Nice to see Dave showing off their policies for a new term, erm, no that was the SNP manifesto.
Lynton Crosby, political genius.
More to the point, he's not attacking Ed Miliband. He's attacking someone else, who won't be on most voters' ballot papers, and making Ed Miliband look sensible and moderate by comparison.
Methinks Mike has misrepresented Matthew Goodwin a bit in the thread header
Matthew Goodwin (@GoodwinMJ) 20/04/2015 19:40 Came home to Conservative leaflet. Fear, negativity, blah. Totally uninspiring -> pic.twitter.com/yCwWmocLdZ
SCUP holding up well, but still a few percent from SLAB crossover.
In view of the weakness of SLAB and SLD polling tactical voters look better to be voting Con.
But PP at 11/10 on 200+ LD lost deposits looks good. There could be 50 in Scotland alone.
This loss deposits bet is something that commented on a couple of days ago. The Yougov poll for Scotland having them on just 4% does make 50 loss deposits in Scotland look very possible. Considering how much they have focused on so few seats in E-W makes another 150 also look very plausible. Indeed the Liberals lost 304 deposits in 1979 when getting 13.8% of the vote. If nothing else it the sort of bet that would give one interest in alot of the declarations on May 7th...
In 1979 , the lost deposit threshold was much higher than the 5% of today , 12.5% IIRC
Ah that would make more sense. Thank you. I see that PC lost deposits in 11 out of 40 seats in Wales last time around with 11% so still think that the Libdems, if they get only 9-10% of the vote, are in danger of having 200 lost deposits. Either way it is probably going to be fairly hefty bill for the yellows to foot @ £500 a time
Nice to see Dave showing off their policies for a new term, erm, no that was the SNP manifesto.
Lynton Crosby, political genius.
More to the point, he's not attacking Ed Miliband. He's attacking someone else, who won't be on most voters' ballot papers, and making Ed Miliband look sensible and moderate by comparison.
Does anyone know — are we getting another joint exit poll this time? It's more interesting when there are at least two IMO. In 1992 there were 3 from BBC, Sky, ITN.
Things have gotten out of control this Parliament with so many online pollsters popping up and YouGov being five times a week.
I don't think so - we've all got used to taking the odd rogue poll with equanimity, because another one comes along a few hours later and says it's nonsense. Previously, one rogue could change the political climate for days, and that's not really a sensible way to conduct politics.
Anyway, a tick and a tock to postal vote time. Around 25% of the total in my patch - is that about average?
What if all the You Govs turn out to be rogues?
We are starting to see a clear divergence between the panel and the phone pollsters.
Someone is going to look stupid come May 8th.
Yougov seem to be stuck - Tory votes and Labour votes and UKIP votes all seem to vary by about 1%. If they move together then Labour lead is 1, if they move in parallel Labour lead is 2 and if they move against then Labour lead is 3.
These are the Tory percentages since 1st April (on the right) (Yougov fix panel with a 1% Labour lead)
34 33 34 34 34 33 33 33 34 33 35 34 33 34 37
And Labour
35 36 34 34 35 35 34 36 34 35 34 35 35 33 35
Now with 15 polls you would expect one of them to be an outlier (1 in 20) - so which is it
On topic-ish. There are 36 days between the beginning of April and the last day before the election so rather than doing a full April PB polling average, I've split that period into two, the first of which has just finished (i.e. 1-18 April). The results are interesting, though how much you believe them probably depends on how much credit you give the ICM score. Full piece to come mid-week, I hope.
There is only one genuine ELBOW - accept no imitations!
If DC can stay in office after the election, the SNP have said they'll vote against in a confidence motion/queen's speech etc
But after that confidence motion, is there anything to stop DC working with the SNP on vote-by-vote matters of mutual interest? Assuming Con are still in power then Con+SNP would have to be a clear majority regardless of LDs etc?
Does anyone think it would be plausible to get some sort of federalism act through with Con+SNP support? Something along the lines of Devomax for Scotland and EVEL for England. Give the SNP basically full control for Scotland and the Tories a majority for England ... while finally addressing the WLQ.
The only interesting question now is who is going to be getting the blame? Who are the defeated SLAB MPs going to criticise in the bitter aftermath of defeat?
I just don’t see Ed surviving this.
Irrespective of who the Scottish MPs blame, Ed is not surviving if he doesn't get into government, surely?
Indeed so, and in fact it would be in several Shadow Cabinet members' interests to make sure Ed didn't get into power from 20-odd seats behind on 265. They might be PM within a year.
But Cameron holds the trump card in that situation: if he resigns, Miliband will be invited to form a government. He wouldn't say 'no', would he?
That's a rather nuclear trump card for DC to play. But, good point. Important to remember that internal party dynamics might be crucial if it's on a knife-edge.
It's one that's been played in the past, to mixed effect. The figures you suggest are indeed knife-edge (I'd guess Con+LD = SNP+Lab = 315) but in that position, would the Lib Dems prop up the Tories? I suspect not. In which case, Cameron staying in office is really him just waiting for the other parties to pick their moment to bring him down. So why give them the satisfaction? And with it being so knife-edge, precipitating the event may force hands before either Labour or the SNP are ready, leaving the Tories - if not Cameron himself - in a reasonable position to come back.
I doubt Cameron would be all that keen to hang on to office for its own sake. He's been PM for five years and party leader for nearly a decade. He's said this would be his last term either way. The hunger isn't quite the same as for a Leader of the Opposition.
Well if DC can get a Queen's Speech through on Labour abstention, then he might be able to do a deal with the SNP (full autonomy for EV4EL). But I can see that he might prefer to force Ed into Number 10 in very weak circumstances.
Will Farron move against Clegg ?
I'm convinced that as soon as polls close on May the 7th.
Tim Farron will call for Clegg to quit, David Davis or Graham Brady will call for Dave to quit and some Labour folk will call for Ed to quit.
Everybody quits except Nicola and we have another go in October with Chuka, Boris, Tim, Douglas, Caroline (and Nicola)?
If DC can stay in office after the election, the SNP have said they'll vote against in a confidence motion/queen's speech etc
But after that confidence motion, is there anything to stop DC working with the SNP on vote-by-vote matters of mutual interest? Assuming Con are still in power then Con+SNP would have to be a clear majority regardless of LDs etc?
Does anyone think it would be plausible to get some sort of federalism act through with Con+SNP support? Something along the lines of Devomax for Scotland and EVEL for England. Give the SNP basically full control for Scotland and the Tories a majority for England ... while finally addressing the WLQ.
Well the SNP, PC, SDLP, Greens & Galloway will vote against the Conservative Queen's speech, the big unknown is whether ALL OF Labour will (The Lib Dems can pick and choose in fairness).
The only interesting question now is who is going to be getting the blame? Who are the defeated SLAB MPs going to criticise in the bitter aftermath of defeat?
I just don’t see Ed surviving this.
Irrespective of who the Scottish MPs blame, Ed is not surviving if he doesn't get into government, surely?
Indeed so, and in fact it would be in several Shadow Cabinet members' interests to make sure Ed didn't get into power from 20-odd seats behind on 265. They might be PM within a year.
But Cameron holds the trump card in that situation: if he resigns, Miliband will be invited to form a government. He wouldn't say 'no', would he?
That's a rather nuclear trump card for DC to play. But, good point. Important to remember that internal party dynamics might be crucial if it's on a knife-edge.
It's one that's been played in the past, to mixed effect. The figures you suggest are indeed knife-edge (I'd guess Con+LD = SNP+Lab = 315) but in that position, would the Lib Dems prop up the Tories? I suspect not. In which case, Cameron staying in office is really him just waiting for the other parties to pick their moment to bring him down. So why give them the satisfaction? And with it being so knife-edge, precipitating the event may force hands before either Labour or the SNP are ready, leaving the Tories - if not Cameron himself - in a reasonable position to come back.
I doubt Cameron would be all that keen to hang on to office for its own sake. He's been PM for five years and party leader for nearly a decade. He's said this would be his last term either way. The hunger isn't quite the same as for a Leader of the Opposition.
Well if DC can get a Queen's Speech through on Labour abstention, then he might be able to do a deal with the SNP (full autonomy for EV4EL). But I can see that he might prefer to force Ed into Number 10 in very weak circumstances.
Will Farron move against Clegg ?
I'm convinced that as soon as polls close on May the 7th.
Tim Farron will call for Clegg to quit, David Davis or Graham Brady will call for Dave to quit and some Labour folk will call for Ed to quit.
Everybody quits except Nicola and we have another go in October with Chuka, Boris, Tim, Douglas, Caroline (and Nicola)?
I'm going through the Lib Dems seat by seat evaluating their chances.
The big question is - Is Lord A's 2nd poll question more correct than his first?
If it isn't they are down to about 2 to 4 seats.
I am splitting the difference between 1st and 2nd Qs for Lib Dem seats for my predictions.
I think atleast part of the bumps the Lib Dems get in the second question are people thinking they're being asked about LOCAL elections.
The only seat I'm pretty much 100% convinced is completely safe is Farron's. Next is Carmichael, then Lamb, then Laws.
There's even a slight question mark over Lamb and Laws on the basis of local election results.
I'm fairly sure Lamb will survive, but thinking the Tories gaining Yeovil might be worth a shout because of (a) the apparent strong swing the Tories are getting in the West Country, and (b) the fact Laws may struggle to keep Labour tacticals onside.
I'm going through the Lib Dems seat by seat evaluating their chances.
The big question is - Is Lord A's 2nd poll question more correct than his first?
If it isn't they are down to about 2 to 4 seats.
I am splitting the difference between 1st and 2nd Qs for Lib Dem seats for my predictions.
I think atleast part of the bumps the Lib Dems get in the second question are people thinking they're being asked about LOCAL elections.
I'm forecasting 21 seats on the basis that they'll do better than both questions because neither actually names the candidate.
They are on more than 21 if you take that view.
Unfortunately the Lib Dems have chosen to perform their "named" polling with a bunch of leading questions ahead of the VI question. Combined with tiny sample sizes (Sub 450) and selection bias they are worth far less than the Ashcroft polls.
Why couldn't a BPC pollster have just done a straight one question named candidate poll in say Hallam, Sutton and Cheam, East Dunbartonshire, Twickenham and Torbay for instance. That would be VERY instructive.
"Curiously, an experiment has shown that employers who were asked to make public declarations of their support for women and minorities then hired fewer women and minorities, which suggests that phariseeism does indeed lead to worse behaviour. As long as you say the right things, you can behave how you like."
Of course it's not hypocritical in any way for a coalition to attack the opposition because it might form a coalition... #youcouldntmakeitup
A little hypocritical perhaps, but there is a world of difference in the arguments back in 2010 and Labour/SNP now. Labour would be entering into some form of arrangement with a party openly wanted to break the union, and openly promising to use Ed's weakness in England to maximise sweeties for Scotland in return for the support he needs to stay in number 10.
Conservatives were able to get a lot of what they promised done in coalition with the Lib Dems. Labour will only be able to get some of what they promise done in partnership with the SNP, and the country will pay a very high price for it.
At least the Lib Dems were committed to reducing the deficit for example. The SNP want to all but forget about deficit reduction and go on a massive spending binge. Given Labour's record in government when it comes to excessive spending, i doubt they will need too much encouragement from their partners North of the border to end austerity.
Sir John Major is right. A deal between Miliband and Sturgeon will cause mayhem for Britain.
No, it's scaremongering, or overstated at least. As we've seen with the LibDems, you can't dictate policy with 50 seats. And a Lab-Con alliance will vote to maintain the union, keep Trident, protect English interests, etc. Yes, Scotland will get a few sweeties, but politics has always been about bribery. The reason that Tories are ramping up the SNP bogeyman spin is that (a) they can live with New Labour but Ed+SNP sounds worryingly Old Labour and (b) irrational scare tactics work.
Nice to see Dave showing off their policies for a new term, erm, no that was the SNP manifesto.
Lynton Crosby, political genius.
More to the point, he's not attacking Ed Miliband. He's attacking someone else, who won't be on most voters' ballot papers, and making Ed Miliband look sensible and moderate by comparison.
Agreed. Not that I am complaining. Even Tom Bradbury on ITV mentioned the fact that at a Tory press conference, Cameron was reduced to waving about the SNP manifesto.
According to ElectionForecast the coalition government would be heading for a healthy re-election under the German electoral system where you need a majority of votes excluding the votes of parties getting less than 5%.
Their current forecast:
Con 34.4% Lab 32.6% LD 12.6% UKIP 10.5% Greens 3.8% SNP 3.6% Oth 1.8% PC 0.6%
90.1% voting for parties getting at least 5% so 45.2% needed for an overall majority. Con + LD = 47.0%.
(I know the SNP would win constituency seats in Scotland under the German system).
Looking at Rees Mogg's tables, there is no difference between Question 1 and 2 even though the swing to the Cons from Labour heavily implies personal vote (Even if it is in the SW region)
A straw for SLAB to clutch at. In the latest round of Ashcroft polls, in most seats, a third of SNP voters say they don't "rule out" voting Labour; if around half of those people moved over to Labour, it would be enough to save most of them. Even Glasgow SW would be narrowed from its current 21% deficit to a 3% deficit.
But all that's a big "if", and obviously no signs at all of it happening so far.
Looking at Rees Mogg's tables, there is no difference between Question 1 and 2 even though the swing to the Cons from Labour heavily implies personal vote (Even if it is in the SW region)
NE Somerset is moving away from Labour demographically like many ex-mining seats.
If DC can stay in office after the election, the SNP have said they'll vote against in a confidence motion/queen's speech etc
But after that confidence motion, is there anything to stop DC working with the SNP on vote-by-vote matters of mutual interest? Assuming Con are still in power then Con+SNP would have to be a clear majority regardless of LDs etc?
Does anyone think it would be plausible to get some sort of federalism act through with Con+SNP support? Something along the lines of Devomax for Scotland and EVEL for England. Give the SNP basically full control for Scotland and the Tories a majority for England ... while finally addressing the WLQ.
Totally, David Cameron has doubtless got a Big, Open Offer in mind for them.
More short-term, the new boundary rules will massively over-represent Scotland, because the referendum produced so many registered voters. So Con/SNP will want to work together to get a new boundary review done and the result passed by parliament.
If DC can stay in office after the election, the SNP have said they'll vote against in a confidence motion/queen's speech etc
But after that confidence motion, is there anything to stop DC working with the SNP on vote-by-vote matters of mutual interest? Assuming Con are still in power then Con+SNP would have to be a clear majority regardless of LDs etc?
Does anyone think it would be plausible to get some sort of federalism act through with Con+SNP support? Something along the lines of Devomax for Scotland and EVEL for England. Give the SNP basically full control for Scotland and the Tories a majority for England ... while finally addressing the WLQ.
It could happen in theory. What is more likely is that SNP will say to either a Labour or Tory minority Govt is that you get one year to legislate to introduce Devo Max to Scotland and if not the Holyrood 2016 becomes a repeat of the 2011 Holyrood Election. I am not an SNP member so I am speculating on that. The SNP now has 115,000 members and they have one objective and it isn't Devo Max because no other Party in Scotland is even calling for that, not even those supposedly progressive Liberal Democrats.
I think the word Federalism would send a shiver down Tory and Labour spines as it is, they are too addicted to the gravy train that Westmidden represents to them. You would have thought that the Tories at least would have been glad to see less Scottish Labour hacks swanning it down in Westmidden, I will never understand their reasons for not having Devo Max on the ballot. The Brit Nat Parties miscalculated in my view not having Devo Max on the Referendum paper in my view for different reasons. Now there is a dogs breakfast happening.
According to ElectionForecast the coalition government would be heading for a healthy re-election under the German electoral system where you need a majority of votes excluding the votes of parties getting less than 5%.
Their current forecast:
Con 34.4% Lab 32.6% LD 12.6% UKIP 10.5% Greens 3.8% SNP 3.6% Oth 1.8% PC 0.6%
90.1% voting for parties getting at least 5% so 45.2% needed for an overall majority. Con + LD = 47.0%.
(I know the SNP would win constituency seats in Scotland under the German system).
Given that we now know Dave was going to stand down if Yes had won the referendum he must have something very big and bold planned for Scotland should the Tories end up winning. Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK. At some stage he is going to have to try to build some bridges, unless - that is - he has now given up on the Union because he will not be PM when it goes.
Given that we now know Dave was going to stand down if Yes had won the referendum he must have something very big and bold planned for Scotland should the Tories end up winning. Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK. At some stage he is going to have to try to build some bridges, unless - that is - he has now given up on the Union because he will not be PM when it goes.
According to ElectionForecast the coalition government would be heading for a healthy re-election under the German electoral system where you need a majority of votes excluding the votes of parties getting less than 5%.
Their current forecast:
Con 34.4% Lab 32.6% LD 12.6% UKIP 10.5% Greens 3.8% SNP 3.6% Oth 1.8% PC 0.6%
90.1% voting for parties getting at least 5% so 45.2% needed for an overall majority. Con + LD = 47.0%.
(I know the SNP would win constituency seats in Scotland under the German system).
Ed Miliband's current position reminds me a bit of the last Danish election when the Social Democrats took power despite getting what I think was their worst election result ever.
Given that we now know Dave was going to stand down if Yes had won the referendum he must have something very big and bold planned for Scotland should the Tories end up winning. Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK. At some stage he is going to have to try to build some bridges, unless - that is - he has now given up on the Union because he will not be PM when it goes.
EV4EL / FFA
Why on earth would the SNP take FFA? It would make Scotland much poorer than it is now.
Given that we now know Dave was going to stand down if Yes had won the referendum he must have something very big and bold planned for Scotland should the Tories end up winning. Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK. At some stage he is going to have to try to build some bridges, unless - that is - he has now given up on the Union because he will not be PM when it goes.
EV4EL / FFA
Why on earth would the SNP take FFA? It would make Scotland much poorer than it is now.
The exact point which has yet to be fully understood in Scotland by the electorate but the politicians know. FFA would leave to massive cuts and the end of any party ruling Scotland who accepts it. There are a few committed YES voters who want independence or FFA whatever it means but they make up maybe 10-20% only of the voters. The rest just want a better life.
The financial cost of FFA is about 7bn even with geographical allocation of oil. This is more than 10% of total expenditure. The Scots could borrow some of this initially but would the UK government support this as you may get a Greece type problem. The last time the Scots were net contributors to the UK was back in 2011/2012. The problem is not just falling oil prices but falling oil production and the decimation of the Scottish banking sector.
It is strange irony that the time that the Scots get serious about independence is the time when it does not make sense financially.
Not paying for Trident would save the Scots around 200m a year not the 100bn that a SNP supporter told me yesterday when I pointed out the numbers.
The financial cost of FFA is about 7bn even with geographical allocation of oil. This is more than 10% of total expenditure. The Scots could borrow some of this initially but would the UK government support this as you may get a Greece type problem. The last time the Scots were net contributors to the UK was back in 2011/2012. The problem is not just falling oil prices but falling oil production and the decimation of the Scottish banking sector.
It is strange irony that the time that the Scots get serious about independence is the time when it does not make sense financially.
Not paying for Trident would save the Scots around 200m a year not the 100bn that a SNP supporter told me yesterday when I pointed out the numbers.
It is an interesting one: the SNP can't take FFA because it would show that financially an independent Scotland would be significantly worse off. I guess the SNP have already thought of that by saying they will never do a deal with the Tories. By rejecting FFA they can carry on making absurd claims about how much better an independent Scotland would be.
I'm trying to reconcile the oddschecker total seat figures and I don't think they make sense. An example is as follows:
Oddschecker says 888Sport quoted a Lib seat value of +32.5 on 15/11/2013, but it didn't quote a CON seat figure until 22/04/2014, nor a LAB seat figure until 12/7/2014. Which means that for five months 888Sport were only offering a seat figure for LIB and not for LAB or CON. Which is implausible.
Can anybody explain this. Is Oddschecker.com just plain wrong?
Given that we now know Dave was going to stand down if Yes had won the referendum he must have something very big and bold planned for Scotland should the Tories end up winning. Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK. At some stage he is going to have to try to build some bridges, unless - that is - he has now given up on the Union because he will not be PM when it goes.
EV4EL / FFA
Why on earth would the SNP take FFA? It would make Scotland much poorer than it is now.
I am not sure they will take it but they will bluff about it. No one is offering them FFA except the Tories anyway. SNP will find a way of saying No if that came to pass.
At the moment, it makes sense talking about independence but not being independent.
I'm going through the Lib Dems seat by seat evaluating their chances.
The big question is - Is Lord A's 2nd poll question more correct than his first?
If it isn't they are down to about 2 to 4 seats.
I am splitting the difference between 1st and 2nd Qs for Lib Dem seats for my predictions.
I think atleast part of the bumps the Lib Dems get in the second question are people thinking they're being asked about LOCAL elections.
The only seat I'm pretty much 100% convinced is completely safe is Farron's. Next is Carmichael, then Lamb, then Laws.
Farron is not safe. There was a huge swing to the Lib Dems last time. Some of that may swing back. But the LDs in single figures is not only possible, it is probable.
The financial cost of FFA is about 7bn even with geographical allocation of oil. This is more than 10% of total expenditure. The Scots could borrow some of this initially but would the UK government support this as you may get a Greece type problem. The last time the Scots were net contributors to the UK was back in 2011/2012. The problem is not just falling oil prices but falling oil production and the decimation of the Scottish banking sector.
It is strange irony that the time that the Scots get serious about independence is the time when it does not make sense financially.
Not paying for Trident would save the Scots around 200m a year not the 100bn that a SNP supporter told me yesterday when I pointed out the numbers.
Your problem is a complete lack of understanding of the fiscal position of the UK.
Currently total subsidies paid by Scotland to England average at around £10bn per annum. The goal of the SNP is to engineer a situation where FFA can be implemented with those subsidies being minimised, stopping Scotland having to bail out predominantly the London budget year after year.
It is working very well. We are damn close to that position now.
All the SNP has to do is position the UK so that they get the best deal, FFA without paying subsidies to Westminster and Independence will be inevitable as soon as the relative wealth flushes out. With the additional tax revenues (probably heightened by specific tax cuts) this will be an exponential growth.
The financial cost of FFA is about 7bn even with geographical allocation of oil. This is more than 10% of total expenditure. The Scots could borrow some of this initially but would the UK government support this as you may get a Greece type problem. The last time the Scots were net contributors to the UK was back in 2011/2012. The problem is not just falling oil prices but falling oil production and the decimation of the Scottish banking sector.
It is strange irony that the time that the Scots get serious about independence is the time when it does not make sense financially.
Not paying for Trident would save the Scots around 200m a year not the 100bn that a SNP supporter told me yesterday when I pointed out the numbers.
It is an interesting one: the SNP can't take FFA because it would show that financially an independent Scotland would be significantly worse off. I guess the SNP have already thought of that by saying they will never do a deal with the Tories. By rejecting FFA they can carry on making absurd claims about how much better an independent Scotland would be.
No, FFA would demonstrate the opposite - as long as the SNP can get a fair deal which is reliant on the English public demanding it, not the SNP, not Scotland but the electorate of England.
And to achieve this, it is absolutely vital that the SNP position is not to make it clear to the media how broken the GERS numbers are. Their difficult goal (which so far they are achieving) is persuading Scotland that gerrymandered figures can be ignored without making it clear to England that they are partially reliant on the revenues from this gerrymander.
Things have gotten out of control this Parliament with so many online pollsters popping up and YouGov being five times a week.
I don't think so - we've all got used to taking the odd rogue poll with equanimity, because another one comes along a few hours later and says it's nonsense. Previously, one rogue could change the political climate for days, and that's not really a sensible way to conduct politics.
Anyway, a tick and a tock to postal vote time. Around 25% of the total in my patch - is that about average?
What if all the You Govs turn out to be rogues?
We are starting to see a clear divergence between the panel and the phone pollsters.
Someone is going to look stupid come May 8th.
Yougov seem to be stuck - Tory votes and Labour votes and UKIP votes all seem to vary by about 1%. If they move together then Labour lead is 1, if they move in parallel Labour lead is 2 and if they move against then Labour lead is 3.
These are the Tory percentages since 1st April (on the right) (Yougov fix panel with a 1% Labour lead)
34 33 34 34 34 33 33 33 34 33 35 34 33 34 37
And Labour
35 36 34 34 35 35 34 36 34 35 34 35 35 33 35
Now with 15 polls you would expect one of them to be an outlier (1 in 20) - so which is it
There would only be a 50% chance that there is an outlier in 15 polls
According to ElectionForecast the coalition government would be heading for a healthy re-election under the German electoral system where you need a majority of votes excluding the votes of parties getting less than 5%.
Their current forecast:
Con 34.4% Lab 32.6% LD 12.6% UKIP 10.5% Greens 3.8% SNP 3.6% Oth 1.8% PC 0.6%
90.1% voting for parties getting at least 5% so 45.2% needed for an overall majority. Con + LD = 47.0%.
(I know the SNP would win constituency seats in Scotland under the German system).
Comments
Matthew Goodwin (@GoodwinMJ)
20/04/2015 19:40
Came home to Conservative leaflet. Fear, negativity, blah. Totally uninspiring -> pic.twitter.com/yCwWmocLdZ
I see that PC lost deposits in 11 out of 40 seats in Wales last time around with 11% so still think that the Libdems, if they get only 9-10% of the vote, are in danger of having 200 lost deposits.
Either way it is probably going to be fairly hefty bill for the yellows to foot @ £500 a time
I thought they were meant to be the same?
They are definitely both done by Hanretty. Surely he isn't issuing two different forecasts?
These are the Tory percentages since 1st April (on the right) (Yougov fix panel with a 1% Labour lead)
34 33 34 34 34 33 33 33 34 33 35 34 33 34 37
And Labour
35 36 34 34 35 35 34 36 34 35 34 35 35 33 35
Now with 15 polls you would expect one of them to be an outlier (1 in 20) - so which is it
He's just a pound shop tim really, without the personal ethics or betting insight of course.
The big question is - Is Lord A's 2nd poll question more correct than his first?
If it isn't they are down to about 2 to 4 seats.
But after that confidence motion, is there anything to stop DC working with the SNP on vote-by-vote matters of mutual interest? Assuming Con are still in power then Con+SNP would have to be a clear majority regardless of LDs etc?
Does anyone think it would be plausible to get some sort of federalism act through with Con+SNP support? Something along the lines of Devomax for Scotland and EVEL for England. Give the SNP basically full control for Scotland and the Tories a majority for England ... while finally addressing the WLQ.
I think atleast part of the bumps the Lib Dems get in the second question are people thinking they're being asked about LOCAL elections.
I'm fairly sure Lamb will survive, but thinking the Tories gaining Yeovil might be worth a shout because of (a) the apparent strong swing the Tories are getting in the West Country, and (b) the fact Laws may struggle to keep Labour tacticals onside.
Unfortunately the Lib Dems have chosen to perform their "named" polling with a bunch of leading questions ahead of the VI question. Combined with tiny sample sizes (Sub 450) and selection bias they are worth far less than the Ashcroft polls.
Why couldn't a BPC pollster have just done a straight one question named candidate poll in say Hallam, Sutton and Cheam, East Dunbartonshire, Twickenham and Torbay for instance. That would be VERY instructive.
"Curiously, an experiment has shown that employers who were asked to make public declarations of their support for women and minorities then hired fewer women and minorities, which suggests that phariseeism does indeed lead to worse behaviour. As long as you say the right things, you can behave how you like."
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/04/dont-get-angry-at-katie-hopkins-if-you-dont-support-policies-that-could-save-migrants/
Great stuff!
Their current forecast:
Con 34.4%
Lab 32.6%
LD 12.6%
UKIP 10.5%
Greens 3.8%
SNP 3.6%
Oth 1.8%
PC 0.6%
90.1% voting for parties getting at least 5% so 45.2% needed for an overall majority. Con + LD = 47.0%.
(I know the SNP would win constituency seats in Scotland under the German system).
http://www.electionforecast.co.uk/
But all that's a big "if", and obviously no signs at all of it happening so far.
That's a whole another question.
More short-term, the new boundary rules will massively over-represent Scotland, because the referendum produced so many registered voters. So Con/SNP will want to work together to get a new boundary review done and the result passed by parliament.
I think the word Federalism would send a shiver down Tory and Labour spines as it is, they are too addicted to the gravy train that Westmidden represents to them. You would have thought that the Tories at least would have been glad to see less Scottish Labour hacks swanning it down in Westmidden, I will never understand their reasons for not having Devo Max on the ballot. The Brit Nat Parties miscalculated in my view not having Devo Max on the Referendum paper in my view for different reasons. Now there is a dogs breakfast happening.
But it doesn't state who is doing the accusing.
Sometimes I really wonder if papers are trying to create news rather than report it !
And what is it with the whole passive "people have said..." third person style.
Should just come out with "The paper accuses Sturgeon of a con-trick !"
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/salisburypost/obituary.aspx?n=larry-upright&pid=174627697&fhid=21558
Also, the family respectfully asks that you do not vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016. R.I.P. Grandaddy.
It is strange irony that the time that the Scots get serious about independence is the time when it does not make sense financially.
Not paying for Trident would save the Scots around 200m a year not the 100bn that a SNP supporter told me yesterday when I pointed out the numbers.
'Everything he has done since the day of the referendum has been designed to drive a wedge between Scotland and the rest of the UK
The wedge was driven 15 years ago by New Labour when they set up the completely one-sided partisan devolution deal with a complete disregard for EVEL.
They thought they were being clever at the time, It's now come back and blown up in their faces.
I'm trying to reconcile the oddschecker total seat figures and I don't think they make sense. An example is as follows:
Oddschecker says 888Sport quoted a Lib seat value of +32.5 on 15/11/2013, but it didn't quote a CON seat figure until 22/04/2014, nor a LAB seat figure until 12/7/2014. Which means that for five months 888Sport were only offering a seat figure for LIB and not for LAB or CON. Which is implausible.
Can anybody explain this. Is Oddschecker.com just plain wrong?
See Oddschecker Con under, Oddschecker Lab under, Oddschecker Lib under
At the moment, it makes sense talking about independence but not being independent.
Currently total subsidies paid by Scotland to England average at around £10bn per annum. The goal of the SNP is to engineer a situation where FFA can be implemented with those subsidies being minimised, stopping Scotland having to bail out predominantly the London budget year after year.
It is working very well. We are damn close to that position now.
All the SNP has to do is position the UK so that they get the best deal, FFA without paying subsidies to Westminster and Independence will be inevitable as soon as the relative wealth flushes out. With the additional tax revenues (probably heightened by specific tax cuts) this will be an exponential growth.
And to achieve this, it is absolutely vital that the SNP position is not to make it clear to the media how broken the GERS numbers are. Their difficult goal (which so far they are achieving) is persuading Scotland that gerrymandered figures can be ignored without making it clear to England that they are partially reliant on the revenues from this gerrymander.