Could the Lib Dems really be reduced to six seats?
December 29th, 2006
Putting today’s Communicate Research figures into the Baxter calculator
The above is from Martin Baxter’s Electoral Calculus site and shows what happens if you put the party shares from this morning’s Communicate Research poll for the Independent into his Commons seat predictor. For the numbers the pollster reports are, compared with last month’s figures CON 36 (+2): LAB 37 (+1): LD 14 (-3).
The fieldwork for the survey took place in the week before Christmas and ended two days before the YouGov poll that was in the Sunday Times at the weekend and had the Lib Dems down at 15%. That poll, however, had the Tories with a 5% lead.
We have discussed before how the CR methodology, which is currently “under review”, does not use past vote weighting to ensure a politically balanced sample which would tend to give it bigger Labour shares.
CR’s survey means that all the pollsters have shown a fall back in Lib Dem support during December which must start to get worrying for the party leadership.
With most of the pollsters the party is not faring as well as the first surveys taken after David Cameron’s election as Tory leader a year ago when Charles Kennedy was still in charge.
The Martin Baxter calculation is based on a uniform national swing and does not take into account regional variations or local factors like the strength of a Lib Dem incumbent. Lembit Opik’s Montgomery seat, for instance, comes out as a Tory gain. But the six seat prediction is not good. The other main calculator, from Anthony Wells at UK Polling Report, has a different way of calculating the swing and puts the Lib Dems at 30 seats.
I’ve long taken the view that as long as Ming remains in good health he would go on to lead his party at the next election. Now I think that unless there’s a reversal in the polling trend then he might just start to come under pressure.
Mike Smithson
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In 1970 the Liberal Party got through the election with six seats on 7.5% of the national vote. As we all know, the British electoral system is not proportional and we cannot know how the random element will play out. However, a drop to 14% would certainly lead to a big drop in seats. I’m afraid I regard that as quite likely as the Liberal Democrats seem to have no discernable strategy other than “incrementalism” which cannot work in a first past the post electoral system. As the electorate realise that voting Lib Dem increases the chances of the party they want least, they will return to the party most likely to prevent such a result. The only way round this is to have such a ’strong brand’ that it overcomes these rational concerns, to adopt a strategy, over the long term, in which the positive outweighs the fear factor. Ming has much to commend him but, so far, he does not look to have the makings of such a strong brand, he sounds a little like Kofi Annan; precise, thoughtful and irrelevant.
Dear LibDems,
I wouldn’t give unweighted tosh like CR a second thought. As a Tory I know I don’t.
One thing about the CR poll that I did not comment on is that the pollster is reporting the Labour would do BETTER than at the last General Election - up nearly one bper cent. So after the loans row and everything elose the Indy’s pollster thinks Labour has improved its position. What more do you need to say?
The Libs got 13.8% in ‘79 and even that garnered 11 seats, with the disastrous Thorpe affair around their necks like an albatross, against the strongest pro-Tory tide since the War.
So Baxter is just-for-fun. I would estimate, barring a cataclysm, a baseline of about 40 seats now.
I think it’s true to say, every time the Lib vote has fallen, they’ve held onto more seats than a UNS would predict.
While the third party is often seen as a wasted vote nationally, historically they’ve scored highly on the question “If you thought they could win, would you vote for them?” When they DO capture a seat locally, electors tend to prove that the latter question is the more salient… and they’re rather hard to dislodge.
2 - Commentator, most pollsters take the view that, important though trying to accurately assess what are current levels of support of each of the parties, the real thing you should use polls for (especially when we are nowhere near election periods) is for discerning trends. In that sense what is important is not that certain pollsters are showing the LibDems at lower levels than others, but that ALL of the pollsters are showing a recent decline in LibDem support (to the extent that rogue polls, natural variation etc can probably be ruled out). So yes, LibDems should give them a “second thought”.
3 - Depends if you take the view that a large number of Labour supporters “lent” their vote to the LibDems as a protest against Blair and Iraq during the last election. There are all sorts of reasons why Labour could be higher now than at the election.
The story of 2006 is surely the unprecedented and consistent rise of “The Others.” Assuming no polling bias, the Margin of Error on small parties is a lot smaller than for the rest, typically +/-1% at 95% confidence, so we can be quite certain this phenomenon is real….
1-4 All sensible comments. However, the question relates at least as much to the response of Lib Dem activists to the polls as to whether the poll is accurate.
This is the second poll in a row to have the Lib Dems in the mid-teens and while there might be questions about the methodology employed in both cases, it won’t do party members’ confidence much good. For that matter, nor will it for the average Tory member seeing this one, but at least that’s offset by decent scores and leads in other polls - and by the performance nationally.
And therein lies the crux of the matter - not so much whether the figures are right, but whether they’re plausible. Ming has been anonymous in the media recently, though other Lib Dems have done quite well at getting on TV - but that only counts if they’re recognised and I’m not sure many are. There has to be a concern among members and activists that even if this figure is an aberration now, it might not be before too long if thngs stay as they are.
It is of course not just possible but likely that the Lib Dems will do better than their national performance in those seats they already hold, but that could still lead to more losses than the party’s suffered at an election since the 20’s: the consequence of having more seats than at any point since then. The Lib Dems haven’t much of a record of removing leaders precipitously but then they’ve not really been in this position before.
Short of further health problems, I don’t see Ming going this side of the next election; he’s a resolute campaigner and has a mandate from his party - a fact which ought to be of significance. It would also be seen accurately as a panic measure. The only comparable situation historically is the removal of IDS in 2003, but that was at least the only ‘coup’ in the party that parliament - to remove Ming would mean a second in the same one - and the Tories had a steady pair of hands to put their confidence into. Ming, by contrast, is the Michael Howard figure. To go elsewhere would be a jump in the dark.
The Lib Dems won’t be reduced to six seats whatever happens and Baxter really shows its flaw when it produced outcomes like that on sensible input figures (14% is low, but not impossible for a third party, especially if some votes leak to minor parties), and Lib Dems know that. Their problems will come if they start to panic in the face of any possible losses - they are inevitable for all parties sooner or later - rather than adapting their game plan.
Alex, I don’t think so. No amount of lipstick can pretty up the pig that is CR. Let the LDs be concerned, sure, by their showing in the real polls, YouGov, Populus, and ICM. A sample that’s worthless means a poll that’s worthless. Ask John Kerry.
In this case, if it shows a LD decline that is imo pure co-incidence. Their huge Labour sample is not reflective of the population as a whole.
The principle way CR has an impact is that ConservativeHome will highlight it and put it in their totally discredited “poll of polls” and bang on about how the Cameron project is apparently “faltering”. I am not looking forward to 9am as it is not good for my blood pressure to see the leading Tory site taking this rubbish seriously.
7 - that is true, but should also be treated warily. Most of these “others” voters will not get an opportunity to vote for their chosen party.
One other technical question on the pollsters - when they record a person’s vote as “other” do they require a party to be specified? Or is the “other” vote recorded regardless?
I meant principal. Sorry. Need coffee.
re 10. Yes - generally the other parties are recorded and listed in the detailed data from the pollster. Some people, however, just say “other” without naming a party and they are also included in the listings.
re 4. Rod - you cannot just dismiss Baxter as “just for fun”. He has been around for a long time and has a good record. What I was hoping this thread would produce is a serious debate on how the Uniform National Swing is calculated. Baxter operates in a different way from Wells and this will arise time and time again in the run up to the General Election.
10. Yes, so this pool of Others throws added uncertainty to the polls, so far as seat outcomes go. I think the increase in the others since 2005 has been larger than the Con/Lab lead…Who will they “break” for? More analysis is required by the pollsters…
Of course you can dismiss it as “just for fun” if you are only interested in seeing how close the LibDems could come to wipeout. “just for fun” is roughly equivalent to “not to be taken seriously” which is what it is. It serves a useful purpose for showing the electoral advantage that the system currently gives the Labour Party, and is quite good for post-election analysis/explanation, but as a serious predictor - well it’s as good as any model, which is not very good at all.
On the question of whether the Lib Dems could be reduced to six seats, I think it should be made clear that it is Anthony Wells’ calculator that uses the standard Uniform Swing method, while Martin Baxter has his own method which he calls the ‘transitional model’.
Baxter’s model has a certain mathemetical elegance in that it prevents a party’s vote share falling below zero, but it is much harsher on the Lib Dems than it is on the two main parties for an equal fall in national vote share. It hasn’t been tested under the specific circumstances of a large fall in Lib Dem vote share coupled with a significant rise in Conservative support. The last time this happened was 1979, and by my reckoning Baxter would have predicted one seat for the Liberals (Orkney and Shetland), uniform swing predicted six seats and they actually ended up with 11 seats.
If we go into the next general election with the Lib Dems down by three points or more on their 2005 share and the Conservatives on the up, the standard uniform swing calculation should prove a much better predictor of Lib Dem seats than the Baxter model.
It reallly is time for CR to reveiew its polling method. I find it scarcely credible that any poll could show NEW Labour in the lead, in fact I am sure the other polls are correct to weight for misremembering.
Its a bit like people saying they are Chelsea or Man Utd fans, they arent really nor are they in real life, they support their local team !
I have a strong feeling that local factors/tactical voting will weigh heavily at the next Election, particularly if your Hospital has been closed.
Unless NEW Lab can get out of Iraq b4 the next election, methinks they will get a hammering at the polls.
12. I do dismiss him - nothing personal. I’m in good company, I think. As far as I know, there is not one single reputable psephologist since 1945 who has stuck with the “proportional loss” method of forecasting seats, as Baxter does. In fact some have considered it only to hypothesize why it manifestly DOESN’T work, notably Michael Steed as long ago as 1970.
I well remember a 1985 Guardian headline “Alliance zoom to 266 seats - on a computer…” I think that was, in retrospect, pretty dismissive too. That prediction was, you’ve guessed, based on proportional loss.
UNS is not perfect, and perhaps can be improved upon. It is interesting that in 2005, the 66-seat majority forecast was obtained using a probabilistic approach…
The Independent says CR asked a squeeze question, which then increased the Labour share.
Is this `spiral of silence` regarding Labour voters going to catch many out, as it did for the Conservatives in 92.
The Libdems will certainly have to do some serious thinkiing about Ming, Ming will be 67 by the time of the next GE. He could be thought of as a Michael Foot character, with all the derision that would bring. As for the polls, which ever way you cut it, the Tories should be basking in a substantial lead, they are not!
If I recall CR had the Lib dems at 16% a week or so before the last election.
However they do appear to be in some sort of trouble and for whatever reason are on a general downward path.
Has Opik,s activities anything to do with it?
Perhaps as an “Event dear boy an Event”, it has been underestimated.
Personally I thought it almost inconceivable that the present leader would remain through to general election in 3 years time, the LD’s problem will be if one is called in 2007.
Maybe better start thinking about the odds on a woman leader.
In answer to the original question
YES,and the sooner the better.
20.”If I recall CR had the Lib dems at 16% a week or so before the last election”
In the run up of the GE, CR showed the Libdems at:
Jan 30: 20%
Feb 27: 17%
March 27: 17%
Apr 3: 16%
Apr 17: 20%
Apr 24: 18%
May 1: 23%
Lib Dems in December..You Gov 15/17 Comm Res 14 ICM 18 MORI 18 Populus 19…it is surely now clear that all these pollsters are greatly understating the true Lib Dem share…which is surely around 25% as shown by Dunfermline, Bromley and the amazing success in the May locals in places like Worthing.
1. Personally, I’d like to see the LDs develop a ‘fear factor’ of their own. Labour and Conservaties have honed their messages about what voters lose if they switch (abandon Labour and lose public services, abandon Tories and face higher taxes) but LDs haven’t articulated what voters lose by NOT voting LD, which leaves their vote softer than the others.
20.”Maybe better start thinking about the odds on a woman leader”
The LD women with potential (Willot, Swinson, Featherstone, Goldsworthy and co) are still in their first term (well, some can argue that Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne are also from the new intake. Even if they’ve both been MEPs).
Among the pre 2005 women…well, IMO Teather is not up for the job. and the rest? well, has anyone thought of Annette Brooks or Sandra Gidley as potential leaders?
24.
The fear factor would be you loose your chance of PR.
However the reverse could be true for many, the fear of actually been forced into it.
Given the scornful response to myself and others who have been speculating for so long on here and elsewhere that such an event was inevetable, I am not surprised that the Lib Dems are alarmed that their polling numbers are drifting ever downwards.
Sadly too many of their activists and MP’s just don’t get it; unless the Lib Dems decide once and for all which direction they intend to go in they will continued to be squeezed back to irrelevance.
Kennedys personality alone was worth 5% and this, added to an unpopular opposition and Government allowed Lib Dems to defer the Big Decision.
But the political landscape looks so different and will continue to change during 07. Cameron is drawing support from the right of the Lib Dems and Brown I am sure will draw support from the left.
Which way are you going to go? - Left, right or down?
19 — Ming is five years younger than John McCain who looks like being the Republican US presidential candidate next time round.
28. But he looks much older.
dez @ 18 — perhaps these shy Labour supporters are pro-Labour but anti-Blair.
As I see it Baxter uses proportions rather than actual swings. So if Lab goes down 5% from 40% all Labour seats lose one-eighth of their votes. If LDs go down the same amount from 20% to 15% he takes one-quarter off the LD votes. It’s this that makes it not at all credible in cases of the LD vote dropping.
30,
John, you could be right.
That theory will be put to the test this summer.
It could also be, as between 91-92, that supporters were reluctant to admit, they preferred the government in a third term, to the alternatives currently on offer.
28. I’d expect there to be increasing focus on McCain’s age just as there was for Bob Dole, especially if he’s up against an Edwards or (even more so), Obama. He’s an old man. As is Ming.
Americans seem more inclined to accept leaders in their 60s and 70s than the British (or at least than British politicians). Could you imagine any British party choosing a leader already into their seventies in anything other than exceptional circumstances? Besides, as Yellow Peril points out, it’s not just that he is old, it’s that he looks and acts another ten years older still.
- In that sense what is important is not that certain pollsters are showing the LibDems at lower levels than others, but that ALL of the pollsters are showing a recent decline in LibDem support (to the extent that rogue polls, natural variation etc can probably be ruled out). So yes, LibDems should give them a “second thought”.
by alex December 29th, 2006 at 7:52 am
Agree with this Alex Th emost worrying poll was ICM in th Guardian whch showed a 4% drop from November- 22% -`18%.
Th real problem looming for the Lib Dems is The may local elections.
Current ratingd are are down on 2003(-3 on ICM ),whilst Tory ratings are up(+10 on ICM).
The likely result is Labour wipe out but also a substantial loss to the Tories of seats and councils from the Lib dems.
This will lead to a Tory surge in the polls squeezing the Lib dem vote further.
With this scenario it is difficult not to see a leadership contest.
rogerh
I share the concerns expressed about Labour’s favourite pollster CR.
Turning to the topic of this thread, is it the LD activists that will drive the pressure for change at the top? More likely the pressure will be from the people with power to change the Leader, the LD MPs.
Who openly put the first knife into Charlie? Answer, Sandra Gidley in a marginal with only a 125 majority.
If even the UK Polling Rpt is wrong in predicting over 30 losses and the real picture allowing for incumbency factors is a loss of 20 that is still 1/3 of the LD MPs under the axe. That will sharpen their minds and reopen a Leadership struggle.
The other factor that could come into play is that whilst the LDs may only lose 20 seats in total, their attrition rate in MPs may be 5 or more higher as they may also pick up a few seats from Labour whilst losing more to the Conservatives. 25 threatened MPs is a really big problem for the LD Leadership.
28
This is not the United States, the party political system here is entirely different.
You may be able to continue as PM, up to and probably over the age of 65. I think the chances of anyone over the age of 60, certainly 65, being elected to that position, are very unlikely: unfair perhaps! As for John McCain (who I respect) I don’t think he will be the Republican Party nominee.
Now that ideology has all but disappeared, from UK politics, voters look for other ‘things’ to vote for, or against, party leadership therefore becomes even more important.
The LDs were regularly polling below these figures during 1997-2001 and yet they increased their seats in 2001….
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Re 31
Agree - in fact, had we gone back to 1950, 1951, or 1955, the Liberals would probably have had no MPs at all according to Baxter - type predictions. This did not happen.
Re 34
Disagree - currently held Councils and seats will be much more influenced by local factors. Where the problem will come IMO in May, is that if the national party’s popularity ratings don’t turn up again, it will restrict LD gains. This is where people may well vote for Independents, or various flavours of “others” instead. Some Tory partisans on this site seem to think that Lib Dem voters will “automatically”, “revert” to the Tory party. Many have no time whatever for any flavour of Tory, and are frankly not keen on Labour either. So I think the sooner that these people and their Labour equivalents acknowledge that we are NOT returning to “two party politics”, the better.
In terms of Lib Dem prospects, unless there is a genuine turnaround, the party will face a very difficult situation at the next GE. And having previously rubbished ideas that Gordon Brown will call a snap Autumn 2007 GE, I am beginning to think that figures like these may well encourage him. We have to remember that both Labour and Tory have everything to gain by trying to knock the Lib Dems back far lower at Westminster, Ths after all is the main reason why Thatcher and Blair (the most successful PMs of recent times electorally) kept calling GEs on the same day as local elections - to restrict LD progress! 1991, 1993 and 1995 were very successful for the LDs at least partly because of that factor.
LDs would be right to be concerned about low polls and happy about good election results. Whilst they shouldn’t dismiss the former, the latter is more important.
UK Politics is currently focused on New DC, Blair Switch and GB. It’s hard for LDs to attract attention in these circumstances and they would be foolish to try to do so artificially. It’s been a difficult time for them but I think they’ve handled it well. As long as they don’t panic, they will have opportunity enough soon enough. The May elections, for example, could be good for them. If they are not, that would be the time to consider change. Not now.
Mike , Baxter does not use a UNS but a proportional method of calculating swing as 1 or 2 posters mention which means that the effect of a fall in the LibDem vote is greater in his calculations the larger the LibDem vote is . Look at the calculation on his site for example on Norfolk North . His current figures show an overall swing of around 4% but the detailed figures for Norfolk North have a swing of over 8% with LibDem share down by 12% . This forecast .
If LibDem support has really fallen to these sort of levels and Labour support is holding steady at near the level of the last GE then you would expect that council byelections would also be showing a big loss of LibDem seats and fall in votes and yet the LibDem vote is resilient up a little in most seats fought compared to May and the last GE and it is the Labour vote that is well down on the level of the last GE and indeed collapsing in much of the South .
It is true that LibDems generally perform better in council byelections by around 4-5% but allowing for this they would indicate LibDem support generally is holding firm at around the level of the last GE , Labour support is well down and Conservative and Others support is up . Any opinion poll which gives a conflicting message needs to have it’s methodology questioned closely .
41. ‘LibDem support generally is holding firm at around the level of the last GE’
Beyond parody. No doubt after a round of significant net losses next May it will still be the case that the Lib Dems are ‘doing well’.
Unless their vote share falls into single figures, I think there are three dozen seats that are unloseable for the Lib Dems. So, I would agree that any model which gives them six seats on a 14% share is flawed.
The rise of “Others” means the Lib Dems no longer get the protest vote. In particular, if the Greens get 3-4% of the vote nationally, that would come disproportionately from the Lib Dems. The Greens won 8% of the total vote in London, in May, and must have done considerable damage to the Lib Dems’ chances.
Morning all. Thanks for the article Mike.
I am having a great deal of trouble taking this poll seriously. The methodology sucks, and I am certain it underestimates Conservative and Lib Dem support.
42 If there are significant net losses next May then you would be correct and the LibDems would not be doing well and by contrast the reverse would be true so we have a measure on which we can judge LibDem performance without wishful thinking on both our parts .
39. Margaret Thatcher didn’t call either election for the same day as the locals. Both 1983 and 1987 elections were held in June - she used the locals in those years to test support before going for a dissolution.
Some excellent stuff here this morning, as always.
Just to season the pot, let me return to my King Charles’s Head - the scenario in which at the next GE we are also voting, for the first time, for a tranche of elected Lords-in-Parliament (LPs) as well as MPs. I’ve already suggested that this will lead to a significant amount of “split-ticketing” - there’s plenty of evidence that people do this already and holding a FPTP election for the Commons and a PR election for the Lords at the same time is about as clear a steer as ever could be …
I’d expect this to benefit the Tories in the Commons and hurt them in the Lords.
It also opens up the possibility of the LDs going into the next election with Sir Ming as Party Leader seeking a seat in the Upper House and A.N.Other as leader of the Parliamentary Caucus, elected from among and by Lib Dem MPs. It may not do them any good, but it would at least avoid an outright sacking.
43. Re the Greens.
Just an idea, but I think the fact that they finally gained seats in various London councils (they were just represented in Lewisham and now they’ve at least 1 councillor also in Hackney, Camden, Islington, Lambeth and Southwark) will make a bit more difficult to squeeze them in those areas as their council presence can give them more exposure in between elections.
I think it’ll also help them to hold their London Euro seat in 2009.
Thankyou David 46 - defective memory! But I think the principle still holds good, that people are thinking about both elections at same time. I believe this also accounted for poor District performance by LDs in 1999, with impending Euros in the June. And, of course, it was Callaghan who set 1979!
43 Yes Sean I agree that the strong Green performance cost the LibDems perhaps 15-20 seats across London in May . There are indications that the Greens have slipped back a little since then but their performance will still be significant .
49. Callaghan? I thought it was Frank Maguire, member for Fermanagh & South Tyrone, who famously came to “abstain in person” in the critical vote-of-confidence in March 1979….
I would like to invite readers of pb.com to visit the web-blog of the Save Bedford Hospital party on http://www.vote4barry.blogspot.com
Best wishes to all for 2007
As a LD in Marcus’ part of the world I don’t see any sign at all that his analysis is right (so maybe he is correct!).
The simple reason we are drifitng slightly in the polls is our lack of publicity. I don’t really blame anyone for that. Nor do I expect it to continue if an election is in the offing.
45. Excellent. What figure would you then describe as ’significant’…given that you thought zero net gains last time was a good performance?
RE: 53 Jon
The last period when LDs were consistently down at these levels was I believe Dec 2001 6 mths after the GE. The equivalent Dec 02 period (18mths after GE) was 23/24%.
They were well above the current levels all through 02,03,04 and 05.
Therefore the present figures for LDs is a 5 year low.
The Greens at 5% is more than significant, a squeeze question on their vote (and BNP who come out at 2%) is crucial. Having said that, I stated early yesterday that anything with a labour lead is not credible and so this poll is pretty worthless, until they get their act together it’s difficult to read anything into their findings.
One thing which may happen however is how Brown might react if he sees polls like this, he might (hopefully) think that he could win an election and the polls supposely helping labour could easily lead to their electoral dolwnfall. A bit early for a New Year’s wish but I can hope!
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54 - I think that you have to distinguish between seats fought last in 2004 and 2003 . With the former I expect a similar performance to this May , with no significant gains/losses between any of the major parties . With seats fought last in 2003 in England I would expect around 500 Labour losses with 2/3rds to Conservative and 1/3rd to LibDem and churn both ways between Con and LibDem with perhaps 50 Conservative net gains . The change in voting system in Scotland will lead to an inbuilt loss of 100 seats but I expect them to lose perhaps a further 100 .
Any chance of an intelligent response and forecast from yourself on what you expect to happen ?
50 Mark, I think the danger that the Green’s represent to the LD’s isn’t their ‘performance’, but their mere ‘presence’ (on the ballot slip). The Lib Dems no longer have the left of centre protest vote to themselves.
In a similar,though different way to the Liberals, then LibDems being seen as being a receptacle for protest votes against the Conservatives & Labour, people now have the chance to look at all three (major) parties, assess there’s nothing to choose between them (I paraphrase; anoraks such as we here could labour the nuances forever) and decide on that basis that they might as well vote for something they actually do believe in. It’s a mirror image of the Conservatives and UKIP as well as Labour(and to the lesser extent Conservatives)and the BNP.
Accepting that the pollster in question has profound questions regarding their methodology to answer for, what no-one has really touched on is how such a trend (if confirmed) will affect ‘Project Cameron’.
Those of us that have never been impressed/bought into his ‘Liberal/Conservative’ approach, will be increasingly emboldened were this to become a the norm, and the necessary Conservative 8% lead to become a fantasy.
For no other reason than this, setting aside the faults of Baxter as well as the imcumbency factor of sitting LD’s, I fear tales of them being routed are far too optimistic/premature.
59.”I think the danger that the Green’s represent to the LD’s isn’t their ‘performance’, but their mere ‘presence’ (on the ballot slip). The Lib Dems no longer have the left of centre protest vote to themselves”
I think this can become more evident in areas where the Libdems are in power at council level.
55. The Lib Dems did have a friendly political wicket to bat on at the time - the most significant political debate the country’s had for years and they were the only major party on the same side as most of the country, against a leader of the opposition who wasn’t up to the job and a PM who was leading a very split party. The remarkable thing is that the Lib Dems didn’t have more support.
I’m not sure that this kind of electoral cycle analysis is that useful any more, if it ever was. There are so many one-off incidents that can shift polls that establishing an unbiased base-line against which to measure is extremely difficult. To take one obvious point, the Conservtives are now seen a more positive light than at any time since 1992; that will obviously have an impact on the Lib Dems. The likely change in PM next year will be another. The Lib Dems can do precious little about either.
Interesting how we all make our own judgements on which pollster is the most reliable. Mike thinks that asking people who they last voted for and then largely ignoring their answer is the way to go. MORI believes that a big enough sample in face to face interviews is the way to find an accurate sample. Commentator thinks which ever one gives the Tories the biggest lead………
As I understand it none of the pollsters have changed their methodology since the last election so what better way to judge than on their last verifiable predictions? These are the results taken a week before the last election (as near as possible)
Yougov -36-32-24
CR- 39-31-23
ICM- 38-32-22
MORI- 38-32-22
Populus-38-32-21
So all are remarkably accurate. Yougov being the marginally the best followed by MORI and ICM.
Roger,
As Mike has explained a few times, I think, Mori’s poll right before the election changed to using past vote recall, bringing it in line with other pollsters. After the election they returned to their normal ways. CR overstated Labour by 3 and understated the Tories by 2, favouring Labour by a full five points over reality.
People seem to be missing this hugely important story
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article2110312.ece
“John McTernan, the Prime Minister’s political secretary, has been interviewed under caution by the Metropolitan Police over a Downing Street e-mail trail in the “cash for peerages” inquiry.
The interview signalled that police are embarking on an intensive second round of interviews with the Prime Minister’s closest aides as the unit under Assistant Commissioner John Yates draws the net tighter on No 10. Mr Blair, who was interviewed without caution before Christmas, could also face a second police interview - this time under caution.”
62 - CR being 5% out doesn’t exctly inspire confidence, this poll could easily become Con 38%, Lab 34% with that sort of accuracy.
54/58 When asked for an intelligent response Yellow Peril disappears into the blue yonder .
Afternoon all :). Of course, no one likes to see the party they support apparently slipping in the polls but activists in both the Conservative and Labour parties have also gone through phases like this and it’s how parties and activists respond to periods of unpopularity that are the true test.
Cameron will eventually be unpopular and the reaction we see at ConHome and even on here when his party slips back even a fraction is revealing. As a long-time LD supporter, I can certainly recall times when if we had polled 14-15%, we’d be reaching for the champagne.
Of course, I’d prefer us to be higher - who wouldn’t ? We’ve had a difficult year, much of it self-inflicted but as I’ve argued elsewhere, CK had to go and it was better done now than later. Menzies is a very different leader - again, as I’ve said before, he wasn’t my choice. To be fair, I doubt if we would be better off with Chris Huhne now. The fact is no one wants to listen to what we are saying - we are in the Blair endgame now and the parallels with 1989-90 are stark. Even Cameron doesn’t get huge publicity - it is all about Blair and Brown and will be until the leadership change.
I doubt there will be a “snap” election in 2007 and as we move into a more defined pre-election period, the focus will turn back to politics in a way that it has not for the last couple of months.
As has been pointed out on “Conservative Home” this months ‘poll of polls’ gives Labour a seven seat overall majority. Obviously being “Conservative Home” I’m sure we should ignore their results completely……
64. Commentator. Poor John Yates! About to be thrown on to the beat in this weather! How long can he drag this out before his superiors smell a rat. I think we should club together and buy him some thick woolly socks so the cold of the streets wont be too much for this delicate malingerer!
Health minister Ivan Lewis has defended Hazel Blear’s protesting against NHS cut in her seat.
Btw, Ian Stewart doesn’t seem to have liked Hazel’s reference to “the people of Salford and Eccles”….he declared “There’s only one MP for Eccles constituency. That’s me. That will be the case up until the constituency is abolished”
Btw, I notice that it seems Mme Dominatrix has not taken any actions against Bob Marshall Andrews’ latest initiative. I suppose it’s because if they do something, they’ll just highlight it.
67 - Stodge you can’t read anything into the comments on ConservativeHome. If even half of what was said on it was true their is no way UKIP would be polling 1% given the predictions of all these supposedly alienated Tories flocking to UKIP cause.
A few obvious points:
1) More people say they will vote Green than actually do, because in an opinion poll you can choose any party, but at an election you are limited to those who actually stand in your seat. I always say I’m voting Green when asked, but apart from in Euros, have never actually had the chance!
2) Baxter cannot incorporate the incumbency factor, and this is why I usually put a pro-Lib swing of 15% from both parties in Baxter to add some reality to the final figures. I cannot see the Libs losing many seats even if their vote nationally plummits. A few marginals maybe, if won in 2005 for the first time, but I reckon they’d struggle to drop below 45-50 seats.
3) The Lib vote obviously is being squeezed,and most of us predicted this a long while back. 2005 was their once in a generation chance of replacing a major party - if they’d gone all out at the Tories they could have virtually finished them off. Now they are losing votes they were lent at the last election back to Labour, whilst Cameron is taking other supporters from them in the other direction. They have very little about them that appeals to many voters and the reasons not to vote for the other two main parties have largely vanished.
4) There is absolutely no reason why Labour shouldn’t be doing well for a govt in the third term - the loans ’scandal’ tarnishes the Tories as much as labour, and the economy is still doing well. Those who have deserted Labour for being too right wing have already disappeared from the party’s support base and may show up in ‘other’ ratings, but until an actual General election - when it’s Labour or Tory for govt - they won’t be showing any support for Labour.
The real standings of the parties are probably
Lib c15-19%
Con c34-38%
Lab c33-37%
which with a 15% swing to the Libs to cover incumbency puts Labour 3 short of a majority. In reality, that would probably mean a slight overall Labour majority of single figures.
71. “There is absolutely no reason why Labour shouldn’t be doing well for a govt in the third term”
However as many governments in their third term, it looks “tired”.
So I would say they’re in the 31-35% box more than in the 33-37% one.
71 - 2005 was their once in a generation chance of replacing a major party - if they’d gone all out at the Tories they could have virtually finished them off.
I doubt it. There is a 25%-30% core of the electorate which is definitely conservative and definitely not liberal.
What do you think we could have done that would have “finished the Tories off”?
It’s pretty clear that the current lack of exposure is hurting the Lib Dems in the polls. As has been mentionned, we are currently in Blair end-game, which is all the press want to concentrate on. Cameron is still managing to get people interested in all his non-stories (like “we will examine high-speed trains” - yeh, and??)
When Blair does go, the flurry of attention will give Brown a small bounce, which I also expect to appear to come largely from the Lib Dems.
In between that however, I expect local factors in the local elections to give decent election results for the Lib Dems. The performance of the parties in by-elections cant be ignored, and that performance shows Tories doing very well, Lib Dems holding up well, Labour much down. That is how people are actually voting in booths.
My guess of the situation right now is that Lib Dems are down 4% ish on the GE. However, remember that they were down at these levels in Feb/March this year also, but recovered by May.
Re: John McTernan interview, how many have been interviewed under caution now? It means surely that he is a suspect.
74.”The performance of the parties in by-elections cant be ignored, and that performance shows Tories doing very well, Lib Dems holding up well, Labour much down”
Compared to what?
PS I find it so strange that the proportionate swing method produces such naff results. It looks so logical. As a (former) scientist it is exactly what I would assume would be the underlying mechanism, yet clearly UNS is a better approximation, even though it doesnt really make any sense!
75: Compared to pre-Cameron.
77. I suppose that with “byelections” you meant council byelections. Sean Fear in one of latest Friday slots made a recap of council byelections held since September. 23 of those seats were also contested in May 2006 and Labour is 1.8% down compared to the May 2006 performace. The 2006 locals national projected share for Labour was on par with the one of 2004 locals (so pre-Cameron).
76 - there are arguments that try to rationalise it. You can argue for example that supporters of a party tend to stick with it in proportion to the extent to which they’re surrounded by other supporters. But this and other explanations seem rather ex post facto: to my knowledge no one has built a model that uses convincing quantitative assumptions and gives you UNS as an emergent property.
I remember in the runup to the 2005 GE Printz becoming VERY ANGRY!!! about predictions not using proportionate swing, and Robert Waller discussing some of the rationalisations.
75 Compared to GE voting performance . Although Labour have done realtively well in some byelections especially in the North that is relative to their bad performance in 2004 . Even in these wards their vote is well down on the 2005 GE performance . There is no evidence whatsoever in real people going out to vote that Labour is at anything like the 36% vote share they got at the last GE .
73 - What should you have done?
Presented yourselves as a slightly right-of-centre party with some of the more populist aspects of your program highlighted instead of the already obvious opposition to the Iraq war. You played all your cards on hands you’d already won. Students and anti-war voters were already likely to vote for you. But creaming up soft Labour votes in safe Labour seats only gives nicer final figures - it doesn’t result in many gains. The real weak votes you needed to get were Tory votes and they were more likely to occur in seats you could win. Some voters returned to the Tories reluctantly, probably having not voted in 2001, because they wanted to register dissapproval with Blair - and replacing in the final figures those ex-Labour voters who couldn’t be arsed to vote for Blair. It was those votes you should have been picking up.
If the tories had acheived a similar result in 2005 as they had in 2001, the Libs would probably have been up to 80-90 seats and would have been set to really attack what would have been a totally demoralised Tory party. Instead, the Tories could feel they were recovering and left you in their trail once again.
Oh, and most of the public don’t care if your leader liked a bevy or two - we could identify with that a lot more than with some Etonian pretender - of whatever colour!
81 - thanks for responding (and good to see you here again). As it happens I tend to agree with you on what we should have done, but I think the idea that it would have had us replacing the Tories is far-fetched. There are plenty of Tory voters who aren’t liberals, not even right-of-centre ones!
Utter B**8ks this “Poll.” They have now surely claimed Mori’s title as most laughable poll. ICM have traditionally been best at measuring Lib Dem support, and at 18% I think they have it about right. By most historical standards good going for the Lib Dems. As it claims a Labour lead in defiance of all evidence and all other pollsters I think the Lib Dems can relax. Also think YouGov now has same problem re Lib Dems telephone pollsters did/have with Tories.
80. Mark, I think it’s pretty pointless to compare council byelections % with GE %. You can compare trends vs previous locals(they’re going down, they’re going up, by how much), but you can’t just say “Lab polled 28% in ward X in 2004 locals, then they polled 28% in last October’s byelection, but they probably polled 36% in that ward during the GE; so Labour is down”. You are not comparing likes with likes.
84 W
Pimpernel: The idea of replacing the Tory party is fantasy and always will be. There is always a conservative party in every stable political framework - there has to be to defend tradition and the status quo of the elite. The Liberals/Lib Dems will never be that conservative party - they have been opposing that mindset since long before Socialism was ever dreamt up. (Note that that conservative party isnt always fiscally free-market. But there is always a socially conservative party. In former Soviet countries they are communists.)
There was a small possibility that New Labour would become that conservative party and kill the Tory party (and that the Libs could become the centre-left replacement), but now Blair has been skewered that reallignment wont happen.
There was only one realistic chance of replacing a major party since the 20’s, and that was in 1982. The opportunity passed when the Falklands war happened.
For now, Liberals should realise that “replacing” another party is bunk - the task should be to win as many seats as possible on their own policy, on their own platform. Attempting to answer the question “Are you going left or right” is as much a distraction from the real work as “Who will you go into coalition with”. It is simply falling into the trap of playing the game by the rules that favour the two-party system, and by extenion the Lab/Con dichotomoy.
84 OOps , we will have to agree to disagree on this then Andrea , IMHO you can make good comparisons with council elections/byelections and GE vote shares . You do have to make some allowance for Labour turnout and vote share being lower and LibDem support being 4-5% higher in the former and in many cases we have the direct comparison of vote shares of County Council and GE at the same time as to how people voted slightly differently in the two sorts of elections .
barry @ 52 — it is a mess. Tidy up the about me section. Get rid of the spots that make it hard to read. The MRSA FoI refusal item is interesting but you should link to the Independent story.
What are all those html comments about?
Should there not be a section explaining how and why Beford Hospital is in danger?
Of course, Andrea, especially in terms of specific percentages. But if the vote of one party is holding up in local elections, rising for another one, and falling for a third (in this case Labour), then I think it is reasonable enough to suspect that something similar might be happening at the national level too in that area.
The factor which has an influence on both is local party organisation, which has an effect on turnout. In some countries, political activity comes to an end several days before the election (I don´t know whether that is the case in Italy); but in the UK it goes on until the polls have closed. So local organisation is very important in getting the vote out.
If the local organisation has fallen away (as seems to be the case with Labour), then this will have an impact on the Labour voters´ turnout at both local and national elections.
86. Mark, yes, I think we’ll never agree on this one.
Take Manchester Gorton local elections….2004: LD 49.6%, Lab 32.1%; 2006: Lab 40.1%, LD 38%
Would you say that if a GE had taken place in May 2006, Labour would have done much worse compared to 2005 GE, because their % is worse than the GE performance (even if up from 2004 locals)?
88.”But if the vote of one party is holding up in local elections, rising for another one, and falling for a third (in this case Labour), then I think it is reasonable enough to suspect that something similar might be happening at the national level too in that area”
Tressage, I agree. The difference between me and Mark is what we prefer to compare to.
“In some countries, political activity comes to an end several days before the election (I don´t know whether that is the case in Italy)”
it comes to end on Friday at midnight (elections are on Sunday and Monday). No knock up of voters during election days (as you don’t know who your voters are, cause parties don’t do door to door canvassing)
For ex my approach usually is….using an example
Liverpool Derby West 2004 locals: LD 44%, Lab 38%; 2006 locals: Lab 41%, LD 32%
Hull North 2004: LD 38, Lab 30; 2006 LD 42, Lab 26
looking at those figures, I would say that Labour is doing well in Derby West, whilst in Hull it’s struggling. So if a GE had taken place last spring I wouldn’t be suprised to see Labour vote holding well in Liverpool Derby West, whilst having a further swing to LD in Hull North
90 - But locals and Generals are completely different on just about every level.
You cannot even compare year on year results in locals as moving sentiments as regards a GE figure!
For a start the turnout is usually half that of a GE, and will depend on the circumstances prevalent in each ward. The voters are usually the more committed voters, but even they still need to feel it’s worth turning out to vote.
It also depends on who is controlling the local council - people fed up with a Tory led council might well vote against the Tories locally, but against Labour in a General.
Some constituencies will have more than one council in them - so that’s 2 seperate situations to take into account within one seat.
Then the wards and the local councillors - a local lib dem councillor for example might have a very strong personal vote that has no part in the General Election vote. People might turn out in a marginal ward more than they will in a safe ward.
All that can be said of the final vote figures is that comparing year on year gives a rough show of how a party’s hard core vote stands, and how well motivated the local activists might or might not be. But for predicting a result in a general they are as much use as the Euro elections!
Why don’t Italians canvas? What’s the point in politics without canvassing?!?!?
92. Pimpernel, I don’t enterely agree. A deep analysis of local elections (trends, who run the council, the decision made by councils, who’s standing where, the make up of the area, coverage in local press and so on) can reveal more things than expected (and some swings in GE would be less surprising)
“Why don’t Italians canvas? What’s the point in politics without canvassing?!?!? ”
I suppose it’s because they’ve better things to do than having people hitting them with their door
Thanks for your answer, Andrea. How do Italians campaign then?
Anyway, the sad reality is that I, Mark Senior and few others spend time looking local election results, trends, wards changing hands, local byelections and similar stuffs!
I even like when I find silly little things like wards that elected 3 councillors of 3 different parties in all out elections!
I should make “stopping looking at local elections” a resolution for the New Year!
I seem to remember, that talk of removing Michael Foot was halted, due to a good byelection result, (was it Darlington Andrea?) so beware, the runes may not be telling you the truth. The LD’s, probably more than any other party, need a visible leader. Paddy Ashdown’s energetic leadership, lifted them after the collapse of the Alliance. The Libdems need another Ashdown!
96 - Was it Darlington that was won by Labour in the by-election and then lost a few months later at the 1983 general election?
94. Tressage. Leaflets are usually put in your mailbox or delivered in the streets. Naturally the majority of people try to avoid people leafleting in the streets.
Then there’re posters. There’re spaces where all parties can put up their posters for free. Then posters are also put up in other advertising spaces (so paying for them).
But there’re not party people going around knocking door to door and asking people their support (and writing down what they’re voting for).
Why are messages so often “awaiting moderation” these days?
96/97. yes, Coldestone and Max. Labour held Darlington byelections in 1983 just to lose it in 1983 GE.
99. MBoy, because are you being a naughty boy?!
re 99. Because we get about 500-1000 items of spam a day and the spammers are becoming a lot smarter in working out ways to get through our defences.
I very much want to keep our policy of open publishing here but trying to distinguish beyween spammers and legitimate comments is getting harder.
Andrea: What - you mean an NBoy?
At Christmas…chance would be a fine thing. Must wait until 31st to be naughty! Although, I’m being naughty by reading this and not getting on with the things I had allocated to today. Doh…
97
I think it was, Darlington, along with some favourable poll readings, stopped the Labour party ridding itself of Foot. There comes a time when a political party has to bite the bullet. Loyalty becomes self destructive, the Tories realised this with IDS. The Libdems may do well in byelection/locals but come the GE, they will suffer, if the Ming problem is not confronted and solved.
Mike: Some kind of visual text identification test on comment submit should help. (You know: “Type in the letters you see here”)
MBoy - the reason your comment went into moderation is that you used the dreaded word S O C I A L I S M. This contains the word C I A L I S - the leading competitor to Via-gra and subject of a massive amount of spam. Try to spell it in a way they does not get caught.
You know how hard it is to be a socialist!!
3 more GE05 LD candidates have joined the Conservatives bringing the number to 6 in 2006.
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2006/12/three-more-libdem-candidates-join.html#links
96 - aahhh, you shouldna stop studying the minutiae of local election statistics - they’re fascinating - F W S Craig’s books on General Election results have given me years of fascinated reading and calculator practise!
I just think they tell you more about local elections is all!
Having said that, I use local election results to analyse where my party needs to be concentrating on building up support and where we are letting other parties have to easy a ride!
Because it the absence of annual general elections, we have to use whatever data we can find! If you have the knowledge of local situations, personalities and issues, then yes I guess you can make educated assumptions for a general - but without that indepth knowledge, then the figures don’t tell a true story, and when projected on a national basis, they have no relevance at all… imho etc!
107. The final word of your post would also be caught by the same filter!
Is there a way in which the posts awaiting moderation could be numbered when they become generally visible? At the moment, it becomes quite difficult to reference which post people are referring to when one that had been held in moderation pops up further back in the thread and increments all those following it.
Thank you, Iain (aka HF, 108). They all sound very confused to me.
Mike/Mboy
My posts are rarely held. Is this because they are mainly about betting? Or does the filter automatically let harmless nutcases through?
MBoy
The setup Baxter uses is not a true probabilistic (Markov) approach because we don’t have the data about what proportion of LibDems are transferring in the polls or indeed for any other party.
It makes a giant difference. If 1/5 of people who voted LibDem in the last election vote Tory and that’s it then we will indeed get slaughtered and be down to 20 or whatever. If however 1/5 of people who voted LibDem vote Labour but quite a few who voted Labour vote Tory the precentage shares can be exactly the same but the LibDems would fare far better despite having a pretty low vote share. Labour on the other hand would do far worse.
Obviously you can make it more complicated than that but I hope it makes sense.
Incidentally whichever way you look at it Chris Huhne would be looking endangered, at least if you believe this poll (which I don’t).
If he had been the leader we would be getting some publicity - it would just be very unwelcome - all about how the leader is electoral toast.
re 111 Tressage
My name is not Iain. A loss of 6 MP candidates selected by the Lib Dems seems rather a lot in one year.
Certainly more “high profile” (ahem) than the recent defections claimed by ukip (ie one chairman of an assn).
114. They had 1 defecting to Labour earlir this year too (but Labour has 1 defecting to the tories, so they’re “unchanged”)
109 Sorry Pimpernel that is simply not true . If you had looked at the local election results in 2004 then the GE result in Solihull for example would not have been the complete surprise it was to many .
Socialism is not a dirty word!!!!
117 - I did say if you had the indepth localised knowledge of an area then locals might well be more useful, but simply looking at the statistical results without understanding the local conditions will tell you nothing about a General Election result. You could only tell the possible warnings from local election results in 2004 and their possible impact on Solihull in 2005 if you fully understood what was happening on the ground, why people were voting in a particular way, who was voting and not voting, and what issues were prevalent.
As would looking at local elections in Welwyn Hatfield, Mark. To see Labour’s council strength vanishing steadily in an authority where it had traditionally been strong did indicate a fundamental shift away from Labour among local voters.
Solihull WAS a Lib Dem REGIONAL target at the General, sensibly they kept quiet about it, put in the resources and reaped a reward.
There is a lesson here. They will probably hold it because there is such a large Labour third party vote to squeeze.
Regarding all the PPCs joining other parties, would have been interersting to see what they would have done if they had been elected! It’s all good fun.
Any Tory 2005 candidates defected to the Lib Dems? As candidates for LDs last year, we could be feeling lonely!! However, after 40+ years fighting Tories, I doubt if I am about to defect!
105. TBH I really don’t think any Lib Dem alternate would do better. Mid term starved of oxygen the Lib Dems always dip. Lastr time was different… Iraq was there. So unless TB/GB invade Iran next year this pattern is not unusual as I say the best guide for Lib Dems is ICM. So long as you hold steady at 18-20% with ICM, at this stage you have no need to panic. Besides Lib Dem organisation is improving to the extent I could easily foresee a 1997 style dip in vote share with gains in numbers of MPs.
BTW HF araound at all.
I don’t see why the Tories couldn’t gain but Montgomeryshire… but only if Sian Lloyd was the Tory candidate.
Iain is being rather selective in his poll data. Mentions the 14% for Libdems, did not mention the 1% Labour lead: any ideas why?
New Thread. Rod Crosby on the Kalman Filter
97/98/101
Darlington was unusual, and critical. Had Labour lost it, Foot would have been replaced, Labour probably would have performed better nationally at the GE, and Ossie O’Brien ironically might have regained the seat, avoiding the ignominy of being the shortest-serving MP(excluding death) since the War….
The definitive list of by-election records….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_by-election_records#By-election_holds_overturned_at_next_election
Feel free to add/correct…
In answer to the original question, yes, it is entirely possible that the Lib Dems will be reduced to six seats, and if so I hope that those self-serving political pygmies who thought getting rid of Charles Kennedy would boost the party’s electoral prospects will reflect on their idiotic and treacherous behaviour.
Punter at 123 said “Mid term starved of oxygen the Lib Dems always dip. Last time was different… Iraq was there.”
Well if the figures at the same point last time were boosted by Iraq then it follows that the figures this December have dropped because the “Iraq votes” have left.
The facts are that there has been a significant fall of 5 to 7 percentage points in the LD polling.
107. A pity they don’t invent a potency drug called “Conservative”.
(And think of the business they’ll do in Ludlow)
128. Yes and Bolsover will fall to the Tories when the Beast steps down. If they got six seats in 1970 or 11 in 1979 in Tory storm surge years not very realistic is it, on double the vote share even by CR standards.
129. So 18% is high by LD historical standards, as they recover if they follow previous patterns they will start to hit 22-23% again. Re-Paste beow a reply to your 24 on the Cruddas thread:
24. Quite. I think the organisational aspect is the “hidden” strength to Ming we can’t always see, though others do. Hence I could easily see a1997 scenario in that the Lib Dem vote share declines on 2005, while the number of MPs increases due to shrewder and more long term targetting.
by Punter December 27th, 2006 at 12:00 pm
Yes its all over for LDs - 5 seats max at next election!
Its a cheeky holiday!
So says Ave it 07
40 - PtP sensible post which concurs wth my own view.
128 - what a load of tosh.
There are probably a hardcore of 30 Dem seats that can be considered safe regardless of national polling. What I can’t see is their room for gains. They are deluding themselves that they will build on 2005 swings in Muslim areas and after their failed decapitation strategy attempts at gains from Tories appear ill-fated. Their best hope for gains lies where they are second to Labour, but they don’t seem to see this. I’m not sure that their existing Parliamentary party will be in a position to do anything more than try to hold gains (and this is probably their best electoral strategy) and hope for a coalition arrangement with the Tories.
Just one point.
If 3 Tory PPCs had defected to the LibDems, a wave of LibDem posters would be on here predicting the end of the road for Cameron, the meltdown of Tory support and the arrival of the LibDem “real opposition”.