Are these the people punters should thank - or blame?
July 25th, 2008
Was it their “17% Labour margin” that made the SNP prices attractive?
Yet again an election has shown the pollsters up and reinforced my default position when assessing all voting intention surveys - “always assume that Labour is being overstated“.
The whole atmosphere in the lead up to yesterday’s Glasgow East by election was affected by the Scottish Progressive Opinion survey that had Labour 17% ahead. I was highly sceptical about their methods right from the start and it was an examination of their detailed data that led me to conclude that this was a 50-50 by-election.
Yet even though the polling industry as a whole has an appalling record of Labour over-statement in by-election surveys few pundits and punters and pundits had the confidence to dismiss PSO’s 17% Labour margin out of hand.
Thus we saw the Politics Home PHI 100 panel give it to Labour by a staggeringly awful 86%. They really ought to read PB!
The markets saw Labour tighten to as much as 2/5 after the PSO survey came out and the party remained heavy odds-on favourite until the reality of the count started to emerge at just after midnight.
It was this poll, I believe, that drove media opinion and led to all those stories that Labour were going to squeeze home.
Finally I should say well done to the BBC. The coverage overnight was really excellent - maybe our messages are getting through.
Mike Smithson
MessageSpace Advertising
Are any of the people saying that the Tories should effectively “abandon Scotland” the same who are wont to argue that the Tories need to re-establish themselves in the “Northern cities”?
Nobody can predict what the future holds in Scotland. With Labour discredited, and SNP unpopular there could be scope for further Tory gains. Also at the moment talk of independence remains theoretical. As its prospect looms there will inevitably be a polarisation in Scotland around the issue - at the moment voting SNP is “safe”. It may not be in the future. If that happens then the Tories (presuming they remain “Unionist”) will attract votes as a result.
Did I not say the SNP were going to win? I await congratulations from those who bet on the basis of my inside canvasser’s knowledge.
Putney, I’m waiting.
The incredible keeps on going!
After Boris for mayor, the Tory in C&N, the NO of the Irish — now, the SNP at Glasgow…
Wow!
This time, I would like to thank Easteross and Icarus and Stuart Dickson for their very useful posts on the matter.
1. alex: there could be scope for further Tory gains
There could indeed, and that’s reason enough not to abandon Scotland.
Their guy on the BBC was talking abour 4 to 10 gains. I think, looking at the 2005 numbers, 10 is as close to impossible as you get in politics - but even if they can gain 3 or 4, they’ll be much better placed for 2014-5. Assuming that Scotland remains in the UK, of course!
Firstly, my very warmest congratulations and best wishes to John Mason, and to all my fellow members and supporters of the Scottish National Party and the wider movement for Scottish self-governance. I want to hug you one and all, and maybe even give one or two of you a wee peck on the cheek. Yes, even you shy Calum Cashley… dinnae hide at the back there…
I have only met John on a handful of occasions, but he made a strong positive impression on me right from the go. He reminds me a wee bit of that other ‘quiet man’ of the SNP, Andrew Welsh, although Andrew is probably more of a happy go lucky sort of chap. John is serious and professional. That is a very, very, very good thing for his constituents.
Secondly, congratulations to all the other candidates! Each and every one of them did a wonderful job, within the own particular context of the different tasks and challenges each person faced. Make no mistake, Margaret Curran was a fine candidate, a fomer government minister and prior to putting herself forward for this contest (thereby saving her party from total collapse) a front-runner to lead the Scottish Labour Party. And deservedly so, because she is a credit to her party; a highly intelligent, confident and competent person, far calmer than her, ahem, rather ’shrill’ public image. I wish her all the best in her (perhaps brief) future career at Holyrood. Maybe she did leak all that Wendy Alexander stuff to the Sunday Herald, maybe she did not, but I would be careful who you believe on that point!
“Are these the people punters should thank - or blame?”
No. Punters, like politicians, must take responsibility for their own decisions and actions. Punters reading PB during the last 3 weeks have been told, repeatedly, by Mike and many, many other commentators, to take it easy, cos this one was a tuffy! If you did not ‘take it easy’, ie if you took a strong position either way, then I am very sorry, but you will be getting very little sympathy from me. You were warned, again and again and again.
Please note that PSO are simply a small marketing and market research agency tring to do a half decent job in a tough market. Yes, they made some schoolboy methodological bloopers (go easy on them MRS guys!), but they are not trying to pretend that they are at the cutting edge of social or political research. The real villain of the piece is their client, the Scottish Daily Mail. But then I think the Scottish Daily Mail is the villain in many a tale, so I will just cut off what could easily become a rant right there.
PS. PB.com exclusive: John Mason once whipped me (yes, lil ole me) in an election!! He took approx 100% of the votes when Glasgow Baillieston CB were selecting the candidate for the Garrowhill by-election all those years ago. What a wise choice those members made that night
Mr Smithson, you are far too modest. You did brilliantly in this by-election. You correctly predicted that turn-out would be relatively high when everyone else, including all the local experts, took a different view. You correctly predicted that would be good for the SNP, again defying conventional wisdom. Finally, political betting as a whole was a great forum for airing theories about what was going on.
I must thank Stuart Dickson in particular for his insights (but I assume this morning that he won’t be up too early). Despite all my own instincts being wrong about this by-election being wrong at every stage, I made money by listening to those more knowledgeable than me.
5 - Shouldn’t you still be partying?
One thing that was flagged up during the count but not, I think, mentioned since the declaration: once more, Labour have under-performed their own expectation management… it’s getting to the stage where it might be reckoned a Law…
6. I am up antifrank: bright and breezy!
Someone at PB said the other day that PB posters divided into two tribes: emiters and receivers (actually, he used different words which I can’t remenber, but it was the same concept). He also said that the ‘receivers’ were more likely to gain money by betting than the ‘emiters’. You, antifrank, are a ‘receiver’. I….. don’t bet!
Yes, Mike Smithson correctly predicted the turnout, in stark contrast to my good self. However… I got the order of the parties 100% correct, even the SSP, Solidarity and Greens! Although I did give Crighton and the smoking chap a combined “oth” of 1%, which was laughably poor predicting on my part. I believe I am the only PB poster who got all 7 parties in the correct order. Right, I’ll stop blowing my trumpet now.
I’m slightly regretful that I didn’t bung that 50 GBP on the SNP with Sporting Bet two weeks ago. However, I decided back then to donate it to SNP HQ instead, so I am sure they will spend it far more wisely than me. I don’t really like chocolates, champagne or fine vases full to bursting with flowers anyway.
8 - Did you hear Margaret Curran trying to spin the line that “some people predicted we could have done a lot worse, so it’s not too bad”?
9 - I said that! It’s nice to profit from my own words for once. And you have every right to blow your own trumpet, your final prediction was excellent.
Presumably, Nick Palmer has said “ugh!” and gone on holiday.
Has Brown been very clever in fact in letting the blame for defeat fall on the Blairite policy of punishing benefit claimants?
11. Oh, was it you? Ha, just goes to show you the power of the subconscious.
10. She is right. It could easily have been an awful lot worse. For example if Frank McAveety, the MSP for neighbouring Shettleston, had accepted the offer to stand. Gordon Brown tried to persuade McAveety to do it. Brown did not phone Curran. That in itself speaks volumes for Brown’s political acumen.
12. Nick Palmer MP did his job. And very well too. However, come the next UK GE Nick Palmer MP (fine upstanding bloke that he is) will not be canvassing doors in Mount Vernon for the Labour Party. In fact, that is an inteseresting point! Without all those MPs and activists bussed in, or phone canvassing, from England, just who is going to be chapping doors for Labour in the East End of Glasgow come 2010? Or in Inverclyde? Or in Paisley? Or in Edinburgh SW? Or in Kilmarnock? Or in East Renfrewshire? Or in Kirkcaldy? The mind boggles…
Morning, only just awoken to the by-election results so here are my thoughts. Clearly an appalling night for Labour and a very good night for the SNP. However looking at the other parties is also instructive, I would say that this is a pretty decent result for the Conservatives, vote share broadly the same as at the general election and largely unsqueezed. It was a very very bad night for the Lib Dems up in Glasgow, they lost three quarters of their vote from last time. I suspect though that come the election this seat shall return from whence it came.
RodCrosby. Would you be interested in betting on your prediction of only 1/2 Tory gains in Scotland at the next election? £50 says there will be more than that?
15. Well, don’t blame Ian Robertson! (That is directed to all you PB Lib Dem rampers out there. We all know you are out there.)
One PB Lab Dim ramper made a disgraceful comment about Charlie Kennedy a few weeks ago. I was genuinely shocked. The Lib Dems, if they have any sense whatsoever, will not point fingers of blame at individuals, but will look very long and hard at their political party and its strategic positioning and policy platform.
(Note: the Lib Dems do not have any sense whatsoever.)
15 - possibly. However i don’t think you can ignore the fact that these recent by-election reverses have come about on General Election level turnouts. I would guess that it’s one thing to attract back voters who have just sat on their hands, but another to get back people who have got a taste of voting for another party.
Once the taboo of not voting against Labour is broken, what is the reason to go back?
It’s not all bad for Labour. If the Glasgow East swing was repeated in the next general election then Labour could still expect to win two seats, it would be a toss up to see who was leader and deputy leader
I shall shortly be off to reclaim the family silver with interest!
It may fall to Barack Obama tomorrow to have a word in Gord’s ear,after all Gord did promise to listen.
17 - I have sympathy with that view but to me the high by-election turnouts point to a much higher turnout at the next election, I think we could see turnout at the next election break 70% which in recent context would be good. So on that basis I suspect that the turnouts at the recent by-elections will increase. Glasgow was down slightly on General election, so there is plenty of room for a reversion to type.
Here, for no particular reason
is the result from the Motherwell & Wishaw constituency at the Scottish parliamentary general election in May 2007:
1. Lab (Jack McConnell, First Minister of Scotland) 12574 (48.1%)
2. SNP 6636 (25.4%)
3. Con 1990 (7.6%)
4. SSCUP 1702 (6.5%)
5. LD 1570 (6.0%)
6. SCP 1491 (5.7%)
7. ATP 187 (0.7%)
Now, where did I put that old missionary map of southern Africa…
Following my posts last weekend and yesterday, when I confidently predicted a Labour victory in Glasgow East, I promised to come back on and either eat humble pie or confirm why I thought my judgement was right.
There was never any serious evidence of a SNP win in my view. It was a safe Labour seat. The polls all said Labour, even though we know they probably over-stated the lead and that most of them were flawed in some way. People on the ground felt it was going Labour’s way…
Well, well, well… I went to bed last night confident, and am really shocked to hear this morning’s news. What a contest! I underestimated just how unpopular Brown and Labour are. This is a whole new ball game now. I can’t see how Brown can survive. Ironically this could cause the Tory seat spreads to drop as a new leader may be able to limit the damage at the next election - which could be soon.
A famous day and one which has changed the course of history in this country. From a punting point of view, I have lost quite a lot of money on this. I just didn’t see how Labour could lose it. (They almost didn’t). But I had very good times recently with Boris, at Crewe and on the commons’ spread markets, so it’s not all doom and gloom year-to-date. But it was a costly mistake!
Ah well, shame my humble pie’s not tasty. But it’s not so bitter, either, as I have effectively already won my general election bet on the Tories to win most seats at the next election (all prices from 8/13 down to 1/3 - and I’ll have a bit more 1/3 if I can later this morning…)
Interesting stuff…
18.
The MacChattering Classes have spoken???
Did you hear them Gord ?????
Just checked out al-Beeb’s Politics web-page. In it’s Features, Views, Analysis segment it has the aptly-titled SNP Eathquake. Yet the accompanying picture is of Maggie “It’s not my fault we lost” Curran and her cohorts.
I think this says all about that broadcaster. FoxNews is slightly fairer and balanced, and titter ye not…!
Mike will you be publishing the result of your own PB poll? Only asking ‘cos I backed the SNP, and I would like to see that I actually got something right, in print!!
Oh the pleasure of gambling. Just transferring my winnings from Betfair, Ladbrokes, PaddyPower and Betfair into my bank accounts.
…Boris 2-1….Crewe…4-5….Labour lost deposit in Henley 4-5…Glasgow East…average 2-1…
What a great summer.
I went to bed after the site went down????
Didnt Easterross call it just about spot on?
Spreadfair - Commons seats next UK GE
Con 335 - 348
Lab 233 - 248
LD 43.8 - 48
SNP 8.8 - 12.8
PC 3 - -
Winners:
- SNP
- Stuart Dickson’s early morning postathons
- Jack W’s ARSE
- Those who backed the idea that however bad Labour thinks it can get, they still have no idea…
- Black women Trade Unionist Tories
- BBC by-election coverage
- mobile phone manufacturers
- the folk of Glasgow East
Losers:
- Labour
- Labour - for trying to be smart-arses by calling the by-election in Fairs Week
- Scottish Liberal Democrats
- Scottish Labour’s near-feudal political machine
- Mark Senior’s “comfortable Labour hold”
- the Scottish political media for decades of shamelessly suckling at the Labour teat
- oh, and Labour folk who think it can’t get any worse
25 — I’m transferring money too. From Betfair (SNP win) to Ladbrokes (low turnout). More the pointlessness of gambling on this occasion.
21 - re: spreads - not necessarily.
Don’t forget that the spreads are showing probably underestimating the current situation/”lagging” the polls because of the length of time before an election.
Bring the election forward and they will rapidly switch towards reflecting the polls, which even with a new leader are not certain to recover that much.
re 19 The turnout factor is key. I maintained throughout that a high turnout was bad for Labour as it was in Crewe.
If electors want to get the government out or give it a kicking they will come out to vote.
Gordon has finally cracked the election turnout problem - became so unpopular that everybody wants you out.
Sky News poll now has 87% voting that “It is time for GB to go” I didn’t now that that many Libour MP’s knew how to press a red button.
There is no question that Brown should go but Clegg has seen his LD vote collapse! If i were a LD i would want a new leader!
33
How many mobile phones got smashed this morning?
re 24. Yes I might publish it later alongside the “experts” of Politics Home. We divided 50-50 - PH had it for Labour by 86%.
I just watched Cameron on Sky; he was very statesman like and towers above Brown politically. Cameron is correct, there should be a general election (Maybe this is a strategy to box Brown in as leader till the election as a new Labour leader would obviously have to call an election) Clegg does not even rate at the moment
.
This must change the *swing back* theory very dramatically! Indeed the Swing away from Labour is gaining momentum the closer we get to the election. C & N was in the high teens this one is in the low 20’s.
Hoiked from the BBC web-site (HYS) as I think this view may be interesting…:
Added: Friday, 25 July, 2008, 04:03 GMT 05:03 UK
Labour’s only hope is for Brown to go today to advise the Queen to ask Deputy Leader Harriet Harman to be Prime Minister for the summer. Labour needs a full democratic Leadership election at the Party Conference. Harriet Harman has the Party’s confidence as Deputy Leader and it’s time for Labour to return to normal. They’ve till 3 June 2010 to save Labour from extinction and they must start today. They risk being third in the next Parliament, with the LibDems as HM Loyal Opposition to Cameron.
Gerard Mulholland, Paris, France
I’d like to hear Nick Palmer’s views. As Stuart Dickson noted, he has been pretty honest about the Glasgae East bye-election. [Though I suspect he'll become a tax-exile in Switzerland once the chickens his party have laid have come home to roost. I'll leave any further thoughts of the honourable member to Guido's site...!]
The only people more desperate not to have a 2008/2009 election than Labour are the Federasts of Brussels - because they could no longer rail-road through their Euro-constitution if Gordon is replaced. I’m sure they will be convincing him to stay on…
34.
He will be in one hell of a bad mood i should imagine - Putting the blame for the failure on the incomptents running the campaign.
It reminds me of that comment; when Cameron said he was useless in the last PMQ’s! Brown must know that time is running out and he is truely very unpopular indeed.
37
Fluffy. I cannot envisage a situation where Nick Palmer would EVER say its time for Gordon to go. He is an uber loyalist
How long will it be before we see MPs defecting from Labour to Conservative?
#41
As an English Democrat I’d rather the likes of Gisela Stuart crossed-the-floor our way, but these are difficult times…!
I called it wrong, and consider myself lucky to have got out with a £20 profit after some (very frantic!) late trading. I shall never again underestimate just how universally unpopular Gordon Brown is. Well done to everyone who was on the SNP from the beginning.
I got this wrong. The SNP *have* improved their campaigning. I must also admit that both my SNP and Scottish Conservatives friends are right: the Union now faces the perfect storm.
Czech-Slovak style divorce for the UK within 10 years? A much higher possibility than those of us who believe in a federal Britain would have believed even a year ago. Time to reduce your Sterling assets substantially- even without the financial meltdown that is already underway.
PHILOL.
It’s time for Politics Home to sack its panel of ‘experts’. They’ve just gone and done a silly.
Just got up after a late night.
I cant help feeling smug when since 16:00 hrs yesterday, I predicted that the SNP would win by a nose. Only my Turnout figure of 36% ws wrong.:))
#44
Why reduce Sterling? It’s only the Scottish pound that is discounted in Europe I believe.
Is Camerons call for a GE designed to get the Labour troops rallying behind Gordon…
Has there ever been a time in politics when the Opposition wanted to keep the Govt in office?
37. I wonder if he still has a house in Switzerland, it must be a great place to live; massive mountains, clean air etc.
Even if Labour suffer “only” a 10% swing at the next election they will be soundly defeated. I cannot see how Labour can get out of this, they have played every card, every trick including tax changes triggered by C & N, then Glasgow east and still they cannot mitigate the slump.
I think Marquee Mark you need to add two more winners:
Am Balach - excellent call Am Balach, I said at the time you struck me as telling the absolute truth
and while not to detract from Jack’s ARSE, it was a brave call, it’s Easterross who has called this right from the start, consistently, in the face of stupid opinion polls and the PH100. This was an area he knew well and he was 100% spot on.
I said 50-50 and that was about right. I am delighted with how well Davena did and that I was right that the Tory vote would not be squeezed but the LD vote would. That’s because a Tory vote is a tribal vote for an ideology whereas many LD votes are not for LD policies, but are protest plague on all your houses votes.
the Cameron effect saw her avoid the third party squeeze even in a knife edge situation where it should have been impossible.
#45.
Hey I said rhat! Wrote to Politics Home last night and told them to get new and better members 0f their PH100 panel, which has got several thing wrong lately.
Congrats to the SNP. The entire country (England) is cheering you this morning!
Well done PB and especially Easterross. I’ll be collecting my winnings.
On the bigger picture, isn’t the story here quite simple: Labour is unpopular in the middle of its third term and the winner in a by-election is the challenger best placed to supplant them, in this case the SNP. Come 2010 I can’t see anything but a comfortable win for Cameron, with the SNP doing well in Scotland.
My main betting interest is actually the LibDem performance in 2010. I still reckon they will end up with fewer than 35 seats.
50 - You’re rather rewriting history. Once again, you were adamant at the outset that the SNP couldn’t win this one.
48. I think so! I would be amused to see in the autumn what would happen if Brown had one of those motions put up against him docking his pay by £1,000. WOuld Labour MP’s ralie to him or use it as an excuse to ditch him?
Bye bye Brown.
Several thousand voters in Glasgow E switch from Labour to SNP.
New Labour leader in the Autumn…
…who calls a general election in May 2009…
…which is won by the Conservatives…
…and a referendum on Scottish independence gives a ‘yes’ vote in 20010 or 2011.
And all stemming from one by-election.
Did Conor McGinn’s comments about Labour being anti-catholic help the SNP?
Look, and see my forcast for the next year in political terms:
The Great Leader will suffer further humiliations around the conference season.
He will bw forced out by late Decemer 2008.
General Election im May 2009, after new labour leader cant hack either. Lol.
Well, I got this pretty wrong. Just thankful I don’t do this betting lark, based on this.
By the way, how many votes for Frances Curran?
58
555 i think
Good Morning Campers …..
Very disappointed that my ARSE was 0.5% out in its projection of the SNP majority. Must try harder !!
I hope many of you made the odd shilling trading on the result and that you now feel that having had you fill of my ARSE on several occassions that its iconic status on PB is assured !!
All political parties might also consider doing away with the actual voting and simply endorsing the ARSE projection on the eve of poll !! A proportion of the money saved to be put into future PB parties, the Mike Smithson Restoration Fund and the purchase of a flat in Sheffield Hallam for Martin Day !!
All hail the ARSE …. you know it makes financial sense.
55
It would be far more poignant to put forward a motion to reduce his salary to 10p. It would be his epitaph… the 10p PM!!
548
FYI
John Mason, SNP - 11,277
Margaret Curran, Labour - 10,912
Davena Rankin, Conservative - 1,639
Ian Robertson, Lib Dem - 915
Frances Curran, Scottish Socialist Party - 555
Tricia McLeish, Solidarity - 512
Dr Eileen Duke, Scottish Greens - 232
Chris Creighton, Independent - 67
Hamish Howitt, Freedom 4 Choice - 65
Turnout 42.25%
Congratulations to Mike on another successful nite.
Congrats also to the SNP, Stuart Dickson, and of course Jack’s mighty ARSE. All spot on.
Gordon to go soon? I doubt it? Sell Labour seats on Spreadfair at 235. (Sporting Index suspended.)
John @ 56.
Steady on. Whilst this is endeniably dismal for Liebour - I’m not sure it warrants the hyperbole being chalked up by many posters today. Close by elections really don’t have the pedigree of truly seismic changes - such as independence referenda.
I still expect GB to be at the helm come the GE. Going down (taking down) the ship. After all he truly believes that he is the only helmsman capable of taking the “tough and long term decisions” to steer the country out of the mess he has created over the past 11 years.
If all the Labour MPs who would lose their seats if this result was repeated were to troop in to see Gordon about it, not only would there be a bloody long queue, but the great leader would end up talking to himself I expect…
My only fear is that GB may well throw in the towel. Whenever any voters are given the chance to vote, they are absolutely battering him, and he is breaking all the records of unpopularity set by poor old John Major. I know he has a bunker mentality, but this just gets more terrible as time goes on. He must know the game’s up.
“The SNP’s victory in Glasgow East has little or nothing to do with Scottish nationalism.
It reflects the profound discontent with Gordon Brown and New Labour currently affecting the whole country. The SNP is merely Scotland’s vehicle for expressing that discontent.”
Anthony King, Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/scotland/2457192/Glasgow-East-by-election-Labours-heartlands-lose-heart.html
61.
Good idea that!
#62
MTF, please inform SkyNews that others have polled more than 876. It makes the UK premier news-channel not twat-like then Adam “My wife used to hump-around for the Blairs” Boulton…!
60.
I recently asked if anyone knew if the SNP had used the image of Brown with Thatcher at no. 10 in the Glasgow East by-election. I heard Michael Crich say in Newsnight last night that this ‘trump card’ (my term) had been used heavily in campaigning yesterday. I wonder to what extent this tactic contributed to the sensational result.
64. You’re doing Gordon Brown an injustice, Robin. It didn’t take him 11 years to mess up the country - he’s managed it in under two years.
54 of course I was, but over the course of the campaign I changed my mind, based on SNP canvassing reports from Marcia, Am Balach and Easterross. If the facts change, you change your mind!
By last night I said about 50-50 and I wasn’t betting.
Deeply upset that I appear to be getting no credit for also forecasting the result many times and also providing warnings about Nick’s view of the outcome!
In the huff…until I visit the bookies to collect my winnings!
What a TRIUMPH for pbCOM, for;
Mike’s predictive narrative of how the vote would go, and how to bet accordingly;
Jack W’s ARSE- calling it for SNP by a whisker- double WOW;
PbCOM’s collective voting- calling it for SNP by a whisker;
Easterross- consistently telling us how the vote would go with a certainty that he had already seen it and then come back from the future;
PBCOM has just had its finest hour in the unlikeliest constituency of Glasgow East!
Well done Mike
72 sorry, well done Iain!
Where is Easterross to collect his laurels?
I see that Michael Brown in today’s Independent is touting Alan Duncan and Greg Barker for top jobs!
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/michael-brown-a-brown-exit-is-camerons-biggest-worry-876678.html
Brown/Duncan/Barker is there some kinda link.
#65 “he is breaking all the records of unpopularity set by poor old John Major”
It’s easy to forget that JM wasn’t actually that unpopular - it was the party that people grew tired of.
60- Jack W- am in awe! Can I come and work for you after all the high rollers come in to buy a piece of your ARSE to tell them what is going to happen.
Bloody marvellous Jack- said in all seriousness.
I’d like to see old GB touring the country on a soap-box!
What an amazing result! :O I always thought those opinion polls showing Labour winning this bye were going to be wide off the mark. Once again opinion polls overstate Labour and Labour do worse than even their worse polling shows.
So, how long before someone calls for Gordon Brown to go? Surely Labour can’t let this fiasco slide without taking down Brown?
Oh yeah, and what about the disaterous showing of the Lib’s? Lets be honest, poor old Clegg is doing no better, and in some respects worse, than Ming, isn’t he?
79. Can and will. The Labour Party is deluded, living in a late 90’s time warp where the tories are hated and all they have to do is come up with a good policy to win. I also think most of them underestimate Cameron quite considerably.
Thanks to the ARSE !
However am now seriously worried about my date of GE bet (I’m all green but heavily into 2010) - could things get so bad Broon is brought down early and a GE is called ???
72 tyson. Post of the day !!
Old Benn on Beeb24 now.
60: yes £100 up thanks
The Con LD dynamic is interesting in this result and suggests that the LDs are being punished for their share in the recently defeated Scottish government. And that offers a real worry for LDs north of the Border. LD Incumbency depends upon voters breaking with the national agenda because the local LD MP is very NICE. If the electorate begin to think the local LD is just like the rest and not particularly NICE then Incumbency does not work.
The LDs assume that no-one who matters in the Tory Party has been able to work that one out, vide the rampers here in the two English by-elections.
There will be between 35 and 40 LDs in the next parliament.
Adam Boulton has just said that if a similar swing happened at a GE across the country, DC would be PM with a majority of 30 or 40. Can this be right ?
The performance of Jacks ARSE was awesome. I am afraid I chickened out and halved my porfit on aSNP win but someone took my lay on turnout (over 50%) which gave me a profit on that market - A good night.
Don’t worry about the Lib Dem vote - that the Tory voters were not bright enough to switch to the SNP is their problem!
Best analysis seen so far : Iain McWirter in The Guardian:
“Labour’s policy forum in Warwick today has been turned into a wake, mourning not just the loss of Labour hegemony of Scottish politics, but also of its core vote. There can no longer be any doubt that Labour is facing electoral oblivion under Gordon Brown. Of course, the Prime Minister is not going to resign immediately, and Number Ten is clearly hoping that Glasgow East will be forgotten by the time the party gathers for the annual conference in the autumn. But following the worst local election results in England since the 1960s, the humiliation of losing Crewe and Nantwich and being beaten into fifth place by the BNP in Henley, Glasgow East must surely be a wake-up call to even the most complacent Labourites. Change, or die.”
It may take time for this to sink in but Labour MPs are not daft Nick and his mates will come up with a plan. I afraid, like it or not, Gordon will have to go probably sooner than later.
Well, it is all up to the meeting at Warwick, what the unions will bankroll, and who they will accept as party leader - unless Gordon Brown has come back from Israel with new funding assurances. The pressure on Alan Johnson to step up must be quite something now. The way ahead now is all about labour party funding.
Stuart fantastic result last night very pleased for you personally One of the the first SNP people on here three to four years ago could you have imagined that you would be in government and winning by elections
86.
Talking B*llocks there!
Well thanks to the collective wisdom gleaned from this site I am up £600. Mostly due to better insight into the polls and the insights into the campaign.
How did Labour think it was going to go so well when at the start they had no candidate and had no canvass records? Those facts would have been known to their decision takers yet they went ahead and rushed the process. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
What does it say about the current (Harman) and previous (Blears) Labour party Chair? They tolerate this incompetence? How many other “safe” Labour seats also have little/no canvass records? Is this typical of its “safest” top 100? If it is then they are no longer safe.
86. Probably, because being in inner Glasgow the Tory share was very poor - As it always inevitably will be in Glasgow. Of course, Cameron will do MUCH better in most places than he did last night in Glasgow East. Still, its a straw for the RedCrosbys of this world to cling to.
85. Since the Lib Dems were not the incumbent here, how can you make a judgement about incumbency?
The Lib Dem result was poor, but expected given the opinion polls.
The Tory result was decent, but at 45% in the UK opinion polls should have been higher.
86. fr: Adam Boulton has just said that if a similar swing happened at a GE across the country, DC would be PM with a majority of 30 or 40. Can this be right ?
Difficult to tell, as all three main GB parties dropped vote share.
But calculating the swing from the 2005 results gives
Con 33.24 - 0.64 = 32.60
Lab 36.21 - 18.99 = 17.22
LD 22.65 - 8.35 = 14.30
Plugging that into Baxter gives Con 296, Lab 78, LD 36 - Con 30 short of majority.
But, of course, it’s utterly meaningless to try and extrapolate four-party results to the three-party system in England.
Brown’s position is due almost entirely to his decision not to call a GE back in the autumn, (said it would) that must weigh on the minds of all Labour MP’s.
A couple of if only’s thrown into the mix: if only Labour hadn’t won the Darlington by-election in ‘83, Foot would have been removed, what would have happened if Tory MP’s had when given the chance voted out JM?
Labour MP’s must be thinking, what have we got to lose? We might as well try a change of leader, who knows?
86 - I would have thought that it is extremely difficult to forecast a national picture from a seat where the principal movements have been between 2 parties only one of which can form a national government. I would suggest that all this shows is that Labour could lose a lot of seats in Scotland. Depending on how badly they are performing elsewhere then they could pull in there lowest seat tally since the days of Ramsay MacDonald!
85, 93 - I don’t believe that anything useful can be extrapolated from either the Lib Dem or the Conservative results last night. The most I would be prepared to say is that it illustrates that the Lib Dems’ core vote is smaller than the Tories’ core vote. That doesn’t tell us anything meaningful about how either is going to perform next time across the whole country. I don’t regard it as a particularly poor result for either party. There is only one party that should be mourning this morning and only one that should be celebrating. The Lib Dems and the Tories weren’t in this two horse race.
87 If core vote Cons had been needed to swing over for SNP to win then there would have been no reason for them to swing over as SNP couldn’t have won. But, it was vital for the Cons in Scotland to get third place. Otherwise the Today programme would have been full of calls for Dave’s resignation.
RodCrosby thinks the Tories could win 3 seats in Scotland, this result might make it 4. So core Cons who voted Con yesterday did the right thing and non-core Cons who switched to SNP did the right thing as well.
Could this be the death knell for the staggeringly self-important PHI 100 - here’s hoping.
For all the talk of Brown going by the Autumn how is this going to really happen? Which Labour M.P. is going to sacrifice their future by becoming the next Labour leader who will lead them into oppostion for a generation? I can see Brown hanging on until May 2010.
66. People like Prof King are like the military experts in 1939-1940 who predicted the course of the Battle of France based on the experience of WW1. The German military’s blitzkreig tactics steamrollered them. They no longer knew what they were talking about (Hillaire Belloc had the grace to admit this).
There has been a seismic change in Scottish politics. As I have said before on here, devolution is a trial separation of a failing marriage. Divorce is inevitable. The ‘Scottish’ Labour Party has nailed its colours to the Union, because it suits the UK Labour Party to have a massive tame block vote to outweigh the natural conservative (small and large C) strength in England. Alex Salmond is the kind of politician seldom seen, a natural leader who really clicks with ordinary people. I can see David Cameron and Alex Salmond cooperating and negotiating sensibly and reasonable for the better governance of these islands, without the bitterness and hatred that is part of Scottish Labour’s DNA, seen in its most perfect flowering in Gordon Brown.
http://www.politicshome.com/Landing.aspx?Blog=2061&perma=link#
One to keep for next time
98. AVfC: RodCrosby thinks the Tories could win 3 seats in Scotland
Overnight, he said only one or two…
Oops, I screwed up the link. It’s post 88 on the last thread.
Well, if I were a Labour chap I would change my mind as to whether Brown should remain leader.
Even if he refuses to go easily and the electoral leadership process is messy or even divisive it cannot, surely, be worse than the electoral millstone that is Brown.
The only downside is that they might go for the worse option of Harman or Balls.
Not sure what Labour will do though. Have to see how the Cabinet and media react in the next few days.
Good gloat thread on Labour Home “Gordon shouldn’t go down alone”
http://www.labourhome.org/story/2008/7/21/55937/3884
100. Exactly. Similar tales could be told for Wales and NI. The South of England will become a Tory/LD story (if the LDs can get their act together). The North of England is looking pretty homeless. Rich pickings for BNP.
“Cameron issues election challenge”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7524791.stm
Congratulations to the SNP and to their posters who predicted the result - you really deserve your morning cheer. The bottom line, it seems to me, is that when a party is well behind in the polls, there is no such thing as a safe seat. Tribalism among voters is now relatively rare, and the instinct to use a by-election to kick a party out of favour is very widespread indeed.
Our collective judgment of a 50-50 chance was pretty good, but I think people are being a bit harsh on the Politics panel - they were only reflecting the collective wisdom a week or so ago, and I think the SNP reckon their campaign only really took off in the final days. For the record, I think I was the first here to predict a highish turnout and I refused throughout to call a winner, though I reported colleagues’ confidence that we’d make it (which wasn’t, in fact, all that far from the result). One prediction that didn’t work out was Easterross’s view that Scots Tories and LibDems don’t vote tactically - the Tory share is down a bit, the LibDem share by two thirds, and I’d guess most of them went with the by-election momentum.
To respond to the friendly personal bits: as mirthios says, my plan is to say ugh! and go on holiday, though not till next week: I’ll be away for 10 days. For anyone who’s curious, I’m the current holder of the world championship in Diplomacy - a board game hinging on persuasion and alliances - and defending my title at the World Boardgaming Championships in Lancaster, PA, in the pretty and olde-worlde Amish country. I’m not sure what the last sentence of Fluffy Thoughts at 37 is about (I paid more tax working in Switzerland than I do now, because I was earning more), but to respond to Martin at 49 I don’t own a house (or anything else) in Switzerland (or anywhere else abroad). I’ll be fighting my corner in Broxtowe with my usual single-mindedness, and we’ll see what the electorate decide.
104, Morris Dancer. Your reasoning is widely held but inappropriate. As I’ve ranted at 88 - follow the money. It is not up to the Cabinet or media, it is up to whoever is prepared to fund Labour to take part in a GE.
100. I agree, King probably thought it was a dreadful result for the Tories last night!
He always says it! He seems stuck in the past, whilst i am not sure about the head of steam for Scottish independence you claim - there certainly seems to be one behind the Scots nats. The two are not necessarily mutual as polls have said people support the SNP but not Independence.
99
There are two things a PM must have, a very thick skin, and total self belief, there will be someone, (there always is) who believes (rightly or wrongly) that this is their moment. That destiny has chosen them, and only them, to find a way out of the swamp.
108 - wow. World champion at Diplomacy? I’m genuinely impressed, Nick.
How did someone like you wind up becoming a Labour MP?
108 typically brave music-facing from Nick although he is clearly wrong on the Tories who did superbly to avoid the squeeze and leapfrog the LDs
Professor Curtice on the Today programme this morning said that if Labour were to face any more by elections in the next 6 months, they’d be lucky to win any of them.
Has Ave It let his identity slip!
PS - Diplomacy is indeed very difficult.
I suppose being an actual politician would help!
109, oh yeah, I always forget that bit.
Unions then. Oh goody.
It’s obviously time, isn’t it? I suspect there’s hardly anybody left here who wouldn’t conclude that the people of Britain have lost all confidence in their SOVNARKOM and especially the People’s Tractor Commisar, and the only way to restore that confidence is to call a general election.
More bad polling news for Gordon:
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/politics-headlines/anal-warts-take-poll-lead-over-brown–200807251122/
#111
Disagree. The two things that the next PM will need is an English parliamentary seat and a comfortable majority. The rest is down to the electorate….
And of course Gordon’s ineptitude over timing means that all the Labour MPs have to relive the horror again in October when Mr Mason takes his seat.
There’s nothing diplomatic about forcing people to sign up for ID cards!
Poor Old Gordon - What A Shame.
I unfortunately couldn’t stay up any longer last night and rashly traded away half my profit just in case Labour sneaked it. But still mustn’t grumble as I too have just transferred some lolly out of Betfair.
108. Sounds like an interesting holiday! Good luck with retaining the title (Sounds like skill rather than luck!).
New thread - Move over PoliticsHome
McCain’s VeeP : Pawlenty….
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/07/23/mccain-talks-up-pawlenty/
So they have confirmed the economy grew by 0.2% in Q2.
Could mean that Q4 may see a slip into recession looking at the trends.
The campaign to replace the PHI 100 with the PHARSE 1 starts now.