Should we focus more on negative voting?
November 11th, 2009
Is this what ultimately will be the clincher?
As we get closer to elections, it seems, there is one hardy topic that always emerges - that of the impact of negative campaigning and we saw in 1997, 2001 and 2005 how much of the Labour message was primarily about demonising the Tories.
But what about negative voting? Do negative messages chime with what some of the electorate wants and what’s the impact?
So does it matter in the current context whether or not “Dave has sealed the deal” when the evidence from previous elections is that negative feelings towards a party can matter more than positive ones?
People who vote in this way, I suggest, represent large and significant voting segment which might not yet be being fully picked up by the opinion polls for so much is dependent on what they do in their own specific seats.
Only two of the pollsters, ICM and Angus Reid, have voting questions which ask respondents to focus on what they will be doing locally and interestingly both have been recording smaller Labour shares and bigger Lib Dem ones.
We do know that in 2005 ICM found that nearly one in five of all voters answered YES to the question “Did/will you vote … because it is your first choice or because you want to try and keep another party from winning in your Constituency?”
At the same time, on the eve of the 2005 election, Populus found that more than half of those voting Labour and Lib Dem were doing so “more because of negative views about other parties than out of enthusiasm..” for their own one.
All the evidence this time is that the mood is anti-Labour and my guess is that we might see disproportionate swings against the party in the marginals.
For on top of the anti-Labour moves a lot of the anti-Tory votes that are locked in from the last three elections could unwind further distorting swing projections.
In summary I believe the the uniform swing seat projectors will be as “out” as they were in 1997 when the dynamic was all against Major’s Tories.
Mike Smithson
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Not first, Shirley?
I am anti-Labour and proud.
I am pro-Tory and humble.
If people want a change they will vote for it. So far the polls indicate a change is indeed what people want.
good question.
people vore for the least worst at this time, rather than someone they fully endorse.
a line such as we know you hate all politicians, and after the expenses farce who can blame you, but we will as of tyher next election try to be a bit better and actually do what we say on the tin. that might resonate instead of pollies telling us how wonderful they (still) are.
or even; “vote for us and we will try not to be as bad as the last lot were!”.
Watching Sky News. Why are people so fascinated by state murder?
I am both anti-Labour and pro-Tory and proud of both positions. Fortunately I live in a Con-Lab marginal so I have no difficult decisions to make, but it would be difficult to decide if I were more anti-Lib Dem or anti-Labour.
Mike S - Do you have a betting position on the number of Socialist seats post-GE?
“Only two of the pollsters, ICM and Angus Reid, have voting questions which ask respondents to focus on what they will be doing locally and interestingly both have been recording smaller Labour shares and bigger Lib Dem ones.”
Mike, a valid point for those that are clued up on their individual constituency seats. But the other point you make has even greater relevance.
“All the evidence this time is that the mood is anti-Labour and my guess is that we might see disproportionate swings against the party in the marginals.”
Hence my prediction that turnout will be up in those marginal seats, and that will be the biggest problem for both Labour and incumbent Libdems. You can ask the question about what voters will do locally at this moment in time, or get them to focus on party affiliation. But when push comes to shove in that polling booth, they will opt against this government rather than for an incumbent MP.
2&3.You two need to get a pair of tartan pompoms asap. Nite all.
Just like to say that I am delighted that the migrating geese that were parked in the field near my home resting have now moved on, noisy bu**gers.
David Roe
Just been scanning over a number of blogs and the response (earned or not) suggests more supporting Brown and Labour. Particularly true in Glasgow NE, I’d have thought.
If you’re looking for a headline for Friday’s edition, I’d suggest
“It’s The Sun Wot Won It”
10 - Heh. I think Gordy has dodged a bullet.
Great topic.Really great topic.
Historically,ie when Michael Howard was still Leader,the conventional wisdom was that the next GE would be a two-Party affair and that the Lib Dems would be badly squeezed.This narrative intensified and at one point the midpoint of the Seat Spreads for the Big2 was comfortably in the high 570s.Indeed, I got lucky and Sold them in the mid 580s.
Things are different today.Now the midpoint of the Spread for CON+LAB is more like 560 and the Lib Dems have climbed out of the low mid 40s to the small 50s and are rated even higher by the bookies.
The topical feature however is the prominence of all the minor Parties, both NATS and OTHERS and the parts they will play in the downfall of the Big3 but of Labour in particular.
The challenge for the Lib Dems is to do superbly well in the 100 Seats where they have some sort of chance and let the rest go hang.
a) I’m pro-Scottish and anti-BritNat. And I vote accordingly.
But SeanT, for example, is a bigger “nationalist” than I could ever be. Sean is utterly obsessed with the politics of identity: individual, national/supranational and ethnic. It oozes out of his writing. I suspect that Sean votes “against” rather than “for” a party.
b) Baxter is going to have a torrid UK GE 2010, especially north of the border.
c) Poor weather in Glasgow? Good! John Smith House will be filling their breeks.
False charges of anti-Semitism demean the accuser, not the accused
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danielhannan/100016352/false-charges-of-anti-semitism-demean-the-accuser-not-the-accused/
Eeryone talks about 1997 in terms of tactical voting and few talk about 2001.Surely the 2001 GE saw the real triumph of TV.
In 1997 the Conservatives had been in government for 18 years.In 2001 they hadn’t and yet contrived to lose every Seat they possibly could lose and the Lib Dems had a minor triumph in terms of Seats which was not related to their percentage of the poll*.
We know that there is detestation of Labour, but will this manifest itself in tactical voting ? In 2001 there was a kind of symbiosis between NuLabour and the Lib Dems with the latter having dreams of becoming ‘the real opposition’. I don’t see a similar love-in between them and the Tories, so TV will probably have to be spontaneous rather than orchestrated.
* Is there a site that gives details of UK elections since WW2 ? I used to have one but it has moved.
Mike, the anti SNP stuff from Labour is always very prominent and extremely visceral. And it nearly always worked. Until 2007.
Nobody bothers attacking the Tories directly. They only get mentioned in passing.
Seventeenth?
I am neither anti-Labour nor pro-Tory, just neutral.
Mike. In the past, how good have the exit polls been? A thread on the subject would be most interesting, especially if counting is not going to start until the Friday. Has it always been the practice to leave this to the BBC? Maybe Angus Reid, with your help, could do a better job. I, for one, would be prepared to make a financial contribution and maybe others here would feel the same - might help us to get some sleep on the Thursday night.
I don’t that ‘anti-Labour’ is the right term. Labour have made a mess of things, so we vote them out, and hope the other lot do a better job.
That said, I’m very much pro-Tory this time round, love all this ’small government, big society’ rhetoric.
FPT “The difference is that a grieving mother has been exploited by a national newspaper, in pursuance of their own narrow political agenda.”
I read she’s 5th generation army family. If the above view gets any traction then easy way out if she was up for it would be a “I used the Sun not the other way round” story i.e her trying to get the heli problem into the public domain as much as she could.
1) It’s quite possibly true.
2) Even if it was just reacting to grief if she’s 5th generation then she’ll see the use in the line for getting the heli problem more in the public domain.
Point being helping to get the heli problem sorted could end up saving the lives of dozens of lads out there which would be a very fitting memorial for her boy.
@@@
“Should we focus more on negative voting?”
Very much so. The three largest parties are all sitting in a room ignoring a herd of elephants and a lot of the vote will be over which party they dislike most. Tory/LD should be way ahead on this because Labour is allegedly the government but Tory/LD need some clear blue signature water between them and Labour to maximize the benefit as at the moment they all look the same unless you squint.
(Imo this is because they all look the same on some of the big stand-out issues like Europe, immigration, expenses, neocon whack-a-mole, crime etc, so the differences in less stand-out areas get less noticed.)
It looks like Obama expects NATO to deliver extra an 4000 troops. Don’t hold your breath.
“President Obama is to ask members of Nato to provide up to 4,000 more troops to help to break the deadlock in Afghanistan. ”
“His appeal is set to be largely ignored, however. At present only two Nato members have offered more troops — Britain and Turkey — and no other country is expected to come up with any, according to alliance sources. Such a response would threaten the credibility of the alliance in Afghanistan and represent a considerable snub for Mr Obama, who was viewed as a welcome change after the administration of President Bush. ”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/Afghanistan/article6911741.ece
Ah, but there’s STILL a large anti-Tory feeling around too. Cameron manages to stir up some of that. Negative voting can hit oppositions too: remember Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock? In some ways William Hague and Michael Howard also took negative voting hits too. Once Cameron gets going with his posh voice in the campaign proper the Labour vote will harden.
I’m more than ever thinking that the Tories will not win outright. They simply do not have the support they need, and all this ‘Brown isn’t popular’ guff so beloved by Mike is a red herring. Come the spring Labour will be polling in the 30’s. If the Tories don’t start hitting well over 40% they can kiss goodbye to a straight win this time around.
“Gordon Brown: Five More Years!” would surely be the biggest reason for negative voting. Although “Labour: Five More Years!” will run it close. And most any of the Cabinet would do the job:
“Harriet Harman: Five More Years!”
“Ed Balls: Five More Years!”
“Peter Mandelson: Five More Years!”
“Liam Byrne: Five More Years!”
“Bob Ainsworth: Five More Years!”
or even ex-Cabinet:
“Jacqui Smith: Five More Years!”
The overriding desire at the next election - the one that will drag people off their arses and actually get them to vote this time - will be:
“Labour: Just MAKE IT GO AWAY!”
[i]We do know that in 2005 ICM found that nearly one in five of all voters answered YES to the question “Did/will you vote … because it is your first choice or because you want to try and keep another party from winning in your Constituency?”[/i]
Uh? Q: Will you do x or will you do y? A: “Yes”. Makes no sense.
21 We should get Turkey to provide 100,000 troops into Afghanistan - in return for guaranteed EU membership within 10 years. That would have a certain appealling symmetry.
23 - if you click the link Mike provides and look at page 14 you’ll see the answers separated by first choice etc.
Marquee Mark @ 24
Unfortunately the mass of the Turkish public are no longer that enthralled by the possibility of rule by Eurocrats. So there is not much bargaining power there.
Its a shame as they have a lot of experience of hunting down terrorists in the mountains.
1) 2001 was the big TV election not 1997. Labour went from 3rd to 1st in several seats in 1997.
2) Will the widespread boundary changes make TV more or less likely? It makes the current state of the parties less certain, but on the other hand makes it easier for the Libdems to produce dodgy barcharts which can’t easily be refuted.
Maybe tears can shift “get him out” voters to “stay at home” non voters.
26 A large new somewhat Eurosceptic country in the East was one of the attractions of proposing their being given a guaranteed fixed date to join… You can understand their going a bit cool on joining the EU now, the original core of Europe having so obviously treated them like a bad smell. Although, if given a firm date, I suspect Turkey would still go for it.
And their membership would be worth it, if in return we got an army of mountain warfare specialist Muslims based in Afghanistan. Their troops might not all be up to our exacting standards, but I would rather we were helping to train up Turkish NATO troops, than Afghans who turn round and shoot you when they have been taught how to use a machine gun.
Populus splits are available - usual caveats apply.
South-East.
Cons 43; LAB 25; LD 19; GN 7; UKIP 4; BNP 2; OTH 1.
Midlands
Cons 47; LAB 24; LD 16; GN 5; UKIP 5; BNP 2; OTH 1.
North
Cons 33; LAB 39; LD 18; GN 3; UKIP 2; BNP 3; OTH 2.
Wales & South-West
Cons: 41; LAB 19; LD 23; PC 9; GN 1; UKIP 8; BNP 0; OTH 1.
Scotland
Cons 18, LAB 44; LD 7; SNP 26; GN 2; UKIP 4
Strong sample in favour of public sector
What would demonstrate that Cameron has “sealed the deal”?
I see the phrase being bandied about, but without much explanation.
Quick answer - Yes
I’ve thought that this effect would be huge this election. I remember the euphoria around the ‘97 election where almost everyone I spoke to had the same attitude - Get the Tories Out.
I’m detecting a similar feeling now, and if this continues to the GE I think it will bring muc larger changes than any of the opinion polls are suggesting.
Does anyone know what the Canadian polls were sying on the run up to the collapse of the Conservative vote there?
31 I’m not sure it has any meaning over than a vague feeling that given how dire the alleged government is the Tories ought to be consistently 45%+. I think they should be 45%+ of the non-others vote.
Agree!
I agree that the answer is Yes. I’m certainly one such voter.
In a safe Conservative seat, I’d vote UKIP. In a marginal, like Luton South, it’s very easy for me to vote Conservative, to oust Labour. In a seat like Totnes, I’d vote Conservative , to ensure that an MP was returned who would not keep Labour in office, in the event of a hung Parliament. In a seat like Oxford East, where the Conservative had no chance, I’d vote Lib Dem to oust Labour.
33 The reason they don’t have that 45% is that 6-10% consistently say they’d vote for parties to the right of the Conservatives.
31 Talk that Cameron hasn’t yet “sealed the deal” is short-hand for the despair engendered by the Left in knowing that the Tories have indeed won the next election, short of some miracle they haven’t yet settled on. It is based on wilfully clinging to polling from the Nineties and earlier, whose modern relevence has been discredited by many, most noteably OGH.
36 . Yes. That’s my point. He can’t seal the deal in the normal sense because c10%+ of the electorate aren’t part of the mainstream anymore.
2001 was indeed the triumph of TV here in Dorset.
Many people ascribe the Tory losses in Dorset South to Labour and Mid Dorset & North Poole to the LDs to Billy Bragg’s TV campaign which recieved both national and a lot of local attention at the time.
That tactical unwind is going to help the Tories and the LDs in S Dorset. In Mid Dorset, where I live, I doubt that it will have that much effect, Labour being so unpopular.
However, a much stronger Tory campaign this time in Mid Dorset could make a big difference to them. Much of the seat is classic suburban swing territory with a real desire to see the back of Gordon Brown. That’s where negative voting is going to play its part.
37 I think it’s them having a false hope based on not taking into account that a large chunk of the “others” vote isn’t part of the same game anymore. So they’re looking at the Tory share relative to an imaginary total possible vote share of 100% when in reality the total possible vote share is c90%. If that makes sense.
37 - The effect, as you’ve pointed out before with references to Kelvin Hopkins, may be affected by the expenses scandal.
I wouldn’t rule out differential “anti votes” due to that.
A definite ‘yes’. Also “…the uniform swing seat projectors will be as out as they were in 1997″ is why I have always believed that talk of the Conservatives needing a 6 point lead to have a majority is wide of the mark.
O/T on the GB letter - I am starting to believe in the keep Gordo conspiracy. At the outset there seemed a real possibility that this could stir up the plotters one more time. By some of the clearly anti-Brown papers coming out for him (on the dubious grounds that he is a decent man) they have shored up his position until the new year, when it will surely be too late.
Complacency?
Not our Ken
A Labour victory would be better for Britain than a hung Parliament, Kenneth Clarke suggested yesterday…….
In a second move that could antagonise the party hierarchy, Mr Clarke also appeared on the verge of claiming that the election was all but won.
“We are probably going to win,” he said, prompting grimaces from nearby Tory advisers. The Cameron source said: “There is no complacency.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6911724.ece
44.Re uniform swing projections.Were the uniform swing projections in 1997 wildly out?they may have bben for the Lib dems but then there was publicity on how Labour voters should vote in top 20 or so Con/Lib marginals.
I accept the mood will be to get out Labour but am prepared to bet that uniform national swing will be the closest to the result in England(not in Wales and Scoaland with the complications of a four party contests)
Yes we should take heed of negative voting, but perhaps another very significant impact will be those who either in all conscience cannot vote for another party and sit on their hands and also those who say “a plague on all their houses” and also stay away from the polling booth.
Both parties will probably hurt Labour more than the other parties and this could lead to some surprising results.
Would anyone like to hazard a guess at the combined effects of the negative voters and the absentee voters?
Enjoying the 1992 results - never seen it in full before, and how many NuLabourites when they had hair!
Yes of course there is plenty of tactical voting, mostly due to our archaic voting system of first past the post. If we want people to vote positively, we need a system that encourages them to do so.
Anyone know what is the poll mentioned on page 2 of yesterdays Sun which says a poll from Monday showed tories on 42 labour on 28?
43 That, too.
42 Yes. The County Elections showed both UKIP and BNP doing best in safe Conservative or Labour areas, while disillusioned Labour voters from 2005 were switching directly to the Conservatives (or staying at home) in more marginal seats. That’s the pattern I’d expect to see at the next Election. Radical Right voters are likely to be both very politicised, and very determined to do damage to Labour.
On Radio 5live, c. 7.50 Nicky Campbell was interviewing one of the scientists who met Johnson at The Home Office. The scientist said that he found out via the BBC News that he had resigned, before the meeting with Postman Pat started. He hadn’t even disgussed resignation with the Home Sec at that point. The guy is not a happy chap, and is disgusted by the treatment.
48 You mean a system where you could have massive negative voting - but still couldn’t prevent a party only a relative few want from edging into Government? A party such as UKIP, or the BNP…
Even more worrying, the notion that a PR system could return Gordon Brown back to Downing Street for 5 more years, just because he massaged the egoes of a few LibDem MP’s and give them junior Ministerial posts, should be enough to scare folks off changing from FPTP for a few more decades.
Marquee Mark @ 31
The decision makers in Turkey are still in favour of entry.
From the UK’s point of view, Turkish membership would ensure the end of the superstate. Its precisely that reason why the federasts will never let them in.
I am torn on the subject, wanting them in as a Brit, but being married to a Turk, I don’t want to inflict such a fate on them
31: Marquee Mark
The potential impact of a significant Turkish force fighting “fellow” Muslims leads to some interesting trains of thought.
The arguement (put forward by our politicians) for the UK being involved in Afghanistan is very much on the lines that we are fighting a line of terrorism that stretches from Afghanisatn and Pakistan right back to the UK.
However, no-one has countered that arguement with the thought that if the UK’s immigration and asylum policies had not allowed the rapid and very significant influx of alien cultures and religions into the UK, would that problem still arise?
WRT Turkey, will they suffer a similar internal threat to the UK or would such action by Turkey just aggravate the internal tensions that already exist between the traditional Islamists and those who wish to follow a more liberal and Westernised path?
I am pretty certain that there will be a large “none of the above” vote, driven by disgust over expenses etc. In the absence of such an option on the ballot sheet (as in Russia!), I suspect the impact will be in low voter turnout, especially by the WWC. This will probably result in the minor parties doing better than expected as their voters tend to be more committed but on balance will not affect the final tally by more than 2-3 constituencies.
Morning All
51 – Interesting, the picture painted yesterday was that all three resigned after meeting Alan Johnson, which would make sense; it now appears as though someone is playing silly buggers at the home office . . but I’m baffled as to what they wished to achieve.
51 dr spyn
Huh? How does that work?
I don’t understand this story. Someone has obviously screwed up - who?
Yes - it’s a pity, but the general belief that all politicians are crap means that appeals for positive votes have a more uphill task than claims that the others would be worse.
A problem for the Tories (and SNP) in some areas is that they are in power locally in most places, and that isn’t universally a popular thing to be. In Notts, the new Tory County Council is behaving like the sort of Thatcherite stereotype portrayed by a scurrilous Labour leaflet - they’re selling off every single retirement home, slashing services for the elderly, nearly doubling the meals on wheels charge,abolishing a taxi service for disabled elderly people, etc. - nearly all targeted at the elderly for no obvious reason and without any budgetary crisis (the current settlement for Notts is pretty good, unlike most southern counties), and at the same time as refurbishing their new offices and adding more paid portfolio jobs for the ruling councillors. Clearly the package will yield a nice warchest when they want to get re-elected in 4 years, but right now it’s hardening the anti-Tory vote in a big way.
44 the Keep Gordo conspiracy…
Brown is not a decent man, he is a nasty conniving opportunist, and Jacqui Janes has clearly been dumped upon from a high level to shut her up, in classic Brown fashion. But I agree, it’s misfired. She’s made her mark in no uncertain manner and left him, if possible, even more damaged; meanwhile, if it shores him up to limp through to the election, that’s another bonus for the Conservatives. In fact it’s a Tory win-win scenario.
55 - I think a ‘none of the above’ box should be mandatory on all ballots.
On negative voting, I’m in a pickle myself. This seat is Labour and will stay Labour by a distance. Tories are third and unlikely to improve. So do I vote LD, who are second? Do I vote tory anyway? Or do I vote Green, as their vote has improved significantly in recent years in the seat?
I’m leaning green, as they have the greatest capacity to scare Labour in this seat.
The Mirror tries to pin the blame for lettergate on Cameron.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/opinion/voiceofthemirror/2009/11/11/shame-on-you-dave-115875-21812923/
58 Sounds like the Labour councillors round here a feew years ago Nick.
50 “Radical Right voters are likely to be both very politicised, and very determined to do damage to Labour.”
Yes, absolutely no joy for them in that 10%.
58- not that you’re biased in anyway
Just heard Mandelson on the radio and he didn’t irritate me. Am I ill?
32. Financier
Holy Smoke!
Populus’ Scottish split is totally in agreement with Monday’s TNS-BMRB/Herald findings. There is no doubt at all in my mind that we are witnessing a powerful Swingback to Labour in Scotland.
Could it be that large numbers of Lowland (and I am including the NE in that broad definition) SLD voters are going to swing tactically behind SLAB in some areas? I say this cos the SLD figures have been absolutely appalling for nearly 3 years now, and if anything are getting worse! (Much to my surprise.)
Here is the +/- change from UK GE 2005:
Lab 44% (+5)
SNP 26% (+8)
Con 18% (+2)
LD 7% (-16)
UKIP 4% (+4)
Grn 2% (+1)
BNP 0 (n/c)
oth 0
http://populuslimited.com/uploads/download_pdf-081109-The-Times-The-Times-Poll—November-2009.pdf
61 “The Mirror tries to pin the blame for lettergate on Cameron.”
…actually it blames the Sun (no surprise there), which is describes as Cameron’s “puppetmasters”.
Unfairly perhaps I feel a degree of cynicism about the Broken Brown we saw at yesterdays press conference. The guy who made the phone call on Saturday sounded like Gordon, the one who pulled out all the stops for sympathy, making himself into the victim, didn’t. Perhaps like a Gordon Brown Budget it takes a day to fell you’ve been had.
It was a clever strategy, moving the spotlight from the letter/call and Mrs Janes to Gordon Brown, starting with a downer through bringing up Rememberance Day and the repatriation, father who had lost a child, tears in eyes over the attacks on his character, that he was a shy man driven by duty to talk to people up and down the country.
That was backed up by members of the Brown gang, Austin, Whelan assisted by Mandelson turning the fire on to the Sun, very successfully, but re-inforcing the “Gordon meant well, it was handwritten, unfair to attack a guy with sight difficulties, lost a child himself”.
I think it worked to close off the immediate story, not sure though that tears and sympathy garner votes.
7 “Mike S - Do you have a betting position on the number of Socialist seats post-GE?”
Has any one else noticed how much the “S” word has started to appear on PB and elsewhere recently?
Not that our great leader can complain - he always makes a point of referring to the “Liberals” rather than the Liberal Democrats in an obviously pejorative manner.
I live in fear of the ‘Jedward Vote’.
A contrived position by the unthinking classes (generation X-Factor) who don’t see politics as relevant, label all parties the same and are determined to overthrow the orthodox belief that the Tories will win.
Interesting comment in the Mirror today, attacking the Sun for being a down market newspaper pursuing a political agenda. So unlike the Mirror. I’m pretty certain that it was Mirror journos who stalked Cameron through the streets of London and then raided his bins to run a story on the type of nappy he used for his disabled son. Damn those down market newspapers and their political agendas, eh Kev?
58 But is the local council eating babies yet Nick?
Marquee Mark @ 52: The Liberal Democrats I speak to have no desire to prop Gordon Brown up, and it’s only Tories stirring who suggest otherwise.
I’ve long advocated that Nick Clegg should publically say no coalition under any circumstances save national emergency after the election; we’ll work issue by issue with each party where we can get agreement.
And UKIP/BNP in Government, just sounds like Tory spinning again. Who would allow the BNP to share power? And I can only imagine one party close enough to UKIP to work with them
Neither of us have any desire to see UKIP/BNP getting elected, but the Euro elections shows the strength of feeling in the country - maybe you’re revealing true Tory values by seeking to deny this.
48. I was watching some of the 1992 election coverage last night. Its weird to see so many long departed faces. John Smith. Robin Cook. Jill Dando. Its kind of jarring when they pop up, their images frozen forever in time.
Excellent stuff though. I’m going to watch some more tonight.
70 Bono - There is surely an at least opposite faction, who will vote on an anything but
SocialistLabour basis in a mindless fashion, purely on the basis that’s “it’s time for a change?”Stepping back from it all, Labour seem to be spinning the line that being incompetent to be the PM has become a disability that no one is allowed to attack?
or the Python’s “She whiffs a bit but is good to the kids”.
74- I’m not certain that the Jedward vote would have reached X in the alphabet
67
Sorry Ted,
I don’t have £29,000 worth (per ‘Coffeehouse’ running total) of sympathy for Brown.
In the words of Harry S Truman (plunged into the the toughest job in the world, who had to make more far more difficult decisions),
‘If you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen’
11, on this issue perhaps, but at the GE he won’t dodge the shoal of enormo-haddock!
73 - Yes, and also some young fresh faces who are now old and hardened ones. I have to go to work now, but Alan Milburn has just been elected for the first time. You wonder how different things might have been had the Tories held on in Darlington.
67 Ted. The only flaw in your theory is that Brown cannot fake sincerity to save his life and he’s hopeless at lying convincing.
In my view what you saw yesterday was what you got; whatever Brown is, he’s no actor.
Mandy speaks the truth - inadvertently.
“If you read the Sun you’d think the enemy that our brave troops on the ground, the enemy that they’re fighting, is the British government.”
Yes the Govt is the problem.
61. “But the glee with which a Tory propaganda sheet that purports to support our armed services has used this incident to denigrate the Premier at this critical time is shameful.”
What a load of rubbish that is coming from the Mirror. Given some of their past reporting about Iraq and their unquestioning support of Labour they are in no position to cast stones.
81, it’s becoming a habit, as with his strangely revealing public utterances that the Government are insurgents.
74
I hope so…
76
I wouldn’t say that, just in case the few that can read tell their mates…
61 - Linking Cameron to the Letter story in the Sun is a bit daft.
OK he’s given Murdoch what he wants with OFCOM and put the lightweight Jeremy Hunt in charge of CMS (The equivalent of telling Mike Tyson that his cage fighting opponent will be Tim Henman) but linkage to particular stories is silly.
65 - credit to Stuart for giving us Scottish updates whether they suit his party or not. That said, a regional subsample should always be taken with lashings of salt.
71 - they haven’t got to eating babies yet, but they’ve only been in power for a bit. Give them time!
The serious point is that this sort of council policy feeds the narrative (negative, as per the thread), that voting Tory isn’t a harmless vote for a nice change but a serious decision likely to have serious consequences.
65. SLAB is coming back in the West of Scotland as Gordon Brown is much more liked than Tony Blair and his cronies ever were. While I dont like his politics he is much more honest as a person. I cannot see Labour losing any of their seats in Glasgow or Lanarkshire with the possible exception of East Renfrewshire.
The most remrakable thing with the polls at the moment seems to be how consistent and predictable they are. The big switch has come in Middle England and there seems little that Labour can do to turn it back.
I would also suggest that the BNP is not a right wing party. 90% of their policies would look good in a communist manifesto. They are a nationalistic left wing party. Their main fight is with Labour and their suppporters are probably the ones that hate Labour most.
I think the anti-Labour vote has mostly gone to minor parties not the Tories and this backs up Mike’s article.
85 - “OK he’s given Murdoch what he wants with OFCOM”
What are you talking about?
TNS-BMRB have now released the full datasheets from Monday’s Herald poll. Now we can assess the full Holyrood results, which the Herald failed to publish. I wonder why?
The Green figure on the regional vote is ALWAYS important to look at, as a small but significant number of seats are entirely dependent on the level of the Green vote. This survey is very poor for the Scottish Green Party. That is good news for several Tory list MPs!
Holyrood v.i. - Constituency vote (FPTP)
(+/- change from Scottish GE 2007)
SNP 40% (+7)
Lab 32% (n/c)
Con 13% (-4)
LD 11% (-5)
oth 5%
Holyrood v.i. - Regional vote (AMS)
(+/- change from Scottish GE 2007)
SNP 37% (+6)
Lab 29% (n/c)
Con 12% (-2)
LD 12% (+1)
Grn 4% (n/c)
SSP 2%
Sol 0
oth 4%
http://www.tns-ri.co.uk/_assets/files/Scottish_Market_Polls1.pdf
89. typo - several Tory list MSPs
86 NickP
“….voting Tory isn’t a harmless vote for a nice change but a serious decision likely to have serious consequences.”
WTF, voting for ANY party should be a serious decision likely to have serious consequences.
You seem better suited to children’s television than politics, Nick.
That poll is really out of line from the TNS-BMRB one though, Stuart. I mean 44% for Labour? The 39% on the TNS looks more realistic, and it had a decent polling size unlike a mini-sample. 12% for the LDs on the TNS poll is still getting pretty well stomped, but is probably more realistic as well. That’s still down 12%.
I’m not sure if it’s totally tactical though since the TNS poll also shows them down 5% from the 2005 Holyrood election on constituency from 16% down to 11%.
If Labour hang on the Sun can say after yesterday “It w.as the Sun that lost it!”
The total collapse of the Lib Dem vote in Scotland outside their own seats is truly astonishing, I suggest Charles Kennedy takes over up there.
I LIi LOVE it . Labour are so desperate now - its fun to watch. Everyone is fair game, even grieving mothers of troops killed . I listended to the taped transcript in disbelief. He argued with her and contradicted her. Christ almighty.
89
Interesting how different voting intentions are between Westminster and Holyrood.
A brief glance at the numbers suggests a number of tory voters will vote SNP in Holyrood to keep Labour out.
Or am I missing something?
#91 Oh sorry that I left off the reference number. I was referring to your comment #65
95. You are perhaps missing that a number of SNP voters will vote Labour in Westminster to keep Tories out. LOL
Oops… sorry. Lost my connection and didn’t think the first one posted.
48 Are the 1992 results online somewhere?
86 NickP There are also other local influences on voting such as the fact that in a performance assessment carried out by the government, Nottinghamshire Police was ranked the 3rd worst police force in the country.
That is likely to have more impact at the GE than the adding of some porfolio jobs.
Still 3rd worst is not the worst so your police have something to aim at.
I heard Mandleson twice, both on 5 live and radio 4. What irritated me the most was his blatant lie that Labour did not encourage the Sun hammering Major and his Govt, yet when the boot is on the other foot….
95. Perhaps you’re missing that a number of SNP voters will vote Labour to keep the Tories out.
The Sun’s behaviour has been a major own goal for the Tories (if indeed the Tories were in on the story, but with Coulson as Cameron’s PR man you have to assume so).
However it will blow over in a week unless the Sun carry on like this. If they continue to be seen to be bullying Brown (and I appreciate this is deeply ironic given Labour’s use of the media, spin and PR) given the innate british sense of fair play it will be counter productive. Coulson’s best advice to the Sun from a Tory point of view after this is that they should tone it down a bit. If they go back to being the odious paper they were under McKenzie it will lose the tories more votes than they’ll gain.
SimonStClare @ 88
He thinks that Cazmeron is already Prime Minister. Easy mistake to make I suppose.
Anyone spot the irony in the title re the author ?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/simonheffer/6539877/When-it-comes-to-Europe-David-Cameron-is-howling-in-the-night.html
86 Nick P “voting Tory isn’t a harmless vote for a nice change but a serious decision likely to have serious consequences.”
Indeed it is, Nick - the serious consequence it will have is, over time, rescuing Britain from the dire straits that 12 years of Labour have left us in. Your wording is very revealing, and IMO is typical of Labour’s real lack of understanding of the dynamics. People aren’t moving to Cameron because they think it’s harmless to do so and he seems quite nice; they are moving that way to get things changed.
On topic: Mike is 100% correct. The essence of democracy is not about voting governments in, it is about voting governments out. That is one reason why FPTP is a good system.
I also think Mike is correct in his analysis of the differential effect that the ‘time for change’ mood will have. It’s hard to get hard evidence for this until we actually see the full election results, but there are indications that support Mike’s analysis in the regional splits in national polls, in the Politics Home marginals poll, and in local election results. In particular, the larger pro-Tory/anti-Labour swing in the Midlands looks very clear.
Authentic excerpt from today’s Mirror. It would be wrong to comment on the story out of respect for the family involved, but you do have to wonder about the mentality of the sub who thought the word “joy” was appropriate in the context.
Family’s joy at message from No 10
By Matt Roper 11/11/2009
The parents of rifleman James Backhouse, 18, were deeply touched to receive a hand written letter from Gordon Brown five days after he died in a blast.
His dad Andrew, 47, said: “It’s a bit scraggly and looks like it was written with a felt pen. But it’s the fact he tried to write it rather than get someone to type it. We both thought it was a lovely idea. It’s pathetic the Prime Minister is being attacked after sending a thoughtful letter.
“Gordon Brown is blind in one eye, I’m sure it affects how he writes.”
James, in 2nd Battalion The Rifles, and from Castleford, West Yorks, died in Helmand on July 10.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/11/11/family-s-joy-at-message-from-no-10-115875-21812910/
Let not forget that Gordo lied at the Press Conference yesterday (after lying and arguing with the women in question), for that alone all the “broken man” stuff appears one massive smokescreen.
What’s the betting this broken man does a big interview in a friendly Sunday paper about the whole incident? Again, where an alternative reality of events is given, interrupted only by the children “accidentally” bursting in.
77 Gordo will have spent Sunday being advised by Sarah (PR Professional), Mandelson & Balls on his demeanour and actions at the Press Conference. It was about garnering sympathy for Gordon, his character, somethings he has done before. His apology to Dorries was based on “I’m a moral person, I wouldn’t be involved with this”.
Reports point out his clothes were sombre, his body language unhappy. I think it was very deliberate - witness his answer to BBC question on whether he had the character to defend governments position on Afghanistan, it didn’t answer the question but again was about himself grieving and apparently that he was shy.
It was successful - the Lobby was uncomfortable and sympathetic. A day late but “sorry” worked.
“it’s the fact he tried to write it rather than get someone to type it. We both thought it was a lovely idea.”
But it is MoD policy is it not?
101: The story has now, in essence run its course. A two part story, one with the letter, and one with the recording.
I don’t think the Sun or the Tories (especially) will be too concerned with the supposed ‘backlash’. If Brown needs pity, then thats a dire state of affairs for a Prime Minister, everyone knows tha papers have little to no morals anyway.
The Labourites running about bleating about it are funny though. One should look at Toilets with his ‘druggy dave’ attacks.
Richard Nabavi, shhhh. How am I going to get good prices on midlands constituencies if you tip people off?
There seems to be a general sympathy for Brown over the Sun stunt, the decision to record the conversation was a major error.
Ironically, seeing as the SUN is hawkish on Afghanistan its probably given the, ‘lets just pull out’ cause a considerable boost.
The Libdems will probably go into the GE as the only party committed to withdrawal, it could increase their vote considerably.
“Everyone is fair game, even grieving mothers of troops killed”
Labour have used smeary tactics so often that I truly believe that they’ve lost any perspective they ever had. As someone mentioned on another thread - as far back as 2002 and little old ladies being racist.
Alistair Campbell must be holding his head in his hands on some of this stuff. Before it was nasty spin and then it became official smear and I recall that post Smeargate it was predicted that Labour would learn its lesson and pack it in.
But no - they’re at it again within a few months with anti-Sem1tism, Nazis, grieving mothers should be grateful to get any old tat from Gordon [he's very busy watching X-Factor and ringing Susan Boyle].
This whole business is off the Thick of It scale - I mean FFS, getting into a row with a dead soldiers mother - who then goes public with the phone call after No 10 spins a ‘Gordon’s apologised’ line that wasn’t true.
Re his sincerity at the press conference - I think it was true but in a completely humiliated/feel sorry for me way, it was about him not the families of the dead.
I’m sure he had plenty of advice about what to say/use - I came away from it thinking, he isn’t just useless technically, he’s actually pathetic too.
I’d be interested to hear what the US media makes of this humiliation of Gordon. Perhaps Obama Beach can give him a chocolate biscuit.
Another call for a Exeter constituency odds market please..
111 - The Sun didn’t record the conversation, the lady in question did without The Sun being present. If I was her, I would have recorded a conversation too (and it showed him lying and trying to argue black was white, when we can all see the black). Unless you want to call both liars.
58, Nick P - no doubt it was only the famous PB.com word limit which prevented you from mentioning that the Labour-run Nottingham City Council is closing the Fairham day centre, against Conservative (and union) opposition.
I trust you don’t mind me mentioning it now, in the interests of balance.
86. NPMP - “That said, a regional subsample should always be taken with lashings of salt.”
Agreed!
Note: the Populus Scottish sub-sample was 132 respondents ( a little bit higher than usual).
However, the reason that I am persuaded that the Populus sub-sample is on the right track, is because it chimes so well with Monday’s TNS-BMRB/Herald poll:
Westminster v.i.
(+/- change from UK GE 2005)
Lab 39% (n/c)
SNP 25% (+7)
Con 18% (+2)
LD 12% (-11)
oth 6%
http://www.tns-ri.co.uk/_assets/files/Scottish_Market_Polls1.pdf
I reckon that we are witnessing the death of the hypothesis proposed by Easterross, ChristinaD and others (including myself it must be said) that next year’s UK GE in Scotland will see “Holyrood-type” voting patterns. I now gravely doubt that. I reckon that apart from the collapse of the Scottish Lib Dems in the Central Belt and the North East, we could see surprisingly few seats changing hands!
Betting implications? Well, for starters, I’d suggest that LAB at 6/4 (PP) for Dunfermline & West Fife is a no-brainer. Money in the bank.
(Disclaimer: Stuart Dickson is NOT a financial adviser. The value of your “investments” may go down as well as up.)
110 antifrank - I thought you’d already bet on every constituency on offer.
PBR on Dec 9th according to Sky.
PBR on December 9th
Unemployment 2.61 million up 30,000
Update
I am still reading Gyles Brandreths book, and I am into the section of where Gyles is MP for Chester. It would do all PB’ers good to read that section just to remind themselves how the media went after Major and Conservative Mp’s. I had forgotten quite a bit of it and am quite taken aback at the relentlessness of what happened from 92 onwards.
Re. ‘Seal the deal’. I agree that it is vague & cliched - and I find it tiresome for that reason. However, what I think commentators have in mind is that there is one very significant difference between 1997 and 2010, despite so many striking parallels. That is that in 1997 Labour had only to win a piffling number of seats to form a government. And from about 1994/1995 onwards it was an absolute certainty that they would win the next election. However, were Cameron to gain 100 seats he would only have done enough to secure a hung parliament. Yes, a Cameron governemnet is the most likely outcome in 2010, given the deep unpopularity of the present government, but it is not the absolute certainty that Blair’s win was. In 1997, the real surprise was the huge majority he ended up with.
118. No hurry eh..
58 yes Nick the tories may be cutting services in Notts CC but they are not increasing the regressive council tax which has to be paid far from easily by many lower income families.
They are also concentrating cuts on areas which are fairly gimmickry as opposed to across the board cuts to services that really matter like Children in care etc.
Many notss folk are grateful that there is no longer a labour council increasing the counci, tax by 4-5% year on year
I think this could be a valuable lesson for the Sun.
The story is now more or less over, unless some idiot Labour backbencher asks Brown to condemn the Sun at PMQs - but the way Wapping handled things was pretty dire.
Never forget, selling copy comes far ahead of any political goal they might have. But I wonder if they actually sold any extra copies? I doubt it.
In which case, they should have made as much political capital as possible out of it. Crucially, that means having the British public on side. It means focussing on Brown’s genuine character flaws, and awful, ill-thought out, callous and often downright immoral decisions - but not his disability.
They could also do with a few more trial balloons when it comes to stories like this. How much better would it have played if Mrs Janes had gone to her local newspaper first? I’m sure a suitable title owned by News International could be found.
By going straight to the Sun, there was an immediate motivational question thrown up.
That is all, of course, on the (reasonable) assumption that they actually want to run this kind of story again. I think it is hard to see them growing a newfound respect for propriety…
The PBR seems a bit late, a pointer to a March GE?
121 MTF - Yes, over the past few years Labour have had an extremely easy ride compared with the last Conservative government. It does look as though The Sun is now trying hard to catch up, though.
But why is the Labour Party doing so badly in Wales?
There is a hint in that Populus poll of weak Labour support and strengthening Plaid support.
Looks like common sense is prevailing to SW norfolk:
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/goldlist/2009/11/south-west-norfolk-association-officers-give-liz-truss-their-full-support-.html
111
“The Libdems will probably go into the GE as the only party committed to withdrawal, it could increase their vote considerably.”
An increased vote?
Hmm.
A sudden departure by JG Brown and Labour would have an opportunity to change its commitment - but it couldn’t be Miliband(maj) too close to ‘Hilts’.
Labour dumps Brown and moves to pull out of Afghanistan? Are we now into Hung Parliament/Small Labour Majority territory?
114
I’m sure the Sun had nothing to do with the recording of the conversation, nothing at all, absolutely, who could think anythinbg else, slap my wrist.
Who could think that a newspaper that once faked an interview with a dead VC holders wife stoop to such a thing: tut tut!
58 and I would suggest that if the labour party is opposed to targeted cuts like this in Nottinghamshire then how are they going to convince the national electorate that they have any idea how to cut the national debt or out of control spending in a general election campaign
Score thus far:
Labour Party 1 The Sun 0
The Day 1 story was good for the Sun and bad for Labour, but OMG how the Sun blew it on Day 2! Learn your lesson chaps.
122 How dare you! “Seal the deal” is not vague! We have clearly established that the percentage vote Dave needs in order to seal the deal can be expressed by the formulae X = Y+5, where X is the “seal the deal” percentage and “Y” is the highest percentage of the vote Dave polls at any time before the election, up to and including 100.
#95 JR Tomlin
You are absolutely right. There is a real possibility of a number of people who would otherwise vote SNP considering voting Labour to keep the Tories out. But the Scottish electorate is clearly volatile and, despite media attempts to disguise the fact, more supportive of the SNP government than even in 2007.
The risk for Labour, if the trail badly in the UK polls in the general election campaign, is that the then likely SNP message that only the SNP through their continuing power in the Scottish Parliament added to by Westminster MPs can divert the Tories from policies not supported by Scottish voters, may become very plausible.
Whathever happens at the GE, the SNP will have many more votes than in 2005 and probably more seats. They will therefore have a powerful base for the future with many Labour/SNP marginals for Westminster.
As for the Lib Dems, they have chosen to present themselves as the third unionist party rather than a second Home Rule party and therefore in the drift in Scotland to people identifying themselves as for or against the union they have made themselves even more pointless than they might otherwise have been.
Incumbency will probably allow enough of their sitting MPs in Scotland to survive the GE, and therefore give them one last chance to change their stance. If they do not, it will be all over for them in Scotland.
131 - Unless you can prove otherwise, I would be careful with your words.
Why should the Sun hold back on attacking Brown?
Most people hate his guts and anything that re-inforces this and reminds us all about what a complete sh1t he is will run well. Afterall, not every one can can read Tom Bowers book.
Higlighted on Guido thsi morning, what we have today is a fine example of carousel propoganda, which liebour have used to full effect. Yesterday they flooded the Sun, Mail and al Beeb websites with organised pro Brown comment, then today use the comments as proof of their own story line. Obviously Mandlebum and co still think the population are idiots and believe the rubbish he spews up on Toady.
126, was November last year I think.
Hard to say if it’s a March pointer though. I hope so. The sooner these insurgents are thrown out the better.
107 Ted. If the positions were reversed and Cameron was the subject of such a post many here would call that post a smear !!
You have no evidence of what Brown and family did on Sunday least of all that they were fabricating some shabby attempt to deceive the media. And you gave us the shock news that Gordon wore a sombre suit. Well knock me down with a clothes brush but the PM rarely wears anything other than dark suits for “business” matters or perchance you’ve spied him in some lilac linen suit at PMQs ??
Gordon Brown is a very poor PM, certainly one of the worst in modern times but your overblown critisism on this issue is completely misdirected and utterly shallow.
What has the Sun done that overstepped the mark?
Day One they published a story brought to them by a very angry women, who wanted an apology.
Day Two, Gordo was exposed as a liar and somebody who is willing to argue black is white and completely unable to handle the situation.
There should have been a Day Three, Gordo continues to lie and spin at Press Conference.
Why shouldn’t the Sun publish this material brought to them by a member of the public? It is all true after all.
141 “one of” - are you still of the view that John Major was worse?
138
Will you be reporting me to Dave’s best mate Rupe if I don’t.
Will I get a dead kangaroo’s head in, my bed?
137 - the Mail comments were so obviously NOT from their usual readership anyone who reads the site would know that.
It’s actually quite funny, if not a bit sad, that they were panicked into such tactics.
130: How would that really be able to be sold to the public….
Hi, sorry, we’ve ditched Brown, and now want you to ignore everything we’ve been saying and doing up to that date. I, Milliband senior, may have been selling and putting forward the case for Afganistan, but hey, I never really beleived that in the first place…
Big sell. A year ago they could have done it by proving and showing the change, but now its simply too late for a U-turn of these kind of magnitudes.
139 JackW. You just hit the front in my Poster of the Year Book.
104. Richard Nabavi - “… there are indications that support Mike’s analysis in the regional splits in national polls, in the Politics Home marginals poll, and in local election results. In particular, the larger pro-Tory/anti-Labour swing in the Midlands looks very clear.”
Indeed.
The Midlands are still shaping up to be a Labour bloodbath. The evidence for this is solid.
A ‘Swingback’ to Labour in Scotland or Northern England is not going to alter this.
Bye bye the ‘MP’ bit of NPMP.
142 Oracle
What does it gain the Sun?
There are two things which they want:
1. To sell more newspapers
2. To create anti-Labour/pro-Tory feeling
The story didn’t do number 2, and I doubt it did number 1. In which case, I would judge the strategy a failure.
146. The only thing that will stop Brown standing is a medical reason - may or may not have to be real. He will not be challenged but Mandy may knife him. Then again Mandy may want Brown to be the well of poison to nail up after the GE and look for a fresh start with a young “the project” type - why sully the long term by putting them up for a hammering next June ? In the meantime Labour will continue its scorched earth policies.
113 - Paddy Power at one time had a market on cabinet ministers to lose their seat which covered Bradshaw in Exeter. It is no longer online but might be if you called.
Personally, I wouldn’t bet on him losing - the boundary changes help him (more, I suspect, than the calculus sites suggest); Labour clung onto their County Council seats in Exeter in May, albeit narrowly, suggesting a degree of grit on their part; the Lib Dems have a strong City Council position suggesting the Tories won’t mop up anti-Labour votes; and the Tory candidate is no more than okay (very young, possibly bright future etc but not especially compelling). There are probably better bets out there.
OT I’vejust seen Oracle was critical of me a few times because he/she thought a blog post I did was critical of p0ker players.
I think Oracle misread me. I was merely expressing astonishment at the precocity, willingess to embrace risk and the work ethic of top level players, not saying it’s a bad thing they exist.
Having lots of very young people regularly playing nosebleeds is a new thing - and it’s come from the ability to play huge volumes of online and thus develop strategies that used to take years on the road to pick up. It’s a sort of new ultraspecialist fast learner skill, that has become possible through the internet.
Anyway, this isn’t the place to talk non political gamnbling, but oracles welcome to email me if they want to know more about my view of the game.
138
As one of Rupe’s secret police, you’d better report this as well.
http://www.liberalconspiracy.org/2009/11/11/sun-faces-backlash-on-campaign-against-brown/
‘allo ‘allo is that Wooga Wogga, this is your faithful servant number 436 calling.
Morning all and indeed taking Mike’s theme, there will almost certainly be disproportionate swings in many seats.
Something many of you in England seem to forget is that you are in a great many cases fighting totally different seats. In 2005 in Scotland we saw totally unexpected results because even the psephologists cannot be sure how people actually voted in the key wards which will be moving constituencies. The best example was the 2 Dumfries seats. Dumfries and Galloway was meant to be an easy Tory gain and Russell Brown increased his majority and D, C and T was supposed to be an easy Labour hold by more than 5000 votes and David Mundell took it by 1400.
145 So true - it’s like reading CiF when it’s invaded by Tories
Can you imagine the humiliation of being PM and your only option is to almost cry on TV because you’re crap at your job/have zeeeeero social skills and everything you touch turns brown.
Tony may have been a phoney, but I never felt he needed my pity when things went wrong/ditto Thatcher and Major. I felt quite genuinely annoyed when the press put the boot in a bit too far - with Gordon, nope.
149.
I would think they sold more on Monday than usual.
Can we move on from the Sun v Brown - yesterdays news ?
148. Absolutely, if that Populus split is correct and the Tories are 23% up in the most marginals rich part of the country then even polling below 40% nationally, Cameron will have a solid majority probably something along the lines of 1979.
149: You do have to look at the long term though. It may very well have helped Brown, generating a certain level of pity and feeling for him.
However, will that have helped Labour? I’m sure the Tories will be happy if it makes Brown position more secure. After all how can Labour ditch a pitied man?
146
Slackbladder.
You’re probably right, but a new leader and a handbrake turn on policy (and Miliband couldn’t deliver it - he might have to leave the cabinet) could be persuasive for a party in a panic.
138 - Given your false claim that Mrs Janes recorded the call your offer of legal advice seems superfluous.
149 - What about what the mother wanted?
As I have said on here before, I wasn’t really very critical of the original letter, mistakes happen, Gordo was careless, but never the less he caused serious upset to this women (however unintentionally). I think it is fair enough to report that. As for no bowing, other papers reported that.
Then, this is the part where I am really critical, the phone call and the press conference. Gordo had an opportunity to do right, do good and probably walk away from an unfortunate situation with some Brownie points, instead he resorted to his usual tactics, lies, arguments and tractor stats (while his hench men have been all over the media spinning like crazy).
141. JackW and 147. URW
Ted is not a member of “The Herd”. He is an intelligent, thoughtful kinda guy, and an asset to this site. But Ted, and all Tories, must tread very carefully from now on.
If they let the old “Nasty Tories” meme catch on again then PM Dave is in deep trouble. Never, ever take the electorate for granted.
I must admit that the last two days have given me pause for thought. Is there a possibility, just a teensy-weensy possibility, that RodCrosby (and Alex Salmond) have been right all along? Are we headed for a Hung Parliament?!?
The Mirror editorial is a bit tenuous to say the least. The other thing that the paper has done on the story, though, is exactly what I feared would happen. Mrs Janes’s brother is given a full page in which he criticises her and says the rest of the family are shocked by her actions, while the relativesof other dead servicemen are say how wonderful it was to get a personal letter from Brown. Hopefully now the story will go away.
URW “139 JackW. You just hit the front in my Poster of the Year Book.”
Although I probably just hit the buffers for others !!
Jack W is an old buffer and 107 !!
102 and 137
That’s interesting too. So, there has been a clear disparity in voting intentions in Scotland for Westminster/Holyrood for some time. Tory and Labour tend to poll higher in Westminster polls, SNP higher in Holyrood.
Does then make sense that voters are switching tactically to vote against Labour in Holyrood and/or tories in Westminster.
This spells trouble for the LDs methinks.
Why should I have pity or make allowances for Gordon Brown because he has poor eyesight. No other person with a disability would get away with, what he gets away with.
Unemployment numbers better than expected ?
The number of people unemployed in the UK rose again in the three months to September, although the 30,000 increase was the smallest since May 2008.
Unemployment totalled 2.46 million in the quarter, said the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The jobless rate remained at 7.8%.
The number of people claiming unemployment benefit rose by 12,900 to 1.64 million in October.
This was the smallest increase in 18 months.
160 - Sorry Tim, better be 110% correct, her with her friend on her friends Blackberry, I believe is the story. However, The Sun have catergorically said they were not present.
162 The Tories are not the Sun in the same way that the Mirror is not the Labour Party.
All tabloids have form and I can’t think of a single mention of the Tories at all over the last two days in respect of this story except for Labour’s attack dogs.
I’m sure the Sun have gone too far [but its not a GOTCHA!]. It’ll blow over in a week or so and Gordon will have another drama to turn into a crisis.
106,112 I’m no expecting to win my 33/1 joke bet with Ladbrokes against the Tories winning Birmingham Perry Barr, but I am expecting to lay it off profitably should Betfair’s constituency markets ever start to attract some business.
31. Their [Turkey's] troops might not all be up to our exacting standards
Ooh, I don’t know. I have a feeling that when Turkish troops have faced off against ours, they have usually won.
Turkish totty is fabulous, too.
156
Good enough reason to keep it going.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2009/nov/11/sun-gordon-brown
Stock market not doing to bad either, unemployment, doesn’t look like we’ll hit the 4 million mark, (as predicted by the usual suspects) were you one of ‘em ‘arry?
162 Stuart Dickson.Noted.
I wasn’t having a pop at Ted but just getting an early plug in for Jack W. My second and third choices are tim and John Loony.
At his best I think JL is the most *different* poster on pb.com but definitely not a loony.
tim is the pb.com equivalent of the BNP in the wide world.You all love him really but are afraid to say so and can score brown ie points by slagging him off.
JackW is not only the elder statesman but a real gent and one helluva butcher.
154 and 162 - Labour will be wiped out across the midlands. I would be surprised if they retained any seats where the majority is less then 12,000. It will be absolute carnage. Something similar will happen in outer London and the SE generally. I am on the ground here and I can tell you that the anti-Labour mood is so palpable you can smell it and taste it.
Now how about this for a bit of wishful thinking by Mandy
“Lord Mandelson has accused The Sun newspaper of portraying the government as the “enemy” of UK troops in Afghanistan rather than the Taliban.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8354131.stm
152 - Having lots of very young people regularly playing nosebleeds is a new thing
You are wrong again Hopi, Nosebleed stakes online run about approximately 20 people. That is 20 people worldwide, and at least half at not young and don’t rely on it as their source of income.
Mrs Janes is the most important person in all of this. She was upset by the letter. What her brother thinks is neither here or there.
156 – “Can we move on from the Sun v Brown”
Afraid not old boy, today has been designated as the day Cameron is revealed as the mastermind behind the Sun’s infamous story, by Thursday Thatcher will be in the frame.
172. I predicted 10 million and the ftse at 954
Still its all great news - my pension pot is almost back to where it was 3 years ago.
165 - This happens in many parts of Europe where there is a strong regional/nationalist party and a two-tired system of governance. I lived in Catalonia for many years and in the regional elctions the nationalist (though not independentist) CiU always won most votes, whereas in the Spanish elections the socialists always did.
As requested;
Exeter
Labour 5/6
Conservatives Evs
Liberal Democrats 16/1
UKIP 50/1
Greens 100/1
178
For f**k’s sake I think that too, great minds ‘anall that.
re 89 Stuart those figures would suggest in a Scottish election
SNP 54
Lab 44
C 15
LD 14
Green 1
SSP 1
In case no one noticed - the Sun is giving away a set of memorial poster pages today to celebrate the Armistice.
Nice touch.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/sun_says/244723/The-Sun-Says.html
181 shadsy. Wow !! If you can’t do business at those prices, you can’t do business.
Kudos.
37. In a seat like Oxford East, where the Conservative had no chance, I’d vote Lib Dem to oust Labour.
Interesting. I was in Brent East at the last GE, and voted Labour in order to bugger Labour at the next.
The reasoning was that the seat had a Lib Dem incumbent who, as you say, would have kept Labour in power had the result lain in the balance.
It therefore made most sense to keep the seat looking as winnable as possible for Labour. So I voted for them, on the basis that come the next GE, both they and the LibDems will waste resources fighting each other for a seat that will be anti-Tory no matter what.
Those resources are thereby squandered strategically. They’re not available to seats where a Lab or LD candidate might oust a Tory.
Mind you, I had recently been playing Sid Meier’s Civilization rather a lot at that time, and had absorbed the lesson that when two of your rivals are at war, the best thing you can do is arm the weaker side.
re 116 let’s remember that Gordon Brown’s government wants to record ALL our phone conversations.
181. Thank you !!!
The Ghost of Harry Flashman @ 150
Then again Mandy may want Brown to be the well of poison to nail up after the GE and look for a fresh start with a young “the project” type - why sully the long term by putting them up for a hammering next June ?
Why not put up a rival for Mandy’s real choice, who can stave off complete disaster, but destroy their own chances.
162 SD. “Ted is not a member of “The Herd”. He is an intelligent, thoughtful kinda guy, and an asset to this site.”
All the more reason for my surprise at Ted’s comment. Even the sainted David Herdson has been known to go off on one.
The fact is that Gordon Brown has become a lightening rod for all sorts of pathetic critisism and comment that barely passes muster as fantasy. Gordon Brown is going down and seems determined to take all Labour hands with him. There is no need to massage the actuality whilst watching the PM slip beneath the waves.
185
That’s exactly the reasoning behind my thinking of voting LD or Green in Camberwell and Peckham. Tories will not win here, so best to make it look winnable for someone else.
Its so easy to get a name wrong, isn’t it!
http://www.hurryupharry.org/2009/11/11/the-sun-shows-how-easy-it-is-to-get-a-name-wrong/
Oh dear.
http://tinyurl.com/yay765m
Spectator engages in Back to the Future.
Labour at 1/6 for Glasgow NE with Hills.
178
I expect Brown to somehow snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
I think we’ve found who keeps commenting on ConHome threads:
http://tinyurl.com/yh4vwo7
“People were upset about the way [sitting Conservative MP] David Maclean behaved over parliamentary expenses. This time around it was time for a change in the type of candidate. We were looking for a good local candidate.”
Mr Stanyer believes that Conservative central office dictated the short list of six. “They were peas out of the same pod,” he said. “Totally unrepresentative of people in the constituency.”
He added: “I have nothing personal against the candidate chosen. He may be a perfectly decent bloke.
“But how can a man like him, Eton-educated, comprehend what it’s like to live here?
“We need somebody born and bred in Cumbria who has had to suffer the poor standards in many of our schools. We are a relatively poor area.
“I can’t believe there isn’t a local businessman, retired academic or teacher who wouldn’t make a better MP.”
What an idiot.
141 Jack W - that’s why I prefaced my original comments with concern I was being too cynical, too shallow.
Gordon Brown may very well have not been acting, his upset real, my supposition that he discussed this matter at all with those around him completely false.He may well have had nothing to do with Charlie Whelan, Ian Austin and Lord Mandelson hitting the airwaves in attack mode.
Its just that it felt like a call for “sympathy for me”, too much exposition of hurt, wearing a hairshirt. It felt like a very successful political ploy, but maybe its success was it wasn’t a ploy but for once a real show of pain at being misunderstood, good intentions traduced.
Altogether no-one has come out of this well, I’ve found my sympathies for both Mrs Janes & Gordon Brown changing with events.
Picked this up from Mr Dale’s 12 list - some good points about Labour tactics and how they stack up against the Tories.
http://www.liammurray.co.uk/2009/11/its-far-from-over-but.html
165, 174 There is another impiortant effect that reinforces this — the calibre of the candidates.
The SNP and Plaid Cymru regard the Scottish Parl’ment/Welsh Assemblies as the most important — and so their most capable politicians pursue careers there.
Labour and Tories regard Westminster as most important, so the ranks of their MSPs and AMs are full of people low calibre dross, who couldn’t even make it to Westminster.
‘Brown letter warns against voter apathy in by-election’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6911732.ece
118 Stuart, I do not think we have to retreat from our former position just yet.
The thing which is clear and which I expect to be repeated tomorrow is that the Scottish LibDems are in meltdown everywhere. Tomorrow I reckon both the Tories and LibDems will lose their deposits but I expect Ruth Davidson to do relatively much better than her LibDem opponent.
In West Central Scotland I only ever saw the SNP defintely taking Kilmarnock and holding Glasgow East. The following seats could see major changes because of variations in voting.
Inverness: LibDems will face SNP challenge, possible return to a Russell Johnston finish?
Argyll: LibDems will lose if people decide either Tory OR SNP is clear opponent.
Gordon: as per Argyll
West Aberdeenshire: LibDems will lose if votes go to Tory and the “donald Trump” effect
North Aberdeen: much may come down to the “Aberdeen Council effect”
South Aberdeen and South Edinburgh: if LibDems are in meltdown then Tory should leapfrog them, even if Neil Hudson is not the perfect candidate
Ochil and S Perthshire: only thing stopping an SNP gain from Labour is a return to Tories
Perth and Angus: anti-SNP feeling may unseat them if the voters go Tory
Edinburgh SW and Renfrewshire E: Darling and Murphy out due to anti-Labour feelings in generally middle/upper middle class constituencies
Kilmarnock: who will people blame for Johnny Walker closing down, Labour or SNP? If Des Browne retires then SNP gain
Glasgow East: as I said last year John Mason will hold at the GE and probably lose at subsequent one.
D,C and T: big increase in Tory majority
Dumfries and Galloway: Labour lose
Roxburgh etc: If LibDems are in meltdown then the Tory MSP will also become the Tory MP.
Dunfermline: Yes if Labour is recovering then LibDem should lose but I suspect Willie Rennie may hold on but
East Dunbartonshire: as I have said since June last year I think Jo Swinson is in a sticky situation, the local LibDems having almost imploded in 2007.
It will be in the Lothians and Central Scotland where the SNP will either break through or fail against Labour. Seats like Livingston, Linlithgow, Ochil, Edinburgh East (without Gavin Strang) and Edinburgh N and Leith.
Stirling is looking like a return to the Tories rather than an SNP gain.
Dundee West: SNP shoe-in.
It will all come down to how much anti-incumbent feeling there is and whether 1 alternative candidate can gather them to him/her. Howvever there are too many Scottish seats where the 2nd and 3rd placed candidates are too close to one another and that provides the best hope for the Labour incumbent. However these tend to be very middle class constituencies which in England would have 10,000+ Tory majorities and even in 1997 would have remained true blue.
I still have 2 sets of my 7 Scottish predictions to go and will post them as drafted in June last year. You can then all weigh up whether Shadsy is being mean or generous with his odds for Scottish seats.
172 - I don’t think you will like to hear that lifelong Labour supporters in my office who listened to the telephone recording will NOT be voting Labour IF Brown is still in charge. I will not repeat what they said exactly, but they were disgusted the way he spoke to the mother, and they also for the first time ever complained to the BBC about the Nick Robinson piece about the story.
URW 173. “JackW is not only the elder statesman but a real gent and one helluva butcher.”
I’m obliged and would like to take this rare opportunity to advise PBers to place their Christmas orders for Auchentannach Christmas Hampers early. Full of juicy yuletide treats for all the family !!
Weather looking quite good for Polling Day tomorrow:
BBC: Sunny Intervals, Max: 11°C
However, Google weather indicates risk of rain.
These unemployment numbers a slightly decieving. 80000 people lost full time jobs whilst 86000 gained part-time jobs. All we are seeing is the benefits of the UK job market flexibility, something you europhiles would love to give away! However, longer term as evident by yesterdays massive job loss announcements, it cant continue like this.
119 - Touché! But it’s true, the Tories in the midlands look likely to pick up many many seats, just as Southam Observer suggests. One or two of the bookies appear not to have cottoned onto this yet.
British youth unemployment hits record high
Britain’s youth unemployment rate reached a record high of almost 20pc
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/6542812/British-youth-unemployment-hits-record-high.html
163. Southam Observer. Yes, that kind of thing is inevitable. It’s always the same when a tabloid exposes to the public gaze an ordinary member of the public in order to sell more copies - the unfortunate individual is spat out & left trying to put their life back together. The story here is not about Gordon Brown, but the utterly unethical way in which the Sun has behaved. A paper that exploits the grief of a recently bereaved mother - could they stoop any lower?
202 - BBC weather forecasting is shockingly bad. I’d go with Google.
200 John
Irrelevant.
The number of people who heard the call (and Brown’s extremely poor handling of it) is miniscule compared with the number who saw the coverage of the call (overwhelmingly sympathetic towards Brown).
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Dr Campbell said: “Alan Johnson talked about building a level of trust between the council and the Home Office and my resignation was apparently announced by the Home Office while I was on the train home from London.
“I sent a formal letter to the Home Secretary late last night but I’m dismayed that my resignation was on the BBC News as soon as I got home. So I’m very concerned about what the Home Secretary believes is a level of trust.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article6912064.ece
Postie is losing that rep as a safe pair of hands fairly quickly.
206 - I agree completely and said on the day the story broke that this is what would happen. I can understand Mrs Janes’s reasons for going to the Sun and I hope (and suspect) that she is strong enough to get through what is bound to be an horrendous time for her. But all the other families of service people and their relations phoned and tracked by the Sun, the Mirror and other tabloids over the last few days did not ask for any of this, but they have still got it.
195 Ted. You wear your hair shirt well enough Ted and it appears a sombre one. Clearly a fine fit and with such sartorial elegance how might I be prevailed upon to do anything other than pronounce you truly forgiven !!
208 - They also said that it was obvious that Labour had gone over board on the comment from sites, and phone in’s. They were NOT fooled by this ’spin operation’.
189 Sadly, Camberwell and Peckham’s not winnable for anyone other than Labour, even if Labour were reduced to 100 seats.
First post after 4 years of intermittent lurking!
15 URW 3.46am There’s a complete list of post-1945 results under ‘election information’ on this site
http://www.politicsresources.net/area/uk.htm
99 Jimbo 9.16am Thurs night ‘92 BBC coverage here http://www.youtube.com/user/ajs41#p/c/0BCDC9522FC7C5E2
208 I’d agree with that - those on here who listened to it seem to be in the *urgh how could he get it so wrong* camp, those who didn’t are in the *stop kicking a man when he’s down* one.
I don’t think it’ll change any votes - however I think it’s interesting how OTT Labour’s response has been - for a paper they don’t care about, boy are they pi$$ed.
I can only assume that they’re still in angry mode, making an enemy of NI was a very silly tactic. Perhaps they still believe that the media will turn their way again and can afford to do this - I think they are totally wrong-headed.
I don’t think there’s been a government that’s won in the face of a relentlessly hostile media opponent - and over the subject of dead soldiers/government failure to look after/equipment them.
200 “who listened to the telephone recording”
That could be another line the Sun could take “listen to the tape and then judge us”.
212 John
I didn’t mean to imply that I in any way doubt your story about your friends. I was just pointing out that it wouldn’t apply more generally, because not many people will have actually listened to the call in full.
This is even more so because Downing Street denied permission for Brown’s portion of the conversation to be repeated on TV.
206
On the other hand!
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23767823-good-news-on-jobless-raises-hopes-of-recovery.do
Still don’t worry, once Dave’s in, interest rates at 12%, VAT 25% you’ll get 4 million then, c’mon be ambitious make it 5.
130 Stuart Dickson
More from Populus.
Of the 1504 people contacted:
15% would not vote, highest in the North, Midlands and Scotland, Lowest in Wales and SW.
7% Refused to comment
14% said “Don’t Know”. Highest in Wales and SW.
So 36% of those contacted did not give a positive reponse.
Would Not Vote is highest in C2, D & E (19%)
and in age groups: 18-24 (25%) 25-34 (19%)
There was an intesting question: “What do you think will be the likely result of the vote in the GE?” This was addressed to all those who said that they would vote. The results are:
Conservative Majority 100+: 14%
Conservative majority <100: 36%
Hung Parliament Cons. largest party: 15% (Most in SE 18%)
Hung Parliament Labour largest party: 11% (Most in Scotland: 23%)
Labour Majority < 100: 11% (Most in Scotland 27%)
Labour Majority 100+: 5%
Do Not Know: 9%
Did the Scots only apply the question to Scotland and not GB?
Morning all.
Just chipping in some unexpected points from my CLP meeting yesterday.
* Membership is up again for the third month in a row. This has not been seen for years.
* Members are reporting of a much improved reception on the doorstep.
Curious.
207 - Youth unemployment
Funny how the Labour employment laws now in place and the minimum wage result in 20% youth unemployment. Did Labour not think to take a look at Europe before following the exact same policies?
No doubt thinking it will be different this time, just like the Kenyesian economists trying to spend their way out of recession…..
212. Yes, I can understand her reasons too. And one would have hoped that a journalist might respond by advising counselling, rather than seeing an opportunity for publication.
171 John R. Bad planning and poor generalship lost at the Dardanelles (Churchill practising to foul up in Norway in 1940), but remember Allenby knocked the stuffing out of the Turks in Palestine in 1917-18.
The Turks are formidable fighters. My grandfather fought them, and two of my great uncles are buried in Gallipoli. The Turks are to be respected, but the British ultimately beat them.
219.
Something like this ?
Best Xmas ever at Chez Gordon - a massive present haul for the kids and a delicious dinner for everyone with fine wine - a true sign that the economy is booming.
A spokesman said - the size of his Visa bill due in January is not important.
223 BTW Has anyone heard whether the Sun is donating its revenue for the past few days to a forces charity? I am sure they would hate to make financial gain out of this story.
197. Gwynfa - “Labour and Tories regard Westminster as most important, so the ranks of their MSPs and AMs are full of people low calibre dross, who couldn’t even make it to Westminster.”
Your analysis here is spot on.
The quality of your average Labour or Tory MSP is truly lamentable. Sub-councillor quality in many cases.
However, I’d just like to point out the uniformly high calibre of the SNP’s MPs and PPCs. Angus Robertson and Angus Brendan MacNeil are not atypical: the whole SNP Westminster team is very solid. And of the PPCs I could highlight extremely good candidates like George Kervan (Edinburgh East) and Calum Cashley (Edinburgh North & Leith). Those guys are top-flight quality.
The Mirror editorial, or at least the title, is a little too strong on Cameron:
“Shame on you, Dave”
http://www.mirror.co.uk/opinion/voiceofthemirror/2009/11/11/shame-on-you-dave-115875-21812923/
It’s true that Cameron has not yet found the opportunity to disassociate himself from the actions of his close friends at The Sun.
However, I’m sure that’s something he’ll address soon.
216 “I don’t think it’ll change any votes”
I dunno about that. This is the sort of thing (and the only sort of thing) that can get even solid Labour people to stay at home on the day: betraying the forces, stealing people’s pensions, Labour MPs involved in corruption/sleaze, not much else.
You can tell how much they want to chase the Sun off this ground by their response (although the Sun does have to make sure they look like they’re on the moral high ground at times).
Completely O/T, but the wishy washy why can’t we all be friends part of me rather likes the fact that Boris and Ken can knock six bells out of each other but still get on:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23767792-power-surge-at-londons-most-influential-party.do
This was even apparent during the mayoral campaign as both seemed somewhat divorced from the rhetoric and the slogans. It’s good for London that this happens. Wouldn’t it be good fr the country if it could happen at a national level too? maybe it will when Miliband takes over from Brown.
228. By your logic Cameron should have to disassociate himself from Page Three every day as well.
228 And of course there are lots of Tories that buy the Mirror - watch out Cameron
Would this be the same paper that used fabricated pictures of soldiers urinating on Iraqis?
Mandy would like to think it is Labour 1 - The Sun 0 - but in truth it isn’t.
They are definitely running scared
221. which part of the country is your CLP in thanks Jonathan?
i suspect what is happening over the last couple of months is that labour might be managing to shore up it’s core vote, and to transfer some of those voters into activists as the election gets closer.
be interested what part of the country though, as I think some areas (the north, scotland, perhaps london) may be better for labour at the moment than others (midlands, wales, perhaps north west).
Meanwhile …. according to the Guardian the Conservative Party isn’t being led by toffs from Eton …. let’s hope it isn’t Old Harrovians or Wykehamists either !!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/11/commons-private-education-old-etonians?
224. Yes, Allenby done good. But wasn’t Saladin from a part of the world that would today be in Turkey? If so, that would be a score to the Turks again.
The general point is clear though: they are tough cookies and given the choice you’d want them on your side rather than the other guy’s.
221 - What constituency is it?
219 Where is the evidence that inflation will surge so far as to require interest rates of 12%?
It is remarkable just how like Major Brown is now being treated by the press. In a way, he’s lucky he’s only going to be around for a shorter period of it.
“Where is the evidence that inflation will surge so far as to require interest rates of 12%?”
To be fair, the QE favoured by the current regime is possibly storing up inflationary problems.
223 “Has anyone heard whether the Sun is donating its revenue for the past few days to a forces charity?”
Has the government sorted the helicopters yet after eight years?
236 Saladin was a Kurd.
“However, I’m sure that’s something he’ll address soon.”
Did Labour distance themselves from every attack by the Sun on the Tories? Of course not. They had no need to, as it had nothing to do with them.
Idiot.
233 Yup, a sure way to see how much impact the Sun’s actions have had - all emotional and attack mode.
They don’t seem to have moved on from tearing it up on the conference platform and Hattie’s outburst about Page 3.
Like I said, the Sun have parked their tanks on standing up for the Forces - the number of bad news stories will always outweigh the good ones. They will win the media war by virtue of numbers if nothing else.
Mervyn King on Sky, Inflation to rise sharply ion the near term, then fall back below target.
“Would this be the same paper that used fabricated pictures of soldiers urinating on Iraqis?”
Indeed. They are the last paper to talk about undermining troops.
M King, data showing still in recession, outlook more bouyant.
237 “But wasn’t Saladin from a part of the world that would today be in Turkey? If so, that would be a score to the Turks again.”
Saladin was a Kurd. Richard I tw@tted him (only one that did).
93. david (s) - “The total collapse of the Lib Dem vote in Scotland outside their own seats is truly astonishing…”
How do we know that it is just “outside their own seats” that the SLD vote is haemorrhaging?
I’d suggest that a fair few SLD MPs have their jaikets on a shooglie nail. Eg. Michael Moore. He is even more arrogant than the American one.
234 The South-East, Horsham to be precise. Not sure why this have changed. Makes little sense to me.
The neighbouring CLP Crawley is very active, recently managing a council gain from the Lib Dems. Maybe that has something to do with it. Good press.
The LibDems are definitely very flat. Really poor from them. That too may have an impact.
One other thing I can’t understand is that the party has recently had a reasonable number of young Labour join. Unheard of.
Overall it’s a small improvement. But any improvement is a huge change on the past 7 years which has all been the other way. I guess things are just polarising in the run up to the GE. More positive vibe than 2005 IMO.
Interesting and baffling.
Major faced, for the first time AFAIK, an opponent prepared to lie and smear systematically to get and keep power.
Labour resorted to this because they had capitulated intellectually to Tory thinking in pretty well every important area. The only remaining differentiator available was relative probity, hence the largely fabricated “sleaze” campaign (which Labour was orchestrating at a time when the party was being paid by Ecclestone to change the law for F1, by animal welfare nutters to ban hunting, and probably a few others we haven’t heard about).
Any comparison between Major and Broon is odious. Broon is not fit to toss Major’s salad.
Frank Field seriously sounds like he is about to defect
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/11/david-cameron-wonderfully-bold-speech
Thanks Jonathan. I think that’s right, that things are polarising. I suspect 2010 will be the most divisive, not to say dirtiest election campaign in living memory.
173, URW
I’d like to be able to vote for Yellow Submarine as Poster of the Year, but his long absences make a victory highly unlikely.
I have revised my view of several PBers this year. JackW’s stock is definitely on the up. Other risers include ukpaul. I must admit to a soft spot for coldstone and Roger - they even get up Mike’s nose, which is always a good sign!
Other PBers are on the slide. No names.
Good to see Andrea back occasionally. More please!
Another big thank you to the Tory doomsters on here.
The Paddy Power market on UK Unemployment was so distorted by herd betting that it looks like the best bet for ages.
SInce the doomsters got the FTSE so wrong in fact.
229 Gabble, how amusing. Why it seems like only a couple of months ago that Brown, Mandelson and the rest of the Labour Party were so far up New Internationals fundament that one could only see the soles of their feet. A lover scorned eh?
Afghanistan: Gordon Brown is losing the battle for hearts and minds
In Gordon Brown’s blundering, stumbling phone call to the mother of a dead soldier, there was no comfort or conviction, says Liz Hunt.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/lizhunt/6541903/Afghanistan-Gordon-Brown-is-losing-the-battle-for-hearts-and-minds.html
186 - that has to be the most bizarre strategy for voting I have ever heard…I think, despite my total ignorance on how your seat is looking, that one vote will not have made much difference, especially in the way you seem to hope it will :p
258 (cont) Comments give Gordo both barrels.
256 – Thousands of redundancies announced this week, unemployment up again this week and figures reveal youth unemployment is the highest ever…and you gloat about betting odds.
Is that what socialism is all about young Tim?
260 (correction) In the comments, posters give Gordo both barrels.
133 - 26 years ago.
253 -Interesting that he talks about Cameron, not the Tories. If he were to defect, he would be leaving the Commons as he won’t find a winnable Tory seat in the next few months.
255 SD. “JackW’s stock is definitely on the up.”
Early ante-post favourites rarely carry off the prize on PB. So perhaps I might invite some brick-bats to push my price out somewhat. And there is the other factor - PB Top Knob of the Year is invariably a right-winger somewhat further to the right and usually named Sean !! - Messrs Fear and T !!
Nearly 11 O’clock - two minutes silence folks
252 - Of course, the Tories never cheat, lie or spin. And a flying pig just went past my window.
261 Scroll past unless you know he isn’t telling the truth, like last night
261 - It’s what a political betting site is all about, oh sanctimonious one.
246
LTL
Did King give a reason why inflation should fall back to/below target after the sharp rise?
196 - The idiot in Cumbria who wants a local candidate sounds very odd.
Mr Stanyer believes that Conservative central office dictated the short list of six. “They were peas out of the same pod,” he said</i?
So like Rory Stewart, all the candidates had governed a province in Iraq and walke across Afghanista,
Wow, really Mr Stanyer?
As for this
“But how can a man like him, Eton-educated, comprehend what it’s like to live here?
Well given that Alan Clark managed to represent Nuremberg 1938, Jonathan Aitken managed to imagine himself in a Paris Hotel, Jerry Wiggin stood in as Seb Coe, the MP for Falmouth, and Bill Wiggin will tell you where he’s representing when he learns his address, I’d have though an Old Etonian is the best possible candidate to comprehend what its like to live in Cumbria.
6 months ago if someone had asked me “who is more likely to hold their by-election seat at the next UK GE, Willie Rennie (LD - Dunfermline & West Fife) or John Mason (SNP - Glasgow East)?” … I’d have replied “Willie Rennie”.
My answer now would be “John Mason”.
#154, by Easterross November 11th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Morning all and indeed taking Mike’s theme, there will almost certainly be disproportionate swings in many seats.
Something many of you in England seem to forget is that you are in a great many cases fighting totally different seats….
Go you are a pretentious [plastic-] Scottish Unionist tw@t! [Even we English understand that the Scots are different].
Your comments on yer Scotland appear to be spoken from a higher knowledge, as if we English are not your equals! I suggest you get posting etiquette lessons from the like of Stuart Dickson, oldnat and - yes, even he - MalcolmG.
269 - bp - sorry, I got a phone call in the middle of it, but think it was continuing weakness in demand. There might be something on the Sky news site.
266 Yellow Submarine should not be in the running for Poster of the Year.
He should be running the LibDems.
Unfortunately, the LibDems are run by the Mark Senior Tendency — and are consequently a national laughing stock.
There is more nous and insight in a single YS posting than Nick Clegg has had in his life.
256 The actual outcome has hardly been great.
A point about the difference between being smug on Today and attacking The Sun. The Sun has a very large percentage of swing voters as its readership. Today has about 3 (voters).
The Brown backers (how, how?) who think attacking Brown will be a mistake and lead to Sun readers deserting the Tories in sympathy obviously are just making things up. The Sun attacks dying governments. Look at ‘Now We’ve ALL been screwed by the Cabinet’ and ‘The Sun Backs Blair’ for examples top and tailing the 1992-97 period.
The reason that The Sun is so hated by New Labour is that they know that The Mirror never delivered a single voter to anyone. It has supported Labour, good or pathetic, for decades. The Sun has backed Thatcher and Blair. The Sun likes winners. Gordon Brown isn’t a winner any more than Kinnock was. In fact, he’s much more of a loser because at least Kinnock didn’t set about destroying his party.
Attacking The Sun in such a petulant manner, after years of schmoozing round Wapping like PR consultants is a sad case of attacking the messenger.
Come in No10, your time is up.
I see our resident Smearbot couldn’t help himself, just had to get in that all “important” post between 11.00 to 11.02am
265. Jack W - PB Top Knob of the Year
SeanT wins hands down.
Yes, Sean Fear has sunk very low since his 2005-2006 PB heydays, but OMG he has a fair bit to go to get anywhere near the monumental dickhe@d status of the T of that ilk.
265 - Clearly the way to stop me becoming Poster of the Year is to vote Jack W, anything else just splits the Tory vote.
to -> and
273
Much obliged.
I was just wondering about the rise in imports mentioned at the beginning of the week - but that was off a low base.
274 Gywnfa. ” Yellow Submarine should not be in the running for Poster of the Year.”
Indeed so. However I’d venture he’d make a mighty fine filling for a pie !!
278. Stuart - surely you should be fighting for a separate “Scottish” poster of the year - only to be voted on by Scots posters.
Obviously Scottish posters could get to vote on “English Poster of the year” too - just like MPs.
Simples
Message for the Super 6 about Oxford East. There are a number of countervailing pressures in the seat, its not just Manchester Withington or Islington in a new guise.
The seat has a lot of new development on the edge which will be middle / lower income Tory in the main or not voting. It is geographically (and thus culturally) a bit away from the rest of the seat, even though it may not look that way on a map.
The middle part of the seat is white working class still - loyal at local elections although there are “Working Class Association” councillors iiro. Limited LD inroads. A core vote strategy will work here for Labour.
The town centre part of the seat in classic inner city multi-cultural. Thats the bit everybody recognises.
Andrew Smith is not to be discounted as a grass roots organiser (and his wife as well). It was a shock to them to lose in 1983 to Steve Norris, and it was won back in 87. They will not give up easily.
Boundary changes favour the LDs I believe by adding to the inner city bit
Peter Tatchell is standing for the Greens - so there will be noise!! Impact - who knows?
Outcome = “To close to call” as they say on a US election night, but on balance Andrew Smith to hold on.
The Sun is one thing. One noticeable media change in recent weeks is that the BBC has been in full-on attack mode against the Tories and is probably the reason Tory poll support has fallen. The battering ram is The One Show on BBC One at 7pm. Naturally reflecting the ethos of the BBC, The One Show has always sounded like the Guardian On Air, its greatest moment being the humiliation of Thatcher (Carol). Now it is party political. During the conference season it featured ‘Bullingdon’ pictures of David Cameron thus directly aping what will be one of Labour’s attack weapons. A few days ago it featured the actor Tony Robinson, a top Labour politician (the viewers were not told this) who went on to say it was right to go on spending money and cuts were wrong: Labour spin. Last night in a feature on Gordon Brown’s letter, a supposedly-neutral Scottish female reporter just happened to mention that we should view the whole story in the light that the Sun had switched to the Conservatives (you could tell, she wanted in classic style to spit out the hated words: The Tories). The One Show is classic and perfect propaganda; its victims don’t notice. It will affect voting patterns much more than the Sun.
279.Maybe we should have a primary.
270 TIMBOT, what a surprise. Another day flying the Red Rag for Charlie W.
281 - bp - you can read the full statement here..
http://www.lse.co.uk/FinanceNews.asp?shareprice=&ArticleCode=mo9h0eudyxcu196&ArticleHeadline=TEXTBoE_Kings_statement_on_Quarterly_Inflation_Report
Some more background into Hague and Camerons mistake with their new Euro Group.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/11/david-cameron-right-wing-europe
A pioneering online consultation (Building Britain’s Future) on Gordon Brown’s much trumpeted government relaunch has received only 233 comments since its launch in June, according to Cabinet Office figures.
But the comments are sparse, and where they exist, scathing.
http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/news/2252903/government-online-consultation
283. The Ghost of Harry Flashman
Mandy appears to have gone a bit far - what a chump.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/11/mandelson-contract-sun-tories
“Lord Mandelson triggered a row today after claiming there was a “contract” between the Sun and the Conservative party that could undermine the impartial coverage of the general election by the BBC.
The business secretary said that the Sun’s journalism influenced the way politics was reported on Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News, and this could affect Westminster coverage on the BBC.
The Tories described Mandelson’s claims as “absolute rubbish”, while the BBC insisted that Mandelson’s fears were unfounded.”
278 SD. I think your accounting of “Top Knob of the Year” is somewhat divergent from mine which was of the noble kind rather than that of the genetalia variety !!
279 tim. A cunning plan Baldrick but don’t tell team blue. Oh Bugger !!
I fear a lost deposit looms !!
“Unemployment rate stays at 7.8%”
“The fact that the overall level of unemployment in the UK has potentially peaked marks a stark contrast with other leading economies where numbers are still on the rise.”
http://www.moneymarketing.co.uk/adviser-news/unemployment-rate-stays-at-78-in-october/1001979.article
285 - Do you think the Sun would have run the story in the way it did if it was still backing Labour?
293. JackW
SeanT “noble”?!? Shoorley shome mishtake?
277
We sometimes drop into our own little bubble.
I turned off R5 to avoid listening to Knight, then got distracted by King’s prognostication - but I’d spent the morning thinking of both of my Grandfathers - in a sense they are with us all the time.
266. Broadly speaking, that is correct. I cannot, for example, recall anything from the Tories on a par with Labour making up lies about Iraqi WMD.
Lyingly claiming that others are lying too is the liar’s standard ploy.
The scale, extent, severity, grossness, and mission-criticality of Labour lying are the really new thing about ‘new’ Labour.
“The business secretary said that the Sun’s journalism influenced the way politics was reported on Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News, and this could affect Westminster coverage on the BBC.”
Eh?
Still, amazing how media bias was okay when it was in favour of you, eh your Lordhsip?
292 cont/
A senior Tory source said it was “absolute rubbish” to suggest that the party had struck some form of “contract” or commercial deal with News International.
“Peter Mandelson is living in fantasy land again,” said the source. “If he really thinks there is a contract between the Conservatives and the Sun, perhaps he will explain what the contract was when the Sun backed Labour in 1997, 2001 and 2005.”
294, obviously it’s good that unemployment isn’t rising as fast as predicted, but is it not a lagging indicator?
292 - We will soon be able to tell if Mandy is right about Murdoch and the Tories.
285. MarcoPongo. Really - must start watching it then! Christine Bleakley - not just a pretty face, a bonafide guardianista - who’d have thunk it?
#275, by tim November 11th, 2009 at 11:07 am
265 - Clearly the way to stop me becoming Poster of the Year is to vote Jack W, anything else just splits the Tory vote.
Tupac, me-old-mucka….
:waits-for-alleged-farmer-to-engage-brain:
This site is not about you. It’s about politics and political-betting. Do you understand…?
[This comment was not funded by the Ted for PB-Poster campaign.
]
289 As a number of commenters have pointed out, he wrote the same article two months ago for CIF.
305
That is brilliant - EMS is a tit.
272 Clearly you have a chip on your shoulder. don’t worry you will get over it.
264 SO don’t be so sure. There are still a number of “bed blockers” to be retired by Cameron and what would be far better would be for Frank Field to fight Birkenhead as the Tory candidate. That would mean another so called safe seat Labour would have to fight a full campaign in. Lord Field of Birkenhead, Minister of State for Social Security has a certain “ring” to it.
285 Perhaps, but a shift rightwards, from the Conservatives (which the last three polls have slightly shown) is surely not in their interests.
“We will soon be able to tell if Mandy is right about Murdoch and the Tories”
We can tell already. It’s bull.
298 - Lady Porter fled the UK because of votes for homes; Aitken and Archer both ended up in jail; Major was telling us to get back to basics while he was nobbing Edwina Currie. There was Labour’s tax bombshell, Tony’s evil eyes, are you thinking what we’re thinking and so on and so on and so on. All parties do it and always have.
306 Just another failed politician, bitter that his career has gone nowhere.
Unemployment rates:
10.2% - America
9.7% - Eurozone
7.8% - UK
11.0% - tories
283 - Harry
That one tickled me
307 The personal vote swing would be something of a shocker if he tried it.
305 - Hardly, as he points out Hannan and Helmers recent opposition to party policy.
And confirms he has sent his info on the extremists while questioning whether the leadership have.
292 - I sometimes wonder whether Mandy is capable of speaking for more than a minute without trying to smear someone:
He went on: “The Sun’s owner, News International, has made a decision for the newspaper to support the Conservative party. They have effectively formed a contract, over the head incidentally of the paper’s editor and their readers, in which they are bound to one another.
“What the Sun can do for the Conservatives before and during the election is one part of that contract. And presumably what the Conservatives can do for News International if they are elected is the other side of that bargain.”
As well as verging on the libellous, it’s an incredibly stupid line to take. Labour should be trying to damp this story down, not stoke it up.
309 - Obviously we can’t tell as the Tories are not yet in power and so are not in a position to make good on any promises they may have made.
312 Gabble I seem to remember that you posted that little list a week or two ago.
What country is the Tories?
311 - He defeated the Pro Lisbon, Tory group extremist candidate in an election recently.
316 - I completely disagree. A fight with the Sun will galvanise the Labour base, which is exactly what Labour needs in order to minimise losses at the next election.
It still puzzles me that anyone on here seriously thinks that anyone in the Labour Party believes they will win the next election. Everything that is happening now should be seen through the prism of Labour preparing for opposition.
“They have effectively formed a contract, over the head incidentally of the paper’s editor and their readers”
The Sun wouldn’t be doiung this unless it realised its readers were shifting to the Tories. That’s why it’s succesful. He really is a tit. And it shows just how important Labour think the Sun is. Heads at NewInt will be swelling.
Easterross.
Anyone who has perused [sp?] this site for any length of time would:
# Understand individuals opinions,
# Understand the complexities of the UK and Her regions electorate, and
# Would understand when it is worth to comment, however much bile the poster generates.
We understand Scotland, we understand your tepid Scottish Unionism, and we understand how to use the mouse/scroll-keys to ignore comments from people we dislike. Thats said, I do try to accumulate most views…!
314 - It is difficult to see Birkenhead voting Tory, whoever ran for the seat. If he defected it would be to sit in the Lords in the next Parliament. Though how long he would stay a loyal Tory is probably open to question.
321 - He is playing to the Labour base.
If we are to have a Scottish PB poster of the year then I will support Stuart Dickson who should win easily.
Incidentally, I’d be prepared to stick my neck out and say a Frank Field defection is not, and never, going to happen, which is not to rule out him taking some kind of advisory role to a future Cameron government.
315 Okay, so he added a couple of sentences to it. It’s essentially, the same whinge about how hard done by he is that he’s been repeating since he lost the whip.
319 But his career is essentially over. He’s not going to get re-elected as an independent in 2014.
326 A cross-bencher in the Lords would solve that one. Cameron is offering Frank his dream policy on a plate - all he has to do is pick up his knife and fork.
317 Southam Observer, do you believe in little green men and the Loch Ness Monster?
“Obviously we can’t tell as the Tories are not yet in power and so are not in a position to make good on any promises they may have made.”
Interesting logic. So ,until the Tories prove actively otherwise, one can accuse them of anything and claim it’s probably true but we’ll “find out if it isn’t.”
320 - A fight with the Sun might warm the cockles of activists, but it risks losing votes. Many of those core voters are Sun readers.
In any case, the bigger immediate danger is stoking the “Labour doesn’t care about our brave soldiers” story - that was what I meant by suggesting they should be trying to damp it down.
327 EMS and McGabble have about as much impact as Charlie Clarke.
Once you’ve been labelled as one of the rent-a-gob crowd, you’re influence is microscopic.
327 - He supports Camerons policy on Europe.
I note that Hannan and Helmer, let alone the homophobes and bigots, cmmand your support more than EMS.
294,301
Wait until February’s unemployment figures show the effects of recent closures.
Most of our current work for many multinational clients is for their new facilities in Eastern Europe/India/S America/Africa/Far East whilst they close UK sites. What was once a trickle has become a flood and they cannot get out of an over-regulated and over-taxed UK environment fast enough, with its (as they see)undereducated potential employees.
285 The One Show has become very popular. Clever tactics by the BBC lefty brigade - match a highly personable but essentially socialist presenter like Chiles with a bit of hot totty from Northern Ireland, build up the ratings then subtly introduce guests and items with an anti-Tory agenda as the GE approaches.
316, 324
I think Mandy is playing a game of Jenga: slowly withdrawing blocks and waiting for the precarious stack to collapse.
But who is he playing against?
Have we done this?
Roland Watson Appointed Times Political Editor
“the Tory Party is NOT being taken over by Etonians. No, but perhaps the lobby is,”
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2009/11/roland-watson-appointed-times-political.html#links
Deep breaths Timmy, deep breaths.
More on Exeter - this could be a cracker of a contest
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/6539062/Ben-Bradshaw-lays-into-Emma-Thompson-the-last-of-the-Labour-luvvies-over-racism.html?
316 “it’s an incredibly stupid line to take. Labour should be trying to damp this story down, not stoke it up.”
Depends if it works. Given the Sun is going all out i think it makes sense in theory to try and undermine the messenger as much as possible and thereby dilute all their attacks over the next few months as “it’s just the Sun being biased”.
320 - “A fight with the Sun might warm the cockles of activists, but it risks losing votes. Many of those core voters are Sun readers”
Exactly, Mandy may be playing to Labour’s core base, but the level of panic demonstrated amongst Labour MPs since the Sun deserted Labour will not play well amongst its 3.5 million readers.
It’s a moot point whether such out-bursts will generate a net gain or backfire spectacularly.
333 If he did support Cameron’s policy, he’d still be a member of the Conservative Party. He was reselected on the basis that he would agree to leave the EPP, and then he broke his word. He compounded that by standing against the group’s agreed candidate. Any party would kick out someone who behaved like that.
You’re absolutely right that I agree more with Helmer and Hannan than I do with EMS.
335. Yes, Norm … and we’re going for cebeebies next!
338, the luvvie’s a plank as well. Complaining about a city being too white is racism.
339 Perhaps, however if the *facts* are true-ish, they come unstuck [again].
Being on the wrong end of a media war is nasty and destabilises one’s perspective. Labour are giving away how narked they are every time they open their mouths.
It will sound like whining unless they are careful. Dead soldiers always trump spin.
316. Not stupid at all if you’re looking past the next election and are also looking at the possibility of the abolition of OFCOM.
Another day, another “crisis” for Gordo,
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/11/the-childcare-revolt.html
323 SO I would never expect Birkenhead to return a Tory MP unless the electorate underwent a radical shift as seats like Liverpool Mossside have in the past 50 years. However I would rather a defector in any party stand and fight his/her seat under the new colours wherever possible and if they lose then the HoL beckons. In any event given his age, Frank Field must be entering his last period as an MP.
322 FT you clearly did not read my original comment which had nothing to do with any difference, real or perceived between Scotland and England. The point was that as we dicovered in Scotland at the last GE the perception of the psephologists as to how particular constituencies would have voted at the last election under new boundaries (in our case 2001) proved to be very wide of the mark in a number of crucial seats and as many of us are betting on changes to English constituencies on the basis of predicted changes to 2005 votes for constituencies not yet in existence, caution should be shown by all!
284 Thanks John.
Isn’t Oxford East exactly the sort of seat where you might expect Conservatives to vote tactically to keep Labour out? Or do they nurture hopes of winning it?
Tatchell standing for the Greens should boost *all* the other Parties!
I love how the abolition of OFCOM supposedly means the end of media regulation.
346 (correction)
Another day, another “crisis” for Gordo of his own making.
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/11/the-childcare-revolt.html
348 PtP. Don’t know about that. Say what you like about him, Tatchell is one man who truly deserves the over-used epithet ‘courageous’. I’d certainly consider voting for him.
330 - No, but we can’t say as you do that Mandy’s claims have been proven wrong.
331 - We will have to disagree. I think that Labour should go after the Sun and seek to label it a Tory rag with an agenda at every single opportunity.
352 As I said, you appear to be saying that all claims about the Tories can stand until they are proven wrong.
349. It might be, it might not be, but it’s certainly in Mandelson’s interest to get the message out that Murdoch’s support of the Tories is in exchange for the expansion of his media empire.
In most decent circles, claims have to be proven, not disproven.
335 - The conspiracy theories put forward by the swivel eyed right on here really are a joy to behold sometimes.
347 - I would never expect Birkenhead to return a Tory MP unless the electorate underwent a radical shift as seats like Liverpool Mossside have in the past 50 years.
Now that is a radical change.
“it’s certainly in Mandelson’s interest to get the message out that Murdoch’s support of the Tories is in exchange for the expansion of his media empire.”
Oh yes. But then we can’t be surprised that Mandelson reaches for the smears and lies at every opportunity.
352 - But he’s inviting the public to ask what unholy contract New Labour entered with News Int? Maybe allowing David Blunkett and his dog to write a Sun column?
From the BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8354131.stm
“But a Sun spokesman said: “The Sun strongly refutes suggestions made this morning that the paper does not report our forces’ achievements and their bravery. We are immensely proud of our coverage of Britain’s armed forces.
“The Sun is the forces’ paper and every day we report stories of heroism and bravery from the front line.”
He added: “We have produced special military editions of The Sun which, with the help of the MoD, have been sent to Afghanistan and distributed among those fighting for their country.
“The Sun will continue to proudly support our servicemen and women, campaign for better equipment and continue to put pressure on politicians of all political parties to devote more time, effort and resources to the war in Afghanistan.”
340 - Or go over the heads of most people entirely. My giess is that most people do not buy the Sun (or the Mirror) for the political coverage.
358 - Tim
“The conspiracy theories put forward by the swivel eyed right on here really are a joy to behold sometimes.”
Says the person saying that we’ll have to see if Mandselon’s own theory is proved wrong.
353 Possibly, but I suspect the Sun is capable of being a good deal nastier to Labour than vice versa.
308. Sean F - found it interesting you said you’d vote UKIP in a Tory safe seat.
Personally I like to “register my support” for a party’s policies no matter where I am. My trouble with voting Lib-Dem in a safe Labour seat is that it doesn’t demonstrate to CCHQ - or anyone else - that there is a reservoir of Conservative support to draw upon and build on.
May be illogical - but that’s the way it is. I’d only vote tactically in a close marginal or if I really despised the candidate or wanted to send a message.
And I’ve only ever done that once - at the 2004 Euros - when Michael Howard irritated me by both insulting UKIP and by extension anyone who didn’t rule out EU withdrawal.
Do you think the 2014 Euros will be tough for Cameron?
361 - Page 3’s Peta Todd has just climbed Kilimanjaro with a forces charity group.
She’s really thrown herself into the Help For Heroes cause. A lovely girl she is too.
357. Really? Isn’t this about a swivel-eyed loon from the left concocting a conspiracy theory about Murdoch and the tories? And you’re happy to go along with it…. so what does that make you?
354 - And you seem to be saying that they can all be proven wrong even though the Tories have not had a chance to implement them.
And round and round we go …
353. You didn’t say that 3 months ago Southern.
You would have been the first to complain about the Tories calling the Sun a Labour Rag; which it was.
Easy come - easy go.
353 / 365 - Lets not forget, The Sun isn’t just some paper out there on its own. You want to start a war with Murdoch, he has Sky, The Times, The Sun, NOTW, to fire back on you if he so chooses.
357. Almost as bad as the swivel-eyed left!
“Murdoch und Cameron are in league to take over zee vorld!”
Why is it always swivel-eyed anyway? Are we talking about eyes that cross-over and cannot focus, lazy eyes, or eyes that loop-di-loop in their sockets?
Just received the shock of my life. Am meeting some potential new clients later on today, and one of the men I’m meeting is called Mark Senior.
Surely, it couldn’t be? Could it?
357. Now how wouldn’t it be in Mandelson’s interest? It’s a good idea to get the message out that Cameron and pals are selling out to Murdoch. Just like it would be a good idea for Cameron to let Murdoch have his way, as his media outlets tend to swing rightwards. (Although this may rebound on him in the end, as they may swing a little bit too far rightwards for Cameron’s comfort.)
No conspiracy, just common sense.
366 - CR
I think the next Euros could be very difficult for Cameron to do well in. But no-one gives a stuff about MEPs anyway so I can’t see that as important.
365 Just think of the little stories that the Sun has in its files.
And the NOTW.
The last thing I’d do is pick a fight with someone who makes its money exposing adulterers/cheats and liars.
It was sex scandals that undid Major - I wonder what Labour’s Achilles heel will be.
Another resignation story for Mandy must be tempting…
368 - No it’s about a mad Tory claiming that the BBC has devised the One Show as a means to sublimily influence people to vote Labour.
373. TSE. You could be having a senior monment.
I think all these posts show that the McDoom vs Sun sh*t-fight is well and truly on.
heh heh
I’ve been watching the early part of the 1992 election coverage, when the BBC were still forecasting a hung parliament.
If we get a hung parliament next year, I really hope some of these clips are played to Labour bigwigs.
372 - Either works for me.
From yesterday:
“Ministers assume the Sun gave the Conservative party support in return for policy commitments including a reduction in the BBC licence fee and approval of BSkyB’s stake in ITV.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/nov/10/sun-political-editor-brown-letter
366 - agree CR. Your vote is actually quite unlikely to be needed specifically; it is much more valuable as an indicator of your support.
IS MANDELSON MAD OR SOMETHING !
For the snake one to come out and say the Sun doesnt support the military is the most laughable statemnt this year. If anything the Sun are the most pro military of all papers in this country and I would challenge anyone to argue othertwise !
He will cause more damage if he ain’t careful !
It is a good job that a hung parliament is not the result of hanging chads.
373. There is a picture of him on an early thread somewhere..
376 - Labour sex scandals are the best. Though the details about John Prescott’s made the mind boggle, and there’s not enough mind bleach in the world, to cleanse my mind of some of the images that story caused me to have.
376 - For Tories it’s sex, for Labour it’s money.
Do you seriously believe that the Sun or the NOTW would hold back on anything if Labour were being nicer to them? I don’t.
365 Sean F - Precisely. It’s of course too late for Labour to retain the support which they used to get from the Sun, but by attempting to counter-attack they are just giving them ammunition.
Anyway, Mandy vs The Sun should be highly entertaining. Conservatives can just sit back and enjoy it from a safe distance.
I would imagine theres a few labour MPs with dirty little secrets being rather worried
382 - Conspiracy theory whackjob.
365. What I find so funny about all this is how quickly the almost messianic zeal with which New Labour worshipped the Sun from 1996 to 2008 has so rapidly turned into pure unadulterated hatred now it has switched sides.
I don’t want to fall foul of Godwin’s Rule but it does remind me of the way a certain WWII Axis leader reacted when he found out that Himmler had been making overtures to the Allies.
He went ballistic.
294. Of course, unemployment rates are inversely proportional to the deficit. Unemployment has been kept low by increased government expenditure which, because of collapsing tax revenues, has led to a widening budget deficit and massively increased national debt. The short-term political gain to Labour is obvious. The long term harm to the economy in general is equally so. The Crashmeister believes it to be a price worth paying. It is a price we will be paying for a very long time, indeed.
387 - Labour don’t seem to lose votes over sex scandals in the ay the Tories do. It’s money for them because that’s where the perceived hypocrisy is. We call him Three Jags, not Three Shags for a reason.
366 I voted UKIP as a main choice for the first time in June (as I no longer held any office in the Conservative Party, I felt free to do so). I had also given a top up vote to UKIP in the London elections of 2004. In a seat where it really mattered, I’d always vote Conservative.
My reason for voting UKIP in June (or where it would otherwise be safe to do so) is essentially the same reason why even liberal Unionists would vote for Paisley in Euro elections - to show that one can’t be taken for granted.
#201 Easteross
Thanks for your-as ever- very interesting comments and analysis.
However, you say:
“Argyll: LibDems will lose if people decide either Tory OR SNP is clear opponent.
Gordon: as per Argyll”
I don’t see Argyll and Gordon as being similar seats at all in terms of voting prospects.
Looking at the figures the Tories are nowhere near the Lib Dems in Gordon. They polled about 7,800 to the Lib Dems 20,000 in 2005. They SNP polled just above 7000 and have been given a strong boost by Alex Salmond’s Holyrood victory.
Argyll IS a 3 way Lib Dem/Tory/SNP battle but Gordon will be Lib Dem/SNP with the Tories as also-rans.
I can hear the squeaking of rusty filing cabinets being opened and dust been blown off documents at Wapping HQ as we speak.
377. But isn’t that what the beeb is for? Certainly I can’t remember the last time they gave this government a deserved kicking or expressed approval (without a snide comment or three) to the tories.
By their actions you shall know them.
392 - I think you’ll find most people in the Labour Party always disliked the Sun and rather like the idea of the leadership having caught up.
392 Its the hatred that is clouding Labour’s judgement.
As Mr Nabavi points out - the Tories can just sit back and watch.
SCRAP SCRAP SCRAP
388 I have heard that the press are (still) prepared to sit on some outrageous stories involving MPs. So, I think the Sun could get medieval on the Parliamentary Labour Party if sufficiently provoked.
387
but will no-one please think of the dear badgers..?
399 Well they weren’t going to vote Tory were they?
Was there a legal reason that the BBC didn’t play Brown’s side of the telephone conversation on the news programmes last night? Seemed strange that they didn’t, and if there was no legal reason then it strikes me as somewhat politically biased that they didn’t.
Just noticed that the BBC once again insist on referring to the Chancellor planning to halve public debt over 4 years when of course it’s nothing of the kind and he only plans to halve new borrowing.
400 - I’m having visions of Gordon Brown being like Marlon Brando, and telling Peter Mandelson/Al Pacino
“Don’t hate your enemies, it clouds your judgement”
Not sure Mandy is the one who should be leading the charge against the Sun, this is a man after all who has had to resign twice in disgrace and has many unanswered questions about various other incidents and his friendship network. Playing with fire springs to mind.
342/357. So which part of my post 335 is inaccurate then? No actually you’re right regarding the conspiracy theory the dullards at the top at the BBC wouldn’t see what’s happening under their nose - all they care about are ratings. You should look at the One Show’s own blog page. There are plenty of comments there regarding Chiles being a NuLab luvvie and a champagne socialist. Also the guy who dobbed Carol Thatcher in it. As for the content perhaps you should take a look yourselves sometime.
394
If only they knew…
402 - Ah yes, the Badgers of (Dis)honour
ONS has a full set of unemployment/employment stats - numbers to support both sides of the argument - the Shangrila Brigade and the Doomsters:
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?ID=12
It’s a mixed bag of indicators - headline unemployment rate appears to be getting less bad, less quickly, but full time positions still being lost at an alarming rate [80,000 in the 1/4].
997,000 employed and self employed are now working part-time because they are unable to find full time positions - don’t expect they are happy punters. [Highest number since records began in 1992]
The 18-24 stats are shameful, nearly 1 in 5 unemployed [again highest number since records began in 1992].
398 - It’s not the BBC’s job to give any of our political parties a kicking or to express approval of them.
If the BBC is a biased Labour-suporting propagandist, it is clearly dreadful at its job. This country is currently pro-Tory, anti-Labour, anti-EU, anti-Afghanistan war and anti-Iraq war.
In the absence of PMQs at 1200 today I thought we could start another activity to keep us busy in the months leading up to the Election.
Rather than being the test bed for Labour’s attack line that tim-bot would like PB to be, why don’t we turn this into a game - points awarded when tim/gabble/SO renew their postings on these topics - or suggest more yourselves! So much more fun than responding to them again and again
Smears about Poland
Smears about Latvia
Smears about drug use
Smears about Bullingdon
Smears about George Osborne
Smears about William Hague
Smears about not having policies
Smears about having policies but hiding them
Quoting something irrelevant from 10+ years ago
Smears about Eurosceptics running the tories
Smears about Eurosceptics splitting the tories
Smears about people with ‘posh’ names
Inane waffling about the FTSE on days it is up
Smearing a PB poster instead of replying to a question
Smearing about Ashcroft
Any party that goes to war with a national news paper, let alone one with the highest circulation in the country, is on a hiding to nothing.
From the temper tantrums of the Brighton Conference to the smear operation by Mandy this morning, it just reeks of panic and sour grapes. Is it really worth six months of bad coverage to keep onboard the core vote?
Labour are certainly more vulnerable to charges of ‘favours for mates’ as they are in power.
That did for Blunkett and Mandy.
404 - He wasn’t aware of being taped so TV aren’t allowed to play it or something. That was Sky News’ explanation. Broadcasting guidelines.
371. I do agree that Murdoch has too much influence though.
IMO he should be forced to sell either Sky or the Sun. And if there is no commission, regulatory commission or body to force him to do so, there should be.
381. Ho-hum. I’d say it’s more the happy blinkered filters of enthusiastic partisanship.
Amazing what that can block out.
383. Absolutely. That’s how I feel.
This may not get anywhere, but it’s being pushed by Frank Field, who has the ability to make things happen in the House of Commons, and so it would be unwise to ignore it: Labour MPs are pushing for a vote on the Afghan war.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2009/nov/11/labour-mps-afghanistan-vote
415 - To be precise, they had to get the permission of Gordo and #10 refused.
Mr Smithson.
I would be grateful if you could remove my comment @ 408
Has anyone noticed that Gordon Brown seems to be incapable of standing still at official ceremonies. He fidgets constantly.
The thing about Mandelson is that he’s already so slimy that if Murdoch has something on him, then the question will arise–why didn’t it come up earlier? Because it would have to be pretty disgusting to knock the man off his perch.
415 That makes sense. Cheers.
421: Timing is everything.
411
“If the BBC is a biased Labour-suporting propagandist, it is clearly dreadful at its job. This country is currently pro-Tory, anti-Labour, anti-EU, anti-Afghanistan war and anti-Iraq war.”
You can only work with the materials you have at hand.
423 Nigel Griffith still has some photos in the NOTW’s album IIRC.
406.
Mandy had better stop spraying the rotting fish (Brown) and turn that Aerosol on himself…. The Sun will be going through their filing cabinets as we speak, for a nice little picture of Mandy up to no good somewhere.. shouldn’t be difficult !
Now what was that time when Mandy got that passport for someone or was it the dodgy mortgage or was it the……………..
411. BBC bias is not party political. It is cultural. Everything is seen through an urban liberal-left internationalist progressive filter. This a mainly a consequence of both its employment policy and how it is funded.
Of course, that cultural bias can lend itself to *appearing* to prefer the policies of Party A over Party B - particularly if the individual presenters fail to keep their emotions and phrasing in check - which is, of course, where this problem come from.
412 - A sort of PB Pool? that would be a nice betting feature to add to the site…
427 - Absolutely, which can be seen when they do really go for the government, it is for instance over things like Nutt-sack.
395. Sean F - interesting.
I actually switched back from UKIP to Tory to give Cameron a boost and to show my endorsement for his plans to remove our MEPs from the EPP. I felt he was serious about pushing for reform from within the EU and wanted to encourage that.
Did you not feel the same?
423. Yeah, but I doubt even Nigel Griffith cares about Nigel Griffith’s sex life any more.
REALITY CHECK !
What basis is there for some of the numpties on here that keep hanging their hats on a HUNG PARLIAMENT - oh okay you can have your little deluded thoughts if you want…… BUT YOU ARE LOSERS !!!!
411. I disagree. It is the beeb’s job to give a political party a kicking if deserved.
I do agree that it’s doing a dreadful job, the country is, (as you slightly exaggerate) becoming more “pro-Tory, anti-Labour, anti-EU, anti-Afghanistan war and anti-Iraq war” but the beeb hasn’t changed its tune much, has it? Somewhat out of touch, isn’t it?
Oh, and before you vapour on about the beeb being anti-Iraq war, that’s a hold-over from their spinelessness re: the sand-bagging they got after the Gilligam affair.
427 “Everything is seen through an urban liberal-left internationalist progressive filter.”
Yup. The group think is self-reinforcing. Their anti-US stance was very noticeable before Obama got in.
Like recruits like IME, I haven’t worked with the Beeb for the last 8 yrs but when I did, you’d never be seen dead with a copy of anything other than the Guardian. Their FaceBook profile breakdown was 80+% liberal/left leaning.
413 - The coverage will not change. It was always going to be bad.
432 - Wayne, old bean, clearly you don’t understand how much of a bias there is in the electoral system against the Tories.
427
Exactly. The BBC editorial line is as alien to the WWC manual worker in the north, as it is to a middle class small c conservative accountant in the shires.
Middle class luvvies in Islington however…
Given that the Sun managed to score an own goal with the letter story, and Cameron managed to do exactly the same with the Dannatt announcement, then perhaps its best just to leave these new inexperienced teams to mess up by themselves.
427 - The BBC is in urgent need of some right-leaning employees to stop it keeling over.
As I have mentioned before, those of my friends who are there are definitely of the muesli-eating, Guardian-reasing praternity.
420. “Has anyone noticed that Gordon Brown seems to be incapable of standing still at official ceremonies. He fidgets constantly.”
So would you be bloody hyper if you ate ten dozen KitKats everyday !
429. Also explains why they are quite anti-war as well.
I’ve never been (that) interested in the Israeli/Palestinan debate either but I must confess the BBC does seem to slant its coverage to the Palestinian side quite a bit whenever that topic comes up.
I don’t know where this sceptical BBC attitude towards Israel comes from but I get the impression they just don’t trust them at all.
415. Gordo not aware of being taped? Isn’t every call going out of No. 10 taped? Or is he annoyed that someone else is playing the same game?
434 - What anti-US stance?
New thread
436.
Of course I understand, but the polls tell us it aint gonna be hung its going to be Labour smashed smalltime or sent into hyperspace ! Get it !
396 Good grief, a left-leaning Scottish poster on PB!
Keep posting, Tom. You are your ilk are rare as hens’ teeth.
439 - you mean people like Andrew Neil, Michael Portillo and Boris Johnson, for example.
445 - Clearly you dont get it.
If you were to put the Populus figures into baxter, the tory Majority is around 2.
As someone who desperately wants to see Cameron in power, telling people how easily a hung parliament is no bad thing, it will help motivate the anti-Brown forces, and boost the Tory seat total.
438 TIMBOT, more wishful thinking.
434. IMO I see little alternative but for the BBC to be forced to recruit in a more representative way if it stays fully public, or have a cross-party governing board devoted to examing bias and accountable to parliament, or to split the licence fee and make it semi-independent commercial.
It can’t carry on as it is.
Sky seem to manage to balance things up much better; despite media careers attracting roughly the same sort of person across the board.
447. We can all quote a few. You could add Clarkson to the mix and maybe Dimbleby too.
But they are pretty token, aren’t they?
It’s difficult to argue they are fairly represented when 80%+ read the Guardian and the organisation suppressed its own internal report on bias.
What do the BBC have to hide?
Re Mandelson, I would say that its not so much that the Sun is at war with the Govt but that the Govt is at war with everyone in Britain!!