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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » GE2015 – the scene is set for four way tactical voting
A key part of the Tory effort to remain at Number 10 will be to get over to CON-UKIP defectors that in the key LAB-CON battlegrounds the best way of stopping Ed Miliband becoming next PM is by them voting with the blues rather than the purples.
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Is there any evidence that any other segment of the electorate are so motivated or are willing to vote that way? What we get on here, for example, from the numerous UKIP supporters is that the tories and Labour are just the same and they are indifferent to the outcome. They will vote according to their principles. SeanF may be an exception to this but I can think of few others.
Tim has repeatedly pointed out that tories are traditionally very reluctant to vote tactically. In his view voting according to your principles is evidence of stupidity.
What we have seen in Scotland is that FPTP really does not work well with 4 players and that you get some extreme results with the winner having little over 25% of the votes. But I don't know of any evidence that even this level of absurdity increased tactical voting.
In short I doubt the premise of the headnote. In almost all constituences there will be insufficient reliable information available to make such choices even if the electorate were so minded which I suggest they are not in the vast majority of cases.
F1: very sad to hear that what had been reported, when I first read it, as 'not a serious' head injury has now shifted to Schumacher being in a coma. Help arrived swiftly and obviously money's no object so hopefully he'll be able to recover, but it's clearly a grave situation:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25545993
A real man votes with his principles, I'll leave it to others to vote for things they don't believe in.
As a UKIP man my obvious choice is to vote Tory, but why would I vote for a party that doesn't believe in giving bright working class kids a chance, that is run by a pro-EU elite, that had to be dragged by the Lib Dems into raising the tax threshold.
I don't believe in the Tory party and will not vote tactically to support them. If that means Ed gets in then so be it.
The other day I read an interesting comparison between Vettel and Schumacher, asserting the latter was better because he went to Ferrari and turned it around, whereas Vettel (whilst undoubtedly being immensely quick) very quickly found himself at a winning team and has (so far) stayed there.
As a child my earliest F1 memories are of Schumacher and Hill. I was a Schumacher fan, not so much despite his rule-bending/breaking, but because of it (I enjoyed rooting for the villain).
I presume this means a return to grammar schools. In which case, what happens to the less-bright working class kids?
I see a great deal of concentration on the 'grammar schools', and very little on the perhaps more important aspect: the kids who really need help.
An education system has to help everyone.
I completely disagree with you that tories are failing to give bright working class kids a chance. It seems to me that the Gove reforms are focussed exactly on that point and he has said as much many times (being a bright kid from a poorish background himself). It will of course be some years before we know whether he has succeeded or not. Maybe that is a discussion for another time.
Tactical voting requires (a) a strongly motivated electorate (b) who are more against something than for something and (c) has sufficient reliable information to make that choice. I really do not see even 2 of 3 of these requirements in the vast majority of constituencies.
Being willing to vote tactically, and being wiling to vote LD, are two different things.
Classically it's true of small parties. The far left, the far right (beyond UKIP) and the Greens would all do better if people thought they might win seats, and there have been polls for many years showing LibDems at 30% or more given a push-poll question ("If the LibDems might win here, would you..."), which shows a basic propensity. It's also a factor which many people keep in mind, partly because they otherwise wouldn't vote at all - loads of voters think we're all rubbish to varying degrees, but they will vote because they want to defeat the local candidate of Y.
Next time, I think a lot of Lib-Lab votes are going to be tactical. The main question mark is UKIP, and there I think the tactical vote will prove elusive - their voters are generally going to vote UKIP if they vote at all.
FPT - JohnLoony asks if older contributors were aware of the horrors in Cambodia before the fall of the Khmer Rouge and whether there might be something similar in North Korea. It had become pretty clear that the KR were murderous nutters, and only cold-war considerations prevented a general welcome when Vietnam got fed up with KR border raids and took them out. I don't think the sheer scale of the horror was widely-known, though.
The position is potentially similar in North Korea, but we don't know the full scale for sure. The problem is that in the absence of a free press it's very hard to distinguish between governments that routinely mistreat opponents (like nearly all dictatorships and some democracies) and governments that slaughter citizens on an industrial scale: defectors tend to claim the latter, but it's not always quite true. A key difference is whether you can get by just keeping your head down (as you pretty much could under latter-day Franco and Brezhnev, but not under Hitler or Pol Pot). FWIW my impression is that North Korea is pretty terrible - whether on a Pol Pot scale we shall see when it collapses.
What the world should be doing about it right now is a very difficult question and I don't pretend to know the answer. "Contain it and hope China pulls the plug" seems the default, and it may be the least evil.
I have never been as enthusiastic about F1 as you clearly are but I was a lot more interested in the Schumacher/Hill era. At the time the clear indication was that Schumacher was far more involved in the development of the car than current drivers. Is this perhaps because of the absurd restrictions against practice now in place?
I love t'Telegraph's Scotland threads.* But this one has made me think....
Come the 'Ridding-of-the-Scots' I believe that the Union-Flag should no longer have the Saltaire as a [rather boring] back-drop: Ergo, I propose that every July a new, rUK, Union-Flag should be issued which - in place of the butchers' apron [1997-2010] - the area fore-lost should be represented by the colours of the English Premiership champions.
A Chelsea win would restore history;
An Arsenal win would see a reduced red/expanded white motif (and be better than an unlikely Liverpool schemed flag);
A Manckie-City win would remind us all to wash at 30 degrees-celcius;
An Aston Villa win would remind us that Russia failed to nuke the West-Midlands during the Cold War; and
A Newcastle win would make us look like an Italian dukedom....
Just imagine the fun: Team sponsorship would rocket as corporations try to "buy" the next Union-Flag design. Imagine some of the old-stylee Wimbledon and Liverpool kits from the 'Nineties being reintroduced: What fun we could have with "our" flag...
* That Tanya looks like a sassy chick!
Will Labour supporters see a difference in supporting a Lib Dem after the Coalition? Will we see even less tactical voting?
I would say that Schumacher was more involved, not necessarily just in car development (I have a vague notion he tested the wheels off of everything) but in building the team around himself. He had several unsuccessful seasons with Ferrari prior to the purple patch, but was always a team player (well, with Ferrari, not so much his team mates).
The problems F1 face now are partly not of the sport's own making. Aerodynamics dominate performance, but many tracks (stupidly including the recently designed ones which should've been better crafted) have medium speed or right angle corners, at which passing is practically impossible because the car ahead disrupts airflow, slowing the car behind. Not F1's fault that happens, but if they let unfettered aerodynamic research go on it would probably make the matter worse.
The tyres now are a result of Canada a few years ago when everyone was surprised by how briefly they lasted and we had many pit stops and great excitement. Unfortunately the planks who make such decision failed to consider that if the tyres were predictably short-lived then teams would just work out the optimal strategy (drive at 80% or so instead of 100% with 2 extra pit stops) and the Canadian excitement wouldn't be reproduced.
I don't mind KERS/ERS too much as it's an entirely level playing field. DRS is a gimmick. I also think it's a good thing we'll finally have some variation in engines again. I hope the Renault is a dog.
Edited extra bit: that said, it's worth recalling that 2010 and 2012 were great seasons.
Tactical voting is not an issue in 500+ seats. There the outcome is pretty certain whatever.
Where it does matter is in seats like yours in Broxtowe or mine in Bedford which were won by the Tories in 2010 with very small majorities. Voters in the middle are very powerful and will get an enormous amount of attention.
A LD>LAB switchover in either makes the Tory position even more precarious.
What many on PB don't appreciate is that the general election experience in the marginals is totally different from in the CON & LAB heartlands where you won't see much real campaigning by any partty.
That's a matter of life and death though. If UKIP were to succeed in their ultimate goal of creating a machine capable of rolling back time to the 1950s then those of us born after that decade will, I assume, simply cease to have ever existed.
(Or maybe I've watched "Doctor Who - Invasion of the Dinosaurs" once too often?
I've never really rated Schumacher's ability to 'develop' a car; although he reportedly had a great 'feel' for a car, and understood much of the technology enough to give the engineers good feedback.
The current testing limitations are both understandable and intensely frustrating.
For the reasons Nick describes minor parties get squeezed in FPTP systems and there was undoubtedly a coalescence around the SNP as a credible opposition to a dominant and complacent Labour party. The fact that a significant number of SNP supporters are against independence would be evidence of some tactical voting in their favour because of this but I would find it difficult to assess the extent of it.
It seems to me that FPTP as a voting system will inevitably push a two party structure. It is possible for those parties to be different in different parts of the country but eventually people will think they have a binary choice they can comprehend. The SDP/Liberal Alliance never quite made that breakthrough and suffered. Unless and until UKIP do the liklihood of tactical voting on a large scale seems slight to me. Maybe Scotland is further down that path.
1. Anti-Tories who traditionally voted LibDem in seats where Labour are nowhere - what will they now do that a LibDem vote is a Tory vote? There is a log of anger out there so I can't see apathy capturing too many. So it's good news for independents and therefore the incumbent Tory.
Unless of course Farrage continues his canny appeal across the spectrum. As long as he maintains his principled opposition to Cameron I can see UKIP sucking up a lot of support in Tory/LibDem marginals. Yes their politics isn't an obvious fit for those voters but as a protest vote against the Tories it could be extremely powerful.
2. Government supporters trying to keep Labour out. I'm sure a bit if the Tory-UKIP switching vote is soft but like several posters on here I believe much of the switch is permanent at least with Cameron as Tory leader. Bit what about the other way, Tories going UKIP in Labour seats to try and block out the Labour candidate?
I remain convinced that UKIP are the elephant in the room that PB Tories and most pollsters don't want to address. We shall see.
There is a website www.tactical-voter.org.uk/ but it seems to be defunct. I used it when a LibDem voter living in a Lab/Con marginal, and as a LibDem supporter (if not by then a member) I've certainly voted Labour to "keep the Tory out". It wasn't much of an issue really because the Tory was nearly as daft as they come, and although to my delight he lost, he subsequently regained the seat, then defected to UKIP
FPT I agree with Nick (where have I heard that before) re the Khmer Rouge. It did seem, IIRC correctly that, as I posted on the previous thread, they were viewed "officially" as both a stabilising factor in an extremely unstable area, and also as some sort of bulwark against the Chinese. British troops were actually involved in training some of theirs at one point. Occasional Cambodians still grumble about it. It was only after a couple of years that, as NP says, it was generally realised that they were murderous nutters.
[Strange but true: I received a write-in vote for a Californian governor election. In the end I was defeated by Arnold Schwarznegger].
In 2010 I cast an anti-tactical vote. I live in a Lib Dem/Labour marginal (well, it won't be in 2015, but it was in 2010). Rather than vote for either, I voted for the Greens. A wasted vote? Only if you think that the only objective in voting is to get your preferred candidate elected.
Josias I agree we need to give every child the best education possible, why would the return of grammar schools prevent that? I live in Bucks where we still have grammars and believe me the kids who do not pass the eleven plus still get a very good education, I know from experience as my eldest granddaughter did not pass but still did much better than we expected her to.
I strongly dislike the Tory traditional right's view of society and I regard the EU as in general a good thing that we should remain a constructive part of. These are dealbreakers for me.
I liked David Cameron - I still do, as it happens: he's lazy, which is generally a good thing in a politician since it stops them doing too much. But the unjustified sense of entitlement and superiority that all politicians radiate comes across particularly badly in many Conservatives, and I don't see why my vote should encourage them.
At the next election, if I were choosing on the leaders I'd choose Ed Miliband because he learns from his mistakes. But like you I worry about the unreconstructed left of Labour and it has repeatedly shown that it does not wish to make the tough choices that need to be made.
Nick Clegg is by far the weakest of the three party leaders (full disclosure, I've never liked his public persona, which has the air of a bishop who has recently retired following a slightly murky scandal, and the rest of the public has caught up with me on this). But I think the Lib Dems have done a good job in Government, by and large, and at present I expect I'll vote for them in 2015.
There's also evidence that these switchers are more motivated to vote and have more positive views of the TwoEds than LAB voters generally.
I'm writing a post on this which I had hoped to finish this morning.
The Liberal Democrats claimed yesterday to be the first governing party in recent history to have increased its membership while in power.
Figures released by the party showed that in the last three months of the year membership grew by more than 2,000 – wiping out reductions seen in the first two quarters of 2013. Overall the party will go into 2014 with over 200 new members – which is an achievement not matched by their Conservative coalition partners who have seen steep falls in paid membership since 2010.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/support-for-liberal-democrats-increased-this-year-9029518.html
The only "political" activity I've come across recently was an invitation to join the Con Club, as "the beer is cheaper there". The next sentence was "Have you ever heard anyone discuss politics there Fred?" To which Fred shook his head!
The Tories have been campaigning hard in my ward recently - I was recently canvassed by a rather handsome and polite young man, so gave him more of my time than I might otherwise have been inclined to.
I do not want Labour back in; I don't think they deserve to be in power again so soon and while I have a grudging respect for Ed Milliband I think that we will only have a left of centre/social democratic party worth voting for once the cohorts of Blair and Brown have shuffled off the stage.
So I will be watching keenly to see who is most likely to beat Labour here, though given the way the polls are at present it may well be that Labour take the seat handsomely.
Come to think of it, was the education system ever perfectly sound? There are certainly anecdotal reports of low literacy levels amongst conscripts to the armed forces in the 1940s and 50s.
In any case, what exactly is Gove doing to remedy the situation? He seems to have presided over a shortage of school places but let's leave that to one side. Free schools seem more a sign of despair than a solution -- HMG has no idea how to improve schools but if we let the world and his wife have a go, maybe something will turn up. Because surely if Gove did know what was the Free School secret sauce, he'd immediately roll it out across the country, would he not?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25548140
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/25547624
Read Derek Jameson's life story, re his time in National Service.
But as you say, we are nearly back to 2-party politics in most parts of the country: Labour vs SNP.
Er...no. People naturally look back to the carefree days of their youth and imagine that everything must have been better but this is merely whimsical nostalgia. The education system might not be perfect but it is far better now than it has been at any time in the past. I have no doubt that my kids received a much higher standard of education in the state system in the 1990s-2000s than the one I received in the 1960s and 1970s.
Fair to say that my vote in East Ham will be irrelevant - Stephen Timms got 70% in 2010 and it's hard to see him doing any worse to be onest.
The 2014 London local elections will be hugely significant as a pointer for how the key battleground is looking. Labour had a very good year in 2010 but will need to do better to be on course to pick up seats in 2015. There are any number of key Boroughs - Sutton, Kingston and Richmond for obvious reasons likewise Barnet, Enfield, Harrow, Merton and Croydon to name just a few.
On a complete tangent, isn't it now time to scrap all public holidays and allow people to work as an dwhen they want (with safeguards for those who don't wish to and without compromising anyone's paid holiday entitlement). I was listening on LBC to a discussion regarding running Tubes on Christmas Day which happened until the 1970s - strong support for a restoration of that service.
Current weightings are 1/2th Conservative, 1/3rd Lib Dem, 1/6th UKIP.
I'll be hoping for a narrow Labour victory on the night.
My seat (Engel) is nailed on Labour.
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/12/how-lib-dems-tried-hide-fall-their-membership
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2530753/MARTIN-SAMUEL-What-Nicolas-Anelka-did-twice-bad-Luis-Suarez-John-Terry-episodes.html
But I will vote first and foremost for the person locally I think will be the best representative for my constituency. Of course party affiliation will play a big part of that so it is most likely my vote will go to the UKIP candidate but that is by no means certain. Were I in Birkenhead it is 99% certain I would vote for Frank Field. Were I in Haltemprice then it is 99% certain my vote would go to David Davis.
But this idea that as UKIP supporters we should vote Tory to keep out Labour is laughable. On the issues that matter to me personally there is not that much difference between the two and when it comes to the 'vision' of each party I am afraid they both leave me cold. Two organisations whose sole aim is to get elected and stay elected and who will promise anything to achieve that in the certain knowledge they will be able to ditch all their promises once they are in power.
Both parties (and of course the Lib Dems in spades) are utterly bereft of principles and undeserving of support under their current leaderships.
I cannot see the Tories win a majority in an election, until they become a one nation party again.
'The Cambodian training became an exclusively British operation after the “Irangate” arms-for-hostages scandal broke in Washington in 1986. “If Congress had found out that Americans were mixed up in clandestine training in Indo-China, let alone with Pol Pot,” a Ministry of Defence source told O’Dwyer-Russell, “the balloon would have gone right up. It was one of those classic Thatcher-Reagan arrangements.” Moreover, Margaret Thatcher had let slip, to the consternation of the Foreign Office, that “the more reasonable ones in the Khmer Rouge will have to play some part in a future government”.'
http://tinyurl.com/cjma4cw
Why would Labour voters be likely to switch to the Lib Dems now in Con/LD marginals when:
- They backed Labour when that party was much more unpopular than it is now?
- The Lib Dems, by contrast, are far less popular nationally?
- The Lib Dems have deeply undermined their 'vote Yellow to stop Blue' by going into coalition with Blue.
- Most Con/LD marginals in 2015 were also that in 2010, so tactical considerations are the same now as they were then?
The arguments for tactical voting are all very well but the question is not whether tactical voting will take place or not, but whether more or less will do so than last time.
Imagine a lefty voting LD to keep outa Tory in a marginal, failing, and Conservatives edging the national vote share.. Leading to the current coalition continuing... Not so clever now
The world has moved on and David Cameron will reinforce the Lib Dem appeal to LAB voters by telling us all of what is in his black book - the policies that the yellows have stopped the blues from doing while in government.
http://survation.com/2013/12/alan-bown-polls-4-new-constituencies/
Since I made that earlier post, I've been triyng to square the circle between the poll results and the logic. I do wonder whether these mythical new tactical voters exist at all. We know from the guest article the other week that it seems that significant numbers of people are now misremembering how they voted in 2010 (this is not new - in fact it's a common feature of governments that lose popularity). Could it be that although they say they voted Labour in 2010, in fact they actually backed the Lib Dems, have now written that out of their mind but could be persuaded to back them again if they thought that there wouldn't be another Blue-Yellow coalition.
The Ashcroft mariginals polling asks a two stage question. The standard one and then a "your own constituency" one. My figures are based on the proportion of the former who said LAB who then switch to LD for the 2nd question.
Their move is the reason why the LDs appeared to be doing well in the key LD-CON battles.
Even though I am thatcherite tory I find it pretty repugnant that any 11-year old should be given a test and branded with a 'secondary modern' stamp on the basis of the results.
Have streaming by all means, in fact why not make it compulsory. But send everybody to the same school. I reckon you learn a great deal about the problems of the low paid or non-working classes by being educated in the same school as them.
This tactic will work towards putting a government in power which will wreck the UK from end to end and complete the brilliant work of Gordon Brown. The US will have to find another aircraft carrier near Europe and the imbecile British people will get their just deserts for being politically retarded.
Interestingly the same Sutton Trust study which identified the low number of Free School Meal children at Grammar schools also found that those areas with Grammar schools see no drop in results for the comprehensives in their areas compared to areas without Grammar schools.
In short the presence of Grammar schools has no adverse effect on the eventual results of those children not passing the 11 plus and since those who do pass end up with a slightly better result at GCSE and A Levels the overall effect for an area is to slightly improve results.
Of course opponents like Chris Cook are only interested in highlighting the lack of FSM children at Grammars whilst ignoring the fact that there is no adverse effect on non-Grammar children.
Are you advocating the return of corporal punishment? I remember seeing many a jack the lad getting smacked around by the larger teachers at school in the 70s.
Doesn't that suggest to you that a sizeable chunk of UKIP's support will never be satisfied with any measures on immigration or immigrants, no matter how restrictive?
As some PBers may know, I have in the past been acquainted with a few people who are fans of the DPRK and of the Juche/Songun system, but I have never heard any of them express a single word of support for the tyranny of the Pol Pot régime.
Having done a fair bit of work in schools over the years I am stunned to see kids playing on their mobiles, openly chatting with each other and sitting with their backs to the teachers whilst lessons are being 'taught'. Swearing at the teachers and talking over them/answering back is now endemic.
I have seen this in more than a dozen schools I have visited in the East Midlands over the last 5 years. There have been one or two honourable exceptions (notably a couple of Grammar schools and one very good Academy) but generally what I have seen is a complete lack of discipline and no effort or ability on the part of the teacher to do anything other than get through the lesson and get the children out.
It's the same on both sides though, there are many pro EU immigration posters on here who paint UKIPs position on immigration as being much more severe than it is, as if having a visa system would mean zero immigration
If I were living in a safe Conservative or Labour seat, or in a seat that UKIP might win, like Thanet South or Eastleigh, I'd vote UKIP.
The British government has got this right - we should be giving generous aid to help the people on the ground. And we are.
But the result was (IIRC) Con 511, Lab 272, LD 267. So the tactical voting went the wrong way.
Since then I don't think I've done anything which would normally count as "tactical" voting, except perhaps in the Greater London Assembly election in 2000, where I decided not to vote for Peter Tatchell (who was then standing as an independent in the list section, and who might have been a good GLA member) on the grounds that he did not have a realistic chance of reaching the 5% threshold.