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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Keiran Pedley on the Ipsos Mori poll that puts Andy and Yv
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Keiran Pedley on the Ipsos Mori poll that puts Andy and Yvette neck and neck
For obvious reasons there isn’t a lot of polling out there at the moment. This makes following the true state of the Labour leadership contest quite tricky. Fortunately, we had a poll yesterday from Ipsos Mori that looked at the Labour leadership among the general public and Labour voters. The tables are here.
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But polling this is pretty much impossible. The laughable uptake of trade union members (in the low thousands last I heard) means that the correlation between this electorate and Labour voters, let alone the general public, is poor at best. I think Keiran makes a good point that Burnham's apparent weakness in London is likely to be a problem for him. Beyond that it is almost impossible to predict.
Apart from her chromosomes I cannot see why a Kendall second preference would go to Cooper who is high priestess of deficit denial. Electing Cooper would mean another five wasted years.
On the other hand Yvette does offer some value in the betting, as well as better prospects for an LD revival than Kendall.
And Bill Cash has a majority of 16250. Is there something about having a very safe seat that allows MPs to indulge in delusional twaddle?
Is her strategy to bore us all into voting Labour?
A pleasing result from Denmark.
"Tredinnick, who – incredibly – sits on the Commons Health Select Committee, believes that astrology works and, according to the Telegraph, that a full moon can cause internal bleeding. And, it goes without saying, he supports the cult of homeopathy, which puts lives at risk with its idiot doctrines.
To quote the world-renowned scientist Lord Winston, ‘Let me say firmly: I think his views are lunatic’."
http://health.spectator.co.uk/roll-of-shame-mps-who-back-homeopathy-fan-david-tredinnick-for-chair-of-commons-health-committee/
Why is it no surprise that he doesn't accept the scientific view on AGW?
http://www.europeanfoundation.org/100-reasons-why-global-warming-is-natural/
Good article, Mr. Pedley.
Mr. Song, that comparison is beneath you. Pope Francis is a believer (in man-made global warming). He also suggested that those reacting to Charlie Hebdo cartoons (by murdering the cartoonists) were akin to a man punching someone for insulting his mother. I wouldn't equate every or the average pro-global warming [as it were] person with such backward views.
You might well recall I commented specifically on that chairman vote and asked who the 64 people were who preferred an astrologist to a doctor as health chairman.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/jul/08/muir-russell-climategate-climate-science
How about NASA, do you dispute their data?
http://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/
I have been over the Stafford issue and Francis report here on multiple occasions. I am no apologist for Labour on health reforms and in the noughties they squandered a lot of money and instituted a bullying top down management under Milburn, Reid and Hewitt that poisoned the NHS management culture and (along with the Iraq war) caused me to resign from the party. Burnham 's role at Stafford was to instigate the first inquiry, amongst other ways of fixing a dysfunctional hospital.
It is worth noting that hospital scandals are not unique to Labour governments (the Bristol Childrens Heart scandal and Alder Hey organ retention scandals were under Tory regimes), that there are several hospitals where the mortality rate on drfoster (SHMI) is currently at Stafford like levels, and that scandals are not unique to the UK nor the NHS. Winterbourne View, the PIP breast implant scandal and Musgrove Park ISTC were all in the private sector.
Of course some scientists allow their ideology to affect their work, see Stephen Jay Gould or Lysenkoism.
Very good result from Denmark, well done Danish People's Party.
Britain Elects @britainelects 8h8 hours ago
Holmwood (Mole Valley) result:
LDEM - 50.2% (+24.0)
CON - 30.7% (+2.1)
UKIP - 12.5% (-19.1)
GRN - 6.6% (-)
Changes from 2014.
Britain Elects @britainelects 8h8 hours ago
Liberal Democrats hold their Holmwood seat on Mole Valley District Council and gain the second seat from UKIP.
The fourth IPCC gathering made some predictions about temperature, got them all wrong, and for the fifth meeting increased their self-confidence in their forecasts from 90% to 95%. That's about as scientific as going to a bar, asking out 20 women, getting slapped 20 times, going back home and writing in your diary "Today I confirmed my status as a studmuffin."
There is no getting over that: he puts the reputation of a hospital trust over patients' welfare
You are also ignoring (as ever) his earlier role as Minister of State (Department of Health) (Delivery and Quality)
http://www.parliament.uk/biographies/commons/andy-burnham/1427
Nope .. WE read on here, we don't necessarily investigate to the nth degree.. The BBC supports and promotes the idea of global warming, hence I am almost automatically suspicious. The BBC are not to be trusted.
http://s.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/projects/fathers-days/index.html
Liz Kendall looks likely to demonstrate how few Blairites remain in the Labour party. The follow-up question is how many will continue to hang around if she loses, particularly if she loses badly.
Labour supporters aren't keen on the likes of Dan Hodges and John Rentoul, but both have a large audience for their views. If they're going to spend another Parliament firing potshots at the Labour leadership, that really isn't going to be helpful for the Labour party.
Nanette Milne (Conservative, NE Scotland) will stand down from Holyrood. Born in 1942, she is an MSP since 2003.
In Wales, Keith Davies (Labour, Llanelli) announced retirement. He was first elected in 2011 with a majority of less than 100. However, he is already 75. In 2012 he suffered from health problems and he was censured after a fall out at a Cardiff hotel while drunk.
Another thing the Pope got wrong was condemning fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are good. Fossil fuels mean we live far better lives than people did when they didn't have them. They mean we don't burn every available tree for charcoal.
its one of the best things about the Tories GE victory, no champers and 5 yrs of pain.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/33194545
P1 starts in about quarter of an hour.
Mr Bumble Popular Among Beadles
Geo-thermal's great and I think solar, tidal and hydro-electric have great potential. Wind's a crock (can make a case for supplementary micro-generation but nothing beyond that).
I feel like you are going to ignore this, but there are two main parts to the scandal:
1) The poor medical care.
2) The lies, cover-ups, bullying of staff, attacks on whistleblowers, paying off of whistleblowers, etc, etc, that allowed 1) to continue for far too many years.
We will never abolish poor medical care, but we can try to ensure that when there is poor medical care, it is detected and corrected as quickly as possible. Actions like paying off or sacking whistleblowers instead of listening to them just allows bad practice to fester.
That is where Stafford failed, and it is why the public inquiry was so necessary.
Moves like the following are a good start:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-31362196
"If it fails to make the payment, it risks having to leave the eurozone and possibly also the EU."
Not seen it suggested anywhere [else] Greece might have to leave the EU.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-33194917
As an aside, though, I was in Canada last week at a government symposium on the future of agritech. There were a number of very interesting speeches but one which struck me particularly.
The issue with global warming isn't to do with flooding or environmental cycles or anything else. It's to do with food. A 2oC increase in temperature causes agricultural productivity in China to fall by 68%. And stops rice growing in the tropics.
A lack of food is the biggest single cause of political instability in history.
It all suddenly made sense why governments are *so* focused on the issue
As an aside, though, I was in Canada last week at a government symposium on the future of agritech. There were a number of very interesting speeches but one which struck me particularly.
The issue with global warming isn't to do with flooding or environmental cycles or anything else. It's to do with food. A 2oC increase in temperature causes agricultural productivity in China to fall by 68%. And stops rice growing in the tropics.
A lack of food is the biggest single cause of political instability in history.
It all suddenly made sense why governments are *so* focused on the issue
Liz Kendall is in some ways similar to Ed Miliband. We now know what platitudes she'd carve on the LizStone, but it's not clear what lies beyond that.
Betting-wise, I'm green on Burnham, Cooper and Kendall and will just have to take the risk of a Corbyn landslide.
The argument about global warming is about science not frightening people with religious dogma: commit sin and burn in Hell forever! Fail to cut carbon dioxide emissions and the whole planet will die!
If there's a case to be made, it must be made and judged on scientific grounds.
Cash is an idiot himself, so no surprise he nominates a fellow 'lunatic'.
Let's say it's a 50/50 chance that the theory is correct. Please note, I'm being incredibly kind to you by making that assumption, given the weight of scientific opinion at present.
I'm not prepared to risk the future of the planet on a flip of a coin. In fact, I regard the idea as highly immoral.
No, I won't say there's a 50/50 chance. Science starts with scepticism. If a believer wants me to agree with them, they have to persuade me. Until then, my view is it's politically motivated tosh.
As for 'weight of scientific opinion' - weight doesn't matter. It's not a popularity contest, it's not democracy or choosing a prom queen. It's about facts and what's correct. The weight of scientific opinion supported Newton's view on the properties of light, and was wrong.
You are prepared to do great economic harm based on a theory that's dubious at best. You're trusting the long-term predictions of individuals who got their short-term forecasts completely wrong, then upgraded their own self-confidence in their next prediction to 95%.
Meanwhile, my inbox is full of messages from the leadership and deputy leadership candidates. All asking for support, most asking for help, and some asking for money.
You prefer to do nothing on the ground that no one else has committed to do anything. That is the attitude of a moral coward. Sometimes it is important to take a lead. If that's what's called virtue signalling nowadays, then count me in.
CO2 is not a pollutant, it allows plants and trees to grow and give off oxygen. CO2 is not a major component of so called greenhouse gasses. Water vapour is a 90% component. Industrialisation does bring all kinds of pollution of course and fuel and productive efficiency is important, as is a clean environment. But hydrogen powered cars which give off, you guessed it, water vapour is hardly the solution to any supposed global warming.
But the General Election was just a moment - a snapshot, as Lord Ashcroft used to say. It was a moment when people were panicked by a couple of foreign manipulators into voting Conservative for fear of a SNP-dominated Miliband government. That particular threat is now out of the way, and is not repeatable.
So the Lib Dems are now back on the way up. Three local government wins in the last ten days and 18,000 new members. With broken sleazy UKIP on the slide (as they say), and both Labour and Conservatives divided and unsure about what they stand for, the future looks very encouraging for Liberal Democrats.
With respect to climate change, it's always happened, will always happen (the idea that some equilibrium can be established is barking). Rather than virtue signalling we need to find ways to live with and ameliorate the effects of those changes.
As Indigo points out, unilateral action simply disadvantages that actor economically, without necessarily having a major impact on the underlying trend.
I'm also risking eternal damnation by being an atheist.
One should always consider the possibility that one is wrong. It is not something that I have ever observed the opponents of the scientific consensus ever doing, despite their apparent lack of expertise in the area.
AGW ...There is the famous precautionary principle which the Greens love. If something might happen and it's serious, we should take 'appropriate' action. The enthusiasts assume we must take action no matter what the cost but this is clearly wrong.
We might get struck by lightning if we leave the house. If so, it's likely to be fatal. The precautionary principle suggests we don't shelter under trees or by metallic railing during a thunderstorm. It doesn't mean we should never go out.
It is possible that certain gases like carbon dioxide are responsible for warming the world. We don't know it's the main reason or even for sure that the world is warming so to spend billions immediately can hardly be described as appropriate. Those billions could be spent on drug research or immediate aid to starving children.
I can see the economic benefits (eventually) of tidal power or geothermal power after a large initial outlay. But nice though solar power is (and I have panels which earn me a nice annual sum - thanks Ed), it can't take over.
For some reason, AGW has become a faith and not a science. Anyone who has doubts is a heretic and should be thrown onto a low-carbon emission fire.
As Huxley said - "The great tragedy of Science — the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact."
Cherry-picking? I've put forward some facts based on recent history, and if you think I'm cherry-picking feel free to put forward contrary points which support your view.
All you're doing is asking "What if you're wrong?" without any evidence to back that up.
One thing I strongly believe is that we should not place ourselves at competitive disadvantage compared to other countries in order to achieve certain targets. If there are to be targets, they must be for all - particularly the USA, India, China and I guess the EU and other G8 nations.
Miliband's move to appoint John Prescott as climate change advisor during the campaign was a particularly bizarre one given he has no scientific background so far as I am aware, almost as strange as nominating Treddinick for the health chair given his belief in the miraculous power of sugar and water.
Really.
In the financial year ending 2015 (April 2014 to March 2015), public sector net borrowing excluding public sector banks (PSNB ex) was £89.2 billion (4.9% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)): a decrease of £9.3 billion compared with the previous financial year.
In May 2015, PSNB ex was £10.1 billion (0.5% of GDP); a decrease of £2.2 billion compared with May 2014.
These terrors never materialised.
Right now, we are not at a point to say definitively which school of thought is correct, though we should note that those who are most expert almost all prefer the first school of thought.
But what you (and every opponent of the scientific consensus) forget is that we have to decide now what actions if any we are going to take on the basis of the information that we have at hand. We cannot simply wait and see, because if we do so, on the view of one school of thought - the one, remember, that is currently favoured by most expert opinion - later will be too late to act.
So we have to decide what actions we take right now. These actions may be wrong. However, it would be complete folly to risk the world if there are steps that we can take right now to mitigate the potential harm.
The arrogance of the opponents is what stands out: the willingness to risk the future of the entire planet to prove a point that they cannot possibly prove right now.