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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » YouGov Euros poll has Ukip moving up – Opinium moving down

The big polling news is that Lord Ashcroft has announced that starting this week he’ll be doing a weekly phone poll right through until the general election. He’ll also be doing regular battleground surveys.

Read the full story here

TheScreamingEagles

Oh which pollster(s) to believe

TheScreamingEagles

And Huzzah to Lord Ashcroft

TheScreamingEagles

And Huzzah to Populus, clearly the new gold standard.

saddened

It all hinges on who actually turns up to vote, as opposed to those who have said they will. If the usual Euro apathy rules again, it's all up in the air.

Edit: As UKIP and Tories both fish from the older generation pool, they may be more resilient than Labour.

AveryLP

FPT

Pulpstar said:

@Shadsy Nice to see Eastleigh coming in , on that one at 7-2

Does Thanet South go odds on when Farage announces he is standing there ?

I have been watching out for Farage's comment on Pfizer's bid for AstraZeneca due to Pfizer's historical connection with the Thanet South constituency. After 60 years of operating an R&D facility in Sandwich, Pfizer announced it would be closing down its operations in 2011 with the loss of some 5,000 jobs. Pfizer was by far the largest employer in the constituency.

Since then the former Pfizer site, now sold by Pfizer and renamed as "Discovery Park", has attracted significant funds as a designated Enterprise Zone has attracted over sixty new, mainly R&D, companies employing 1,500. Even Pfizer itself changed its all-out plans and has retained a small operation on site.

All in all the general view is that Pfizer has behaved well in the circumstances and has been very supportive of attempts to regenerate the site. Portraying the company as a villain may not therefore be well received in Thanet.

Given that Farage has close links with the area (born just outside Thanet South's boundaries, stood in the constituency in the 2005 GE and UKIP is supported nationally by a major donor, Alan Bown, a constituency resident), his reluctance to attack Pfizer may well be connected to his local knowledge and his plans to stand in the constituency in 2015.

Note his comment today on his LBC phone-in where he is merely content to portray the EU as the villain rather than the US company:

Q: What conditions should be put on the Pfizer AstraZeneca deal for it to be allowed to go ahead?

Farage says for the last week we have had farcical debate. We cannot decide, because this is in the hands of a Brussels bureaucrat, Mr Almunia.

It is difficult to accredit Farage with being subtle and light-touched but here may be a rare example. I am slightly more confident in my bet on Farage standing in Thanet South as a result of the way he has been handling the Pfizer takeover.

ToryJim

Both seem to have Con and LD nudging up a touch.

OblitusSumMe

The big polling news is that Lord Ashcroft has announced that starting this week he’ll be doing a weekly phone poll right through until the general election.

That is fantastic news for polling geeks.

Morris_Dancer

If UKIP win, that's super for them, but anything else must count as defeat (I reckon they will top the poll, but the PFJ may harm their prospects).

Stuart_Dickson

TheScreamingEagles said:

And Huzzah to Populus, clearly the new gold standard.

Not sure about gold std. But certainly one of the more respected pollsters.

Pulpstar

TheScreamingEagles said:

Oh which pollster(s) to believe

Why not believe both ?

UKIP 29.5; Lab 26; Con 23; LD 9 seems perfectly sensible...

JohnLilburne

TheScreamingEagles said:

Oh which pollster(s) to believe

well they both have them within MOE of 30%. On UKIP I think it is less helpful to look at trends as I think all pollsters have had difficulties getting a handle on them, whether to prompt or not, how to weight etc. So it could just be that the last Opinium oversampled.

taffys

Interestingly Pfizer have announced plans to sell bonds in big size today...

Pulpstar

OblitusSumMe said:

The big polling news is that Lord Ashcroft has announced that starting this week he’ll be doing a weekly phone poll right through until the general election.

That is fantastic news for polling geeks.

Good - Online polls have so many adjustments to particularly UKIP that getting an accurate gauge on them is very very hard indeed due to self selection bias and imo the overcompensation often seen for it.

Phone polls will be a better judge.

RodCrosby

Opinium UNS

UKIP 23 (+10)
Lab 24 (+11)
Con 17 (-9)
LD 2 (-9)
Green 1 (-1)
SNP 2 (nc)
Plaid 1 (nc)

Lab emerge 1 seat ahead despite coming second in the PV. Shows that D'Hondt is slightly biased to Lab...

Quincel

Ashcroft says his first phone poll has the Tories ahead:

twitter.com/LordAshcroft/status/465851669675515904

Pulpstar

JohnLilburne said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Oh which pollster(s) to believe

well they both have them within MOE of 30%. On UKIP I think it is less helpful to look at trends as I think all pollsters have had difficulties getting a handle on them, whether to prompt or not, how to weight etc. So it could just be that the last Opinium oversampled.

Yep THink the +/- is due to this not because of any fall in support for UKIP. Looking at the Populus data tables something similiar seems to have happened.

Easterross

Afternoon all, so the weekend polls are looking more like outliers. Looking more like Labour could be 3rd in the Euros.

Morris_Dancer

Mr. Quincel, Labour down on 32 seems out of kilter with other polls. All other numbers seem more or less in line.

ToryJim

Quincel said:

Ashcroft says his first phone poll has the Tories ahead:

twitter.com/LordAshcroft/status/465851669675515904

That's an impressive way to debut, not that I'm suggesting it's contrived but to launch a poll and get a result that will imminently get talked about must be pleasing.

AlastairMeeks

http://images.dpchallenge.com/images_portfolio/35000-39999/37252/800/Copyrighted_Image_Reuse_Prohibited_355060.jpg

saddo

Just seen the performance of wee Dougie on Sunday Politics yesterday.

It does now appear clear that Miliband & Co actually believe all their evil Tory bollox to be actual fact and seem to be losing the plot. They are likely to go more and more left wing the nearer it gets to May 2015 as they believe their own hype.

JohnLilburne

Quincel said:

Ashcroft says his first phone poll has the Tories ahead:

twitter.com/LordAshcroft/status/465851669675515904

Squirrel video! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugowjSrmyeI (parental advisory)

SandyRentool

Looks like there's a new Gold Standard ;-)

TCPoliticalBetting

At these Euro polling levels, the surprise should be that the Con vote is holding up so well compared to last time and the surge of UKIP. The 2009 figs were:
C 27.90% LAB 15.80% LD 13.80% UKIP 16.60% GRN 8.10%

Also noted that the Lab polling in 2009 (last 5 surveys) was running at almost 2% points above the actual result whereas the C result was 0.7% above the polling.

If Yougov in the article was right we could then see the C result dead level with Labour. What would it take for a Lab Leadership crisis? Lab 3rd in the Euros?

AlastairMeeks

On topic and on Ashcroft, I'm very doubtful whether we should be treating any polls very seriously at present. The public is in a febrile and frivolous mood, and there's no clear way to know how the public mood will develop over the next year.

anotherDave

Opinium have published the details of their Observer Westminster VI poll.

Mr Farage has the highest net approval of the four party leaders (+30/-40).

http://news.opinium.co.uk/survey-results/political-polling-6th-may-2014

Neil

So having ridiculed all those who got a crossover prediction wrong by mere months Compouter faces the ignomy of having his / her prediction out by at least a year. Tragic.

Richard_Nabavi

Ashcroft full write-up here - some interesting stuff:

http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/05/lord-ashcroft-in-the-first-of-my-new-national-polls-the-tories-lead-by-two-points.html

AveryLP

Basil defects to the Pirate Party

http://bit.ly/1sEatP3

Lennon

Which company runs Ashcroft's Phone polls? (ie can it be compared to a previous poll)

TheScreamingEagles

I've updated the thread header with Lord Ashcroft's first and new phone poll

glw

RodCrosby got it right then, assuming that the new Ashcroft poll is considered to be in play.

Slackbladder

BOOM Crossover baby!

Need to see it with other established pollsters though I think.

OblitusSumMe

antifrank said:

On topic and on Ashcroft, I'm very doubtful whether we should be treating any polls very seriously at present. The public is in a febrile and frivolous mood, and there's no clear way to know how the public mood will develop over the next year.

Certainly it would be very surprising if the opinion polls scores were not significantly different by the time most of the public have forgotten about the upcoming elections, and hopeful eyes turn towards potentially clearing skies with hands poised on barbecue skewers.

It's the wild changes that make watching the polls fun and, I imagine, for those who bet, profitable.

TheScreamingEagles

Lennon said:

Which company runs Ashcroft's Phone polls? (ie can it be compared to a previous poll)

In the past, he has used Populus, but populus haven't conducted a phone poll since late 2012

JosiasJessop

Time for everyone's favourite squirrel:

http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130625111842/nicktoons-united/images/6/66/Sandy_Cheeks_-_Bikini.png

TheScreamingEagles

We're expecting the Guardian/ICM poll today.

TheScreamingEagles

Pepe Mel gone.

anotherDave

This seems to be Opinium's first EU Parliament poll. So they can't be showing UKIP 'moving down', this poll is the starting point.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2014_(United_Kingdom)#2014

TheScreamingEagles

Re the Ashcroft poll a couple of things to remember

1) It is just one poll
2) Even on this score, Ed becomes PM
3) Poor Basil

Richard_Nabavi

Wow, now this is a poll finding to savour:

How positive or negative do you feel about each of the following, using a scale from -100 (very negative) to +100 (very positive), where zero means neither positive or negative?

George Osborne: -30.61
Ed Miliband: -31.23

Put your coffee down before reading the next bit.... that is amongst Labour supporters!!

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/National-poll-summary-140512.pdf

RodCrosby

YouGov UNS

UKIP 24 (+11)
Lab 22 (+9)
Con 17 (-9)
LD 3 (-8)
Green* 1 (-1)
SNP 2 (nc)
Plaid 1 (nc)

*estimate, no Green figure given.

Lennon

AveryLP said:

Basil defects to the Pirate Party
http://bit.ly/1sEatP3

Oooh Aaarghh... I think that if he is wanting a new crossover challenge - Pirate Party to be big enough to warrant separate inclusion in 'Others' (so like the Greens at the moment).

TheScreamingEagles

1,001 adults were interviewed by telephone between 9 – 11 May 2014. Results have been weighted to be
representative of all adults in Great Britain

AveryLP

Richard_Nabavi said:

Ashcroft full write-up here - some interesting stuff:

http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/05/lord-ashcroft-in-the-first-of-my-new-national-polls-the-tories-lead-by-two-points.html

Richard

You neglected to quote the best bit directly:

Interestingly for proponents of the theory that the Tories have a particular problem with female voters – which my previous analysis suggests is mistaken – women gave Cameron slightly higher marks (-3.33 on a scale from -100 to +100) than he received from men (-4.46).

In memoriam tim.

JohnLilburne

TheScreamingEagles said:

Lennon said:

Which company runs Ashcroft's Phone polls? (ie can it be compared to a previous poll)

In the past, he has used Populus, but populus haven't conducted a phone poll since late 2012

What does "CATI" mean in the table header?

[Edited to say: Computer Aided Telephone Interviewing. Thought it might be an obscure MR company]

Anyway, I though milord Ashcroft was his own polling organisation, he just contracts out the tedious job of phoning 1,001 people and asking them PITA questions.

Scott_P

First!

This is great news for the YeSNP campaign...

Scott_P

if the party suffers a poor result on 22 May, becoming the first opposition party in the last 20 years not to win the European elections, Labour's tensions could once again burst into the open.

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/05/labour-tensions-over-election-strategy-are-growing

TheScreamingEagles

JohnLilburne said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Lennon said:

Which company runs Ashcroft's Phone polls? (ie can it be compared to a previous poll)

In the past, he has used Populus, but populus haven't conducted a phone poll since late 2012

What does "CATI" mean in the table header?

Anyway, I though milord Ashcroft was his own polling organisation, he just contracts out the tedious job of phoning 1,001 people and asking them PITA questions.

Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing.

In the past he subcontracts, he comes up with the questions and the areas they should target, such as marginals etc, but the fieldwork is done by pollsters.

RodCrosby

'by May', and here it is right in the middle of May...

Not a bad prediction, even if I dare say so myself!

(^_-)

glw

Richard_Nabavi said:

Put your coffee down before reading the next bit.... that is amongst Labour supporters!!

That's good but I think I'm going to enjoy the excuses even more.

Slackbladder

Richard_Nabavi said:

Wow, now this is a poll finding to savour:

How positive or negative do you feel about each of the following, using a scale from -100 (very negative) to +100 (very positive), where zero means neither positive or negative?

George Osborne: -30.61
Ed Miliband: -31.23

Put your coffee down before reading the next bit.... that is amongst Labour supporters!!

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/National-poll-summary-140512.pdf

So basically.... Ed's crap.

AlastairMeeks

OblitusSumMe said:

antifrank said:

On topic and on Ashcroft, I'm very doubtful whether we should be treating any polls very seriously at present. The public is in a febrile and frivolous mood, and there's no clear way to know how the public mood will develop over the next year.

Certainly it would be very surprising if the opinion polls scores were not significantly different by the time most of the public have forgotten about the upcoming elections, and hopeful eyes turn towards potentially clearing skies with hands poised on barbecue skewers.

It's the wild changes that make watching the polls fun and, I imagine, for those who bet, profitable.

My current betting strategy is based around UKIP doing very well in the Euros, as my posts on my own site, I hope, make clear.

JohnO

AveryLP said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

Ashcroft full write-up here - some interesting stuff:

http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/05/lord-ashcroft-in-the-first-of-my-new-national-polls-the-tories-lead-by-two-points.html

Richard

You neglected to quote the best bit directly:

Interestingly for proponents of the theory that the Tories have a particular problem with female voters – which my previous analysis suggests is mistaken – women gave Cameron slightly higher marks (-3.33 on a scale from -100 to +100) than he received from men (-4.46).

In memoriam tim.

I belive he is still among us and saving his pocket money for yet another payout to the pbTories.

JohnLilburne

anotherDave said:

This seems to be Opinium's first EU Parliament poll. So they can't be showing UKIP 'moving down', this poll is the starting point.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2014_(United_Kingdom)#2014

http://news.opinium.co.uk/survey-results/european-parliament-polling-6th-may

"Changes refer to our previous unpublished poll (data tables available shortly) conducted between the 29th April and the 1st May."

Scott_P

@LadPolitics: Tories now clear favs to win most votes at G.E. after @LordAshcroft poll. Labour still favs to win most seats. http://t.co/8985Dy2GDR

MarkSenior

The Ashcroft data tables have the same presentation of ICM polls

RodCrosby

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

glw

Slackbladder said:

So basically.... Ed's crap.

That's being quite generous. It's more accurate to say that Labour supporters rate the most incompetent and evil Chancellor in history more highly than they rate the intellectually self confident Ed Miliband.

rcs1000

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

Almost no stable government possible with that result.

anotherDave

Daily Politics interview with Unite Against Fascism (UAF) bod. UAF apparently _don't_ think UKIP are fascists.

http://youtu.be/sVFlCRY3cy4

Richard_Nabavi

Note also that Labour supporters have a more favourable view of Nick Clegg than of Ed Miliband.

Mr Axelrod, I think you have taken on an interesting challenge.

TheScreamingEagles

rcs1000 said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

Almost no stable government possible with that result.

Grand Coalition.

Dave as PM, George Osborne as Chancellor, Ed Balls as Chief Sec to the Treasury, Ed Miliband as Home Sec?

ToryJim

Interesting that swing voters rank both Farage and UKIP below Clegg as the least favoured of any on the list. I wonder if that says anything about the solidity of the UKIP vote or if there is a limit at present to the size of its vote.

Scott_P

glw said:

That's being quite generous. It's more accurate to say that Labour supporters rate the most incompetent and evil Chancellor in history more highly than they rate the intellectually self confident Ed Miliband.

Like

Pulpstar

rcs1000 said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

Almost no stable government possible with that result.

I think Lib Dems will outperform UNS of their VI number at GE2015.

anotherDave

ToryJim said:

Interesting that swing voters rank both Farage and UKIP below Clegg as the least favoured of any on the list. I wonder if that says anything about the solidity of the UKIP vote or if there is a limit at present to the size of its vote.

Given that UKIP attracts swing voters, and LDs don't, I think it says there's a mistake somewhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election#Graphical_summary

OblitusSumMe

MarkSenior said:

The Ashcroft data tables have the same presentation of ICM polls

Yes, and there's some interesting stuff in there. It looks like the Greens are on 5% in this poll, most of that coming from 2010 Lib Dems, but also most of those being "swing voters" who might vote differently in 2015 to how they say now.

The Tories have a lead in this swing voter category, and they also notably have a really strong lead in the C2's, by 33% to 22% (Table 3). Slight note of caution on this is that the C2s were upweighted by 50% in this poll's sample from 140 unweighted to 218 weighted.

Will be interesting to take another look at that sub-sample in next weeks poll.

David_Evershed

Looks like the Conservatives will again need a coalition with Lib Dems if they want to be in government.

But will Lib Dem hold enough seats at the next general election to make this possible?

The Conservative Party needs to do whatever it can to help the Lib Dems get back its deserters to Labour.This will help both Cons and Lib Dems retain some seats against Labour.

Lennon

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

And what would the Effective Number of Parties be?

JohnLilburne

antifrank said:

OblitusSumMe said:

antifrank said:

On topic and on Ashcroft, I'm very doubtful whether we should be treating any polls very seriously at present. The public is in a febrile and frivolous mood, and there's no clear way to know how the public mood will develop over the next year.

Certainly it would be very surprising if the opinion polls scores were not significantly different by the time most of the public have forgotten about the upcoming elections, and hopeful eyes turn towards potentially clearing skies with hands poised on barbecue skewers.

It's the wild changes that make watching the polls fun and, I imagine, for those who bet, profitable.

My current betting strategy is based around UKIP doing very well in the Euros, as my posts on my own site, I hope, make clear.

I think they will. The graph on the Wikipedia page still shows them averaging less than last year's peak by about half a point (although if you average the 10 most recent polls it now puts them over 15%) but that was after the publicity they got for doing fairly well in the County elections. This year they are going to get a double dose of publicity with a no doubt much improved poll in the locals compared with the last District elections, and then probably winning the Euros. Lorra lorra publicity. The question is how much they will tail off over the next year but my guess is they won't go much below 12% as that seems to be where they levelled out at before the current pre-Euros publicity. The next question is whether they will pick up an election campaign boost - depends on OfCom I suspect - and whether people who support them for local/Euro elections will still vote for them in a GE. Certainly they're a big potential spoiler.

isam

migrationwatch ‏@migrationwatch 27m

.@CVar_Sil you are now forecasting Rom&Bulg migration in line with our estimates, which you dismissed as 'speculating wildly' last August

isam

Blimey

Lord Ashcroft ‏@LordAshcroft 7m

In my poll, 52% of Con voters, 47% of Lab, 61% of Lib Dems and 47% of UKIP say they may change their mind before the election.

anotherDave

JohnLilburne said:

anotherDave said:

This seems to be Opinium's first EU Parliament poll. So they can't be showing UKIP 'moving down', this poll is the starting point.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_election,_2014_(United_Kingdom)#2014

http://news.opinium.co.uk/survey-results/european-parliament-polling-6th-may

"Changes refer to our previous unpublished poll (data tables available shortly) conducted between the 29th April and the 1st May."

!!
Thanks for that.

TheScreamingEagles

David_Evershed said:

Looks like the Conservatives will again need a coalition with Lib Dems if they want to be in government.

But will Lib Dem hold enough seats at the next general election to make this possible?

The Conservative Party needs to do whatever it can to help the Lib Dems get back its deserters to Labour.This will help both Cons and Lib Dems retain some seats against Labour.

Appoint Nick Clegg as our next European Commissioner and allow the Lib Dems to choose a leader more amenable to the 2010 LD > Lab switchers.

TheScreamingEagles

Hopi Sen ‏@hopisen 5m

How to be sensible: Be no more excited/worried by @LordAshcroft poll with Tory lead than you were by @YouGov poll with 7 point Labour lead..

ToryJim

TheScreamingEagles said:

rcs1000 said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

Almost no stable government possible with that result.

Grand Coalition.

Dave as PM, George Osborne as Chancellor, Ed Balls as Chief Sec to the Treasury, Ed Miliband as Home Sec?

I think it would be more likely to test the Fixed Term Parliament Act, if that were the result a second election would have to follow rapidly.

TheScreamingEagles

Anyone want to guess what Dan Hodges' blog about this Lord Ashcroft poll is going to say?

Ed is crap, I was right?

Socrates

TheScreamingEagles said:

David_Evershed said:

Looks like the Conservatives will again need a coalition with Lib Dems if they want to be in government.

But will Lib Dem hold enough seats at the next general election to make this possible?

The Conservative Party needs to do whatever it can to help the Lib Dems get back its deserters to Labour.This will help both Cons and Lib Dems retain some seats against Labour.

Appoint Nick Clegg as our next European Commissioner and allow the Lib Dems to choose a leader more amenable to the 2010 LD > Lab switchers.

The Conservative party would never forgive Cameron for appointing an arch europhile as our only representative in the European Commission.

TheScreamingEagles

Socrates said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

David_Evershed said:

Looks like the Conservatives will again need a coalition with Lib Dems if they want to be in government.

But will Lib Dem hold enough seats at the next general election to make this possible?

The Conservative Party needs to do whatever it can to help the Lib Dems get back its deserters to Labour.This will help both Cons and Lib Dems retain some seats against Labour.

Appoint Nick Clegg as our next European Commissioner and allow the Lib Dems to choose a leader more amenable to the 2010 LD > Lab switchers.

The Conservative party would never forgive Cameron for appointing an arch europhile as our only representative in the European Commission.

We're pragmatists, we'll do whatever is necessary to ensure we remain in power after the next general election

(And no, I wasn't stroking a white cat as I said that)

Richard_Nabavi

anotherDave said:

Given that UKIP attracts swing voters, and LDs don't, I think it says there's a mistake somewhere.

I don't think it's a mistake as such. Lord Ashcroft's definition of 'swing voters' is a very disparate mix - "those saying they do not know how they will vote or that they may yet change their minds".

I'm not sure that's a very useful definition in this context - it will include an odd mixture of quite far-left voters, quite far-right voters, disgruntled Tories, Labour voters unkeen on Ed M, Lab/LD switchers, Don't Knows, None of the Aboves, and a few Lab/Tory swingers.

felix

TheScreamingEagles said:

Hopi Sen ‏@hopisen 5m

How to be sensible: Be no more excited/worried by @LordAshcroft poll with Tory lead than you were by @YouGov poll with 7 point Labour lead..

Spot on I think, everything is distorted by the Euro election effect. However, there is every sign that the Labour vote is very flaky and becoming more so as the good economic news gains traction and the paucity of Labour policies gets ever more stark. Particulalrly foolish to think that this or any other poll rules in or out any election result next year.

TheScreamingEagles

liversedge ‏@liversedge 4m

@JohnRentoul The mean attitudes to the parties Lab 0, Con -7, LD -17, UKIP -19 is interesting.

JBriskin

Hi,

I've been lurking. The Hodgson squad's been announced if anyone else is doing the same.

FrancisUrquhart

Labour on 32%....nah not buying it...Labour / Tories gap down to basically 1-2%, that doesn't seem improbable. 34/36 seems to be where we are now.

Despite Cameron being hated by lots of UKIP voters, I still don't buy UKIP will get anywhere near 15% in the GE, doesn't mean they will all vote Tory in GE.

Socrates

isam said:

migrationwatch ‏@migrationwatch 27m

.@CVar_Sil you are now forecasting Rom&Bulg migration in line with our estimates, which you dismissed as 'speculating wildly' last August

The Migration Observatory's response seems to imply that no one should ever make projections on anything.

RodCrosby

Lennon said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

And what would the Effective Number of Parties be?

(for GB)

ENPe = 4.0
ENPp = 2.2

ToryJim

TheScreamingEagles said:

David_Evershed said:

Looks like the Conservatives will again need a coalition with Lib Dems if they want to be in government.

But will Lib Dem hold enough seats at the next general election to make this possible?

The Conservative Party needs to do whatever it can to help the Lib Dems get back its deserters to Labour.This will help both Cons and Lib Dems retain some seats against Labour.

Appoint Nick Clegg as our next European Commissioner and allow the Lib Dems to choose a leader more amenable to the 2010 LD > Lab switchers.

Cameron can't do that as far more important is keeping his backbenchers onside. Appointing a Europhile to the EU Commission would provoke apoplexy, appointing Clegg would provoke nuclear Armageddon. Not happening.

rcs1000

ToryJim said:

Interesting that swing voters rank both Farage and UKIP below Clegg as the least favoured of any on the list. I wonder if that says anything about the solidity of the UKIP vote or if there is a limit at present to the size of its vote.

I think the real risk for UKIP is that they end up the victim of "anti" tactical voting. Will Thurrock LibDems vote Conservative to stop UKIP, for example? (Thurrock, with its high BNP vote in 2010 to be squeezed, plus the nature of the seat that means the winner may only need 33% to get elected makes it - I agree - an ideal target.)

TheScreamingEagles

antifrank said:

http://images.dpchallenge.com/images_portfolio/35000-39999/37252/800/Copyrighted_Image_Reuse_Prohibited_355060.jpg

I should have embedded that picture into my tweet.

Lennon

RodCrosby said:

Lennon said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

And what would the Effective Number of Parties be?

(for GB)

ENPe = 4.0
ENPp = 2.2

Thanks... ENPe above 4 does seem to be a reasonable bound on FPTP

JBriskin

It's a great tweet TSE

TheScreamingEagles

So that's sorted out what every Monday afternoon thread on pb is going to be about for the next year.

[Deleted User]

Sky News just reporting that a new poll (Ashcroft funded) has Tories ahead of Labour by 2% for GE. Is crossover now here?

JBriskin

Oh Caitlin Moran might tell me off for that.

TheScreamingEagles

Mind bleach.

Michael Gove has just talked about the Karma Sutra.

isam

Matthew Goodwin ‏@GoodwinMJ 8m

Why, since 2009, has @Nigel_Farage & #UKIP grown so fast among these groups? (data from @RevoltonRight) ---> pic.twitter.com/mUiIXjMkZg

RodCrosby

Lennon said:

RodCrosby said:

Lennon said:

RodCrosby said:

Ashcroft UNS

Lab 307
Con 293
LD 21
UKIP 0
Oths 11
NI 18

And what would the Effective Number of Parties be?

(for GB)

ENPe = 4.0
ENPp = 2.2

Thanks... ENPe above 4 does seem to be a reasonable bound on FPTP

We could be heading for the nightmare scenario where vote rank
1,2,3,4 turns into seat rank
2,1,4,3

FPTP = random number generator

Democracy? Pffftt!

AveryLP

JohnO said:

AveryLP said:

Richard_Nabavi said:

Ashcroft full write-up here - some interesting stuff:

http://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2014/05/lord-ashcroft-in-the-first-of-my-new-national-polls-the-tories-lead-by-two-points.html

Richard

You neglected to quote the best bit directly:

Interestingly for proponents of the theory that the Tories have a particular problem with female voters – which my previous analysis suggests is mistaken – women gave Cameron slightly higher marks (-3.33 on a scale from -100 to +100) than he received from men (-4.46).

In memoriam tim.

I believe he is still among us ....

I share your faith and am praying for a second coming.

Pulpstar

Btw Labour weighted base @ 213; Con @ 204, Labour 32%, Con 34% - how does that one work.

Shy Tories in the don't knows/refuse ?

On the other side, his UKIP figure of 15% looks very correct indeed. (Almost zero adjustment)