is that by sleeping with the angels for so long at last they are getting a reward.
LDs on 9 per cent ought to get 59 seats in a proportional system.
Maths is not Roger's strong point . Neither is politics in general .
"Then, on 16 April there would be a challengers special involving the SNP, Ukip, Plaid and the Greens. Finally, on 30 April, Cameron, Miliband and Nick Clegg would each have separate half hours in a Question Time-style event with David Dimbleby."
This proposal is a nonsense, UKIP has major party status in England and Wales. If you include Clegg you have to include Farage.
The OFCOM guidance was quite nuanced, as it made it plain that the broadcasters did not have to give equal coverage to the four major parties, and they would have the balance of their coverage judged after broadcast. It also said that the designation of major party status should not be seen as being directive in terms of decisions about debates.
The only specific thing that the major party status does is get a party a minimum of 2 PPB broadcasts - but even there OFCOM made clear that broadcasters were free to offer parties more PPBs at their discretion.
Having said all that, if I were a broadcaster trying to make the decision about how best to allocate broadcast time between the parties I would find it hard to justify giving the Lib Dems equal coverage with UKIP. They can argue that it is reasonable to give due weight to the number of MPs currently held, I suppose, but if more of your viewers will vote for UKIP than the Lib Dems I'd have thought you would want to give your audience what they were interested in.
BBC (breaking news) – “David Cameron has accepted the broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the beginning of April, Conservative sources have said.”
Should read : 'The TV Broadcasters have agreed to the PM’s proposal of a 7-way debate' ?
BBC (breaking news) – “David Cameron has accepted the broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the beginning of April, Conservative sources have said.”
Should read : 'The TV Broadcasters have agreed to the PM’s proposal of a 7-way debate' ?
Can't say I am wild about parliaments "acting over members", that what voters are for. Behave like an objectionable idiot, get voted out. If voters want to elect an objectionable idiots, its not for a parliament to say they are wrong, that's democracy (not that the EU would know democracy if it was run over by the campaign bus of the democracy party full of elected politicians singing "democratic days are here again")
I've just finished analysing the Ashcroft marginals and I don't think it is particularly bad news for the Tories.
I have compared the average over the eight marginals to Q1 with my own estimate using my switching matrix model: The results are:
Ash Marg Switch model Delta Con 34.6 35.0 -0.4 Lab 38.0 39.0 -1.0 LD 4.5 3.3 +1.2 UKIP 15.8 14.5 +1.3 Green 6.0 7.9 -1.9
So Con, Lab and Green are doing slighly worse than I was predicting and LD and UKIP slightly better. But not much in it.
Tories are doing better than I predicted in Southampton Itchen, South Swindon and Worcester, and worse than I was expecting in Chester, Croydon Central and Wirral West.
I'll fine tune my model to take these latest polls into account and post my results in fifteen minutes or so.
Your model was quite bearish on the Conservatives though anyway iirc
It was bearish compared with some other models. My model is based on current polling and doesn't attempt to add trends or swingback or anything fancy.
My latest predictions using the latest Ashcroft Marginal Polls are:
.......seats,,,,,,,share ... previous prediction in brackets
I don't think it changes much. The gain of a LIbDem seat from Con is a surprise. I'll have a look and see which one it is and why it has changed. It must be very marginal.
Let's see what happens tomorrow with the budget, but it looks like labour have fallen for a number of strategic traps.
They've wasted much time and energy attacking Cameron over the debates at a point in the pre election cycle where its had little impact on voters. Cameron now comes out with what he will do and if Labour oppose they look like a bunch of whingers when voters will notice.
Budget tomorrow likely to be spending back to Labour levels from 1997 not the 1930's and labour's whole election pitch is screwed. Classic expectation management strategy by Osborne - make it sound potentially bad, then doing anything better sounds great.
Cameron and Miliband are both pretty good at Q & As, so they will both come across better than they would have done in a direct debate.
The Paxman interview is dangerous though, they've both avoided confrontational interviews during this term and so won't have much practice in dealing with someone like him.
BBC (breaking news) – “David Cameron has accepted the broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the beginning of April, Conservative sources have said.”
Should read : 'The TV Broadcasters have agreed to the PM’s proposal of a 7-way debate' ?
@paulwaugh: I'm told on Fri/Sat No10 agreed with bcasters a package of a Paxo iview, a 7-way, a challenger debate and a #bbcqt special. But now in doubt
Ed, anytime, anywhere, anyplace, except April 2nd...
"Today, the Carthaginian Broadcasting Service can reveal that the Roman Republic has agreed in full to the tough negotiating stance taken by Carthage after the Third Punic War."
The broadcasters have been moronic over the debates.
"Then, on 16 April there would be a challengers special involving the SNP, Ukip, Plaid and the Greens. Finally, on 30 April, Cameron, Miliband and Nick Clegg would each have separate half hours in a Question Time-style event with David Dimbleby."
This proposal is a nonsense, UKIP has major party status in England and Wales. If you include Clegg you have to include Farage.
The OFCOM guidance was quite nuanced, as it made it plain that the broadcasters did not have to give equal coverage to the four major parties, and they would have the balance of their coverage judged after broadcast. It also said that the designation of major party status should not be seen as being directive in terms of decisions about debates.
The only specific thing that the major party status does is get a party a minimum of 2 PPB broadcasts - but even there OFCOM made clear that broadcasters were free to offer parties more PPBs at their discretion.
Having said all that, if I were a broadcaster trying to make the decision about how best to allocate broadcast time between the parties I would find it hard to justify giving the Lib Dems equal coverage with UKIP. They can argue that it is reasonable to give due weight to the number of MPs currently held, I suppose, but if more of your viewers will vote for UKIP than the Lib Dems I'd have thought you would want to give your audience what they were interested in.
It may be because UKIP is only a major party in England and Wales while the LDs are a major party in GB
Cameron and Miliband are both pretty good at Q & As, so they will both come across better than they would have done in a direct debate.
The Paxman interview is dangerous though, they've both avoided confrontational interviews during this term and so won't have much practice in dealing with someone like him.
Cameron could offer Paxo a cheeky peerage to be nice to him. That will sort it out.
@MichaelLCrick: Conservatives think there will now be only ONE debate, for ITV, on 2 April, & debates on 16 + 30 April replaced with other leader TV events
@iainjwatson: Labour and the broadcasters are both stressing there has been no new formal offer on debates yet
Let's see what happens tomorrow with the budget, but it looks like labour have fallen for a number of strategic traps.
They've wasted much time and energy attacking Cameron over the debates at a point in the pre election cycle where its had little impact on voters. Cameron now comes out with what he will do and if Labour oppose they look like a bunch of whingers when voters will notice.
Budget tomorrow likely to be spending back to Labour levels from 1997 not the 1930's and labour's whole election pitch is screwed. Classic expectation management strategy by Osborne - make it sound potentially bad, then doing anything better sounds great.
Gideon seems to me the only senior politician hungry for power and able to think through a strategy to win that power.
A bit like Geoff Boycott. Whatever you thought about him personally he was head and shoulders over the other players of his generation in batting technique and fending off a bowling attack.
The only other current politician who comes near him is Fargle who is more like Brian Close facing Holding at Old Trafford in 1981.
Outside Scotland where you have that well known left hand leg spin wicket taking machine Salmond.
Cameron and Miliband are both pretty good at Q & As, so they will both come across better than they would have done in a direct debate.
The Paxman interview is dangerous though, they've both avoided confrontational interviews during this term and so won't have much practice in dealing with someone like him.
Cameron could offer Paxo a cheeky peerage to be nice to him. That will sort it out.
Tory interviews Tory. Should be horrific for Dave.
@patrickwintour: Tories suggesting broadcasters have devised new formats & abandoned their plans for two extra debates including the DC-EM head to head.
"Then, on 16 April there would be a challengers special involving the SNP, Ukip, Plaid and the Greens."
Think I'm washing my hair that night...
That'll be one for the purists.
I prefer this new format overall, it's more interesting and still gives everyone a chance to impress/flop. UKIP really should be in the Question Time event though and I really can't see how the BBC think they will get away with excluding them.
I've just finished analysing the Ashcroft marginals and I don't think it is particularly bad news for the Tories.
I have compared the average over the eight marginals to Q1 with my own estimate using my switching matrix model: The results are:
Ash Marg Switch model Delta Con 34.6 35.0 -0.4 Lab 38.0 39.0 -1.0 LD 4.5 3.3 +1.2 UKIP 15.8 14.5 +1.3 Green 6.0 7.9 -1.9
So Con, Lab and Green are doing slighly worse than I was predicting and LD and UKIP slightly better. But not much in it.
Tories are doing better than I predicted in Southampton Itchen, South Swindon and Worcester, and worse than I was expecting in Chester, Croydon Central and Wirral West.
I'll fine tune my model to take these latest polls into account and post my results in fifteen minutes or so.
Your model was quite bearish on the Conservatives though anyway iirc
It was bearish compared with some other models. My model is based on current polling and doesn't attempt to add trends or swingback or anything fancy.
My latest predictions using the latest Ashcroft Marginal Polls are:
.......seats,,,,,,,share ... previous prediction in brackets
I don't think it changes much. The gain of a LIbDem seat from Con is a surprise. I'll have a look and see which one it is and why it has changed. It must be very marginal.
The constituency that changes from Con to LD is Berwick-upon-Tweed - Alan Beith's old constituency.
My model had 13,445 for LibDems and 13,478 for Con, - a Con majority of 43. The slight improvement in the UKIP vote indicated by the Ashcroft polls makes that 13,407 for Con, - a LD majority of 38.
Tiny changes can have a big impact on the real marginals.
@chrisshipitv: Labour: we HAVE agreed to 7-wat #tvdebates on 2 April. We HAVE NOT agreed to the news proposals. We STILL want head2head Cameron v Miliband
@patrickwintour: Tories suggesting broadcasters have devised new formats & abandoned their plans for two extra debates including the DC-EM head to head.
Interesting that Farage downgraded to the 16 April event whereas Clegg is in the 30 April event - despite UKIP having Major party status.
Big win for Clegg.
Big defeat for Farage.
This also makes it far, far, far more likely that Clegg will prefer the revised plan - as it gets him on TV on 30 April - whereas under initial debate plan Clegg would have been frozen out at the end.
BBC ticker [no story link yet]: Format of general election debates not yet agreed, sources close to the broadcasters say, after PM accepts "offer" of seven-leader debate
I seriously wonder if Clegg has brokered this - he gives Cameron what he wants - ie only one proper debate - but in return Clegg gets himself elevated into the 30 April event.
I've taken more than one or two stylistic influences from antifrank! But the analysis is new :-)
That is really valuable analysis and I know it will have taken you a long time. I'm going to need to spend some time making sure that I understand it correctly. Your point that not all Lib Dem votes are personal is a very important one, and one that no one has properly modelled up till now. It's one of the leading imponderables of the election just how much the Lib Dems can frame local battles on the basis of personalities rather than parties.
Agreed, great post. A good précis of the peculiar limitations of national polling data where Lib Dems are the defending incumbents. As noted below, I live in one of your supermarginal holds; I may be wrong but with my (limited) experience in the seat so far I'd be quite surprised to see the Tories take it and wouldn't call it as close as you have.
My gut tells me they'll end up closer to 30 than 25. I see one or even two more holds in Scotland, and they could possibly make a gain in Watford. And if TV debates happen, I think there'll be a slight boost (based on the fact that public opinion can't get much worse, and NC is now the most practised leader of the lot in public-facing debate).
Let's see what happens tomorrow with the budget, but it looks like labour have fallen for a number of strategic traps.
They've wasted much time and energy attacking Cameron over the debates at a point in the pre election cycle where its had little impact on voters. Cameron now comes out with what he will do and if Labour oppose they look like a bunch of whingers when voters will notice.
Budget tomorrow likely to be spending back to Labour levels from 1997 not the 1930's and labour's whole election pitch is screwed. Classic expectation management strategy by Osborne - make it sound potentially bad, then doing anything better sounds great.
Gideon seems to me the only senior politician hungry for power and able to think through a strategy to win that power.
A bit like Geoff Boycott. Whatever you thought about him personally he was head and shoulders over the other players of his generation in batting technique and fending off a bowling attack.
The only other current politician who comes near him is Fargle who is more like Brian Close facing Holding at Old Trafford in 1981.
Outside Scotland where you have that well known left hand leg spin wicket taking machine Salmond.
Well, quite. "... it is not widely appreciated that, proportionately to the population, more cricket is played in Aberdeenshire than in any other part of the United Kingdom."
Labour are still trying to spin this as No 10 'caving in' rather than them getting absolutely everything they ever wanted out of TV coverage,,,
Not quite everything. The 7-way/orgy happens week of 2nd April rather than 23rd March.... But other than that, yep, seems to be QED, QFT, MSM, MFI, AOL, GS&M, etc.... To Number 10.
Labour are still trying to spin this as No 10 'caving in' rather than them getting absolutely everything they ever wanted out of TV coverage,,,
Not quite everything. The 7-way/orgy happens week of 2nd April rather than 23rd March.... But other than that, yep, seems to be QED, QFT, MSM, MFI, AOL, GS&M, etc....
I often watch leader speeches during party conferences, even though they're usually dreadful.
Still, if I didn't watch at least it would reduce the viewing figures by 1. I probably won't.
I'll certainly watch. Even if they are not particularly enlightening on the issues, I think it will be very interesting to see how each leader manages being part of a 7 way debate. In particular, how much time each leader spends attacking the other leaders vs. making a positive case and how much time say the Greens spend attacking Lab vs attacking Con
Comments
This proposal is a nonsense, UKIP has major party status in England and Wales. If you include Clegg you have to include Farage.
It's going to be one of the weird outcomes of this election that UKIP's result will probably make the Lib Dems look like unfair beneficiaries of FPTP, when it is still going to be massively penalising them.
Surely everyone is off to Tuscany for a long weekend ?
"You do have admire the balls of the Tory party."
They used to say that about Farage
Chicken Dave has vetoed it hasnt he?.
Now he is running round like a headless chicken?
Could be the first QT for ages without Farage
https://www.change.org/p/david-cameron-take-part-in-the-leaders-tv-debates?utm_source=action_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=255311&alert_id=aMmpRHpcVW_9EVXBrZZnFYhCTplW4dtHOaUG2D+8v+353Lh4eqluP4=
Sign here
David Cameron = The Desert Rats
Ed Miliband = The Republican Guard
That is a bit of a stretch..
http://news.stv.tv/scotland-decides/analysis/307451-stephen-daisley-humza-yousaf-and-david-coburn-have-twitter-spat/
What a coward. Cluck cluck.
Edit to be fair there were no tanks in Baghdad during the First Persian Gulf War
The only specific thing that the major party status does is get a party a minimum of 2 PPB broadcasts - but even there OFCOM made clear that broadcasters were free to offer parties more PPBs at their discretion.
Having said all that, if I were a broadcaster trying to make the decision about how best to allocate broadcast time between the parties I would find it hard to justify giving the Lib Dems equal coverage with UKIP. They can argue that it is reasonable to give due weight to the number of MPs currently held, I suppose, but if more of your viewers will vote for UKIP than the Lib Dems I'd have thought you would want to give your audience what they were interested in.
Should read : 'The TV Broadcasters have agreed to the PM’s proposal of a 7-way debate' ?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31928638
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bramall_Lane
Ed Miliband = Neil Warnock
My latest predictions using the latest Ashcroft Marginal Polls are:
.......seats,,,,,,,share ... previous prediction in brackets
Con....262..(263)....32.3%..(32.5%)
Lab....283..(283)....32.4%..(32.7%)
LD.....30..(29)....8.6%..(8.2%)
SNP....51..(51)....3.4%..(3.4%)
Green...1..(1)....7.5%..(7.9%)
UKIP....3 (3)....15.2%..(14.7%)
I don't think it changes much. The gain of a LIbDem seat from Con is a surprise. I'll have a look and see which one it is and why it has changed. It must be very marginal.
They've wasted much time and energy attacking Cameron over the debates at a point in the pre election cycle where its had little impact on voters. Cameron now comes out with what he will do and if Labour oppose they look like a bunch of whingers when voters will notice.
Budget tomorrow likely to be spending back to Labour levels from 1997 not the 1930's and labour's whole election pitch is screwed. Classic expectation management strategy by Osborne - make it sound potentially bad, then doing anything better sounds great.
The Paxman interview is dangerous though, they've both avoided confrontational interviews during this term and so won't have much practice in dealing with someone like him.
The empty chair debate was just empty air.
@adamboultonSKY: #TVdebates Labour spokesman: we have accepted and plan to attend all three debates on April 2nd, 16th and the 30th.
Seems a little out of date...
Does anyone know if our broadcasters play poker, they seem to fold very readily.
"Today, the Carthaginian Broadcasting Service can reveal that the Roman Republic has agreed in full to the tough negotiating stance taken by Carthage after the Third Punic War."
The broadcasters have been moronic over the debates.
When its an interview!
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=chicken+cameron&rlz=1C1TEUA_enGB505GB517&espv=2&biw=1236&bih=577&tbm=isch&imgil=bOVdC0FqL7lePM%3A%3B5_b-cqEqab_QEM%3Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.facebook.com%252Fnigelfarageofficial%252Fposts%252F668141489900124&source=iu&pf=m&fir=bOVdC0FqL7lePM%3A%2C5_b-cqEqab_QEM%2C_&usg=__gSBvOBGii3z1QZ6uzShTEQBk_C0=&ved=0CCwQyjc&ei=LFoIVfK2K83SaKT2gIAL#imgrc=bOVdC0FqL7lePM%3A;5_b-cqEqab_QEM;http%3A%2F%2Fi4.mirror.co.uk%2Fincoming%2Farticle1458565.ece%2Falternates%2Fs2197%2FDavid%2520Cameron%2520as%2520a%2520chicken%2520in%2520a%2520live%2520TV%2520debate;https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fnigelfarageofficial%2Fposts%2F668141489900124;2197;1463
http://tinyurl.com/mg595m7
!!!
I think they may be somewhat behind the curve here...
Well at least a few pbers will be watching.
Think I'm washing my hair that night...
@iainjwatson: Labour and the broadcasters are both stressing there has been no new formal offer on debates yet
Clear as mud
I prefer my version.
The debates remain rubbish.
A bit like Geoff Boycott. Whatever you thought about him personally he was head and shoulders over the other players of his generation in batting technique and fending off a bowling attack.
The only other current politician who comes near him is Fargle who is more like Brian Close facing Holding at Old Trafford in 1981.
Outside Scotland where you have that well known left hand leg spin wicket taking machine Salmond.
Will he be in a room on his own?
Clearly impossible for two different events to take place simultaneously on 16 April and two different events simultaneously on 30 April.
So if broadcasters are proposing "new" events on 16 and 30 April then the original proposal couldn't also take place.
But what are broadcasters actually saying?
I prefer this new format overall, it's more interesting and still gives everyone a chance to impress/flop. UKIP really should be in the Question Time event though and I really can't see how the BBC think they will get away with excluding them.
My model had 13,445 for LibDems and 13,478 for Con, - a Con majority of 43. The slight improvement in the UKIP vote indicated by the Ashcroft polls makes that 13,407 for Con, - a LD majority of 38.
Tiny changes can have a big impact on the real marginals.
Big win for Clegg.
Big defeat for Farage.
This also makes it far, far, far more likely that Clegg will prefer the revised plan - as it gets him on TV on 30 April - whereas under initial debate plan Clegg would have been frozen out at the end.
I often watch leader speeches during party conferences, even though they're usually dreadful.
Still, if I didn't watch at least it would reduce the viewing figures by 1. I probably won't.
Format of general election debates not yet agreed, sources close to the broadcasters say, after PM accepts "offer" of seven-leader debate
Very clever tactics by Clegg.
My gut tells me they'll end up closer to 30 than 25. I see one or even two more holds in Scotland, and they could possibly make a gain in Watford. And if TV debates happen, I think there'll be a slight boost (based on the fact that public opinion can't get much worse, and NC is now the most practised leader of the lot in public-facing debate).
Poor old kippers and Ed.
I thought all three leaders then came across pretty well.
Doesn't say - but I expect BBC.
Interestingly the new plan has 4 events instead of 3 - but nobody would appear more than 3 times.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4492727.stm
I remember Blair looking very sweaty, shifty and actually rather unwell when questioning turned on to Iraq...
http://www.scotland.org/features/scots-turning-up-for-cricket/