politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The PB GE15 competition: Results from the April round
Sporting Index, which is sponsoring PB’s General Election coverage, is providing a competition prize of £200, payable into the winner’s SPIN account. If the winner does not have an account then he/she will have to open one to receive the prize.
Can we have a thread from someone who knows the answer about the procedure for the Lab leadership election? Has it been changed following the Collins Review, and why?
On the previous thread one or two posters were discussing Ed Miliband's mistaken idea to make "Islamophobia" a crime. No other religion or belief system has required a specific crime banning attacks on it - not Catholicism, not Hinduism, not socialism, not atheism - so I do not see why Islam should be singled out for special protection.
With my incredibly wrong predictions for both the GE and the IndyRef, I feel fairly confident people can take whatever I predict and know the opposite is pretty likely, so I feel I still have some use.
On the previous thread one or two posters were discussing Ed Miliband's mistaken idea to make "Islamophobia" a crime. No other religion or belief system has required a specific crime banning attacks on it - not Catholicism, not Hinduism, not socialism, not atheism - so I do not see why Islam should be singled out for special protection.
Probably no votes in banning attacks on other religions.
lost in Colne Valley by 3.1% in 2005 lost in Solihull by 0.3% in 2010
she has won Erewash this time. When she selected, I thought she could have missed again by a small margin. In the end she increased Tory majority from 5.2 to 7.4%
On Labour side there is Sue Hayman
she stood in Preseli in 2005 and lost by 1.6% in 2010 she stood in Halesowen and Rowley Regis and lost by 4.1%
this week she held Workington with a 12.2% majority. Her success was more predictable.
Is a csv file of the UK election results, scraped from the BBC website.
It's just the absolute bare minimum - excel should open it up fine but if you are using something else then beware of the "Beer, Baccy and Scratchings Party", stupid comma. Should be banned.
If I get time will will work on this more and scrape extra info and format up useful stuff like winning party
lost in Colne Valley by 3.1% in 2005 lost in Solihull by 0.3% in 2010
she has won Erewash this time. When she selected, I thought she could have missed again by a small margin. In the end she increased Tory majority from 5.2 to 7.4%
On Labour side there is Sue Hayman
she stood in Preseli in 2005 and lost by 1.6% in 2010 she stood in Halesowen and Rowley Regis and lost by 4.1%
this week she held Workington with a 12.2% majority. Her success was more predictable.
Very sorry for Philip Allott, who did really well in Bolton W in 05 (which fell to the Tories this time) and then stood in Halifax in both 10 and 15 - cut the majority twice but didn't quite get there.
Hooray - 15th! Had there been a third round a day or two before the election, I would have been nowhere - all confidence had deserted me by then.
Going back towards the end of April, the polls were edging towards 36 ... hinting at the sunny uplands of 37 for the tories. Then they slid back slightly, stuck and mostly tied.
On the previous thread one or two posters were discussing Ed Miliband's mistaken idea to make "Islamophobia" a crime. No other religion or belief system has required a specific crime banning attacks on it - not Catholicism, not Hinduism, not socialism, not atheism - so I do not see why Islam should be singled out for special protection.
Probably no votes in banning attacks on other religions.
No other religious group is seen as a Labour client group.
Is a csv file of the UK election results, scraped from the BBC website.
It's just the absolute bare minimum - excel should open it up fine but if you are using something else then beware of the "Beer, Baccy and Scratchings Party", stupid comma. Should be banned.
If I get time will will work on this more and scrape extra info and format up useful stuff like winning party
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
True sean
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
Agreed. My wife - who has always been on the side of the winners in general elections - was amazed at my pessimism for the Conservatives in the days leading up to the election. 'People just won't vote Labour with Ed Miliband in charge' she said. (Her list of complaints about him was long, and started with him defeating his brother in the leadership election, closely followed by the fact he was put there by the unions when the party and the MPs wanted his brother, but basically boiled down to a physical revulsion whenever she saw him on the screen. It doesn't really need to be more complicated than that.)
Her gut instinct was far more reliable than any of my detailed assessments of polls or subsamples or marginals. People simply didn't want Ed Miliband as Prime Minister.
There's an interesting graphic in the Observer. In safe Labour or Conservative seats, the swing is c.3% to Labour, similar to national polls.
In Con/Lab marginals, the swing is 1% to the Conservatives. In Con/Lib Dem battles, it's 11% to the Conservatives. Outstanding targeting by the Tories.
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
True sean
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
Indeed - over analysing specific metrics, often in an attempt to arrive at an objective calculation of the likely result (for not all those predicting incorrectly were going with the result they wished to be true), and so ignoring or downplaying the fundamentals. It reminds me of something I was once told about potential dangers of too much revisionist history, useful though much of it is, where in the case of the English Civil Wars, revisionist historians could have been said at one point to have challenged and explained away the traditional explanations of the causes of the wars so well, that clearly the wars could not have happened. Focusing on explaining away why this and that were not important, sometimes you forget about or miss focusing on what is.
What gets me is that I have always believed gut feeling is more important in elections, but I still completely misread how much that gut feeling would impact things.
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
True sean
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
Agreed. My wife - who has always been on the side of the winners in general elections - was amazed at my pessimism for the Conservatives in the days leading up to the election. 'People just won't vote Labour with Ed Miliband in charge' she said. (Her list of complaints about him was long, and started with him defeating his brother in the leadership election, closely followed by the fact he was put there by the unions when the party and the MPs wanted his brother, but basically boiled down to a physical revulsion whenever she saw him on the screen. It doesn't really need to be more complicated than that.)
Her gut instinct was far more reliable than any of my detailed assessments of polls or subsamples or marginals. People simply didn't want Ed Miliband as Prime Minister.
My English babymother was the same. Not very political, vaguely centre Left, highly intelligent, would possibly have benefited from some Labour policies.... Yet she "hated" Miliband (her word) and was convinced he could never win.
Looking back with perfect hindsight it is amazing that Labour elected him. And now, without reflection, they are hastening to choose another leader, just like that. Why? Why the rush? What is the point?
Have primaries. TV debates. Road test the new guys and girls. Make sure they work on TV. Try them on focus groups, across the country.
How many times did "Ed is Crap" appear on PB.
We all knew.
We just didn't realise the rest of the country knew too.
Manchester MP Lucy Powell - one of Ed Miliband’s most trusted allies and campaign chiefs - has promised to shoulder her share of responsibility for Labour’s dismal General Election performance.
“In terms of the election campaign, lots of colleagues have said I had a positive impact.
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
True sean
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
Agreed. My wife - who has always been on the side of the winners in general elections - was amazed at my pessimism for the Conservatives in the days leading up to the election. 'People just won't vote Labour with Ed Miliband in charge' she said. (Her list of complaints about him was long, and started with him defeating his brother in the leadership election, closely followed by the fact he was put there by the unions when the party and the MPs wanted his brother, but basically boiled down to a physical revulsion whenever she saw him on the screen. It doesn't really need to be more complicated than that.)
Her gut instinct was far more reliable than any of my detailed assessments of polls or subsamples or marginals. People simply didn't want Ed Miliband as Prime Minister.
My English babymother was the same. Not very political, vaguely centre Left, highly intelligent, would possibly have benefited from some Labour policies.... Yet she "hated" Miliband (her word) and was convinced he could never win.
Looking back with perfect hindsight it is amazing that Labour elected him. And now, without reflection, they are hastening to choose another leader, just like that. Why? Why the rush? What is the point?
Have primaries. TV debates. Road test the new guys and girls. Make sure they work on TV. Try them on focus groups, across the country.
How many times did "Ed is Crap" appear on PB.
We all knew.
We just didn't realise the rest of the country knew too.
According to google, EICIPM was uttered 2400 times on PB...
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
Surname Forename Votes Elected Description Brace Richard Steven 230 I am a Thorp Arch Councillor Crooks Amy Maria 289 ELECTED Time for change Duxbury Graham 269 ELECTED Parish Councillor and Neighbourhood Plan Member Richardson John 231 ELECTED Time For Change Rodger Andrew Donald 231 ELECTED Time For Change Smyth Margaret Lilian Pittam 235 ELECTED Parish Councillor and Member Neighbourhood Plan
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
True sean
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
Agreed. My wife - who has always been on the side of the winners in general elections - was amazed at my pessimism for the Conservatives in the days leading up to the election. 'People just won't vote Labour with Ed Miliband in charge' she said. (Her list of complaints about him was long, and started with him defeating his brother in the leadership election, closely followed by the fact he was put there by the unions when the party and the MPs wanted his brother, but basically boiled down to a physical revulsion whenever she saw him on the screen. It doesn't really need to be more complicated than that.)
Her gut instinct was far more reliable than any of my detailed assessments of polls or subsamples or marginals. People simply didn't want Ed Miliband as Prime Minister.
My English babymother was the same. Not very political, vaguely centre Left, highly intelligent, would possibly have benefited from some Labour policies.... Yet she "hated" Miliband (her word) and was convinced he could never win.
Looking back with perfect hindsight it is amazing that Labour elected him. And now, without reflection, they are hastening to choose another leader, just like that. Why? Why the rush? What is the point?
Have primaries. TV debates. Road test the new guys and girls. Make sure they work on TV. Try them on focus groups, across the country.
How many times did "Ed is Crap" appear on PB.
A google search suggests 520 results for the phrase 'Ed is crap' on PB, and 159 'EICIPM', which seems a little low on both even without variants of the two taken into account
Maybe the amount of threads both appeared in? Multiply that by how many times likely mentioned in both and I'd say we're looking at about 10000+ as a conservative estimate.
There are rumours on the Guardian that EdStone never existed. It was just a plaster model. But - with the great big steel frame, etc - Labour clearly wanted us to believe it DID exist.
Marvellously, that is even worse.
"I want to erect an 8ft limestone policy obelisk" "We haven't got time, Ed" "OK, let's PRETEND we've erected an 8ft Limestone Policy Obelisk. If we wheel in a steel frame, no one will guess that we're lying"
If true, I think that could actually end up being even more damaging in a weird way...Labour never tell the truth....even about a whacking great Obelisk.
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
Well, if anyone knows about shady electoral dealings it is probably Mr Galloway (through his close association with guilty of electoral corruption Luftur Rahman and nothing more)
There are rumours on the Guardian that EdStone never existed. It was just a plaster model. But - with the great big steel frame, etc - Labour clearly wanted us to believe it DID exist.
Oh, Ed. I honestly said you weren't crap, and you make me regret it so.
At the risk of restarting this, one hopes, stale debate given that Milliband has gone, this is what I posted at the end of the last thread.
Labour has form on this. They tried under Blair to introduce legislation which would have put comedians at risk if they satirised Islam hence the opposition to it led by Rowan Atkinson and others. So those of us concerned by what Milliband proposed were right to be concerned that (a) any law would be drawn so loosely as to have that result; and (b) it would become the thin end of the wedge and end up silencing criticisms of Muslims and Islam.
And I feel the same whichever party proposes something similar. Freedom of thought is far too valuable to be given up just because some politician wants to harness a few extra votes.
The real issue here is that political parties need to engage with voters from ethnic / religious minorities as individual citizens not through "community leaders" as if people who are Muslim or Catholic or of Sri Lankan origin are somehow too dumb to be addressed as grown up individuals but can only be spoken to through some intermediator. And this all the more so when there is an undoubted issue with extremist views and behaviour among some in some communities. Treat Muslims as grown ups not as victims to be coddled and patronised. And on occasion some speaking truth to power within that community may be needed.
What needs to stop is this pandering to permanently offended cry-baby so-called community "leaders" who are bullies and often have a quite sinister agenda, completely at odds with the values and expectations of a Western liberal democracy. Doing so just feeds the extremist meme rather than confront and eliminate it. That's all.
There are no votes in doing this for other religions but the reason for this is not that they are necessarily more peaceful - there have been some demonstrations by Sikh extremists with the intention of preventing the publication of material they dont' like - but that the whole "Islamophobia" shtick is not a word which came out of nowhere. It was developed by those with a specifically Islamist agenda with the intention of framing - on the Islamists' own terms - any debate about Islam (or about the Islamists' version of Islam) and preying - quite successfully - on the understandable desire of non-Muslims not to be rude about another person's religion or to attack someone different, especially if the difference between racism and criticising an idea/a religion could be elided by use of a convenient catch-all word. It needed to be challenged not pandered to. The fact that it hasn't been has been one of the factors in Rotherham and Tower Hamlets etc and it is about time that this nonsense stopped.
Could we have a "wisdom of crowds" of all those predictions and see how that came out and perhaps what rough national share would get that result?
Just be interesting to see how it all comes and also how it compares to the pollsters "WoC" numbers.
My Con and Lab figures were pretty bang on the pb mean, though I had LD down as 14 and SNP on 51, UKIP 2 and Green 3. So I should have scored better than the pb mean. I placed 76th.
The pb median would be the 180th person, but median on accuracy on multiple columns may not be very valid.
There's an interesting graphic in the Observer. In safe Labour or Conservative seats, the swing is c.3% to Labour, similar to national polls.
In Con/Lab marginals, the swing is 1% to the Conservatives. In Con/Lib Dem battles, it's 11% to the Conservatives. Outstanding targeting by the Tories.
My entry in the competition was staggeringly crap but one thing I did get right is that there has been a huge unwind in the bias in the system in favour of Labour. The defeats in Scotland for Labour and the massive improvement in the seat vote ratio for the Tories meant they got a significant winners bonus in 2015 unlike 2010.
There are rumours on the Guardian that EdStone never existed. It was just a plaster model. But - with the great big steel frame, etc - Labour clearly wanted us to believe it DID exist.
Marvellously, that is even worse.
"I want to erect an 8ft limestone policy obelisk" "We haven't got time, Ed" "OK, let's PRETEND we've erected an 8ft Limestone Policy Obelisk. If we wheel in a steel frame, no one will guess that we're lying"
I do hope someone finds it. Although I'm not sure it affected any votes, for me EdStone was Labours 2015 Sheffield Rally, and it deserves to be mocked down the ages in playbacks of cringeworthy election moments,
Who do we think will lead the IN and OUT campaigns at the EU referendum? I was thinking that maybe Clegg to run the IN the campaign, but I'm not sure about the OUT campaign. Farage might not be too divisive.
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
kle4Really this election seems to be one of those where people have been fooled by the closeness of the polls into thinking the outcome will actually be really close. As we know, tie on votes is a Labour win, barring any bizarre unforeseen shifts around the place, but the narrative of tieing in the polls with an expectation of shy tory syndrome has led to it being considered a tighter race than in fact it is. Ed faces an awkward aftermath, but that's not the same as it being too close to call.
Pity about Dan Jarvis, he would have at least made an interesting addition to the Labour leadership race, now looks like a Cooper v Umunna v Burnham battle again. Hopefully Jarvis will run for the Deputy Leadership
This election result was truly catastrophic for the centre-left. It's simply earth shattering. The Conservative achievement of a workable majority is a game changer.
If boundary reform goes through, which it will, the Conservatives will probably gain a further 15 seats in England, at the expense of Labour. That makes the gap 189 seats to 334 seats. The Liberal Democrats will still hold eight seats, but who knows if they'll hold onto any under the new boundaries?
I think they're out of the picture for a generation.
If EV4EL goes through, it gives the Conservatives a 135 seat majority in England going into the 2020 general election. That truly is Thatcher landslide territory, and a working majority in England will be crucial to any future UK government.
The Conservative vote-share and result under FPTP should be no real crumb of comfort: over 55% of the English voted for clear centre-right parties favouring tax-cuts, protection of defence, immigration control, EV4EL and Euroscepticism. The equivalent figures for the Left (Labour + Green) are just a shade over 35%. PR is no counter-argument: we've have had a Con-UKIP coalition with an ever bigger majority.
All of that's before we consider the remarkable ineptitude and lack of self-awareness within the Labour party. Further blunders could easily see it lose a swathe of seats in the North East to UKIP, just as happened in Scotland this time.
Only a total and fundamental rethink will now do. Or the Left will be out of power for a very long time indeed.
Is a csv file of the UK election results, scraped from the BBC website.
It's just the absolute bare minimum - excel should open it up fine but if you are using something else then beware of the "Beer, Baccy and Scratchings Party", stupid comma. Should be banned.
If I get time will will work on this more and scrape extra info and format up useful stuff like winning party
BTW What did you use to scrape the data?
I wrote the scraper myself in Python - the BBC page(s) were well structured and it was pretty easy as I write web scrapers for a living.
The thing that made it easiest is the the A-Z constituency page listing had the links for all constituencies and it just hid or showed elements depending on what letter you selected. So rather than having to fetch 26 pages (and work out the calling convention) I just had to do 1 fetch and then iterate through 650 Urls
On the previous thread one or two posters were discussing Ed Miliband's mistaken idea to make "Islamophobia" a crime. No other religion or belief system has required a specific crime banning attacks on it - not Catholicism, not Hinduism, not socialism, not atheism - so I do not see why Islam should be singled out for special protection.
Probably no votes in banning attacks on other religions.
No other religious group is seen as a Labour client group.
SLab used to have West of Scotland Catholics, but no client loyalty left these days. Not much SLab left either.
Mortimer's forecast is spookily accurate. Just stunning. I'd love to know how he or she computed that brilliant bit of clairvoyance.
There were signs, had we been prepared to read them (I didn't).
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
That's what I thought (and blogged about on here before Christmas) but as the polls refused to budge in the first few months of this year, and sustained crossover never really happened, I lost confidence.
tig86 Cameron to lead In, supported by the Labour and LD and SNP leaders, Farage or Carswell Out, supported by Redwood, Hannan, Patterson, Fox and Field
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
kle4Really this election seems to be one of those where people have been fooled by the closeness of the polls into thinking the outcome will actually be really close. As we know, tie on votes is a Labour win, barring any bizarre unforeseen shifts around the place, but the narrative of tieing in the polls with an expectation of shy tory syndrome has led to it being considered a tighter race than in fact it is. Ed faces an awkward aftermath, but that's not the same as it being too close to call.
There's an interesting graphic in the Observer. In safe Labour or Conservative seats, the swing is c.3% to Labour, similar to national polls.
In Con/Lab marginals, the swing is 1% to the Conservatives. In Con/Lib Dem battles, it's 11% to the Conservatives. Outstanding targeting by the Tories.
My entry in the competition was staggeringly crap but one thing I did get right is that there has been a huge unwind in the bias in the system in favour of Labour. The defeats in Scotland for Labour and the massive improvement in the seat vote ratio for the Tories meant they got a significant winners bonus in 2015 unlike 2010.
Judging by the numbers of voters required to achieve a Tory MP, Lab MP, etc, there is now, potentially, an electoral bias TO the Tories.
And this will be further entrenched by Cameron skewing, sorry, altering the constituency boundaries. Heh.
This election result was truly catastrophic for the centre-left. It's simply earth shattering. The Conservative achievement of a workable majority is a game changer.
If boundary reform goes through, which it will, the Conservatives will probably gain a further 15 seats in England, at the expense of Labour. That makes the gap 189 seats to 334 seats. The Liberal Democrats will still hold eight seats, but who knows if they'll hold onto any under the new boundaries?
I think they're out of the picture for a generation.
If EV4EL goes through, it gives the Conservatives a 135 seat majority in England going into the 2020 general election. That truly is Thatcher landslide territory, and a working majority in England will be crucial to any future UK government.
The Conservative vote-share and result under FPTP should be no real crumb of comfort: over 55% of the English voted for clear centre-right parties favouring tax-cuts, protection of defence, immigration control, EV4EL and Euroscepticism. The equivalent figures for the Left (Labour + Green) are just a shade over 35%. PR is no counter-argument: we've have had a Con-UKIP coalition with an ever bigger majority.
All of that's before we consider the remarkable ineptitude and lack of self-awareness within the Labour party. Further blunders could easily see it lose a swathe of seats in the North East to UKIP, just as happened in Scotland this time.
Only a total and fundamental rethink will now do. Or the Left will be out of power for a very long time indeed.
Catching up on a couple of threads over the weekend (I've been so exhausted and partied out, I've been taking a break from pb.com) it sounds like you had a very good night.
Congratulations.
I ended up about £1,600 up overall. It would have been £400 higher, but I could only close down my hung parliament positions at a large potential profit loss.
Almost all my consistency bets game in (but annoyed at Ynys Mon and surprised Birmingham Northfield and Edgbaston didn't go) but made quite a bit of cash on Libdemgeddon, including Bath and Cheltenham which I had repeatedly and heavily tipped on here.
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
kle4Really this election seems to be one of those where people have been fooled by the closeness of the polls into thinking the outcome will actually be really close. As we know, tie on votes is a Labour win, barring any bizarre unforeseen shifts around the place, but the narrative of tieing in the polls with an expectation of shy tory syndrome has led to it being considered a tighter race than in fact it is. Ed faces an awkward aftermath, but that's not the same as it being too close to call.
Haha this is brilliant, I'm sort of feeling sorry for him; he couldn't have been wronger if he tried.
Actually that one was one of mine - but at least my predictions of Labour victory lacked the zeal of a labour supporter and smug attacks on the eventual victors!
All the old guard in Labour need to step aside, i'll probably take two elections for Labour to regain power and be credible. Ed has done so much damage.. Tom Watson..??? they guy who was taking Xmas presents to Gordon Brown's kids.. jeeez
Pity about Dan Jarvis, he would have at least made an interesting addition to the Labour leadership race, now looks like a Cooper v Umunna v Burnham battle again. Hopefully Jarvis will run for the Deputy Leadership
I dont think the tories have too much to worry about from sny of those three... Theyre all known entities
Pity about Dan Jarvis, he would have at least made an interesting addition to the Labour leadership race, now looks like a Cooper v Umunna v Burnham battle again. Hopefully Jarvis will run for the Deputy Leadership
Kendall could stir things up. Although I understand she doesn't have the profile of the others, she did come across as competent and effective against Neill today.
I also think Labour would like to go for a woman leader this time. The issue is that apparently she's a Blairite, which won't go down well in certain quarters. And there is the problem people might think 'who?' and see her as inexperienced. Interesting one, nevertheless.
This election result was truly catastrophic for the centre-left. It's simply earth shattering. The Conservative achievement of a workable majority is a game changer.
If boundary reform goes through, which it will, the Conservatives will probably gain a further 15 seats in England, at the expense of Labour. That makes the gap 189 seats to 334 seats. The Liberal Democrats will still hold eight seats, but who knows if they'll hold onto any under the new boundaries?
I think they're out of the picture for a generation.
If EV4EL goes through, it gives the Conservatives a 135 seat majority in England going into the 2020 general election. That truly is Thatcher landslide territory, and a working majority in England will be crucial to any future UK government.
The Conservative vote-share and result under FPTP should be no real crumb of comfort: over 55% of the English voted for clear centre-right parties favouring tax-cuts, protection of defence, immigration control, EV4EL and Euroscepticism. The equivalent figures for the Left (Labour + Green) are just a shade over 35%. PR is no counter-argument: we've have had a Con-UKIP coalition with an ever bigger majority.
All of that's before we consider the remarkable ineptitude and lack of self-awareness within the Labour party. Further blunders could easily see it lose a swathe of seats in the North East to UKIP, just as happened in Scotland this time.
Only a total and fundamental rethink will now do. Or the Left will be out of power for a very long time indeed.
We also have to bare in mind that the longer the left stay out the longer it is until they get a big new intake to refresh themselves/find talent. Currently there seems to be no-one fresh in the Labour party to take it forward, this problem will only grow as they stay out of power for longer, making it harder to find good people.
All the old gurad in Labour need to step aside, i'll probably take two elections for L:abour to regain power and be credible. Ed has some so much damage.. Tom Watson.. they guy who was taking Xmas presents to Gordon Brown's kids..
.
A lot of the damage goes back further when mysteriously lots of promising Labour figures were briefed against relentlessly.
Listening on iplayer to the BBC R5 coverage of GE night - it's beautiful listening to all the dissing of the exit poll and the lefties hanging on the YouGov poll which came out showing the 'norm' of what was expected. 'We know it's been close, the exit poll doesn't feel right'
Comments
Had there been a third round a day or two before the election, I would have been nowhere - all confidence had deserted me by then.
If we believe Messina / Crosby, all this about "on the day late swing" was worth a tiny amount.
Poor Ed he was still convinced at 10pm on the night that he had done it.
lost in Colne Valley by 3.1% in 2005
lost in Solihull by 0.3% in 2010
she has won Erewash this time. When she selected, I thought she could have missed again by a small margin. In the end she increased Tory majority from 5.2 to 7.4%
On Labour side there is Sue Hayman
she stood in Preseli in 2005 and lost by 1.6%
in 2010 she stood in Halesowen and Rowley Regis and lost by 4.1%
this week she held Workington with a 12.2% majority. Her success was more predictable.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/6mb2iroir0odk1h/2015results.csv?dl=0
Is a csv file of the UK election results, scraped from the BBC website.
It's just the absolute bare minimum - excel should open it up fine but if you are using something else then beware of the "Beer, Baccy and Scratchings Party", stupid comma. Should be banned.
If I get time will will work on this more and scrape extra info and format up useful stuff like winning party
Bugger.
Bugger, bugger, bugger.
Only hope is that there were talking of Greens in England not nationally as they are separate parties?
The party that leads on best leader/economic competence wins the election. Matt Singh made this clear.
But, but, but, there are no Tory ground troops, Grant Shapps is Crap, IOS told us...
Just be interesting to see how it all comes and also how it compares to the pollsters "WoC" numbers.
I think one of the problems for politcal anoraks is we overcomplicate things in our bubble.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
http://blog.core-ed.org/derek/files/2008/10/digital-lemmings.jpg
BTW What did you use to scrape the data?
Her gut instinct was far more reliable than any of my detailed assessments of polls or subsamples or marginals. People simply didn't want Ed Miliband as Prime Minister.
In Con/Lab marginals, the swing is 1% to the Conservatives. In Con/Lib Dem battles, it's 11% to the Conservatives. Outstanding targeting by the Tories.
http://politicalbetting.vanillaforums.com/profile/comments/190/IOS
What gets me is that I have always believed gut feeling is more important in elections, but I still completely misread how much that gut feeling would impact things.
Dave and Nicola what a team - first they destroy Labour then they agree to potpone nationalism.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3075810/There-NOT-going-referendum-Cameron-slaps-claims-Scottish-independence-agenda-stunning-SNP-landslide.html
@MrHarryCole: Labour were already panicking about their supposedly 'superior ground operation' last summer: http://t.co/b7Ev5Jfz1c
How many times did "Ed is Crap" appear on PB.
We all knew.
We just didn't realise the rest of the country knew too.
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=EICIPM+site:politicalbetting.vanillaforums.com&safe=off
IOS: Labour's ground game is honestly brilliant this election. I really wish I could go into the details of it for people on here. Its so frustrating when you read very ill informed comments about campaigning on here!
http://politicalbetting.vanillaforums.com/discussion/comment/652675/#Comment_652675
Come on Andy (sorry Stella) !!
Electorate :
Turnout : %
Surname Forename Votes Elected Description
Brace Richard Steven 230 I am a Thorp Arch Councillor
Crooks Amy Maria 289 ELECTED Time for change
Duxbury Graham 269 ELECTED Parish Councillor and Neighbourhood Plan Member
Richardson John 231 ELECTED Time For Change
Rodger Andrew Donald 231 ELECTED Time For Change
Smyth Margaret Lilian Pittam 235 ELECTED Parish Councillor and Member Neighbourhood Plan
The unluckiest loser of all time?
Maybe the amount of threads both appeared in? Multiply that by how many times likely mentioned in both and I'd say we're looking at about 10000+ as a conservative estimate.
Labour has form on this. They tried under Blair to introduce legislation which would have put comedians at risk if they satirised Islam hence the opposition to it led by Rowan Atkinson and others. So those of us concerned by what Milliband proposed were right to be concerned that (a) any law would be drawn so loosely as to have that result; and (b) it would become the thin end of the wedge and end up silencing criticisms of Muslims and Islam.
And I feel the same whichever party proposes something similar. Freedom of thought is far too valuable to be given up just because some politician wants to harness a few extra votes.
The real issue here is that political parties need to engage with voters from ethnic / religious minorities as individual citizens not through "community leaders" as if people who are Muslim or Catholic or of Sri Lankan origin are somehow too dumb to be addressed as grown up individuals but can only be spoken to through some intermediator. And this all the more so when there is an undoubted issue with extremist views and behaviour among some in some communities. Treat Muslims as grown ups not as victims to be coddled and patronised. And on occasion some speaking truth to power within that community may be needed.
What needs to stop is this pandering to permanently offended cry-baby so-called community "leaders" who are bullies and often have a quite sinister agenda, completely at odds with the values and expectations of a Western liberal democracy. Doing so just feeds the extremist meme rather than confront and eliminate it. That's all.
There are no votes in doing this for other religions but the reason for this is not that they are necessarily more peaceful - there have been some demonstrations by Sikh extremists with the intention of preventing the publication of material they dont' like - but that the whole "Islamophobia" shtick is not a word which came out of nowhere. It was developed by those with a specifically Islamist agenda with the intention of framing - on the Islamists' own terms - any debate about Islam (or about the Islamists' version of Islam) and preying - quite successfully - on the understandable desire of non-Muslims not to be rude about another person's religion or to attack someone different, especially if the difference between racism and criticising an idea/a religion could be elided by use of a convenient catch-all word. It needed to be challenged not pandered to. The fact that it hasn't been has been one of the factors in Rotherham and Tower Hamlets etc and it is about time that this nonsense stopped.
The pb median would be the 180th person, but median on accuracy on multiple columns may not be very valid.
Ah well, I'd rather be happy than right.
I've been right about the last two Labour leaders being as useful as a Catholic Priest at an Orange Order meeting.
kle4Really this election seems to be one of those where people have been fooled by the closeness of the polls into thinking the outcome will actually be really close. As we know, tie on votes is a Labour win, barring any bizarre unforeseen shifts around the place, but the narrative of tieing in the polls with an expectation of shy tory syndrome has led to it being considered a tighter race than in fact it is. Ed faces an awkward aftermath, but that's not the same as it being too close to call.
http://politicalbetting.vanillaforums.com/discussion/comment/660378/#Comment_660378
Ok, now I'm just being a masochist.
34 women and 19 men
7 BAME
4 LGTB
3 retreads
Conservative new intake: 74 MPs
47 men, 27 women (if I didn't misjudge some first names)
7 BAME
LD new intake: no-one
This election result was truly catastrophic for the centre-left. It's simply earth shattering. The Conservative achievement of a workable majority is a game changer.
If boundary reform goes through, which it will, the Conservatives will probably gain a further 15 seats in England, at the expense of Labour. That makes the gap 189 seats to 334 seats. The Liberal Democrats will still hold eight seats, but who knows if they'll hold onto any under the new boundaries?
I think they're out of the picture for a generation.
If EV4EL goes through, it gives the Conservatives a 135 seat majority in England going into the 2020 general election. That truly is Thatcher landslide territory, and a working majority in England will be crucial to any future UK government.
The Conservative vote-share and result under FPTP should be no real crumb of comfort: over 55% of the English voted for clear centre-right parties favouring tax-cuts, protection of defence, immigration control, EV4EL and Euroscepticism. The equivalent figures for the Left (Labour + Green) are just a shade over 35%. PR is no counter-argument: we've have had a Con-UKIP coalition with an ever bigger majority.
All of that's before we consider the remarkable ineptitude and lack of self-awareness within the Labour party. Further blunders could easily see it lose a swathe of seats in the North East to UKIP, just as happened in Scotland this time.
Only a total and fundamental rethink will now do. Or the Left will be out of power for a very long time indeed.
The thing that made it easiest is the the A-Z constituency page listing had the links for all constituencies and it just hid or showed elements depending on what letter you selected. So rather than having to fetch 26 pages (and work out the calling convention) I just had to do 1 fetch and then iterate through 650 Urls
(starts at 10 secs)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNlKQrastLc&feature=youtu.be&t=10s
Catching up on a couple of threads over the weekend (I've been so exhausted and partied out, I've been taking a break from pb.com) it sounds like you had a very good night.
Congratulations.
I ended up about £1,600 up overall. It would have been £400 higher, but I could only close down my hung parliament positions at a large potential profit loss.
Almost all my consistency bets game in (but annoyed at Ynys Mon and surprised Birmingham Northfield and Edgbaston didn't go) but made quite a bit of cash on Libdemgeddon, including Bath and Cheltenham which I had repeatedly and heavily tipped on here.
.
I also think Labour would like to go for a woman leader this time. The issue is that apparently she's a Blairite, which won't go down well in certain quarters. And there is the problem people might think 'who?' and see her as inexperienced. Interesting one, nevertheless.