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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Tim Farron – The Lib Dem leader at the General Election?
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Tim Farron – The Lib Dem leader at the General Election?
Since the Syria vote a lot of the attention and comment has been focussed upon the Leadership of Dave and Ed, trying to work who was and will be the winner and the loser from the Syria vote.
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No wonder they are in trouble!
On 'when', if the change is too early, Farron will either suffer as Clegg has from having to support the coalition / Tories; if it is too late, he won't have time to establish himself in the public's mind. (I'm not convinced that the Tories could run a prolonged period as a minority government at the end of a parliament and an early LD departure - e.g. May 2014 - could see them push for an immediate dissolution).
On 'how', Clegg's on opinion is critical: will he jump or will he have to be pushed? It would be ideal if he jumped, as it avoids all the disruption, bad blood and accusations of navel-gazing of forcing someone out - but if needs be, it'd still be better than Clegg staying. However, would Clegg see it like that? Again, if he jumps, it makes it far easier to manage the time-table.
As TSE also says, in a strange way, the LD's becoming more anti-Tory could actually help the Conservatives by splitting the vote against them (though this depends massively on how strong tactical voting is in individual constituencies), so it may be in Cameron's interests to assist in the process, by offering a way out. The position of EU Commissioner would in some ways be the logical one but there's no way Cameron's party would wear it. A different but equivalent international position might though, should one become available.
That said I could see him lasting the course. I really don't rate Farron.
But I cannot really see Clegg going before the next GE.
After the election, I can see Farron being a caretaker for a year or two whilst they rebuild their core, or longer if the number of potentials candidates is low. And I think he'd be good at it, at least from the party's perspective.
This is particularly the case if there is another hung parliament in 2015, except with the Lib Dems going in with Labour instead of the Conservatives. Farron would be much more acceptable to Labour, with none of Clegg's baggage.
Tough call, the only way for it likely to happen is for Clegg to stand aside willingly, prior to the next GE. - The Lib Dems may have become quite ruthless in getting rid of their leaders, but they were never in Government at the time and that makes a significant difference imho.
The next generation would do better to take over after polling day.
As an example of that I strongly suspect that if Clegg was forced out some of the orange bookers would walk, either sitting as independents or joining the tories. I really cannot see the likes of Danny Alexander or David Laws wanting to follow Tim Farron.
Those that were most opposed to the path that Clegg has taken have left. I suspect his support in the rump that remains is a lot stronger than it was in the 2010 party. Either way the fault lines are deep.
Latest YouGov / The Sun results 10th September - Con 33%, Lab 39%, LD 9%, UKIP 11%; APP -28
Secondary question movements (and of course the VI change) all within MOE.
http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/c5tklw2izp/YG-Archive-Pol-Sun-results-100913.pdf
On topic, Clegg does give me a certain detached impression, as though he'd already made up his mind that he'll be off before too long and isn't that bothered whether we love him or hate him. But I'd think Farron would rather Clegg stuck it out to the GE and took the hit - if Farron takes over a few months before and then they lose 20 seats, it'll be hard for him (or the party) to recover, whereas if he takes over after they've lost 20 seats he can be the white knight who rides them back into the uplands.
You don't have to take the blindest bit of notice of my suggestion, but it's that maybe, just maybe, you could post a little less frequently and with more forethought?
that would be the hit of going back in to government something neither Labour nor the Conservatives can look forward to with the same confidence atm.
I've always found him a grumpy little moaner - like Farage without the jokes or charisma - he's perfect for opposition I guess if you are a tree hugging, luddite, euroholic leftie Meldrew type...
Well perhaps it's just me, but the last one is a case in point. 'Drop in concern ...' Are we talking about the need to drop those things in? That they were dropped in? That they will be dropped in? That, what, this accounts for some unspecified change in the daily opinion poll which hasn't been set out? As I say, I'm sure to the cognoscenti it's obvious, but it sure as heck isn't to me.
Not a Farron fan, to be honest.
In more important news, it's been announced (by the BBC) that Raikkonen's deal with Ferrari is for just 2014, with an option for 2015.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/24042352
That seems... even weirder than a longer contract. If it's temporary, why not go for Hulkenberg, Di Resta, etc straight away?
If Hulkenberg does, as expected, go to Lotus in 2014 and then (possibly) to Ferrari in 2015 that would mean every year he's been a driver he'll have been one for a different team (Williams, Force India, Sauber and then theoretically Lotus and Ferrari).
What is the loose definition of a bestselling author? Perhaps someone who is assured of shelf space at WHS or the equivalent, whatever that is, with Amazon?
"'Drop in concern ...'"
It'll be understood by everyone on here. It's just a shorthand which everyone interested in polling and politics uses. You should try the media if drop (as in lower than yesterday) concern (as in concern) leaves you stumped
Sunday Times top ten bestseller which I believe is one of the generally accepted benchmarks (top ten Amazon too).
You are making a prat of yourself. I suggest you stop but it is a free country.
If Cable (boo hiss) is attacking the economic situation he might want to consider who the Business Secretary is.
"It is Dave Prentis, the chief of Unison, who should be causing the Labour leader to lose his sleep. His blunt refusal to co-operate with any Labour recruitment drive — or even share any data about the union’s members — delivered a shuddering blow to the reform plans yesterday, and to Mr Miliband’s credibility. “You’ve got to remember that Unison doesn’t have the same history as a Labour affiliate as the other two. There just isn’t the same connection,” explained one Labour MP. Another was more bald: “Prentis is callously indifferent to Labour. He intends to sit on his hands.”
Britain’s second biggest union represents 1.3 million, mostly in the public sector. It is his membership that has been most affected by the Government’s austerity measures, and he is most infuriated by Labour’s attempts to win back economic credibility at their expense.
Mr Prentis was uncompromising about the views of his members on Ed Balls’s commitment to stick to the coalition spending plans for the first year of a Labour government yesterday.
“They will not vote for a party that says we want one more year of the Tory pay freeze. They will not vote for a party that says we want the same austerity restrictions for a year, that the coalition have implemented over the previous five years.” The Unison general secretary felt traduced by Mr Miliband’s use of the Falkirk allegations to launch his funding reforms and told him so in a tetchy phone call on the eve of the announcement. The bitter irony, as far as Mr Prentis is concerned, is that his union already does close to what the Labour leader wants in explicitly asking members if they want to give to the party..." http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/article3865851.ece
1) Sad news about URW, I've not forgotten the betting advice he told me here.
2) The suggestion yesturday about Yvette Cooper replacing Ed Balls merely shows how inbred and inward looking Labour has become. An upper middle class Oxford PPE to replace another upper middle class Oxford PPE who is her husband under the leadership of another upper middle class Oxford PPE who's main rival for his job is yet another upper middle class Oxford PPE who happens to be his brother.
Is it any wonder that this bunch can't think of any original ideas about Britain's future? Have any of them ever done a proper day's work, or learnt something more useful than the equivalent of media studies for the posh and privileged or got any experience of life outside their own gilded circle?
3) According to UKPR Sarah Teather's Brent Central constituency the 'White British' demographic is only the fourth largest, behind 'Black', 'Asian' and 'White Other'. Which might explain her support of open door immigration and her opposition to gay marriage.
Even in the midst of a wider LD meltdown, he should be able to hold his own safe(ish) seat, so whether the LDs end up with 20 or 40 seats would matter little to him. 20 might make it easier for him, removing other possible challengers, and making the party in general more likely to back someone who offered a change of political direction from the Orange Bookers.
It's possibly a mistake to think this is about the drivers. It isn't. It's about the team dynamics and leadership. Think of the way Ferrari 'retired' Schumacher at Monza in 2006. As later events proved, Schumacher was not ready to retire. But Montezemelo had his way, and Brawn and Todt soon followed Schumacher out of the team, along with several other key members.
Since then, Ferrari have been nowhere near as dominant.
Bringing Raikkonen in is a massive slap-down for those in the team who have sided with Alonso. It's funny to think that some people in Ferrari are using Raikkonen once again to get their way. Alonso must be checking his bed each night to see if there's a horse's head in it.
Ferrari do best when a) they don't try to be an Italian-only team; and b) they work as one team.
Fortunately for those of us who don't particularly like them, they rarely meet both conditions. When they do, they can be unbeatable.
I'd suggest we try to limit abbreviations where we can, and new readers just ask if something's genuinely unclear to them - ideally, cough, without having a go at the author of the post they're asking about. We're generally pretty nice to new posters.
What I suspect he won't address, and really should, is what his department can do about it in the form of deregulation, reducing the administrative burden, ensure that tertiary education is more focussed on what industry actually needs etc. etc. His department is not pulling it's weight in dealing with the underlying problems that undoubtedly remain.
"A more self-delusional and morally contemptible article would be hard to imagine. Many people have swapped speeding points, he wrote, as if this made any difference to his breaking the law. Moreover, he claimed that a newspaper investigation into his affair with another woman “sparked the end of my marriage”. It seems not to have occurred to him that his adultery was responsible for that."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/telegraph-view/10296402/Beyond-contempt.html
The situation arises because the economy is starting to surge, and will continue to do so through to the 2015 GE. That's an unstoppable force.
But the fact remains that hostility to gay marriage, and homosexuality in general, is much higher among Muslims, African Christians and Eastern European Catholics than among the White British demographic.
"...He ran in circles, shouting for help, but was in an industrial part of town and could see no open homes or cars. He ran to the front of Gypsy’s Bakery & Restaurant and tried to kick the door in. By now “the bear was basically right on top of me,” he said. It weighed 180kg (over 28st) and stood 1.5metres (nearly 5ft) tall. It had already bitten his hip, now it pinned him to the door and swiped at him with a paw.
“The bear’s nose was inches away from me,” he told the Canadian Press. “I was just, ‘What else can I do to get away? I didn’t want to be a stat’.” That was when he pulled out his phone. The glowing screen startled the bear. Perhaps it had never seen that model. It took a step backwards and knocked over a flower pot. As it turned to the broken pot, Mr Kolsun fled.
A few blocks away he saw a house with lights on and people sitting outside. The bear had given up the chase. It was caught later and imprisoned in Churchill’s polar bear jail: an old aircraft hangar containing 28 cells where delinquents are kept in 6ft cells and fed only melted snow to make their stay unpleasant and discourage them from venturing into town again. Mr Kolsun was bandaged, given a tetanus shot, and is back at work. Judy Natchuk, the manager of Gypsy’s Restaurant, said: “He’s very lucky to be alive.” http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/americas/article3865660.ece
The dynamics of that will be that Vince will want to attack the tories but also defend their own record within the coalition against Labour. It is going to be challenging. The obvious path is that we were responsible but moderated the tory passion for cuts.
I have little doubt that will be the line but it makes going forward more problematic. Are Labour, in the view of the Lib Dems, still irresponsible? In which case could they work with them? How will the Lib Dems propose that the balance of the deficit (probably at least £50bn a year) be dealt with? Will they accept the need for further cuts after the election? In which case in what way are they different from the tories?
Problems, problems. The solution offered by TSE of having someone who was not a part of the government in charge seems to me at best a partial fix and at worst a recipie for incoherence.
Vince Cable is a left-of-centre Lib Dem. He is also the most popular Lib Dem, probably the most popular front bench politician. Hard to stomach for those of us not entirely won over by his greatness, but true nonetheless, and therefore a very important cog in the holding together of the government machine.
Also, Mr Cable has every right to give his own thoughts on the economy. He is Business Secretary in a coalition and he is a Lib Dem, not a Tory. It would be more newsworthy if he were to agree with everything George Osborne is doing and come out and say so.
To be fair to Cable and other Lib Dems of a leftist persuasion, I think they have been just as grown-up and collegiate as the righter-wing Tories on the front bench; willing to accept a coalition and willing to bite their lip on policy compromises they don't fully agree with in view of forming a solid government. A greater good, which is what I think we have.
Like I said, on Mr Cable, I'm not won over. But I'm willing to cut some slack. It can't be easy for an ex Labour man to govern alongside Conservatives, but he's been very mature about it.
I like this push and pull style of government. It is infinitely better for us as a country for tensions to exist, compared with the Brown years, where many thoughtful politicians were scared to challenge Brown.
"There's a good argument for shortening Ricardohos to dick it would appear"
How to make friends and influence people, tim?
Richardohos,
Abbreviations and "sloppy" grammar can be a little annoying, and tim, for example, has a blind spot about "its" and apostrophes, but I suspect I'm the only one who notices (being a grammar pedant).
tim is witty and interesting but he is consistently repetitive and often insulting. Still worth reading though. And I sometimes make grammatical errors (usually when I'm criticising someone else).
The applause was, as the press delighted in retelling, “muted”. It came at all the right points in Miliband’s speech, but without much enthusiasm. That’s rather telling when you consider what Miliband was pushing yesterday – an end to exploitative zero hours contracts, a living wage, apprenticeships and house building. As one senior trade unionist said to be last night, “We’ve waited years for a Labour leader to say all that on policy, and everyone is annoyed with him about something else.” http://labourlist.org/2013/09/miliband-avoided-jeers-and-heckles-at-the-tuc-but-behind-the-scenes-tempers-are-fraying/
:i-blame-neil:
Ozzie - It looks like the worst is over but caution still required.
St Vince - Caution still required but it looks like the worst is over.
Hhhmmm ....
Not sure quite how to take this article. I'm not sure Nick "was dealt a damaging blow" exactly by the Syria vote. He would have expected a sizeable minority of the Party not to support a call for military intervention. The revolt on the Conservative side was much less expected.
It also seems that one or two people not well disposed toward the LDs are already putting the boot in to someone who isn't even Party leader yet. Mr Flashman calls him a "grumpy little moaner" - I look forward to TGOHF having a kind word to say about any LD but that might be a long wait.
Farron will almost certainly be the next leader unless the Party keeps 50+ seats and the Coalition continues which is certainly not impossible but is unlikely.
On the substantive, the key point is that as with John Major and Gordon Brown, it will be Nick Clegg's role to personalise the negativity toward the party. He will, in the vernacular, "take one for the team" and people can vote against Nick Clegg and get it out of their systems.
The new leader will then be able to regroup rebuild and redefine the party (I strongly suspect in Opposition) post 2015. I do think we'll hear the return of our old friend "equidistance" and a recognition that the experience of Government has been valuable but that too much was compromised for the purpose of that Government.
"Think military disasters. Neither Napoleon’s invasion of Russia nor General Custer’s Battle of the Little Bighorn quite measured up to the rout predicted when Ed Miliband first took on the TUC.
If the trepidation had been confined to his enemies, then the Labour leader might have felt more secure as he drafted yesterday’s speech vowing to reform his party’s relationship with the unions. Instead, shadow cabinet members past and present looked on with fear. “I don’t know how we got into this mess or how he got ownership of it,” said one senior colleague. “He’s made a leap in the dark without knowing just how dark it’s going to be,” according to another.
No one, however optimistic, thought that the Battle of Bournemouth would prove to be Labour’s Agincourt-on-Sea. Where Henry V cried, on the eve of combat, “By Jove, I am not covetous for gold”, Mr Miliband, heading a party facing bankruptcy and already £1.9 million down as union funding begins to melt away, could ill afford such a cavalier approach.
Even those critics who characterise Mr Miliband as a mouse would not have expected him to set a trap for himself, bait it and hop right in. Yet that, many allies feared, was the course on which he had embarked. What few remembered, or had known about, was the dress rehearsal for yesterday’s performance..." http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ed-miliband/10299590/If-this-stand-off-over-funding-deepens-Labour-and-the-unions-both-face-disaster.html
Nuclear free zones: these were all the rage when I was a kid (Staffordshire was one, as I recall), and I wondered how such councils coped with the use of nuclear isotopes in medicine and industry. Were they banned as well?
Some medicine relies on nuclear isotopes. What will happen when/if the Chalk River and Petten reactors close down, and we can no longer get the isotopes?
You haven't really got the hang of this government stuff have you ? To govern is to choose and that means messy compromises and never getting all you want. I find your last sentence one of the most depressing phrases I've read on PB for quite some time. Are you seriously saying it's better to carp virgin-like from the sidelines rather than get 50+% of what your electors want ?
The LDs chances of being a majority government and implementing its full manifesto in the next 10 years are just above zero %, if you are typical of LD activist thinking, then just wind up the party, it serves no purpose.
"...If he wanted to win them back, he went about it in an unorthodox way, by opening with enthusiastic praise for a Conservative Prime Minister. Not the current one, or even Benjamin Disraeli (the Conservative Prime Minister he praised at party conference last year), but the 14th Earl of Derby, who led the country three times in the mid nineteenth century. The 14th Earl, he said, “first legislated to allow trade unions”, and his name was Edward Stanley – “or, as he would be called today… Red Ed!”
Once the trickle of mirth had subsided, Mr Miliband resumed. If the 14th Earl were alive today, he’d be appalled by David Cameron. David Cameron was a divisive politician, concerned only with the interests of the rich, and ignoring the young and the poor. It was meant to be a serious point, and sounded like one – until, that is, Mr Miliband started talking about the trade unionists’ members.
“David Cameron writes off your members!” cried Mr Miliband. “But your members are the backbone of Britain… Let me just say something about your members… The responsibility of the Labour party is to reach out to your members…” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10299909/Sketch-Ed-Miliband-survives-the-tuts-at-the-TUC.html
"Alonso has since made it clear that his problems at the time were not with Hamilton but with the team not delivering on promises that had been made to him about his status. "
Hmm. This sounds rather similar to how Ferrari will be next year.
Your chances of posting anything meaningful in the next ten years are just above zero. If you're typical of those opposed to the Liberal Democrats , then you might as well pack up and leave serious commenting to the adults, you serve no useful purpose,
What kind of wave? Are you saying the Tories are producing electromagnetic emissions? Or making hand gestures? Or that they're all going to jump up and down in some water, producing rhythmic disturbances?
The latter would make sense, as it would allow the Lib Dems to "surf" said wave. But this poses practical problems, such as the size of the surfboard necessary.
And where would this aquatic adventure occur? And what does it have to do with politics and betting?
Your post makes no sense. Perhaps increase the quality of your output.
The likelihood will be the line of talking first to the party with most seats (or votes - the LDs get two bites at that cherry if they blur it enough). Then the LDs will talk to both sides (as they did last time) and then prostitute themselves to the highest bidder (which the maths didn't allow them to do last time).
Yeah yeah. I was making the point that my English isn't that bad and yet I can't follow a lot of Tim's posts for the syntax and non-sequiturs.
Nick P, if you're still around, thought I'd pick up an earlier remark of yours. I'm generally a Labour voter as it happens although last time LibDem. It's a long while since I voted Conservative. However, I find it extremely difficult to avoid the fact that on the economy Labour f'kd up big time and are no longer trustworthy. This is compounded by Ed Balls's position on spending out of trouble, rather than attempting deficit reduction as Osborne has. Now the economy has turned and is going rampant it's becoming clear to a growing number that the Conservatives have got this spot on, and you bet they're going to ensure the electorate know it. This article puts it very well: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/telegraph-view/10295057/The-recovery-is-just-the-start-of-Labours-woes.html
Whatever Mike says to the contrary the economy is the key, especially during austerity. There's only one way this is heading from here in my opinion: an outright Conservative win.
A circling the wagons kind of thing, around a leader they think has been harshly treated by the duplicitous, ruthless Tories and the media, who has done the best in tough circumstances, and crucially that after leading them to Government for the first time since the pleistocene, he deserves to fight another election.
Mr. Max, I wonder if Alonso would want to return to McLaren. Mind you, Perez wouldn't be the same challenge as Hamilton. On the other hand, a Vettel-Alonso swap could be interesting.
Hoped for, yes, naturally. Expected, I doubt.
If I'm right, then could lead to "it was nice while it lasted"!
MT @dwppressoffice: number of people in work has rocketed by 80k in only 3 mnths – a rise driven entirely by growth in full time jobs
Tory Treasury @ToryTreasury
Now 1.4 million additional private sector jobs over the last 3 years. 3 new private sector jobs for every job lost in the public sector
Stace @stackee
Unemployment rate fallen to 7.7%.
Laura Kuenssberg @ITVLauraK
Claimant count down 32,600 - lowest number since feb 2009
Tory Treasury @ToryTreasury
Employment up 80k to a new record high, unemployment down 24k, claimant count down 32,600. Turning a corner but still a long way to go
ONS @statisticsONS
Employment was 29.84m in May-July, up 80k on Feb-April bit.ly/18LD6yY
I'm not sure that "nice while it lasted" will be printed in their 2015 manifesto though!
He COULD have said "no deals" and waited for Labour and the LDs to fail to agree and then form a minority Government. The problem he had was that after 13 years in Opposition, his entire leadership was predicated on getting the Party back into power. Had he stood back and Labour and the LDs formed a minority administration, his own life expectancy as Conservative leader would have been very short.
By agreeing to talks with the LDs, he safeguarded his own position but it took two to tango and after a century of opposition, the prospect of serious power was too much for Nick Clegg to resist as well. Throw in the good personal chemistry between the two leaders and the Coalition was a lot more predictable than it may have seemed to some at the time.
The percentage of the work force that are paid at or close to the minimum wage will increase with the length of time the minimum wage is in force.
URW was a little eccentric and took offense when none was intended mainly on questions of Israel ( i believe he was Jewish) but had a great insight into politics and the bettign impications often identifying value bets that were no obvious . Used mathmatics a lot in his betting which I admire
This "recovery", such as it is, is looking increasingly top-heavy. The Tories better hope the electorate don't notice their own living standards, and are just thankful for the rosy looking tractor production stats.
It has the unintended effect of levelling down pay rates for thousands of jobs in the low skills area.
"It seems not to have occurred to him that his adultery was responsible for that...."
No best selling author wrote that. All a bit too sanctimonious for my taste
You're seriously arguing that thousands of people currently earning the minimum wage would see an increase in their pay if it was abolished?
Edit to add:
In addition thousands of people who were paid 20% or 30% more than the minimum wage have seen their pay migrate towards the minimum wage, giving them a lower relative income.
Andy_JS said:I've tried looking in the archives to see if I can find any of URW comments but unfortunately it doesn't seem to be possible to read comments in the archives anymore.
Worth pointing out that you can find old comments as follows:
- Go to the 'wayback machine' or one of the other archives of internet sites:
http://archive.org/web/web.php
- Type 'politicalbetting.com' into the input box near the top after 'http://', and press the 'Take Me Back' button next to it
- You should get a calendar showing the dates where they archived the site. Click on one shortly after the date you are interested in, et voilà:
http://web.archive.org/web/20100504100208/http://www4.politicalbetting.com/