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As far as punters are concerned the Tories are set to lose their majority at the next election – pol
As far as punters are concerned the Tories are set to lose their majority at the next election – politicalbetting.com
The Bedata.io chart above shows what’s been happening on the Betfair next general election overall majority betting market. As can be seen a CON majority, now a 34% chance, has risen to its highest level in a year while a LAB majority has dropped to 22%. My guess is that the recent moves are in response to the positive polling news for the Tories.
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Equally, it should be pointed out that this is a government like no other. Not only was it in a coalition for five years - only the second full coalition in peacetime in the age of universal suffrage (the national government of 1929-32 being the other example) - but Johnson hit the reset button in dramatic fashion in 2019. That was the first time since 1865 a government that had gone backwards at the last election increased its majority, and the first time ever that a government increased its majority after more than eight years in office. Plus we shouldn’t forget that boundary reforms will cost Labour several more seats before we even start.
So the odds look reasonable to me, but the value might be in betting on a Tory majority - even if a slim one.
Mr Justice Swift ordered that the guidance should be rewritten to remove the words “such as” and “or passport”, to make clear that respondents should only use the sex recorded on their birth or gender recognition certificate. A little more than an hour after the judge’s ruling the text had been changed.
The campaign group Fair Play For Women, which crowdfunded £100,000 to bring the legal challenge, had argued that the ONS wording allowed “self-identification through the back door”.
This is interesting. You'd have thought the ONS would have wanted the sex question to be as unambiguous as possible, but I suspect they were worried about a challenge from other groups.
Of course, whether or not people fill it in honestly is another matter.
Edit - I would guess most transgender people will just fill it in with whatever gender they identify as now anyway, on the basis that nobody will actually check.
On the sexuality question, the reason it was omitted in 2011 was because the pilot found response rates fell when it was included. But they've decided to include it this time:
26. Which of the following best describes your sexual orientation?
Straight/Heterosexual
Gay or Lesbian
Bisexual
Other sexual orientation (free text field)
That free text field should make for interesting reading for the analysts at the ONS!
Edit - although yes, sorry, it began in 1931 not 1929. Too early, before my morning cuppa! 1929-31 was c+s from Lib to Lab, not a coalition.
FPT 29:50 sounds comprehensive but then stranger changes have happened.
Take these YouGov polls:
19/08/13 Yes 29% No 59%
22/10/12 Yes 29% No 55%
The subject of those YouGov polls? Scottish independence. As it stands the Daily Mail poll on the Royalty gives less support than Scotland's place in the UK had in 2012 and 2013.
Anything can happen between now and polling day.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-56340831
NOTE - this is not meant seriously.
I know he doesn't satisfy either the TOWIE- watching, or the PB if only every journalist was as good as I would be contingent but I thought he was excellent at his job.
The problem is the time it will take.
I suppose if the Tories lost their majority total blandness might be a help to Labour in negotiating a coalition agreement. After all, there will be little to disagree with. But it would also leave them with fewer seats and therefore probably in a weaker position to negotiate at all.
It’s lazy and unbecoming of someone aspiring to run a major country.
And in The Times apparently it's suggested that Priti Patel should be moved/sacked and replaced with Gove. Which might be an interesting idea.
It’s a strategy that’s certainly worked from a social climbing perspective so far but where does it ultimately lead once you’ve done it to the Queen of England?
Oops.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2004/may/14/pressandpublishing.iraqandthemedia
Beyond Johann Hari levels of self-serving shit. He's a bad 'un.
Phonehacking.
Fake photos against soldiers.
Now ridiculing mental health.
Hope he doesn't end up on GB News.
I hadn't twigged that M started as a suitcase model on Deal or No Deal, amongst other things.
But then Grace Kelly started with TV parts.
Whether it makes any practical difference is another question. This strikes me as one of those "point of principle" cases designed to enrich the legal profession. I suppose the government will now be able to count the number of people whose gender is different from their birth sex and... do what exactly? Erect more lampposts? Open more libraries? Fwiw when I completed the census before this judgment, the import of this guidance passed me by.
That's rather creepy. Even if it was a date, perhaps it went badly and she thought he was insufferable.
If someone says they're feeling or felt suicidal and you don't have a nice word to say about it, perhaps don't say anything at all. Plenty of people have criticised her without crossing the line on that.
https://twitter.com/foxinsoxuk/status/1369552893041389571?s=19
And in the Times, a similar but less caustic piece:
https://twitter.com/foxinsoxuk/status/1369545972653699073?s=19
Both articles are worth the read. The Royal Family has years of form at turning spouses into the villain of the soap opera.
Camilla is the interesting exception, who was considered unsuitable in Charles bachelor days, leading to the three in a marriage problem. She doesn't get great press, but not the vilification that the others got. Being a horsey posh helps, I suppose.
eg Watching an interview the other day the interviewee said 'sometimes I call myself lesbian, sometimes bi."
There have always been people around who have changed their sexual orientation several times in a life, though very few that I have seen explicitly talking about it.
Then to demand that gender is a fundamental identity about which everybody else and the physical environment must realign becomes very hard to justify imo.
Correct me if you think I am wrong here. I think I have detected a change in argumentation over perhaps 15 years, certainly since say the late 1990s.
And the comparison with Princess Diana doesn't help them in this respect - because one of the whole issues there was marital breakdown and the explicit presumed absence of loving support from her husband.
Many of the claims about the difficulties they were under effectively seem to stem from press intrusion and treatment - the criticism of the Royal Family themselves seems (the headline grabbing racial accusation notwithstanding) largely to be of a secondary nature - that they didn't do enough to provide support and protection from the press. But it's very difficult to know exactly what they thought should be done about it - it's easy to criticise for failings, without having solutions. For obvious reasons the Royal Family's relationship with the press is extremely delicate - they simply cannot be at permanent war with them, nor can they insist that they be brought to heel. Royal interventions with the press are infrequent and generally very carefully targeted, and by nature they cannot make an issue of everything they don't like and have to put up with.
Fundamentally that is where life in the UK and the US differ. Many/most(?) people in this country have a sort of contradictory view of the press. They think it is too intrusive, has far too much power, abuses that power frequently, and is often a malign force in the body politic and public life. But what people desperately want is self regulation - they want the press to realise that themselves and control themselves as a result - they are extremely wary of any attempt to take legal measures to restrict their activity. Because of where that can ultimately lead.
Some people are heterosexual, attracted to the opposite sex and only the opposite sex. They can't help who they're attracted to, but neither are they expected to do so either.
Some people are homosexual, attracted to the same sex and only the same sex. They can't help who they're attracted to, but were in the past.
Some people are bisexual, attracted to both men and women. They can't help this either, but in the past may have been able to find someone of the opposite sex they were attracted to but nowadays may not find that's the one they fall in love with, since they're no longer restricted by societies expectations.
So he took one for Team Royal - and moved the new cycle from Meghan and Harry to Piers Morgan.
The further bit of my comment got lost.
I'm trying to explore the relations between the concepts of gender / sex, and where sexual orientation fits in in current thinking.
At present Will and Kate serve as the useful foil in the soap opera, that the others can contrast. Even then there are rumours such as the fall out with Rose Hanbury.
It is none of the state's business.
Like you I will not provide this information - it has nothing to do with my ability to perform the job.
Rose Hanbury? Never heard of her until now. Perhaps the press covered it up, but blimey, that would be a huge story to pass up if you thought it was true.
I'd also point out that everyone knows that the economic picture is going to be tricky for a good while. Whilst most people are fairly happy with what the government is doing it's clear that issues such as the recent NHS pay offer will be troublesome in the future for the government. Once more normal politics resumes there will be lots of these. Overall the Tories have won the argument that we should be careful where possible on spending, but that balance is a delicate one.
I think there's also some effect in that political bettors probably on balance want a Tory government and thus are slightly inclined towards not doubling up on their interests.
I backed the Tories and layed Labour a few weeks ago in modest size, I've broadly flattened out now as I think the pricing is now about right given ydoethurs comments and my thoughts.
It doesn't mean dismissing sexuality as a teenage phase, or even a right of passage. The idea of a spectrum of orientation is not quite the same as shifting along that spectrum, at different times of life.
So if sexual orientation is innate / unchangeable, why do people change their sexual orientation - either as I pointed out ('sometimes I say this, sometimes that'), or 2 or 3 times in a lifetime?
I think there's also an aspect of different use of language between say Gen X/Y and Millenials. And also an element of fashion. How big that is, I am not in a position to judge easily.
I am far too timid to bet on anything this fat out :-) .
On the other hand, I know straight people who had homosexual experiences as youths , but became firmly heterosexual later. Were they also living a lie, or are they doing so now? No one can know, other than the individual.
I do think that identity is a flexible thing, and how we see ourselves, and how we interact with the world changes over time. I don't see why sexuality should be more rigid than any other durable aspect of self.
*thud*
The Tory genius for reinvention is at its height, while Labour still seem stuck in a conflict between socialists and social democrats; not seeming to notice that the Tories have stolen the social democrat/centrist left clothes and run.
"So together with Transport Secretary Grant Shapps, I have asked Sir Peter Hendy to address the problem of Union connectivity. He has just produced his interim report, before final conclusions in the summer."
"why are we stopping HS2 in England?"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/10/strengthening-sinews-transport-network-will-make-road-recovery/
One is "My Truth", as use by Oprah. To me that means "My Opinion".
Another was on R4 earlier - the idea that a personal account of a personal experience is beyond question, and must be accepted as revealed truth. To me - that's just a no; of course it must be tested, especially when not self-consistent.
They will in 12-18 months time because by then we'll know (a) how Scotland is likely to play out (b) how the Covid recovery is turning out (c) Starmer will be set in stone and (d) we'll know Johnson's new cabinet and how it's managing the recovery.
I'm assuming the election will be by May 2024, and it's the spring-summer of 2022 that'll firm up the horizon for it.
That's when I'll start to place bets.
And it would render "The issues raised, particularly that of race, are concerning..." entirely disingenuous.
(Probably.)
I wouldn't argue with that.
The facts that the Tories can lose 39 seats and still have a majority; that the boundary changes may well give them an even larger lead than that, the Labour seem to have an uninspiring leader and a dearth of alternative talent and that the Tories have several options to Boris all tend to suggest to me that they should be favourites for a majority.
The Westminster system really only produces hung Parliaments when there is a significant third party element. Whilst we have the SNP the Lib Dems seem to be making no impact at all and are probably more at risk of being supplanted by the Greens than making a breakthrough at this point.
22% support for a Labour majority is perhaps the most bewildering of all.