In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
It is quite shocking that Sangita Myska has been quietly fired from LBC and replaced with the awful Vanessa Feltz.
Vanessa Feltz reportedly not taking her firing from her previous gig all that well.
Which was?
She's got such an annoying voice, I instantly turn off as soon as she comes on.
Talk TV.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
It is quite shocking that Sangita Myska has been quietly fired from LBC and replaced with the awful Vanessa Feltz.
Vanessa Feltz reportedly not taking her firing from her previous gig all that well.
Which was?
She's got such an annoying voice, I instantly turn off as soon as she comes on.
Talk TV.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It always surprises me when people use 'snowflake' in the same breath is being offended about other people's use of pronouns.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
It is quite shocking that Sangita Myska has been quietly fired from LBC and replaced with the awful Vanessa Feltz.
Vanessa Feltz reportedly not taking her firing from her previous gig all that well.
Which was?
She's got such an annoying voice, I instantly turn off as soon as she comes on.
Talk TV.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
I really like Times Radio of late.
Spotify for me. I reckon I’ve listened to Hotel California over 1,000 times this year and Layla about 800. 👍
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
It is quite shocking that Sangita Myska has been quietly fired from LBC and replaced with the awful Vanessa Feltz.
Vanessa Feltz reportedly not taking her firing from her previous gig all that well.
Which was?
She's got such an annoying voice, I instantly turn off as soon as she comes on.
Talk TV.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
I really like Times Radio of late.
Spotify for me. I reckon I’ve listened to Hotel California over 1,000 times this year and Layla about 800. 👍
Hotel California over 1,000 times? You need to check out.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It always surprises me when people use 'snowflake' in the same breath is being offended about other people's use of pronouns.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It always surprises me when people use 'snowflake' in the same breath is being offended about other people's use of pronouns.
It is quite shocking that Sangita Myska has been quietly fired from LBC and replaced with the awful Vanessa Feltz.
Vanessa Feltz reportedly not taking her firing from her previous gig all that well.
Which was?
She's got such an annoying voice, I instantly turn off as soon as she comes on.
Talk TV.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
I really like Times Radio of late.
Spotify for me. I reckon I’ve listened to Hotel California over 1,000 times this year and Layla about 800. 👍
"There is a howling at the moon element at this. The ULEZ formers want to impose their rights to kill people with toxic air - what about the rights of the people being killed or damaged? The 20 mph formers want to kill more pedestrians - what about the rights of the people who don’t want to be killed?"
By that rationale any train or car should be motionless lest they crush someone's foot.
It's perfectly legitimate to advocate a lower speed limit in the name of safety, and equally valid to comment on the economic/personal cost of slower travel times. One side isn't devilish, and the other is most certainly not holy.
The fuss over 20mph in Wales is just weird though. Large swathes of London have been 20mph for a fair while now. You rapidly get used to it.
You could get used to being whipped through the streets in a gimp mask every morning. That wouldn't make it a good and efficient use of your time. It's particularly ludicrous for someone like you, who's incensed by the efficiency loss of (God forbid) using cash, to tell us all how great it is to fart around at 20mph getting nowhere fast, in a bid to protect the hordes of people who were being mown down by people sticking to the 30 limit in less enlightened times.
The evidence in support of default 20mph limits in residential areas is already too strong for it to be rolled back very far, which is why I'm not very worried. Consider even that in England we have 30 years of introducing 20mph schemes, and I can't think of any that have been significantly reversed - can anyone here?
As I see it there are two important changes:
1 - A general reduction in speeds. In Wales monitoring so far demonstrates that the average speed has reduced from 29mph to 25mph, and that 97% of drivers in 20mph zones on main roads are now driving at under 26mph.
That is a huge positive.
2 - Following on, there has been a significant reduction in the more extreme speeders. Those who were previously driving at 35-40 through residential areas will now be doing more like 26-30, which again is a big difference.
There will be some tweaks, but people living and driving places find that they like safer streets / roads where they aren't kept away by risk of intimidation or injury. When reduced KSI data comes out, it will be very persuasive.
It's a direction of travel - pun intended. It will be reversed when there are fairly profound societal and political realisations.
Yes - agree on that.
I think a really interesting aspect is across different places. Taking cycling and walking, Scotland (commitment to 5-10% of the transport budget on active travel, iirc *), and Wales are forward looking, as are certain places in England (London and Midlands / Northern cities).
By contrast Tory Towns in the South-East (and similar places elsewhere like Harrogate) especially are heading back to the 1970s imo.
In about 10-30 years the places which are perceived as nice places to be will have flipped. Reactions will be interesting.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
It is absolute political correct snowflake mince, for a normal human you have no clue if there are multiple people or if it is snowflake mince.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It always surprises me when people use 'snowflake' in the same breath is being offended about other people's use of pronouns.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
It is not the computers, is is those who who operate them.
Yeah, the council are claiming that using BS7666 USRNs require them to get rid of the apostrophes. That's not the case, it just requires them to store an apostrophe-less version in a separate field in the database. It's meant to be used in addition to the human-readable street name, not to replace it.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
It is absolute political correct snowflake mince, for a normal human you have no clue if there are multiple people or if it is snowflake mince.
Unless I've misunderstood, Netanyahu seems to be saying to Hamas:
1. Unless you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah. 2. If you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah anyway.
Glad to hear the Tories are sorting out the most important issue of the UK right now - gender specific toilets.
It’s pitiful that with so many problems facing the country, we’re being served up cheap political gimmicks that even if enacted will change next to nothing.
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Unless I've misunderstood, Netanyahu seems to be saying to Hamas:
1. Unless you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah. 2. If you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah anyway.
Sounds like Netanyahu.
However, I think it unlikely the Americans would agree to Rafah’s destruction if a ceasefire was signed.
Another good reason for Hamas to agree for one.
But they won’t because they’re (a) not actually fighting to win a ground war (b) don’t care any more than Netanyahu does about the ordinary people who are being killed and (c) are even madder than he is.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
Er, quite a few Scottish independents *are* Conservatives as well as conservatives - thrown out of the Party, or ejected voluntarily, whether permanently or temporarily. Makes it difficult to work out the real change in voter sympathy when they are part of a local government election.
On the Tory fightback, it was amusing to hear Maria Caulfield on R4 this morning using the Blackpool South by-election as evidence that the Tories didn't have that bad a day on Thursday.
The essence of her argument was that the Tories would have won Blackpool South if they'd got more people out to vote for them.
The potential for a fight back of sorts is there in the Blackpool by election result though
In 1996 SE Staffs By Election, Labour added 5,000 votes to their 1992 total, and the turnout was 62%
In Blackpool last week, Labour got 2,000 votes fewer than at GE 2019, and turnout was 32%
So if you were trying to make a case for how the Tories could possibly come back into the running, it’s that there is a pool of voters that are so fed up of politics that they don’t bother anymore; they don’t vote Labour even when there’s a 20pt gap in the polls, unlike the year preceding Blair’s first election victory
Another indicator is the IPSIS poll that had Sir Keir as the most popular politician, with a Gross Positive score of 28. This is a low score compared to other party leaders (before the last election Boris was getting mid forties to Corbyn’s 15 or 16). So there is a huge amount of people that aren’t interested/don’t like any of them.
I doubt the Tories are the party to reinvigorate those people though, but they might as well try. I’ve always said it will be a low turnout GE, and still think so. What was turnout like in the locals?
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
Er, quite a few Scottish independents *are* Conservatives as well as conservatives - thrown out of the Party, or ejected voluntarily, whether permanently or temporarily. Makes it difficult to work out the real change in voter sympathy when they are part of a local government election.
I stand corrected, but my impression was that most people who got elected as indepndents in rural Scottish authorities tended in reality to be Lib Dems or SNP, or genuinely unaligned.
Glad to hear the Tories are sorting out the most important issue of the UK right now - gender specific toilets.
Why not allow businesses to decide based on what their customers want ? Pointless red tape. More of it. It’s utterly pathetic. Why should the govt tell any organisation how to organise their toilets.
Trying to stir things up? For sure, it's a newspaper and a rabble-rousing one at that. "Disgusting" - hardly. If the same headline and article were on the Socialist Worker, the Islamic-politics activist wouldn't be moaning.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
They just following the GOP play-back, claim victory early and loudly and if the result is close cry foul play.
Whilst it's deeply ironic to see Anabobazina posting this as they were one of the people most on the "Hall will win train", they are right.
This site was really very bad and seemed to throw any sense or logic out of the window. The site has been very restrained, professional and objective before, so it was quite odd to see.
Cheers but I’m he, not they!
Really gets my goatwhen people think they are being politically correct by improperly using "they" grammatically in case they offend some snowflake.
It isn’t improper to use “they” as a gender neutral pronoun if you don’t know which one to use for God’s sake.
It is absolute political correct snowflake mince, for a normal human you have no clue if there are multiple people or if it is snowflake mince.
I think you need to get a life to be honest.
Typical humourless SNOWFLAKE, went right over your stupid head
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
I liked him in Lewis. It’s sad to see what’s happened
It’s quite tragic, and it’s happened to lots of people on all sides of politics. I think it comes from taking a fairly controversial position, and then being simultaneously persecuted for it and being liked by others. So you get addicted to the “likes” and also angered by the persecution. And so yet got more extreme (because angry) and more obsessive (because of the addictive dopamine hit of the likes)
It’s possibly happening to someone as intelligent and sensible as J K Rowling. I agree with her completely on trans issues but when Elon musk (!!) tells you that you’re getting a bit monomaniacal and relentless then you probably are
It’s happened to people on the left (corbynites). It’s arguably happened (albeit in a different way) to the most insane Remoaners. It’s yet another negative product of social media and Laurence fox is a sad example
Trying to stir things up? For sure, it's a newspaper and a rabble-rousing one at that. "Disgusting" - hardly. If the same headline and article were on the Socialist Worker, the Islamic-politics activist wouldn't be moaning.
Anyone shouting that should get themselves over to Gaza and do their shouting there.
Redditch has a 16K tory majority. It's council went Labour massively on Thursday.
Middle England.
It is not even on the target list of seats as far as I can see.
a) Different turnout b) Local elections sometimes have opposite results to general elections.
But Hung Parliament is stretching it, yes.
It’s been a bizarre few days for political ‘analysis’, I have commented on the frankly weird and disturbing incessant ramping of Hall on here masquerading as betting insight. But even that was based on initial rumours that Hall could win. She got utterly hammered. I have been away all weekend. Did we ever ascertain from where the initial notion arose?
Sorry, but weren’t you one of them?
No, I said at one stage that my view had been changed by the posts on here - and also said at the time (in the same post) that I was almost certainly being irrational. I was certainly influenced by it. But then, in the past, PB has been a generally good guide on election night. Not this time!
We (well, I) are good at collating data and drawing conclusions, and in POTUS or UKGE elections where there is a constant stream of counted votes we can discuss well. But in the gap between the end of the election and the vote counts being released we only have gossip and tittle-tattle and we (well, I) go haywire on a GIGO basis.
In the specific case of LONMAYORAL24 the only info we had was the gossip from various sources, a possible postal vote leak, and the turnout data, all of which were surprisingly favorable for Hall. Given that the only data available suggested a Hall win, the only conclusion was a Hall win. When actual count data came in, it became rapidly obvious that she had lost and PB corrected accordingly.
Lessons to be learned are as follows * We (well, I) am not good at interpreting low-quality data and should not predict until actual count data is available * We are used as a source by Twitter, which is then fed back to us, and we have a feedback loop. So we (well, I), were both cause of and sufferer of the problem * During the low-quality data period it is possible to manipulate the media and Twitter to swing the odds dramatically in such a way to accrue profit from artificially-created value bets. This offers an interesting possibility for betting engineering. * Journalists know f*** all. Wait for the count data.
Considering POTUS24 is six months away, these are good lessons to know now, yes?
I don’t believe you can possibly argue that the only data available pointed to a Hall win. All the data pointed to a Khan win, as others including myself maintained throughout. What we had on the third were some snippets of anecdata, that subsequently turned out to be nonsense (as I said at the time, postal votes are verified face down so claims from postal verifications are almost always rubbish), and some turnout data that was hardly dramatic, and probably explained - if explanation is needed - by some normally non-voters getting off their arses in Outer London to vote for Reform.
The mystery is how Anabob as one of the very first people to have predicted a Hall win (based on nothing, as far as I can see), almost as soon as polls closed, can now be asking how this ridiculous notion arose?
Partly it's the difference in brain wiring that correlates a bit with which political instincts. An overfocus on what can go wrong makes socialism attractive, an underfocus does the same for libertarian capitalism. See the way that Blair and Starmer have trod the path to Number Ten- incredibly cautiously. You wouldn't get a Tory doing that; at their best, that optimism one of their attractive features.
One of the lessons of the last week is to ignore what party sources say, especially when it's not obvious what their basis is for saying it. The "turnout is up/down in the right places" stuff was clearly made up, but we all swallowed it a bit.
What is worth looking at is what the parties are doing. In London, Hall's campaign was obviously low-energy compared with Johnson's wins. That ought to have been a clue that she wasn't on track to win. Similarly, Labour's move of activists from Teesside to the West Midlands was a pretty good indication of where the front line of the election was.
Not much sunny optimism on ConHome. https://conservativehome.com/2024/05/05/goodbyeee/ … Half our council seats – and twelve authorities – gone. Third place behind the Liberal Democrats. Eleven mayoral races lost out of twelve. Due to the lethargic way in which the results were counted, the true extent of the pain has almost been dulled. The more one considers it, the more it seems the anti-Sunak lot stood down too early. Weren’t these the results they were hoping for?
Yet the fight seems to have gone out of the rebels. Jenkyns, Simon Clarke, and Suella Braverman – all persistent Sunak critics – have called for mythical “policy changes”, but not demand an immediate resignation. The hope amongst some is that Sunak can own the coming loss, allowing the right to swoop in post-election. The flaw in their logic is that it relies on keeping their seats.
But it’s hard to see what, say, installing Penny Mordaunt as a boat-stopping, strike-breaking, ocean-going vehicle of electoral salvation might achieve. It would rely on HMS Sword-Carrier not only being able to appease both the party’s left and right, but mimic Johnson in 2019, except without Vote Leave, the benefit of the doubt, or the overwhelming need to Get Brexit Done.
There’s nothing to stop the Prime Minister’s critics from buying ad space in the Telegraph to print “WE TOLD YOU SO” in big friendly letters. But one doesn’t sense the appetite for crowing. As with Blackadder accepting his appalling fate, there is a widespread air of resignation. Our survey and suggests the general assumption is that Sunak going would only make things worse. Our time is up.
The big push can only be avoided for so long. In a year, the Prime Minister has brought the party precisely nowhere. Even those once optimistic that he could be Johnson but competent have lost the appetite. Reboots have rung hollow. We are 20 points behind and commanding under a fifth of the vote. Rwanda is a dud, Farage will return, and the voters are miserable. Why cling on?
There will be no cunning plans. Notwithstanding the ability of Tory MPs to shoot themselves in the foot, it seems that Sunak has done terribly enough to have earnt the right to lead us slowly towards the guns later this year at the head of his denuded infantry. Our former Editor once wrote of our party in a Totentanz – a dance of death. This will be a slow, painful, and hopeless march...
For some unaccountable reason this reminds me of my current reading: the Franklin expedition. Marching hundreds of miles south from where their ships Terror and Erebus were stuck in the ice. Shedding corpses and skeletons, and latterly eating each other, all over the Arctic, and the last few dying in and around a ship's boat dragged all the way.
The surprise of the decade would be if the Tories turn this into Shackleton's expedition instead of Franklin's.
For that they would need a Shackleton, and it doesn't look like they have one (either in charge now or waiting in the wings...)
If in the pickle Shackleton and company were in I suspect leadership from Rory Stewart and Mrs Thatcher would be what you need.
Unless I've misunderstood, Netanyahu seems to be saying to Hamas:
1. Unless you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah. 2. If you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah anyway.
Sounds like Netanyahu.
However, I think it unlikely the Americans would agree to Rafah’s destruction if a ceasefire was signed.
Another good reason for Hamas to agree for one.
But they won’t because they’re (a) not actually fighting to win a ground war (b) don’t care any more than Netanyahu does about the ordinary people who are being killed and (c) are even madder than he is.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
I liked him in Lewis. It’s sad to see what’s happened
It’s quite tragic, and it’s happened to lots of people on all sides of politics. I think it comes from taking a fairly controversial position, and then being simultaneously persecuted for it and being liked by others. So you get addicted to the “likes” and also angered by the persecution. And so yet got more extreme (because angry) and more obsessive (because of the addictive dopamine hit of the likes)
It’s possibly happening to someone as intelligent and sensible as J K Rowling. I agree with her completely on trans issues but when Elon musk (!!) tells you that you’re getting a bit monomaniacal and relentless then you probably are
It’s happened to people on the left (corbynites). It’s arguably happened (albeit in a different way) to the most insane Remoaners. It’s yet another negative product of social media and Laurence fox is a sad example
To be fair i would say many of your positions are more extreme than Laurence Foxes.
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
I agree with that. I would however add that Ratepayers/Residents groups have changed over the last few decades. A while ago they were Conservatives at a local level keen to keep rates low, now they compete with Conservatives and are more focused on services. Epsom and Ewell is a good example where they are the 4th main party and usually win.
In Guildford with the scandal over the local plan that the Conservatives screwed up the LDs took the Guildford wards but the then newly formed R4GV (Residents for Guildford Villages) cleaned up in the villages and combined with the LDs to take control of the council. In the following election the LDs took outright control. R4GV was pretty non-political. It was made up from Conservatives from both the right and left, ex LDs and many non-aligned. The only thing they were all against were the local Tories (although I suspect the Tories amongst them would be voting Tory come the GE). It was a local Tory issue that drove this not the national party.
It is complicated and every area is different depending upon what drives it.
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
Er, quite a few Scottish independents *are* Conservatives as well as conservatives - thrown out of the Party, or ejected voluntarily, whether permanently or temporarily. Makes it difficult to work out the real change in voter sympathy when they are part of a local government election.
I stand corrected, but my impression was that most people who got elected as indepndents in rural Scottish authorities tended in reality to be Lib Dems or SNP, or genuinely unaligned.
Depends where, in the olden days Edinburgh "progressives" were generally Tory, whereas Highland independents were generally Liberal.
Morning all. On reading through the last thread, some thoughts on Thrashergate. I think it was Wulfrun Phil who posted some polling evidence from 2023 locals of GE VI being wider than LE VI. Whilst that is indeed a piece of supporting evidence, some caution needs applying in that the LE question was about an election about to happen (minds made up) and the GE is, as with all opinion polling between terms, about a date far off not yet defined and, as such, it becomes to some extent a measure of dissatisfaction and with more DKs than likely once minds focussed. Differential weighting would also apply given turnout expectations in both type of election which complicates a dual question poll. So, whilst it does suggest support that at a GE the gap might be wider, putting a figure on it you can rely on is too tricky (and admittedly might be more than 7 or 8% as those polls showed as well as less). Reliance on opinion polling cost May dearly - she continued to focus on places she was getting nowhere near whereas Labour were far more canny and reactive to the ground shifting. The 5 million votes just cast give us a good generic overview of where we stand - somewhat worse for the blues than the Thrasher NEV (which is just a projection of votes cast, not a forecast of votes to come) and somewhat better than the current opinion polling average, the art for the party strategists will be defining just where the line is right now. I'd say about a 10 to 12 point lead for Labour if we voted tomorrow. Tactical voting - complicated this time due to boundary changes and imo likely to favour Labour not the LDs as the spectacular opinion poll leads and the seat forecast polls are making Labour look competitive everywhere. Thus we might end up with some (not by any means loads though) seats looking like 1983 - with a big third place vote because the 'tactical' shot was the wrong one
Beneath Thrasher there is the valid bigger picture point that there is little enthusiasm for Labour, and the locals show that people are willing to shop elsewhere when alternatives are available and credible.
But it’s a shame that his analysis seems to have compounded a number of errors. Firstly, assuming no change in Scotland and Wales, when in the former at least all the evidence points to significant change. Secondly, by what they’ve done with the ‘others’ - seven other gains doesn’t seem credibly the result of any UNS model unless it’s a simplistic one that treats voters for the disparate range of other parties as one bloc backing a single candidate, which is obvious nonsense. Otherwise where are these seven other gains in England? Thirdly, by dropping local voters into a national model without any adjustment, when we all know people vote differently in local elections and the LDs in particular pick up local votes thay they never get in a GE.
And the gross error is that, while the national government and national Tory politicians are widely despised, not all voters punish their local councils and councillors accordingly, especially where they’re doing a reasonable job.
The only counter-argument is that Reform didn’t put up many LE candidates but presumably in the Genny Lec will stand everywhere? Thus potentially syphoning off more unhappy Tories. But that could be balanced off by some who are telling pollsters they are Reform voters as a protest but won’t actually carry through.
That's all fair comment and the NEV has been grossly abused no doubt. If Reform are being overstated in polling as seems likely then we are not a million miles away from a low 40s high 20s scenario perhaps. Something in the 10 to 14 point lead range - enough for a pretty comprehensive win through to Blair styley. I still fancy about a 90 seat majority. One other factor - Galloway standing everywhere (he says, he's already got 150 in place though). As we saw with Yakoob in West Midlands, he picked up 60,000 votes and only announced five weeks ago standing on a gaza ticket. They need to start prompting WPB in polling, if he's at 1% or no show then forget it, but if they start hitting 3% then he becomes a complicating factor. Where they stood Thursday they generally did pretty well. Blackburn, Rochdale, Halifax, Oldham, Birmingham etc could be interesting.
London gives a perfect dry run of how Conservatives v Reform would likely pan out in the general election. Reform contested every available seat, against the Conservatives, and they did not make much of an inroad into their vote.
They may have prevented the Conservatives from flipping Ealing/Hillingdon, but that was about it.
The Conservatives will pick up some of the vote that went to independents, in general election conditions, probably enough to get above 30%+, but I agree that Labour are more than 7% ahead, when it comes to the GE/
We now have two types of independents standing in local elections. The usual closet Tories and the new phenomenon of those draped in the Palestinian flag.
I don't see the Conservatives picking up many switchers from the latter.
When I first got interested in politics, independents were very much a dying breed, along with Residents/Ratepayers. But, now, they seem to be on the up (a development I consider positive, in local elections. I've voted independent in the last two rounds of local elections, because the Conservatives' and Labour's literature was generic, whereas the independents at least were addressing local issues).
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
I agree with that. I would however add that Ratepayers/Residents groups have changed over the last few decades. A while ago they were Conservatives at a local level keen to keep rates low, now they compete with Conservatives and are more focused on services. Epsom and Ewell is a good example where they are the 4th main party and usually win.
In Guildford with the scandal over the local plan that the Conservatives screwed up the LDs took the Guildford wards but the then newly formed R4GV (Residents for Guildford Villages) cleaned up in the villages and combined with the LDs to take control of the council. In the following election the LDs took outright control. R4GV was pretty non-political. It was made up from Conservatives from both the right and left, ex LDs and many non-aligned. The only thing they were all against were the local Tories (although I suspect the Tories amongst them would be voting Tory come the GE). It was a local Tory issue that drove this not the national party.
It is complicated and every area is different depending upon what drives it.
Likewise, Peterborough, which the Conservatives nearly captured last year, before feuding among themselves, and many forming the Peterborough Independents.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
Feels awfully simplistic to say that the divorce sent him over the edge, but simplistic doesn't mean wrong.
And once you start in the vortex of "will spout rubbish for clicks, likes or cash", it's awfully hard to get out. Even if it starts as a persona, it becomes the reality.
(Aren't there stories from WW2 of Colditz prisoners feigning madness to try to escape and that sending them properly mad?)
Glad to hear the Tories are sorting out the most important issue of the UK right now - gender specific toilets.
Quite, I think only the most lunatic fanatics would care, even a little bit, whereas the majority will just shake their heads at the transparent nastiness and stupidity.
The fact that it is yet more red tape nonsense shows how far the Tories have become the party of "F&ck Business".
Glad to hear the Tories are sorting out the most important issue of the UK right now - gender specific toilets.
Why not allow businesses to decide based on what their customers want ? Pointless red tape. More of it. It’s utterly pathetic. Why should the govt tell any organisation how to organise their toilets.
Because Kemi B thinks there are votes in it.
(Given that the button being pressed here is building regs and everyone knows that nobody is building anything anyway, this is selling a sizzle not a sausage. I doubt that those this is meant to impress will be impressed.)
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Police & Crime Commissioner Results summary, which I have not seen before:
If you plug the gaps with the Mayoralities then Labour outnumber the Conservatives
If under the old 2 prference system most of those blue ones would be red.
And 1 would be yellow.
That I think - removal of FPTP from PCCs and Mayors if not something more extensive such as Mayors everywhere - is another no-brainer reform that Mr Starmer will be likely to introduce, alongside Hereditary Peers to be ejected defenestrated from the Lords.
Glad to hear the Tories are sorting out the most important issue of the UK right now - gender specific toilets.
Why not allow businesses to decide based on what their customers want ? Pointless red tape. More of it. It’s utterly pathetic. Why should the govt tell any organisation how to organise their toilets.
Because Kemi B thinks there are votes in it.
(Given that the button being pressed here is building regs and everyone knows that nobody is building anything anyway, this is selling a sizzle not a sausage. I doubt that those this is meant to impress will be impressed.)
They just hope Labour will vote against it and they can make something of it.
I am completely lost, if you don't know if somebody is a man or a woman, what should you call them?
mate , pal , sunshine , hundreds to pick from
There is a bit of a gap as to an entirely neutral term.
'Mate' - I'm not your mate, 'Pal' - suggests a certain aggression, 'Sunshine' - unwise , 'Good person' - even more unwise!
Mostly though the 'Excuse me, (fill in the label)' just finishes up as 'Excuse me'. (Sir works mostly, but feels daft for oiks, madam is often ok, miss equally so, young lady works, but old lady never does, and 'lady' sounds rude)
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
Feels awfully simplistic to say that the divorce sent him over the edge, but simplistic doesn't mean wrong.
And once you start in the vortex of "will spout rubbish for clicks, likes or cash", it's awfully hard to get out. Even if it starts as a persona, it becomes the reality.
(Aren't there stories from WW2 of Colditz prisoners feigning madness to try to escape and that sending them properly mad?)
Last point - yes.
There was also Douglas Bader preventing his orderly, who was an NCO or more junior working in an officers' camp, being repatriated as he had become entitled to be.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
Feels awfully simplistic to say that the divorce sent him over the edge, but simplistic doesn't mean wrong.
And once you start in the vortex of "will spout rubbish for clicks, likes or cash", it's awfully hard to get out. Even if it starts as a persona, it becomes the reality.
(Aren't there stories from WW2 of Colditz prisoners feigning madness to try to escape and that sending them properly mad?)
There was certainly an episode in the seminal BBC drama of that name, to that effect. Tweedledum. With one of my favourite actors, Michael Bryant.
I am completely lost, if you don't know if somebody is a man or a woman, what should you call them?
mate , pal , sunshine , hundreds to pick from
There is a bit of a gap as to an entirely neutral term.
'Mate' - I'm not your mate, 'Pal' - suggests a certain aggression, 'Sunshine' - unwise , 'Good person' - even more unwise!
Mostly though the 'Excuse me, (fill in the label)' just finishes up as 'Excuse me'. (Sir works mostly, but feels daft for oiks, madam is often ok, miss equally so, young lady works, but old lady never does, and 'lady' sounds rude)
coughcoughcomradecoughcough...
[EDIT: although the right-wing version - citizen - also works]
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Police & Crime Commissioner Results summary, which I have not seen before:
If you plug the gaps with the Mayoralities then Labour outnumber the Conservatives
If under the old 2 prference system most of those blue ones would be red.
And 1 would be yellow.
That I think - removal of FPTP from PCCs and Mayors if not something more extensive such as Mayors everywhere - is another no-brainer reform that Mr Starmer will be likely to introduce, alongside Hereditary Peers to be ejected defenestrated from the Lords.
Reinstating SV won’t necessarily work in favour of an incumbent government.
In some areas of Britain we are now witnessing the rise of a darker, tribal, more sectarian politics which, ironically, is emerging under the banner of the so-called ‘liberal progressive’ Greens"
Here's something much less amazing. The lowest SNP vote share in any opinion poll of Scots for a decade. They can't cite the Yousaf factor, since the poll was conducted after his departure. Westminster General Election, Norstat (Panelbase): Lab 34% SNP 29% Con 16% LD 8% Fieldwork 30th April to 3rd May
I am completely lost, if you don't know if somebody is a man or a woman, what should you call them?
mate , pal , sunshine , hundreds to pick from
There is a bit of a gap as to an entirely neutral term.
'Mate' - I'm not your mate, 'Pal' - suggests a certain aggression, 'Sunshine' - unwise , 'Good person' - even more unwise!
Mostly though the 'Excuse me, (fill in the label)' just finishes up as 'Excuse me'. (Sir works mostly, but feels daft for oiks, madam is often ok, miss equally so, young lady works, but old lady never does, and 'lady' sounds rude)
coughcoughcomradecoughcough...
[EDIT: although the right-wing version - citizen - also works]
Actually 'fellow pleb', 'young pleb' and 'old pleb' might be ok. By the time they work through it you'll have moved on.
I am completely lost, if you don't know if somebody is a man or a woman, what should you call them?
In the Derby area you could call them duck. The word can be used by anyone when talking to anyone else. Unusual to have a traditionally gender neutral word like that.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
OT Government spokesman on sky just mentioned earmarking asylum seekers for the Rwanda. Unfortunate use of words. My greyhounds have earmarks. Will they be foot shackled at the airport?
I don't really see why any earmarking is needed - they are disembarking from boats nearly every day. Far better to send the message of the channel journey being a one way round trip to Rwanda.
Erm... About that...
The one (1) person the government paid to voluntarily go to Rwanda seems to have been lost. This bodes well. (Via LouCalvey).
Rwanda clearly will only keep the refugees for as long as it gets paid. It will push them out the moment it gets its money. They did that for Israel and they will do the same for the United Kingdom.
It has nothing to do with what Rwanda will or won't do. The migrants didn't want to be in Rwanda; they wanted to be in the UK. If the opportunities were in Rwanda, they'd be there already. They will be moved to Rwanda, and abscond extremely fast, freeing up space and going back to their home countries, or trying somewhere else, or, if really determined, the UK again. The system needs to be off the boat, on a flight. Then the boats will stop coming, the gangs will die out, a great evil will have been stopped, and a huge public policy problem will have been solved.
It has everything to do with what Rwanda will or will not do. Rwanda forced refugees under the Israeli scheme to leave the country once it had collected the cash.It will presumably do the same under the UK scheme. It is only interested in the money and has no intention of providing asylum. The Rwanda scheme is built on a lie.
It won't need to force them. The only lie is that the vast majority of these people are legitimately seeking asylum. They are economic migrants. Nothing wrong with that, good for them for wanting to better themselves, but we are absolutely not obliged morally to let them into the country or pay for their upkeep. It would be better and safer for everyone concerned if they stopped trying to come.
Nevertheless Rwanda did have to force the refugees on the Israeli scheme out of the country according to the article I linked. Also these people are overwhelmingly genuine asylum seekers. This is the reason for sending them to Rwanda. Otherwise the UK could just repatriate them. As they are looking for a safe place they don't have any reason to take their chances back on the people smuggling trail. At least they are safe in Rwanda, provided it keeps to its contract, which is the only basis the Supreme Court accepted the scheme as lawful.
The point is, if Rwanda doesn't accept these people permanently, and there is zero sign it will, the UK will have to keep paying Rwanda forever or it will have to take them back. Neither is a sustainable deterrent for people crossing the Channel.
Judge Merchan: “I find you in criminal contempt for the 10th time."
"Mr. Trump, it’s important you understand the last thing I want to do is put you in jail,” the judge says. “You are the former president of the United States, and possibly the next president as well.” But he warns a jail sanction will be considered going forward.
Are tiny cafes, which usually have only one loo, now required to have two before they can open?
The change to building regulations will also allow contained, universal toilets in addition to single-sex toilets where space allows, or instead of single-sex toilets where there is not enough space.
A universal toilet is defined by the government as a self-contained room with a toilet and sink for individual use.
Not that much Parliamentary time left though, even if the election is December.
Single-sex toilets or single-gender toilets?
Unless there are bouncers upskirting customers it will surely be the latter.
The more they bang on about Woke and Trans the more votes the Tories lose.
At last, a job for which Lozza is eminently qualified.
He is quite unhinged.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
Feels awfully simplistic to say that the divorce sent him over the edge, but simplistic doesn't mean wrong.
And once you start in the vortex of "will spout rubbish for clicks, likes or cash", it's awfully hard to get out. Even if it starts as a persona, it becomes the reality.
(Aren't there stories from WW2 of Colditz prisoners feigning madness to try to escape and that sending them properly mad?)
Last point - yes.
There was also Douglas Bader preventing his orderly, who was an NCO or more junior working in an officers' camp, being repatriated as he had become entitled to be.
'He's my lackey, and he's staying my lackey.'
Bader appears to have been quite an unpleasant fellow. There are quite a few stories from Colditz. Also his political views were very simple and although proudly British one might view that he was fighting for the wrong side. I used to read his column in the Sunday Express when I was a youngster and it wasn't pleasant. And finally one of my closest friends' father was a fighter pilot in WW2 and slightly knew him and took an instant dislike to him saying he was incredibly arrogant.
Still if you are going to win a war you probably need people like that.
PS He also acknowledged that the film wasn't representative of him
Labour's lead over the Tories is down to just 7%, according to an updated National Equivalent Vote estimate.
Sky Elections Analyst Prof Michael Thrasher says Labour's lead needs to be double that to secure a majority. @skynews
The NEV includes votes from Mayoral contests and we know from secondary polling from the likes of YouGov and Savanta some of the Conservative Mayoral candidates, in particular, Houchen, Street and Hall were polling well in front of their parties.
For example, Savanta had Khan ahead by 13 in London but a 25 point Labour lead. I think there are similar numbers for the Tees Valley and West Midlands.
Relying on Mayoral contest numbers to inform the NEV for a Westminster election isn't valid.
Look at the Council results - look at Havant, Runnymede and Cherwell to name but three to see where the actual votes are also headed. Losing nearly 500 seats doesn't suggest a party running close in a hung Parliament - it's close to the 1996 figures and that ended up the following year with 31% for the governing party and a Labour landslide.
You also have in local contests a lot more Independents and Residents running (and with some success). Where will those votes go in a General Election?
No Scottish elections, only the Mayoral election in London and only PCC contests in Wales, Cornwall and a number of other areas - low turnout elections as well.
The NEV has been weaponised by those who want to have a stick with which to beat Starmer and Labour - all I see from last Thursday is Labour heading towards a substantial majority probably a landslide (if we use a 100+ majority as our definition) and the LDs and Greens possibly picking up the odd scrap from the table.
Sky's reporting of the NEV has been deeply irresponsible. It's designed to show the expected results of local elections if they had been held in all areas of the country.
Curtice and the BBC have, to their credit, always been very careful in pointing this out, eg.
Trying to conflate NEV/PNS with a GE prediction is misinformation of the worst sort, and I find it bizarre that Thrasher has put his name to it.
It does show though that whether those who voted LD or Independent locally on Thursday mostly vote Labour or not at the general election will decide whether Labour does indeed win a landslide or just gets a narrow majority or most seats in a hung parliament
Comments
Edit: and in any case he's about half a century out of date (at least) for Glasgow.
I can’t say I listen to or watch any of these. LBC. Talk TV, GB News, Jeremy Vine etc etc. It’s either interviewing people to talk down to them or ever more polarised talking heads. No one comes away informed, just having their views confirmed, and the talking heads make cash out of it for very little.
https://x.com/lisanandy/status/1787448231468695911?s=61
(open the tweet below for the bigger picture)
https://x.com/silviotattiscon/status/1787101006846673392?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
Layla about 800. 👍
I think a really interesting aspect is across different places. Taking cycling and walking, Scotland (commitment to 5-10% of the transport budget on active travel, iirc *), and Wales are forward looking, as are certain places in England (London and Midlands / Northern cities).
By contrast Tory Towns in the South-East (and similar places elsewhere like Harrogate) especially are heading back to the 1970s imo.
In about 10-30 years the places which are perceived as nice places to be will have flipped. Reactions will be interesting.
Then again Bradford does have half of the worst airport in the UK.
(from https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/open-standards-for-government/identifying-property-and-street-information)
1. Unless you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah.
2. If you agree to our terms for a ceasefire, we're going to destroy Rafah anyway.
Clearly, pro-Palestine independent voters will not be voting Conservative in the GE. Equally, people who vote Resident/Independent in places like Castle Point, Lincolnshire, or Havering, will predominantly vote Conservative at the GE.
So, will some, but by no means all, of the independents who have proliferated in parts of the Home Counties, and in rural England.
Most Scottish and Welsh independents are not Conservatives, however.
What turned a fairly successful actor, married to a lovely wife, into a loon?
However, I think it unlikely the Americans would agree to Rafah’s destruction if a ceasefire was signed.
Another good reason for Hamas to agree for one.
But they won’t because they’re (a) not actually fighting to win a ground war (b) don’t care any more than Netanyahu does about the ordinary people who are being killed and (c) are even madder than he is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzFXDvC-EwM
In 1996 SE Staffs By Election, Labour added 5,000 votes to their 1992 total, and the turnout was 62%
In Blackpool last week, Labour got 2,000 votes fewer than at GE 2019, and turnout was 32%
So if you were trying to make a case for how the Tories could possibly come back into the running, it’s that there is a pool of voters that are so fed up of politics that they don’t bother anymore; they don’t vote Labour even when there’s a 20pt gap in the polls, unlike the year preceding Blair’s first election victory
Another indicator is the IPSIS poll that had Sir Keir as the most popular politician, with a Gross Positive score of 28. This is a low score compared to other party leaders (before the last election Boris was getting mid forties to Corbyn’s 15 or 16). So there is a huge amount of people that aren’t interested/don’t like any of them.
I doubt the Tories are the party to reinvigorate those people though, but they might as well try. I’ve always said it will be a low turnout GE, and still think so. What was turnout like in the locals?
Disgusting from The Daily Mail.
What's wrong with being pro-Gaza?
What's wrong with shouting Allahu Akbar?
The way this paper is creating & spreading fear, is appalling
https://x.com/miqdaad/status/1787232991132987546
https://x.com/elysee/status/1787425072572952934
It’s possibly happening to someone as intelligent and sensible as J K Rowling. I agree with her completely on trans issues but when Elon musk (!!) tells you that you’re getting a bit monomaniacal and relentless then you probably are
It’s happened to people on the left (corbynites). It’s arguably happened (albeit in a different way) to the most insane Remoaners. It’s yet another negative product of social media and Laurence fox is a sad example
In Guildford with the scandal over the local plan that the Conservatives screwed up the LDs took the Guildford wards but the then newly formed R4GV (Residents for Guildford Villages) cleaned up in the villages and combined with the LDs to take control of the council. In the following election the LDs took outright control. R4GV was pretty non-political. It was made up from Conservatives from both the right and left, ex LDs and many non-aligned. The only thing they were all against were the local Tories (although I suspect the Tories amongst them would be voting Tory come the GE). It was a local Tory issue that drove this not the national party.
It is complicated and every area is different depending upon what drives it.
And once you start in the vortex of "will spout rubbish for clicks, likes or cash", it's awfully hard to get out. Even if it starts as a persona, it becomes the reality.
(Aren't there stories from WW2 of Colditz prisoners feigning madness to try to escape and that sending them properly mad?)
The fact that it is yet more red tape nonsense shows how far the Tories have become the party of "F&ck Business".
All the voters hate us
But there are millions of non-voters
Lets get them to vote for us
By campaigning to ban toilets
Sure-fire winner
(Given that the button being pressed here is building regs and everyone knows that nobody is building anything anyway, this is selling a sizzle not a sausage. I doubt that those this is meant to impress will be impressed.)
as in - he is still an actor, just playing an unconventional part.
'Mate' - I'm not your mate, 'Pal' - suggests a certain aggression, 'Sunshine' - unwise , 'Good person' - even more unwise!
Mostly though the 'Excuse me, (fill in the label)' just finishes up as 'Excuse me'. (Sir works mostly, but feels daft for oiks, madam is often ok, miss equally so, young lady works, but old lady never does, and 'lady' sounds rude)
There was also Douglas Bader preventing his orderly, who was an NCO or more junior working in an officers' camp, being repatriated as he had become entitled to be.
'He's my lackey, and he's staying my lackey.'
[EDIT: although the right-wing version - citizen - also works]
Westminster General Election, Norstat (Panelbase):
Lab 34%
SNP 29%
Con 16%
LD 8%
Fieldwork 30th April to 3rd May
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/labour-snp-poll-scotland-6p59t5ls9
Tory, Lib Dems, Labour, Greens!
https://twitter.com/ExStrategist/status/1787477181708313015
He needs to join the SNP next!
About the same thing as is wrong with drawing a swastika.
It is a rallying call for terrorists and extremists, even if it may have once previously had innocent meanings.
The algorithms of the various platforms take the shit you are consuming and offer a slightly more extreme version to try.
In a short time, an uncritical person can be sitting in their basement, eating pineapple pizza, listening to Radiohead and programming in Python.
Fortunately, most just become racist political extremists and terrorists.
The point is, if Rwanda doesn't accept these people permanently, and there is zero sign it will, the UK will have to keep paying Rwanda forever or it will have to take them back. Neither is a sustainable deterrent for people crossing the Channel.
Judge Merchan: “I find you in criminal contempt for the 10th time."
"Mr. Trump, it’s important you understand the last thing I want to do is put you in jail,” the judge says. “You are the former president of the United States, and possibly the next president as well.” But he warns a jail sanction will be considered going forward.
Still if you are going to win a war you probably need people like that.
PS He also acknowledged that the film wasn't representative of him