politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The issue that looks set to decide GE2015 – the size of the
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The issue that looks set to decide GE2015 – the size of the UKIP vote
With the vast bulk of the 2010 LDs who switched to LAB in the first year of the coalition sticking with their new allegiance the big decider at GE2015 looks set to be how UKIP perform in the key battlegrounds.
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The sample size in the Ashcroft marginals phone poll was 12,809 not 20,000.
So 12,801 larger than the 8 person online focus group that the Times devoted two full pages to.
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/business-confidence-rises-highest-level-000120585.html
We have stopped using focus groups at work as you get a groupthink effect - one or two dominant players influence the others - We find empirical surveys are a much better guide.
Paul Waugh @paulwaugh 1m
Joke in Westminster is this is a minorities reshuffle: "ethnic Tory MPs, women Tory MPs, northern Tory MPs...and fans of George Osborne"
Laying the Lib Dems in the Euros however...
re: giving away the Royal Mail for free: yes, there is a philosophical argument for that. But if you are going down that route then you should give shares to everyone in equal proportion which means, in practice, people will end up with £50 each (£3bn / 60m). Impractical, and the risk is that as in the Czech Republic and elsewhere you will get unscruplous people who buy on the cheap from people who don't know better. So it is better to charge close to fair value in the end.
re: German energy: I've been spending a lot of time in Germany recently & had a bunch of conversations about renewables. Basically they are all bought into wind power (Germany can be very windy and has lots of remote space), are very sceptical about solar energy and depressed by Merkel's decision on nuclear but understand the politics.
It sucks for people in the zone you are in, and perhaps there is a better way it could have been structured.
But the fundamental point is that someone of £50K+ shouldn't be getting money from the taxes of poorer people
"You may be liable to this new tax charge if you, or your partner, have an individual income of more than £50,000 and one of you gets Child Benefit or contributions towards the upkeep of a child. "
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/childbenefitcharge/
Careless.
I think I'd prefer Lab maj to those highish UKIP scores, as a strong UKIP performance would probably be sufficient for that, and isn't necessarily necessary.
It also depends how UKIP decides to cock-up its General Election strategy this year. They could stand a chance in a few seats if they focused heavily on them, but I suspect they'll instead opt for 5% or so nationwide, preventing the party offering a referendum from gaining office and ensuring the more EU-phile parties get in.
But if you insisted on giving the voters shares directly and those small amounts were too expensive to administer, the way to do it would be to give them away in a lottery, so everybody had a 10% chance of getting £500 or a 1% chance of getting £5000.
Ukip will be another victim of the fptp system - the thought of Miliband as PM is just too scary.
However, this argument is most prone to breaking down when you have super-high marginal rates due to complexities in the system, which create regressive elements. In this situation, there's just about a valid argument that those in supertax thresholds (£50-60k, £100-118k and possibly some around the withdrawal of unemployment benefit thresholds) are giving tax to richer people, who in some cases have a lower effective tax rate than those within the supertax thresholds. Again, emphasising that this doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but is the most sensible way of analysing the concept you're raising, that means that by removing CB in this way, Osborne actually increases the degree to which someone on £50k+ is giving tax money to someone on £60k+.
Robert Peston @Peston 18m
That 0.9% Treasury fee implies government could generate revenues of just under £12bn a year from Help to Buy http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24427274 …
Childcare is far too expensive in this country, and that needs to be fixed. But the LibDems wouldn't allow changes.
Bus passes and WFA were Brownies. Silly and should be phased out, but given Labour's scaremongering in last election Cameron was forced into making a promise. And he is a man of his word.
TV licence - I am not a fan either. There is clearly a role for some public service TV funding, but not for the monolith that is the BBC, backed up by criminal action. If they want to behave like a commercial organisation, why should that be backed up by compulsary extraction of money
Now try addressing the fundamental point: why should someone like me be subsidied by people who earn a whole lot less than I do?
Selling on the market at the best price is what they are doing. Valuation is an art, not a science. A price range with a 10% spread is quite normal. An IPO discount is quite normal. Nothing they have done is particularly strange.
Selling a few nick nacks on ebay sounds like a good start.
And an overwhelming majority of the electorate rejected it - so why are you still talking about it? It didn't happen.
There are different flavours of Kipper, each at, say, 3-4%:
1. Young, thoughtful, they're-all-in-it-for-themselves-I-need-something-different ones (eg iSam of this parish) - could be from Lab, Cons, LD.
2. Older, essentially conservative, really want out of Europe, but get the vote-UKIP-get-Mili conundrum.
3. Older still, don't care anymore hate Cam, Europeans, world-gone-to-hell-in-a-handbasket, cut-nose-to-spite-face.
Being (very) generous to the kippers I would say that 50% of 1s might stay as Kippers; they'll have lots of time and many elections to play about with their political views. 90% of 2s will return to Cons as they get what is at stake re. europe, Labour, etc. And 90% of 3s will stay as Kippers as they don't give a stuff.
So by my rigorous Topping patented calculus, that works out at:
(3.5% x .5) + (3.5% x .1) + (3.5% x .9) = (1.5 x 3.5%) = 5.25%
And that's ignoring the fact that certain utilities may produce a public or social good if held in public ownership to ensure continued uniform national provision.
Alistair Campbell's Happy Depressive - available in paper back from booksellers, and online low tax paying multinationals.
The first UK-wide witness protection scheme is to be launched tomorrow to help secure convictions and care for vulnerable witnesses.
More than 3,000 individuals with a real and immediate risk to their lives will get expert protection under the UK Protected Persons Service, victims' minister Helen Grant said.
Let's hope that there are no other cabinet casualties which would dillute my winnings
On the other hand I wonder if Michael Moore is in fact standing down rather than being sacked so he can spend more time trying to hold on to his seat at #GE2015? I like Michael but would rather see a Tory MP sitting in his place.
Must be seriously rattled about something.
And thereby lies the achillies heel of the Tories: UKIP doesn't care if Labour wins. To Ukippers Labour and Tory are just the same old party. Confound the Lab/Lib/Con party. Vote UKIP for true change.
As long as 40% aren't "scared" it won't matter if the rest are terrified witless!
We've all met a liberal paradox. He's the guy at parties who bangs on loudly about equality and justice – but all his friends know him privately to be a rich chauvinist. He calls himself a feminist, but he treats women like fast food. He is impeccably anti-racist, but doesn't know a single person of colour. He is a socialist, but sends his children to private schools. He believes that he is good by dint of what he believes, and he is so sure of this that he doesn't even notice that he's actually a jerk. This is the great Left-wing hypocrisy: good on paper, awful in practice.
...The shallowness – the fundamental hypocrisy – of the Left-wing attack on the Daily Mail is twofold. First, consider the story of Mehdi Hasan. Hasan is a charming man, a good journalist and a fine writer – but his crusading style hides the fact that he's just as much a grubby reporter trying to pay the bills as the rest of us. On Question Time last week he got a cheap clap out of the audience by launching a tirade against the Mail, which he called "immigrant-bashing, woman-hating, Muslim-smearing, NHS-undermining, gay-baiting". Jolly stirring stuff, except that an understandably irritated Daily Mail then revealed that Mehdi had once applied for a job there.
Not only did he praise the newspaper for its "relentless focus on the need for integrity and morality in private life" but also said that he agreed with it on "marriage, the family, abortion and teenage pregnancies." So, in the opinion of much of the Left, he too might be called "woman-hating" and "gay-bashing". Of course, he's neither – he's presumably just a faithful Muslim. A Muslim who wants to work for the "Muslim-smearing" Daily Mail. Well, we've all gotta make a living.* http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100240034/mehdi-hasan-the-daily-mail-ralph-miliband-and-the-scary-moral-hypocrisy-of-the-left/
@Polruan - careless indeed. Like the PB Tories who claimed that it wasn't a tax. Oh.
I remember commenting the day Mr Moore was appointed that the biggest story on his webpage was about sheep dip.
Unfortunately he did not fulfil that early promise and has not even been a source of amusement.
The only chance that Tories have of squeezing UKIP sufficiently would be if a Tory majority (and EU Referendum) looked on the cards. Under those circumstances sufficient numbers might hold their nose and vote for Cameron. however at the moment it looks a distant prospect
I would be tempted to say that Pakistan's loss is our gain but their need is far greater than ours.
I'm told we will get the newly reshuffled Tory ministerial team at 10.30am
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As usual the book runners are being paid huge fees to deliberately under price an asset so that the share price spikes on day 1 and everyone can call it a success.
Given it's being sold on my behalf, I'd be much happier with a facebook style outcome, but apparently that is a failure when the bookrunners manage to generate maximum income for the people who have contracted them.
UKIP the party may not care, but potential UKIP voters may well care.
All parties will be playing FUD cards at the next election. It's a really negative part of politics.
1) People who have been Conservatives until recently have internalized the idea that FPTP is a good system, so they don't feel comfortable trying game it. Relatedly,
2) They haven't had the experience the left had under Thatcher of being repeatedly slapped around by a united party because, as they saw it, their side was divided into two. It took the left quite a long time to learn even under those circumstances.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10360141/MPs-reshuffle-live.html
No cabinet changes amongst the blues and it's champagne tonight
I think the meme of "scary Ed" is destined to fail; he's not scary, he's just .... not a lot really, and that is the problem.
Even a staunch Labour friend of mine refuses to pass an opinion on him. After he launched an anti-Cameron, posh fop, out-of-touch rant, I asked him his opinion of his party leader.
"I vote for the MP, not the leader," was his response.
I reminded him that his MP was the former MP Witney, the man with seven houses and a butler.
"I vote for the party," was his reply.
Ed could be lucky in that his uselessness in already factored in.
Is it too late to make her Foreign Secretary?
I bought mine through Hargreaves Lansdown,took about 2 mins to apply,trading is simple through this company. Open up an account,and if you get any shares you can transfer them in to a vantage account,and then trade.
If you are a higher rate tax payer,you should also consider a SIPP with the same company. The tax benefits of a SIPP are slowly being eroded,use them now whilst there is still an advantage.
All the usual stuff,I am not an adviser,do your own research etc.
"But the fundamental point is that someone of £50K+ shouldn't be getting money from the taxes of poorer people"
The problem is that a lot of people - like me - are getting clobbered by this, when I don't earn £50k.
Basically, if you now earn in the mid £30k's, have a decent company vehicle and the potential to earn bonuses, you are going to have to fill in a self-assessment form.
My company was looking to defer my bonuses because i got whacked by HMRC a week or so ago - they are on to me. I've decided to say f*ck it and just lose my child benefit.
Car and fuel-card taxes have stealthily gone up, the 40% tax band kicks in at £34k'ish and without the child benefit I'm going to be about £3500 worse off a year. The only other way round it was to try not to earn bonuses (which are capped, not big enough to make the child benefit not matter).
With two young children and a wife working part-time (childcare is mega money) it's going to hurt.
Like I said last week, I'm not that bothered. But there will be a lot of people out there like me, who get clobbered, when rich people get better off. Polling wise, this will crucify the Tories, because many of the people who this directly affects are likely to be middle class, middle earner and ergo sing voters.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0At91c3wX1Wu5dDZoVmdlVXBEQVNvcUNfR294UXo0S3c&usp=drive_web#gid=0
"James Forsyth reports that no Tories will leave the Cabinet today:
Understand that this reshuffle won’t see any Tory in Cabinet, or who attends Cabinet, leave government. So, Ken Clarke is safe
So to merely deprive Labour a majority, the Tories need UKIP down below 5%ish, as well as hoping the UKIP and resurgent anti-Tory tactical dynamic doesn't hurt them too much. A pretty big task.
To win most seats, they need to do all the above whilst holding on to most of their 2010 support. For a majority they probably need to do all the above as well as increasing their vote share over 2010!
Puts it in perspective for the Blues.
I used to vote Labour in a kind of red rosette on a donkey way really, only when I looked at politics more closely did I realise that the party my parents voted for no longer existed.
Voting Labour now would be like going to a Fleetwood Mac concert in 2013 expecting to hear Peter Green singing Man of the World or Oh Well
Given that the Euro 2014 elections are 'the UKIP thing', they're likely, IMO, to exceed those figures in the elections held that day, meaning they will have an even larger base (voters, councillors, MEPs, activists, well-wishers) in 2015 than they do today (and, I'd suggest, the LDs will see the reverse).
Caveat: all of these elections have low turn-outs and Kippers are committed, if nothing else, and 25% of 30% (7.5%, for those poor at maths!) would translate into maybe 16-18% of a typical GE turn-out
So
Assuming that the Kipper vote is comprised of those who wish ConLabLib ill, (various grounds, not least they got us into this mess through unaffordable promises to future generations on welfare, immigration, CM/EEC/EU/USoE, Maastrict/Lisbon etc etc etc and have not a clue how to solve the problems they created, nor any intention of trying to do so) as well as NOTA's in the past (eg soft LD's).
I can see the overall GE2015 turn-out being significantly higher than in recent GE's, with the additional voters being Kippers - and those terrified of the Kipper vote - thus meaning UKIP might well poll comfortably in excess of that 16-18%, as much air-time will be devoted to decrying them.
In conclusion, a UKIP vote in the (very wide) range of 15-25+% seems eminently possible - with the higher the UKIP vote in Euro2014, the more likely their vote in GE2015 will be high too.
I can also see Cameron agreeing to Farage being in the 'Party leader's' debate - on the grounds that his inexperience, lack of consistency and general 'boor in the pub' persona will be exposed and so crush the UKIP vote, only for it to blow up spectacularly in his face and UKIP to poll significantly better as a result.
IMO, there should be 2 waves of TV set-pieces one with RedEd and Cameron (no-one else could be PM) and one with all the other NATIONAL Party leaders (UKIP, Greens, BNP, OMRLP, LDs etc).
Think 1930's to get some idea of where we, in the West, are politically: no powerful national leaders and an international talking-shop that's been exposed as completely ineffectual, and global economic mismanagement coming home to roost - mainly affecting 'ordinary, hard-working families' and leaving rich and political elites unaffected.
RT @jameskirkup #reshuffle latest: Ken Clarke officially in the departure lounge -at Heathrow, en route for govt trip to Washington>Survivor
Clearly, some UKIP supporters will vote tactically for Conservatives (and a smaller number for Labour).
Fuel prices too high? That's all RedEd's fault when Energy Sec and the 'Super-Green' insanity of the LD ministers i/c. Vote Con and see Greenery ended, vote Labour and get prices frozen.
Vote LD and see lights go out and prices soar..........
'Neither of the above' voters who voted LD in the past as the respectable, credible alternative, will now, IMO, vote Kipper.
It's pure and simple a case of directors acting to protect their own reputation rather than maximise the wealth of their shareholders. Not uncommon, but it doesn't make it right.
People in the room are the shareholders representatives, possibly the company CEO (although as an observer) and the heads of equity capital markets at the bookrunning banks
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-85486/How-did-King-fool-so-long.html
Sadly that headline 'How Did King Fool So Many For So Long can be reused so many times for others in his field."
The Independent wrote in 2012 "King was arrested in 2000 after a man approached the publicist Max Clifford."
2) Anecdotal opinion
3) Anecdotal opinion
4) Anecdotal opinion
Everyone here knows your tautologies are still utter tripe tim...
Tim Shipman (Mail) @ShippersUnbound
Dr Julian Huppert should be Lib Dem chief whip. Stern lecturer look. Gold stars for loyalists. 'See me' on essays for rebels.
Several newspapers report Osborne intends to slash green taxes to make energy bills cheaper (and pay for it by taxing fracking).
This.
You'll only know how hard/soft the current support really is at some point in spring 2015.
Outside of the Expenses scandal, the Tories stayed happily above 40 for, what, 2 and a half years? The gradual winding in of the lead happened from Jan 2010 onwards*. IF there isn't a general decrease in the Labour poll by about Feb/March 2015, then its hard and then the Tories will be screwed, hard.
* --- and yes, I know tthe Conservative's own campaign (showing suitability for leadership) didn't help matters. Nor did Labour's insurgents campaign. One of these things cannot be repeated in 2015.
* aside from Andy Burnham