Does the Daily Mirror still have much influence?
November 12th, 2009
Daily Mirror October 10th 1974 - Wikimedia Commons
Can it get more votes out for Brown’s party?
When I started my journalistic career in 1968 the paper ambitious young graduates aspired to work for was the Mirror. It had a circulation topping four million and until the arrival of Murdoch’s Sun was the biggest selling paper in the UK.
It had built up a great reputation for covering serious serious stories in a popular manner and certainly had a big political influence. There was never any doubt where its loyalties lay - see the above from page from the October 1974 election - and almost certainly played a key part in getting the Labour vote out.
So when doing some research for this piece I was quite shocked to discover that its latest daily sales figure is 1,324,883. I hadn’t realised that it had declined to less than a third of its former self. By contrast the Sun is selling well over three million copies a day with the Daily Mail easily topping the two million mark.
So what are we to make of its part in the coming election and its almost daily campaign against David Cameron - of which there is more today in retaliation, one suspects, for the Sun’s move against Gordon Brown?
The story they are splashing has the potential to be quite damaging if handled properly - that Cameron had his own personal photographer with him at the Armistice Day celebrations and the suggestion that he was regarding the event as a “publicity stunt”.
I would have liked to have given you a flavour of the coverage but the Mirror’s website is so piss-poor that all we have is a long text piece with only one picture which does not add to the core point.
The big difference between it and the Sun is that the latter is seen as an agenda-setter even when it’s on the end of criticism as it has been over the lettergate business. Other parts of the media take notice of what its doing - the Mirror hardly registers and that says it all.
Mike Smithson
MessageSpace Advertising
Daily Mirror: best served with haddock and chips.
I would imagine that the Mirror still holds some influence around Liverpool, where it has continued to massively outsell The Sun, ever since the latter’s Hillsborough reportage.
liverpool perhaps, england as a whole it is seen as pravda.
No, except in Labourite minds.
Brown was stung by the coverage of his non-bowing at the Cenotaph. David Cameron did not take a photographer to the Cenotaph. He has a photographer on hand permanently.
Brown lived by corrupting the media and turning it against his opponents. It is only just that he dies (politically) by the same method.
The Mirror is his last bastion, willing to hurl anything it can find at Brown’s enemies. But overall the media lying machine that Labour created, is now chewing up its former masters as enthusiastically as it used to chew up Tories.
The money’s moved on.
Of course, the circulation figures will not equate to readership, particularly with the tabloids. Newspapers are read by households, swapped around at work, placed in cafes and waiting rooms etc
The sun is small c conservative rather than tory. The mirror though is pure labour, so completely predictable.as such it cannot be agenda setting.
The mirror - best use is for looking in to comb your hair !
The mirror - good at hiding Red blemishes with make up
9. Reminds me of the RSM at morning parade.
Smithson, did you use a Mirror to shave with this morning?
Yes Sir.
It looks like it, Smithson. Use a razor next time, will you.
I’ve always been a bit suspicious of how influential newspapers are to voting patterns as people tend to buy the paper they agree with, and most importantly the idiot left of the Labour Party always used it as an excuse when they were trying to sell unsaleable policies.
When the Mirror sold vast quantities of newspapers it was often to men and women who all worked together and all voted Labour for many other reasons than the fact that they all bought the Mirror.
As for this story, if its true that Cameron was posing for private photographs, then is ir damaging?
If it fits the narrative of the chauffeur and the suitcase or the huskies at the North Pole then I guess it might have an impact.
I think this story may have more impact, as has been pointed out on this site since Camerons Quango day turned out to be OFCOM day, theres a nice bit of pandering to News International going on at the top of the Tory Party.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/has-cameron-done-a-deal-with-murdoch-1819010.html
As Mike asked when the Tories gave up their Lisbon Referendum plan, “has a deal been done with the Sun”
The Mirror has lost its ability to communicate - witness its terrible web site.
Do we know the age profile of its readership - I suggest that it is losing more to the grim reaper than it is gaining from school leavers.
A poster on here last night put up what appear to be the photo set.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25129269@N06/
The photographer story would be damaging to Brown but is OK for Cameron. Unfair perhaps but such is the media zeitgeist.
Rain in Glasgow
Including windchill, temp = 4°C
12 Cameron/Murdoch deal (tim). Yes but in electoral terms, so what?
Labour did the same in the 90s, and we have already seen that the Conservative posters on here fully support Murdoch’s (also the Mail’s) BBC-bashing agenda.
It is forecast to basically rain all day today in Glasgow.
The wind is a south-easterly, which is colder than the prevailing south-westerlys.
The key polling times - 17:00-20:00 - are looking like 60% chance of precipitation.
We could be heading for a stunningly low turnout. In such an election, surprises can happen.
Do I believe in fairy tales? Maybe I do…
“The photographer story would be damaging to Brown but is OK for Cameron. Unfair perhaps but such is the media zeitgeist.”
Except, as Tim fails to point out, the previous thread also had a link to the same thing from Downing Street.
It’s rubbish from the Mirror, and undermines completely Laboyrs line about the SUn being party political.
mike - i’m trying to catch up with recent posts on my mobile in india and it’s really difficult. The main page appears to weigh in at over a megabyte and takes a couple of minutes to load. Then to read the comments requires clunky navigation and long loading times. (in contrast, the bbc mobile website is wonderfully light and easy to navigate). please, please give some thought to implementing a proper cms. There’s a lot of good idiot-proof software (eg joomla) that is miles ahead of wordpress. The mirror may have a piss-poor website, but it also has piss-poor content. Thankfully, you only have a piss-poor website to improve…… *I mean that in the nicest possible way*
Ps, does anyone know if it is legal to place online bets in india?
Tim should be congratulated though for finding the one story out there about this that is even more risible.
‘Salmond refuses to predict by-election victory’
The First Minister, on a final visit to the constituency, said that there had been “a lot of movement” towards the Nationalists in the past few days but would go no further than saying: “We are fighting this contest to the wire.”
The SNP candidate, David Kerr, was more explicit, saying that he was “2-1 down with 20 minutes to go”. He added: “At this stage Labour are still ahead and we are still behind. But it is down to the voters . . . We have a chance of victory.”
… Labour optimism that the party will win in a heartland seat was tempered by fears of a low turnout with poor weather forecast for today as well as voter anger about MPs’ expenses. A turnout of below 30 per cent would be bad news for Labour.
Mr Salmond said the SNP’s message that only a vote for the Nationalists could end 74 years of Labour dominance was hitting home.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article6913440.ece
http://politicalbetting.mofuse.mobi/
Armitage- the mobile edition is here.
19 - Could you link to that.
If Brown also had a solo photo shoot with the same photographer it kills the story stone dead.
Ladbrokes - Glasgow North East by-election - Turnout?
Under 38% 4/6 (shorter, from 5/6)
38% or over 11/10 (longer, from 5/6)
“If Brown also had a solo photo shoot with the same photographer it kills the story stone dead.”
Only the same photographer, eh? How…..specific.
The link is on the same thread as the Cameron one was linked on. There are photographs of Brown going about his Remembrance Day business.
Well, the key point for us to consider is how the influence of the newspapers has changed since the last election. I don’t recall how vitriolic the Mirror was in the run-up to the last election, but it was likely to have been the most solidly pro-Labour paper. Consequently I see little change.
The main change is, obviously, the anti-Brown rhetoric that dominates the right-wing press. It should be noted that, for example, the Guardian was lukewarm in its support for Labour last time. I would be surprised if they did anything different this time around.
tim - I was surprised by the figures for voting intention by paper that were shown here a while ago. They showed a much higher degree of Labour support [for example] amongst Sun readers than I was expecting. Therefore your point “I’ve always been a bit suspicious of how influential newspapers are to voting patterns as people tend to buy the paper they agree with..” simply isn’t supported by the facts.
Underr 38% has to be a decent bet.
Norwich struggled to get much above that.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/
The Tories have been worrying away about the possibility of a March election giving Gordon Brown an element of surprise.
Now George Osborne’s backroom team have found a reason to stop worrying unless, that is, Gordon Brown wants to go to the country without having a Budget.
The date of the Pre-Budget Report was announced today as 9th of December. The Code for Fiscal Stability (http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/d/fiscal_stability.pdf ) which Gordon Brown put into law in 1998, states that there must be “at least three months” between the Pre-Budget Report and the following Budget.
Thus, the earliest possible date for a 2010 Budget is the 9th of March. That is after the latest possible date - 1st of March - on which Gordon Brown could call a March election.
The Treasury civil servants are all working towards a spring Budget and Brown would be pilloried if he went to the country without telling voters what economic horrors might lie ahead.
Nick Robinson makes a good arguement for no March election.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/
Looking good for a Tory 3rd place if the turnout is ultra-low:
Ladbrokes - Glasgow North East by-election - 3rd place?
Conservatives evens
John Smeaton 11/8
Greens 20/1
Liberal Democrats 20/1
Tommy Sheridan 25/1
Mikey Hughes 33/1
Any Other Candidate 5/1
Judging by John Smeaton’s column in today’s Scottish Sun, that 11/8 does not look like good value:
http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/papercolumnists/smeato/2725614/Politics-needs-an-MP-whos-not-in-the-loop.html
Err… those are not the words of a confident candidate.
I wonder if the Labour Party will invite him to their conference again?
David Roe, why is the Scottish Sun’s candidate not promoted on your front page on Polling Day? A tad embarrassed perchance?
Jury Team - R.I.P.
FPT Some discussion a thread or two back about Iron Chancellor and all-round economic genius Grendel McDoom selling half the countries gold reserves for fourpence hapenny.
There was some **** about how gold reserves should be treated as some kind of “investment portfolio”. For all i know that may be true on some planets but on the planet i know about people see the countries gold reserve as something for emergencies that ideally shouldn’t be touched outside of a world war or a great depression.
On top of that, not only would the government never sell any gold except in the direst emergencies ideally they’d constantly buy more whenever it was cheap. Even more ideally the country would eventually end up with the entire world stock of gold buried in deep vaults under Kent. People would then feel the future of their kids and grandkids was safe in the hands of wise and sensible Pharoahs.
Point being it’s worth el Torees (or anyone else) using the gold sale to undermine any lingering faith in the Plywood Chancellor and if there’s some come back **** about “investment portfolios” say gold is different as in any really dire emergency situation e.g world war or great depression, gold is bound to be important.
This may be economically illiterate according to some but people who el Torees need to stay at home on the day think like that (and quite rightly imo).
9. David - brilliant. Many thanks. Comments are in reverse order though!
“Brown would be pilloried if he went to the country without telling voters what economic horrors might lie ahead.”
That doesn’t mean Brown won’t do it.
Ryans put it well on the last thread: I wonder if we are about to see a backlash in favour of politicians and against newspapers.
This story looks every bit as absurd as the Sun assault on Gordon Brown. I yield to no one in my contempt for politicians, but they do so many stupid things that condemning them for normal behaviour is quite uncalled for.
The turnout at the Glasgow East by-election last year was 42.25%, but that was in July, and the weather was great.
This NE by-election has been much, much lower-key.
28. tim
Turnout at NN was 45.9%, which is significantly higher than 38%.
This has been a great week for Brown and therefore possibly a bad week for Labour.
After a very quiet period, all the money is on GB staying and a change is now an approximate 3-1 shot.
So maybe the Mirror is doing something right.
34 - David, I’ve looked for a link on the previous thread for a solo photo shoot involving Brown yesterday.
There doesn’t seem to be one.
38. URW
Good news for Gordon Brown is ALWAYS bad news for the Labour Party.
Brown is the Labour Party’s cement shoes.
http://www.cartoonstock.com/lowres/mwi0001l.jpg
38 - Agree with you.
Chance of Brown going down to 45%, but if the polls don’t move then it shows he can’t do right for the Sun doing wrong, and back up to 50%
39: Doesn’t mean they didn’t happen….
Mirror story=non story.
Morning all and the Daily Mirror is now barely better than the Daily Sport. At least the Sport has some talent shown within its pages.
Kevin McGuire is a dreadful journalist (not because he is a leftie) and belongs there.
Bottom line the Daily Mirror is only “read” by people who either dont vote or vote Labour anyway so who cares what it prints.
43, I suspect the Sun will be trembling with dread at the prospect of a media war with the Mirror.
43 - Is it read in Liverpool Mosside?
The big story overnight “MOD pen-pushers get £47m bonus” is a big taking point this morning. It’s going to run on for a few days and damage Labour even more!
Why wasn’t it raised at pmq’s yesterday? Is Cameron going easy on Brown to keep him in place? I suspect yes!
The Mirror is terrible. I can’t remember the last time they had an exclusive that actually mattered long-term.
The “Fizzy Rascal” story during the Conservative conference was a rare moment of excellence, though.
45: Poeple vote in liverpool mosside?
Bookies best prices - Glasgow NE (note: Hills have removed their prices at the moment)
Labour 2/9 (VC)
SNP 4/1 (Lad)
John Smeaton 50/1 (Lad, PP)
Liberal Democrats 100/1 (Lad, PP, VC)
Solidarity (Tommy Sheridan) 100/1 (VC)
Conservatives 150/1 (VC)
Greens 150/1 (VC)
Mikey Hughes 200/1 (Lad)
SLP 200/1 (Lad)
SSP 200/1 (Lad)
BNP 300/1 (VC)
SSCUP 300/1 (VC)
C Campbell 500/1 (Lad)
M Brown 500/1 (Lad)
27 “Therefore your point “I’ve always been a bit suspicious of how influential newspapers are to voting patterns as people tend to buy the paper they agree with..” simply isn’t supported by the facts.”
The Sun is different because the modern Labour party only overlaps 60/40 with a lot of Labour voters.
Example, imagine a town where the four issues are health, general stuff, education and crime, imagine there’s only Labour and Tory, and imagine all four issues come under one council and say the town is almost always 60/40 Labour/Tory.
Now imagine the four issues are split up so there’s separate directly elected health, education and police authorities and a rump council for the general stuff. You’d get something like, Health 80/20, General Stuff still 60/40, Education 40/60, Crime 20/80.
In a nutshell the Labour Party is too Guardianista for a lot of Labour voters on a lot of single issues but *overall*, when you combine everything together, they average out as Labour. So the Sun being right-wing on the stuff a lot of Labour voters are right-wing on isn’t a problem generally speaking.
The Sun coming out explicitly pro-Tory is a bit of a problem for them because the Labour vote hasn’t swung cleanly it’s fragmented in lots of different directions so there’s no political mid-point for them to sit on but it’s less of a problem for them than being pro-Labour (or pro anything else) especially while McDoom is in place.
Just because it amuses me - Ken Clarke in the House of Commons in 1991 saying that only morons read the Mirror.
Mr. Clarke: The hon. Gentleman is quoting the Daily Mirror, a newspaper that only a buffoon would quote. The Daily Mirror, which is read by morons, produced that sentence. If the hon. Gentleman looks at the article in Woman, he will see the sentence that he quoted, followed by my saying that that is a sad state of affairs and that it is necessary to improve the state education system to stop that being the case.
48 - I don’t know, there’s been such demographic changes
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/11/should-we-focus-more-on-negative-voting/#comment-1303351
Betfair - Glasgow NE
Lab 1.07
SNP 7.2
Any Other Party 200
53, aren’t the Labour odds much shorter than they have been?
I wonder if someone’s had a subtle insight (due to some sort of clairvoyance, obviously) about the postal votes.
Liverpool? Mosside? Shome mishtake shurely?
32
Which Chancellor said these wise words:
”for too long governments have taken too much in taxes from people who work hard but are not wealthy”
Sporting Index - Glasgow NE
W.Bain (Lab) 22 - 23
D.Kerr (SNP) 11.5 - 12.5
R.Davidson (Con) 2.5 - 3
J.Smeaton (Ind) 1.25 - 1.75
E.Baxendale (Lib Dem) 0.25 - 0.75
M.Hughes (Ind) 0 - 0.5
30. Possibly, or possibly it’s another of Gordon’s oh-so-clever games in which he ends up checkmating himself.
I could quite easily see him putting forward the 3-month rule as the reason why it was impossible to have a budget before the election. There’s no way it would wash as there’s no reason to have the PBR this late or the election that early. Nor would it get away from questions about ‘what are they hiding?’, but it is the sort of cunning plan to go into hiding that Brown seems keen on. It would also completely undermine any arguments Labour tried to make about the Tories’ plans if Labour aren’t revealing their own.
I don’t expect a post-election budget. Apart from anything else, it gives the Tories all sorts of reasons to meet with Treasury officials and look like a government-in-waiting. However, I wouldn’t be surprised to see another episode of ‘dither before doing the obvious thing’ from Downing Street.
54. Morris Dancer - “I wonder if someone’s had a subtle insight (due to some sort of clairvoyance, obviously) about the postal votes.”
I could not possibly comment.
If PM Dave does just one decent thing in his entire career, I hope that he can genuinely increase the reliability of election results. I am sorry to say this, but it is my own personal believe that electoral fraud is endemic and rampant in certain parts of the realm; most obviously in certain parts of the Scottish central belt.
Trust in declared election results is a fundament of a civilised Western European democracy. The current situation stinks to high heaven.
46 - Yep agreed.
Labour and tim thrashing around and making noise but it does not matter.
People want them gone.
The weather forecast is actually looking worse towards the evening: 70% chance of precipitation.
Which was the last Westminster by-election to be held in such poor weather conditions?
29/30. The budget/election was covered last night
Of course, one thing which Nick Robinson and George Osborne’s backroom team seem to have overlooked is that it is entirely possible, in theory, for the Prime Minister to hold a March election and then delay a budget until mid to late April, just as he did this year. Politically that would be highly dangerous as the Conservatives would say that it showed the government was afraid to hold a budget for fear of revealing the parlous state of the economy. But it’s possible to imagine they could just about get away with it. It would be brazen, risky, full of downsides, but I can just imagine Peter Mandelson arguing for it.
http://iaindale.blogspot.com/2009/11/march-election-ruled-out-or-is-it.html
58 David, I don’t see it would be a problem for Brown that he called an election before the Budget. Public aren’t voting on one Budget and it isn’t an election issue. The PBR will claim to lay out most of what’s going to be announced, last Budget announced other measures. Brown can say “steady as she goes, we’ve said what we will do”. Last week of February he announces election, clean up of outstanding legislation, Parliament ends, electioneering through March.
Budget planned for 16th March becomes one on 13th April - if Brown wins it would be Chancellor Balls first Budget, if he loses Chancellor Osborne steps up.
Having bought a copy of the Wind in the Willows yesterday for my granddaughter, it struck me how alike are Mr Toad and Gordon Brown.
Both are self-congratulating, believe that only they have the best ideas and go ahead with them anyway, refuse to listen to others and have to be rescued by colleagues when all goes wrong.
I’ll leave it to PBers to cast the roles for Mole, Ratty, Badger and the Washerwoman - and who would make up the scary creatures from the Wild Wood - the stoats, weasels and foxes who quickly retreat when confronted(Labour back-benchers)? - perhaps a future cartoon from Marf?
Glasgow Eest was lost to the SNP only a few months ago and NuLab have been truly abysmal in government since then yet the odds are still on a Glenrothes rather than a Glasgow East style result. Logic would suggest that the result would be close.
However the odds are massively for NuLab. What that tells me is that people are voting on the basis that the result will be nobbled. What does that tell us about what kind of society we have become that such an attitude (unthinkable in the past) can be widespread and backed up by peoples money?
On topic. Issue nailed by serf at [8] and Financier at [13].
The Mirror is quite simply not an agenda-setting paper. Partly that’s down to reduced sales and a readership who aren’t influential (it still comfortably outsells The Guardian and Independent but because of the influence of those organs within the BBC, that gives them much more political power).
A question I’d ask is how many floating voters read The Mirror? If Financier is right and they have an aging readership, that implies that their readers are more aligned in their views (as older people are more generally). It would certainly account for their consistent Labour line.
In fact, that very line is one of the things that negates much of the political power of a newspaper: the ability to be an independent voice. In switching as necessary, The Sun has not only established for itself a reputation of backing winners but even more crucially, a reputation for being the voice of a certain type of floating voter - one that makes up a large portion of the electorate. As the number of party-identifiers declines and floating voters increase, The Sun is in the right segment of the market and The Mirror is not.
65. art1000
Err… point of information: Glasgow Eest was lost to the SNP 16 few months ago. 16 is not “a few”.
59. “I am sorry to say this, but it is my own personal believe that electoral fraud is endemic and rampant in certain parts of the realm; most obviously in certain parts of the Scottish central belt”
And parts of certain inner-cities where cultural pressures enable parties to engange in actions such as vote farming.
59, I quite agree.
Whose way do you think the by-election will go, and with what margin of victory?
Is this the week things suprisingly change. The cock up by the Sun, the Glasgow election, these things come in threes, perhaps the polls will turn to Labour as well this weekend. Or not.
I was shocked and awed by something I heard on radio 4 this morning (a sentence one rarely utters). The government… have announced a policy. Apparently they want to make the NHS more like John Lewis’s, although on this occasion it isn’t the policy itself that is important. Labour have actually stopped attacking the Tories for a moment and started trying to run the country, like a government would. I’ve always said that if they wan’t even a vague hope of winning the next GE they need to stop behaving like an opposition and start at least pretending to be a government.
Their press appearances now also seem to involve less stupid point scoring and more discussion of their own record, even Mandelson didn’t mention us once in a radio 5 interview t’other day. An encouraging trend, if trend it be.
I note that the Scottish Daily Mirror has zero online presence.
Like the Scottish Sun, the Scottish Mirror has a huge proportion of Scotland-only content (rampantly anti-SNP, of course); however, unlike the Scottish Sun it is impossible to access that content online.
66. DH
Following on from your prognosis, which paper will the BNP supporters read? The Sun or Express?? I omit the Star as I do not know anyone who takes it.
65. What’s changed since then?
As Stuart points out, Glasgow E was well over a year ago and:
- The SNP government has inevitably done things which not everyone agrees with, as all governments do.
- The prospect of a Tory London government is much more real now, focussing the minds of Labour-inclined voters.
- Labour has learned lessons from Glasgow E, where the canvass base and GOTV was by all accounts rubbish. Note the extremely long lead-time for this by-election.
- The recession has upped the stakes. That might impact on people’s willingness to protest.
No
Tim, it’s not hard, come on
http://www.flickr.com/photos/downingstreet/
OT
You can just picture Tim and Gabble sitting in the lounge now at the asylum reading the Mirror to each other, while looking at each other through the holes left by their press cuttings. “Tim have you seen this picture of Gordon at the kiddies school, ain’t he caring”
SAD SOCIALIST SYNDROME - It gets em in the end you know!
Just wanted to send Labour my good wishes for today in Glasgow NE - here’s to a strong win, and Gordon Brown’s position secured…
69. MD - “Whose way do you think the by-election will go, and with what margin of victory?”
Labour.
But the margin of victory is entirely dependent upon turnout this evening.
Hard rain and strong, cold winds could mean a very tight majority, sub 2000.
Good, dry weather between 17:00-20:00 would see 4000+ maj.
73. Does anybody read The Express either? World’s Greatest paper? It’s like League 2 football fans singing ‘we’re by far the greatest team the world has ever seen!’
I’d guess that the main papers BNP voters read are The Sun and The Mail with smaller numbers for The Star and The Express. That said, not everyone reads a newspaper and I wouldn’t be surprised if a particularly large portion of BNP voters fall into that category.
79, well, best of luck, and keep an eye on the register if you do win.
81. Thanks MD!
Sneak preview of Cameron in India Photo Shoot.
http://tinyurl.com/y9r9oqk
83 – You have an odd sense of humour young Tim.
63. If Labour did that, the Tories (and the blessed Vince) would accuse Labour of being too scared to present their budget because of what was in it. It’s not as if it could be presented as a timetabling clash - the Budget would have been deliberately delayed by a decision to bring forward the Election. Every interview Brown and Darling do (never mind any debates) would be dominated by ‘what are you hiding?’.
If the budget’s held, I agree with you that it will largely pass as a non-event.
#28,#30,#58:
#29 The Code For Fiscal Stability is just that, and is not law in itself, the Finance Act 1988 requires/allows the government to [among others]
(1)lay a code before parliament.
(2)to ammend the code but only after approval of the code by parliament.
15. If, as is usual, there is only one Budget in a financial year, the Treasury shall publish a Pre-Budget Report (PBR) at least three months prior to it, unless this is the first Budget of the Parliament, in which case a PBR shall not be required. In addition, if there is more than one Budget in any financial year, only one PBR shall be required.
This looks to offer some wiggle room.
59 Stuart Dickson. “electoral fraud is endemic and rampant”. How many people in the country would need to be aware of this, for the effect to be both widespread AND effective? Hundreds? Thousands? It would involve ,not only Labour officials, but electoral officials and the voters themselves. Glenrothes was the last time “loss of registers” could be used as an excuse. Is it conceivable that this could happen, without one single whistleblower? Think of all the reasons - private support for some other party, fury at some official involved,depression over unemployment, even conscience could play a part. The most likely - sale of the story to “The SUN”. The conspiracy theory surely doesn’t hold water?
There is an extremely interesting article on Conservative Home
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2009/11/mountaintoclimb.html
Not sure I buy all this stuff about the budget affecting the election timing. Once the election gets called there’ll be plenty of other things to talk about. Election timing is only really an interesting thing to talk about before you know when the election is going to be held.
The Tories might make the claim that Labour are scared of holding a budget, but at that point the opposition leader is usually on record demanding that the PM call an election and Let The People Decide, so there’s plenty for the government to fight back with. The “what are you hiding” line might result in a night of media fluff, but it’s hard to imagine it swaying a lot of votes.
85 David H “If the budget’s held, I agree with you that it will largely pass as a non-event.”
Not quite true, I think. Although the actual financial plans (inasmuch as Labour intend to reveal them) will largely have been set by the PBR, there is still an element of theatre attached to Budget Day, and many voters won’t be very aware of the fact that it is no longer as important as it used to be.
If held a few weeks before the GE, therefore, it will act as a very convenient and high-profile peg on which Osborne can hang his ‘Labour aren’t telling the truth’ argument.
The overall effect is probably neutral as to the election date; as regards spending and taxation plans, Labour will be on the defensive either way.
Hmmm methinks the politicians would be much better thought of, if they stood up to Press Barons like Murdoch. Its sickening to watch Blair, Brown, Cameron and the rest, creep around him.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/has-cameron-done-a-deal-with-murdoch-1819010.html
Wouldn’t it be great if just one of ‘em had the guts to tell him, ‘Piss off back to Wogga Wogga where you belong’
Quentin Letts scores yesterday’s PMQs as a win for Brown
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1227085/Suddenly-Cameron-colour-semi-ripe-mulberry.html
I was bought up on the old Cudlipp Mirror (when he was publisher, rather than editor). Fairly recently I went through copies from the 60s for some historical research. With a far smaller page count it principally carried news stories. Today’s Trinity Mirror is principally about what’s on television.
Like it or not, the real tabloid agenda setter is the Daily Mail.
This is typical content from the Mirror’s stablemate, the Daily Record:
‘Tory backbencher apologises to Scots Labour MP Jim Devine over Twitter sex pest claim’
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/2009/11/12/tory-backbencher-apologises-to-scots-labour-mp-jim-devine-over-twitter-sex-pest-claim-86908-21815558/
Scottish Labour MPs being smeared?!? Nope. The traffic is always the other way.
A look at some new not-for-profit private schools, and what pointers they might give to the success of the Conservative education plans
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6543637/New-not-for-profit-private-school-chain-is-a-class-apart.html
I’ve put up the first of a promised set of posts on Welsh marginals on Channel 2 this morning. Any comments welcome.
http://politicalbetting.blogspot.com/2009/11/welsh-marginals-part-1.html
Off canvassing now (how sad am I) but back later.
Better that the public think that you’re hiding problems and call an election before the budget than for the public to see the scale of the problems by holding an election after the budget?
Daily Mirror scuppered the Labour strategy against the Sun today with that photo and headline. Lets face it, how many will actual buy the paper to read the story inside that don’t already do so?
The mirror is almost obsessional in its hounding of Cameron since he became leader, who can forget someone rifling through the guy’s bins to count nappies for heaven sake? Anyone would think that they actually had a team following the guy’s every move.
Looking at the Indy and Mirror today, looks like a very planned and cynical strategy to drag Cameron into Labour’s row with the Sun, and that blows the sympathy vote out of the water.
98 - I presume if Brown had arranged a private photo shoot at the Cenotaph you’d be supporting his judgement?
re 92. Yesterday I was driving while PMQs was on and heard it on the radio. My view was that Cameron had done OK and had certainly beaten Brown if not by much of a margin.
Yet watching the TV replay later I came to the opposite conclusion.
Thanks once more,meurig. This has to be essential reading for all betting pb’ers.
Behold the power of PB.com!
Ladbrokes - Glasgow North East by-election - Turnout?
Under 38% 1/2 (from 4/6 an hour ago)
38% or over 6/4 (from 11/10 an hour ago)
Our Mike, who art in Bedford;
Hallowed is thy name.
The Mirror, with Piers Morgan, was a dangerous beast. What’s left now is a soulless monstrosity, just going through the motions.
94 - Dorries certainly went into great detail in her story.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1226083/After-Derrieregate-new-Commons-sex-pest-row.html
Strange motives.
100
Those of you with long memories, will remember that after Cameron’s first PMQ’s I commented that his florid complexion showed a blood pressure problem.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1227085/Suddenly-Cameron-colour-semi-ripe-mulberry.html
Those years of debauchery at the Hell Fi…sorry Bullingdon Club, have obviously taken their toll.
98. Re the Brown sympathy vote, I have been sent this internal memo from Labour HQ -
“Our strategy to get a sympathy vote for the PM by rebranding him as a helpless but good-hearted cripple seems to be working. This is the best line we have had for some time but we need to push it harder - we need to think of the PM as a new Tiny Tim Cratchett, Joey Deacon or perhaps Eddie the Eagle.
How can we get there? A few possibilities spring to mind. Appearance-wise, we need to emphasise his disability more - perhaps an eye-patch, crutch or even a false hump? A bit more personal tragedy wouldn’t hurt either - can we run some health scare stories on Sarah or one of the kids? Maybe we could even suggest the PM’s ‘conditions’ are set to deteriorate seriously over the months ahead…..’
(OK I made it up)
104 - Strange motives?
Yours or Hers?
Oh! so of Milliblair is Bannana Man, Cammiblair is Mulberry Man.
William Hill - Ynys Môn
Plaid Cymru 1/3
Labour 5/2
Conservative 10/1
Liberal Democrat 100/1
32 - MrJones.
That is one possible interpretation of the status of gold. i.e. something you hoard for emergencies. It isn’t one I happen to agree with because I think that status only exists in a self-fulfulling way. Sure it’s shiny and scarce, but there’s no reason why we couldn’t be having the same conversation about diamonds, for instance. History is on our side and it’s quite possible that gold demand might be sustained forever. I have my doubts. And if you thought that other countries were going to stop using gold as some kind of reserve then that’s going to affect future demand, and you might not want to be the last out of the door.
That “purpose of gold” is a discussion that hasn’t happened.
However most of the arguments against the gold sale seem to be about the financial impact, i.e. exactly treating it like a normal asset to value and consider in a portfolio context. If you take the view that gold should be reserved and not sold, you shouldn’t really be marking it to market as implicitly is done by those who have said Brown has lost us X, or he lost us an extra Y by selling stupidly.
99.That post sums up the problem that the Mirror and Labour have right now when dealing with Cameron. They stick that photo up on the front page of the Mirror with their obvious perception of his actions that day, well, to them it looks like a cynical ploy using a ‘private photo shoot’.
To me, their photo and headline combines with the flurry of helpful arrow pointing articles looks like a coordinated and cynical attack on the Sun, and with the added twist of trying to drag Cameron in to it. Talk about holing your own ship below the water line just as its launched.
Glasgow NE betting:
Labour now at 1/7 on Paddy Power
As for influencing it’s own readers I think the effect is zero. In nearly all cases it’s preaching to the choir. However if the negative story has legs then it doesn’t matter what the paper.
This Cameron one is interesting. As I reported a few months ago I was at a dinner with some writers and someone told a story about Cameron which I described on here as ‘damaging but not a deal breaker’. This sounds like it could be a softening up exercise before unleashing the (slightly) more damaging story that I heard.
108 wouldn’t harm Cameron with the Chav vote - they would assume its a reference to Mulberry, the leather goods people, as few would know ther was a berry.
94 Stuart Dickson
Ugh. Jim Devine. If the press reports are true, he is an MP who has an excellent chance of finding himself in prison for claiming expenses for non-existent repairs and shelving.
I dislike Dorries immensely, but would take her side over his instinctively because he is such a pathetic man.
It seems both sides agree that the remarks were made - it is whether they were intended as a joke (and whether it was clear they were in jest) that is in question.
SkyBet - Aberdeen South (incumbent: Anne Begg MP - Lab)
Lab 6/4
LD 2/1
Con 7/2
SNP 5/1
Is there any other seat in the entire UK where the 4th ranked party is as short as 5/1?
Aberdeen South is going to be a cliffhanger.
110.You don’t sell something like gold when the market is tanking unless you have too, and Brown didn’t have to and was clearly advised against such a move at that time. With hindsight, that advice has been proved correct. Did Brown have to sell part of our gold reserves right at that moment in time? Now if he was forced into such action at this moment in time, I could better understand it.
Do newspapers carry influence? Of course they do. More so than blogs - yes again. But it is minor compared to TV.
I tend to get most of my news from the internet. This, it strikes me, is becoming more common. Quite a few of my acquaintances also use this source. The problem with the web is that the news articles are rarely long enough or in enough depth.
I like a newspaper, but lack time to indulge. Besides, when my average day does not include passing a newsagent it would take a special effort to get one.
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23768444-gordon-brown-takes-his-revenge-as-murdochs-sky-loses-ashes.do
#92, #100 …The blush had done it. A rare win for Mr Brown.
No body language on the radio.
My word - isn’t the Mirror’s website a shocker
I’ve rarely read a more partisan paper than the Mirror - it’s always been like that and was even too much for my trade union organising father-in-law. He bought the Sun and the Observer.
I’d agree with the analysis above - the Mirror’s readers are usually older, tribal Labour voters, the Sun has a much broader and younger readership.
Just from anecdotal observation - Mirror readers are usually white van men and builders over 40 with a few office readers - the Sun is read by the same sorts but 20 yrs younger too and more office types.
113.McBride style tactics live on it seems.
11 - So you would support Brown if he made a decision to organise a private photo shoot at the Cenotaph.
The weather forecast is improving for Glasgow:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/forecast/6
122. Of course. But for every mildly negative story that can be produced about Cameron there are three or four genuine deal-breakers out there about Brown.
123.OMG, here we go.
Ooooh!
Immigration speech by Our Glorious (and Courageous ™) Leader.
Ahh. No policy announcements…
Man gets photo taken shock !
Man ruins economy - move along it was nasty American bankers…
126 Anyone for bingo?
Of course, if the Sun had published photos of Gordon Brown posing for a private photographer in a memorial garden commemorating this country’s war dead everyone on here would just have said fair enough, what’s the problem, the Sun is an agenda driven rag and the story means nothing.
And yet another flying pig passes by my window!
I am afraid. Top 10 columnists people would pay for online:
I can understand Jeremy Clarkson and Charlie Brooker - they are both hilarious and very entertaining. I can’t believe people would pay for Richard Littlejohn, Simon Heffer and Melanie Phillips though!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/nov/12/newspapers-online-micropayments
105 - was Quentin Letts watching the same PMQs as the rest of us?
130 I very much doubt that - he’s the PM, I’d expect him to have his picture taken for the official record, ditto the LoO.
Talk about clutching at straws
121. I’ve just notice that the Mirror site now allows reader’s comments, blimey, they were the only newspaper site that didn’t allow any for ages.
The spineless Tories I see have given in on civil liberties in the Coroner’s Bill. It doesn’t fill me with confidence that their “cast iron guarantee” to do away with ID cards is worth anything.
Heads up on Browns speech here.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/5532263/british-jobs-for-british-workers.thtml
Further lurch towards nationalisation of socialism..
122. If the story was about Brown I suspect you might think it important that people understood the character of their Prime Minister- even when he was just an aspiring one!
Victor Chandler - Aberdeenshire West & Kincardine
Lib Dems 4/6
Conservative 5/4
SNP 18/1
Labour 100/1
This is the Tories’ No.1 target north of the Forth. It will see the incumbent Lib Dems put under immense pressure, especially as they are being forced to fight tooth and nail in neighbouring Gordon (SNP threat) and Aberdeen South (4-way marginal) too. And Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch & Strathspey is just to the west too, where the Lib Dems are already in full panic mode.
Minor tip: I fully expect the Lib Dem vote in places like Moray, Angus and Perth&NP to utterly collapse, as not only will all their activists there be bussed into AberdeenshireW&K and AberdeenS, but they are going to be horrendously squeezed in these SNP/Con contests. This collapse in the SLD vote (eg. they got approx 7500 votes in each of those 3 constituencies in 2005) will further drag down their already low national vote share.
I’d pay to read AA Gill but not Hefferlump, Michael Winner not Giles Coren… [although his leaked email rant was the funniest thing I've read in years].
On the substance, people who see the story will probably think it mildly distasteful but ‘hey, that’s politicians for you’. On the politics, the Mirror is nearly always partisan, but its readership is dominated by the traditional Labour core vote which is the most hesitant and apathetic part of the Labour coalition at present. So their active support is more important than it would have been in, say, 1997, when the working-class vote was determined to get the Tories out at last. Incidentally, thanks to MrJones, whose political views aren’t mine but always has an interesting take on this aspect.
The Guardian is much more onside than it’s been for ages (including 2005) - by contrast to the above, our Guardian-reading supporters are pretty fired up these days. I don’t think they’ll need nose-pegs as in 2005.
On the by-election, there was a flutter of Labour nerves last weekend when MPs were asked to do some phone canvassing, but it’s died down again - we’ve not been asked to do any GOTV calls today as the local party is thought to be on top of it. Over-confidence, perhaps, but that’s all know. I’d be very surprised if we came close to losing whatever the turnout.
Wibbler, that list overlaps heavily with the list of writers that I would pay not to have to read. There is not one on the list that I would pay for the pleasure of reading.
117 The jury’s out on that one now I think, Christina, following Lee’s well argued and apparently well informed post yesterday.
If nothing else, he showed that there were two sides to the argument.
A lot of hypocrisy from the herd today.
Of course if Brown had done what Dave appears to have done, they’d be slating him for it, and to be honest I’d think it was a mistake, but the double standards on here are amazing at times.
I wonder if Dave got made up for his photoshoot?
142 - Tories, double standards, surely not.
130 – SO, “if the Sun had published photos of Gordon Brown”
136 – Roger, “If the story was about Brown”
142 – Tim, “if Brown had done what Dave appears”
Do you see the fallacy of Transference Gentlemen?
115
A senior Labour MP made sexually provocative comments to Tory Nadine Dorries, after saying he had dreamt about her the previous night, it has been alleged.
Ms Dorries claimed last week that an unnamed Scottish Labour MP had approached her in the Commons and made ‘disgusting’ comments to her.
And last night sources close to the Conservative MP said the remarks were made by former trade union official Jim Devine, 56, MP for Livingstone in Scotland. Last night Mr Devine denied the allegations.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1226083/After-Derrieregate-new-Commons-sex-pest-row.html#ixzz0WdWZnqRq
Still as both MP’s seem to be how shall we put it, ‘colourful’ I’m sure Ms. Dorries will be, ‘brightening our lives’ for some years to come: oh yes!
Mike S. I’ve e-mailed you.
142 Perhaps Gordon could give him some advice
“ON the day Gordon Brown turned orange it emerged that he has hired a former BBC producer to put an end to the visual gaffes that have dogged his time as prime minister. Nicola Burdett, 35, has been told to stop the embarrassing photographs and television foot-age that risk turning Brown into a figure of fun. The appointment has not come a moment too soon. Yesterday the prime minister was pictured at a summit of world leaders in Hertfordshire with a bright orange blob of make-up on his forehead.
The photographs - taken at the Progressive Governance Summit attended by Thabo Mbeki, the South African president - suggested that Brown might have deserted his make-up artist before she had finished.
“It also looks like his make-up woman only had Cuprinol orange,” said Claudia Croft, fashion director of The Sunday Times Style magazine. “Gordon should use something more natural to tone in with his pasty Scottish complexion.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3690033.ece
Turnout in Glasgow NE at the 2009 Euros was only 21.5%.
113
I hope the story isn’t the one about calling a bereaved mother of a British soldier a sh*t. That would be really damaging.
142
Just a touch of powder to, ‘tone down’ the Mulberry, perhaps.
Dear me!
Nadine Dorries has issued a grovelling apology to the Scottish Labour MP she branded a sex pest on Twitter.
According to a report in the Daily Record, Dorries emailed Jim Devine to say sorry for any “embarrassment” she caused with her comments, which were made in response to tweets by Kerry McCarthy which alleged that soon-to-retire Tory Grandee, Nicholas Winterton, had slapped another female Labour on the arse.
Despite her apology, Dorries is not off the hook with Devine, who said last night: “My lawyer will still be pursuing this.”
141.Why did he have to sell the gold at that time against the clear advice given?
re 29 except that the “latest possible day” to call a March election is 8th March.
127.What about Angus next door to WAK?
Ahhhh, there is nothing like the foul stench hypocrisy
117
When you say “something like gold”, I guess you are referring to MrJones earlier comment about gold being a special reserve you should never really sell. I think that is a legitimate position to take (I disagree for reasons I have mentioned about gold value being self-fulfulling with a risk of breaking).
However if you think you shouldn’t sell, then pricing is irrelevant. You should be (and I think MrJones would be) comdemning him even if the price had since gone back to $200. Selling in a “tanking” market might well be a great idea if you think the price isn’t coming back - in that case waiting would be bad.
In terms of the advice. We have certainly seen reports that some people advised against the sale. These included gold traders. None of us know the full details of the advice that Brown got but it looks to me that his actions were consistent with the kind of advice that I would have given (guessing, I don’t know the details of assets and liabilities). It seems impossible to me that someone didn’t advise him to do what he did, you just couldn’t get that idea or detail out of thin air. (Although with Brown anything _is_ possible).
Put it another way. The following seems plausible to me:
- He got advice from some people to rebalance the reserve portfolio to reflect good diversification. Also they advised that there was a small risk that the gold value proposition might break particularly if other reserve holders sold.
- He got advice from other people (Bank of England) not to sell the gold.
- He got advice from gold traders not to sell the gold.
He’s going to have to go against some advice in any case, and with hindsight he might turn out to have been wrong.
What if he had decided not to sell any gold, but gold demand evaporated (because everyone worried that there wouldn’t be any future buyers), and the price went down to $50.
Then today, those who recommended he sell went to the press with their story. I think that some who complain about the gold sale now would be saying instead “I can’t believe he didn’t take the advice to sell our gold when it was still worth $250, he ignored the advice and lost us lots of money”.
I dislike the man with a passion, and cannot wait for him to be unemployed but hindsight can be a dangerous thing.
Glasgow North East by-election
– live Minute-by-minute coverage throughout the day as Labour and SNP clash in key byelection triggered by Michael Martin’s resignation
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2009/nov/12/glasgow-north-east-byelection-byelections
Looks like a smearathon on here today - hope you’ve all brought your latex gloves
Today’s thread…
Mike notices a story in the Mirror and say people don’t notice the Mirror. Interesting argument.
Meanwhile, clearly Dave has an ego and is vain. We knew this. This is not news. However, doing it on 11/11 is. Good work Daily Mirror.
154 -Press Release
” In the morning Dave will be taking his brow furrower, photographer, make up team and solitary air down to the Cenotaph.
Later Dave will chill with his huskie homies in his North Pole crib while his driver returns a wind turbine to B&Q”
154 you read too many of tim’s comments.
153. Chris
There is no market on Angus yet, from any of the bookies (Shadsy!!), so we cannot see where the punters are leaning there. However, it does not take a genius to see that a gain from the SLDs is going to be a lot easier for the Scottish Tories than a gain from the SNP would be in the current climate. Tis not rocket science.
142, how many soldiers do you think have died due to Brown strangling the troops of proper funding for equipment, in particular helicopters?
158 Jonathan: “Good work, Daily Mirror”
154 Southam: “Ahhhh, there is nothing like the foul stench hypocrisy”
As I said yesterday, Conservatives can just sit back and enjoy the show.
Sun breaking out in Glasgow 2 miles from the constituency but the really manky stuff which is currently approaching Northern Ireland is due to hit later today at about 3pm.
I’ll keep you posted on the rain but you can see it’s approach on here
http://www.raintoday.co.uk/
a site I find useful for weather realated cricket betting.
The sunny morning though could be crucial for the morning Labour vote though as the elderly would tend to get their days business completed before it turns dark. Given todays forecast it could be virtually dark by 3.30 pm.
On the Mirror it’s not really relevant to comment on the Scottish Daily Mirror due to the presence of it’s sister paper the Scottish Daily Record. However even the once dominant Record nows lags behind the “Scottish newspaper of the year” the Scottish Sun, in sales and has nowhere near the influence it once had.
Not the betfair market is in-play you can have Lab at 1.18 with the SNP at 5.0. Not a great deal of liquidity though
Ok, I’m confused.
David Cameron is photographed and the pictures published on the Tory Flickr page.
Gordon Brown is photographed in the same place doing the same thing, and the picture published on the Downing Street Flickr page (which of course we pay for).
According to the Lackwit Collective this morning, Cameron is a shameless publicity seeker because the Mirror published the Tory photos, but Gordo is in the clear because the Sun didn’t publish his?
142 ‘I wonder if Dave got made up for his photoshoot?’
What, like Gordon Brown?
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2422245.ece
#130, by Southam Observer November 12th, 2009 at 9:31 am
And yet another flying pig passes by my window!
Charles,
Margaret Beckitt on a Herci-bird perchance…?
92. Wibbler. Martin Rowson spotted it years ago!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/cartoons/martinrowson/0,,1885530,00.html
151. coldstone
Too late my dear chap. I beat you by 49 minutes!
See post 94.
155
Lee
What we do know is Brown announced his intention to sell beforehand and thus the price of gold fell, ensuring that the UK got a worse return for the sale.
153.Oops I meant 137.
155.Well hopefully someone will put in a FOI request to find this advice to sell the gold at that time.
There has been a small move to the SNP on Betfair’s Glasgow NE market.
But no corresponding move on SPIN.
163. “As I said yesterday, Conservatives can just sit back and enjoy the show.”
It is interesting to see the reaction this morning as last night, and to his credit, Gabble was the first person to say Cameron had done nothing wrong.
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/11/what-do-we-think-of-these-polling-questions/#comment-1304708
172. Perhaps people greening out
?
163 Richard, by all means rest on your laurels and enjoy the show.
It didn’t take a lot of searching to find Gordo doing a similar think at Auschwitz.
It is the way of the modern world of politics, Gordo has had a photographer / flickr stream for some time, Obama got one early in his campaign and now so does Cameron. The only difference I can see is we pay for Gordo’s, Cameron pays for his own.
think -> thing
171 - Wouldn’t that fall into the free and frank exchange of advice exemption? I’m not sure how widely that one has been interpreted.
The Daily Mirror in my childhood and youth was one of the great newspapers, containing such memorial and now historical characters like Casandra - William Neil Connor and the cartoonist Zec - Philip Zec.
It was then as now a Labour supporting paper, but it was a NEWS paper and a very well edited one.
Today it is a Rag, and only the - sorry to say this - semi- illiterate read it today.
Meanwhile the big story of the morning is those massive bonuses for MOD employees:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8356101.stm
177.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/04/29/brown-s-tears-115875-21317081/
Gordon Brown and wife Sarah stand before a symbol of Europe’s darkest hour, profoundly moved by their sombre visit yesterday.
A photographer just happened to be there. Anyone spot which paper it was in ?
170 Bono
Lee covered that point in a characteristically clear and comprehensible manner yesterday.
Apparently if you are selling such a large amount onto that kind of market it does makes sense to preannounce.
He seems to know a bit more about it than thee and me.
Does anyone know what the Forces think of the Mirror after the fake urinating soldiers pictures?
If Hillsborough upset people in Liverpool, I can’t imagine the Mirror is too popular with the Services.
181 - If you go searching there is a series of photo where it is clear they are being directed to stand in one place, told to move to another etc, all for the photographer.
181. More staged pics here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1179271/Secret-list-British-prisoners-war-buried-Auschwitz-bunker.html
“Compassion : Sarah Brown sheds a tear as she accompanies her husband Gordon on a trip to Auschwitz last month”
174 Good grief - Gabble could be right for once!
What’s The Mirror’s point exactly? Politician in staged photograph? Shock horror! Most published photographs have been posed, cropped, retouched or manipulated in some way - nothing is how it first appears.
180 - That story may be better coming from someone other than Liam Fox, whose annual phone bill claims were over five times the average employee bonus at the MOD.
“Those of you with long memories, will remember that after Cameron’s first PMQ’s I commented that his florid complexion showed a blood pressure problem.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1227085/Suddenly-Cameron-colour-semi-ripe-mulberry.html
Those years of debauchery at the Hell Fi…sorry Bullingdon Club, have obviously taken their toll.”
by coldstone November 12th, 2009 at 9:10 am
Coldstone - let’s remember this when the howls of protest appear from your buddies if anyone dare suggest all is not well with Brown based on his manner and appearance on screen.
Presumably people who think Brown was an idiot for selling off gold at the bottom of the market will acknowledge that this loss is dwarfed by his incredible flash of brilliance in selling off the mobile phone licenses near the top of the net bubble.
145. Not the first time Nadine has smeared someone without foundation:
So, even though Dorries was completely wrong, and smeared Caroline Flint with manifestly false allegations, it’s apparently unthinkable that she should apologise. Instead, it’s asking for an apology when you’ve been lied about which somehow makes a person unsuitable for office.
http://rhetoricallyspeaking.blogspot.com/2008/01/nadine-dorries-im-really-quite.html
181 Shocker….Polictian in photo-op piece…
Is toilets scraping that barrel again? Well it seems to keep the usual suspects on here happy. something has to.
116 Ladbrokes / Edinburgh North and Leith
Labour 3/2
Liberal Democrats 9/4
Conservatives 4/1
SNP 4/1
188, tim, you missed my post at 163, asking you the following:
“142, how many soldiers do you think have died due to Brown strangling the troops of proper funding for equipment, in particular helicopters?”
tim - but Brown has done just the same - look at the link posted above: http://www.flickr.com/photos/downingstreet/
I can’t see the problem in either case but are you suggesting we can now pull apart the motives every time the Downing Street photographer publishes any shots of Brown? Please clarify for the record.
Victor Chandler have removed their Glasgow NE prices.
Nick Palmer you witter on but you are still not prepared to condemn the Mirror in the same terms as you did the Sun.
By your actions and your hypocrisy will you be judged.
Edmund - he sold the licences to companies operating in the UK who have effectively passed it back onto every mobile phone owner in the UK - it is just another taxation. For goodness sake, don’t be such a plonker.
According to Gordon Brown we are stepping up action against employers who hire illegal workers.
Yet he is happy to keep Baroness Scotland on…
125. Runnymede. “Of course. But for every mildly negative story that can be produced about Cameron there are three or four genuine deal-breakers out there about Brown”
I’m not sure that’s true. The public have a pretty strong idea what Brown is like and one or several stories-good or bad- would be unlikely to shake that perception. That is not the case with Cameron.
The only thing that this Mirror story says to me is that it’s going to be not just a dirty tactics Labour war, it’s also going to be one between the Sun and the Mirror.
The big story about MOD bonuses has really got traction - it could have bought 17000 privates or three Chinooks according to R5.
191. “Presumably people who think Brown was an idiot for selling off gold at the bottom of the market will acknowledge that this loss is dwarfed by his incredible flash of brilliance in selling off the mobile phone licenses near the top of the net bubble.”
We did that last night. Roger thought it was a master-stroke, others including myself disagree.
194. Thanks Mary Hinge!!
(This is why I love PB.)
Right, I do actually have a real life too. I’m offski. Behave chaps and chapesses. And do us all a favour please and just ignore the ‘orrid tim.
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/00778/gordon-brown-holoca_778915c.jpg
Brown in Zionist Photo-op Scandal.
Gee being a Mirror Journalist really is easy..
Gordon Brown is “proud to be Britain”
I notice that R5 aren’t covering Gordon’s speech at all - they keep saying that they’re across it and will bring any interesting news…
*tumbleweed*
196 - Brown is photographed at the Cenotaph during a ceremony, and with other people present.
Cameron arranges a solitary photo shoot at the Cenotaph.
No difference there then.
Or perhaps Princess Dianas solitary photo shoot at the Taj Mahal was exactly the same as if she’d been photographed with other peoople.
Yep.
191. Edmund. Covered yesterday, the answer is no.
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/11/the-pb-super-six-predictions-part-2/#comment-1304435
203 - Mobile licences wasn’t Brown’s decision anyway. But Roger was right last night and you were wrong. Mobile operators did indeed grossly overpay but the effect on roll out and pricing to consumers was negligible.
This years MoD bonuses would have paid for at least one badly needed Chinook airframe (excluding support costs). Imagine how much kit the £300 Million hosed away over the last few years would have bought. Shameful.
#185, by The Ghost of Harry Flashman November 12th, 2009 at 10:03 am
181. More staged pics here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1179271/Secret-list-British-prisoners-war-buried-Auschwitz-bunker.html
“Compassion : Sarah Brown sheds a tear as she accompanies her husband Gordon on a trip to Auschwitz last month”
I saw the photo of Sarah wearing a beret this morning. For some reason I found it discomforting, but I did not know why.
Your comment reminds me:
[Faux French Accent]
MichelleSarah: OhReneeGordon, you arh’ my ‘ero.ReneeRusty:EvetteSarah, I love you too, more then you will ever kno’.MichelleMs Desperate: ButRenneGordoom, ‘ave you not confused moi?[Enter, stage left: A faux Englishman]
Mandlesohn: I am the prince of darkness, and I give you…. Fire…!
['Allo indeed!]
208: And his trip to Auswitz?
Hmm look at all those people in the background…
http://ukinisrael.fco.gov.uk/resources/en/jpg/feature-image-235×157/pm-aushwitz-hp
Tapestry, 6!
The difference between the 12 year long ZaNuLieBor media-prompted assault and the current one on Brown is that the former was mostly spin and lies straight out of No10 and the current attacks on McBrown are completely justified and not a little too late. He has already boogered the whole country!
Ding Dong!
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/11/put-swiss-cow-bells-on-electric-cars-tory-health-spksman.html
208, see my post at 195.
You seem very exercised about a man being photographed in public. How many soldiers do you think have died due to Brown withholding adequate funding? Does it make you as angry as seeing that the Leader of the Opposition has been photographed?
Good News for Cricket Fans!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/front_page/8356391.stm
#185, by The Ghost of Harry Flashman November 12th, 2009 at 10:03 am
181. More staged pics here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1179271/Secret-list-British-prisoners-war-buried-Auschwitz-bunker.html
“Compassion : Sarah Brown sheds a tear as she accompanies her husband Gordon on a trip to Auschwitz last month”
I saw the photo of Sarah wearing a beret this morning. For some reason I found it discomforting, but I did not know why.
Your comment reminds me:
[Faux French Accent]
MichelleSarah: OhReneeGordon, you arh’ my ‘ero.ReneeRusty:EvetteSarah, I love you too, more then you will ever kno’.MichelleMs Desperate: ButReneeGordoom, ‘ave you not confused moi?[Enter, stage left: A faux Englishman]
Mandlesohn: I am the prince of darkness, and I give you…. Fire…!
['Allo indeed!]
‘Effing edit facility: I give up - you wish!
http://www.independent.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00168/Pg-02-brown-pa_168527t.jpg
Oh look a passing photographer… Smile!!
215 Morris Dancer, don’t waste time with the TIMBOT on this subject. I doubt he cares how many soldiers die, how or why.
It wont be long before the photo war turns to the most ghastly photos, not photo opportunities.
One should note however it is the Mirror who started the photosh*t stuff.
The Mirror will never trump the currant bun.
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/4/29/1240990012138/Gordon-Brown-and-his-wife-002.jpg
Oh look…this ones not staged at all! No siree…
How about this one then tim on the front page…
Remembrance Day by Downing Street.
Gordon and Sarah Brown outside Westminster Abbey, following a ceremony to mark the passing of the First World War generation, 11 November 2009;
http://www.flickr.com/photos/downingstreet/4095069683/
Nothing staged about that one is there.
So, I take it the principal is confirmed - the motives can now be questioned every time No 10 releases shots. Let’s hope no one can find any shots of Brown that appear to capitalise on other people’s grief.
210 SNP I worked for BT during the auction period and was very close to the bidding.
It crucified the business when the bubble burst and was a major factor in BT selling of Cellnet/O2 - it desperately needed the cash but was forced into selling it’s golden egg in extremis.
The smart movers were the ones who didn’t bite/have the cash and then took advantage of the miserable/bankcrupt companies that owned them. Some of the licences were picked up for a song.
Still confused.
The new line from the Lackwit Collective is that Cameron’s photo is disgraceful because it was more professional than Gordo’s?
Vote Labour !!!
Here is an email I just send to Victor Chandler
“I placed 2 bets of £5 each several months ago on the Labour party to win in York at the next general election at odds of 40/1. The selection on the site was a listing of ‘York’ under General Election constituency betting.
Victor Chandler has since unilaterily changed the listing on my open bets to ‘York Outer’, a different consituency from the ones where I placed my bet. When I placed the bet the listing was for ‘York’. I consider this a despicable and probably illegal action that has financial consequences for myself. If Victor Chandler considers changing a bet made to be acceptable behaviour it deserves to be investigated for fraudulent trading.
A refund of my initial monies staked must be a first but still utterly insufficient step. Please contact me immedietly to explain how Victor Chandler intends to rectify this despicable behaviour.”
I’m spitting blood here. Who the hell do they think they are?
Mr Brown, Mr Brown, can we have you on the other side of the tracks please (view in order),
http://ukinpoland.fco.gov.uk/resources/en/jpg/5043765/brownauschwitz
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/04/28/article-1174533-04B6D27C000005DC-526_468×298.jpg
http://www.ejpress.org/ImageGallery/15e62f2a-1468-4a4b-b6c4-1fd776d63248.jpg
208 - So where are the other people here (or is Sarah just another member of the public who happened to be there at the same time?)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/downingstreet/4095069683/
Now answer the question posed at 196.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/04/28/article-1174533-04B6EBF6000005DC-105_468×415.jpg
Oh look…a Camera…how unexpected..
The only good thing in The Mirror is Andy Capp!
It’s political coverage is either puerile and infantile rants about the Tories or fawning admiration of Labour, also I don’t think it’s credibility has recovered from the Iraq photos affair. There certainly is a place and a need for a left wing counterweight to The Sun but The Mirror just can’t seem to get the tone right. Perhaps it needs to become far more critical of Labour as that would boost it’s credibility.
Passmore @ 210 - Please, so where did the money for the great windwall come from, if not out of customers’ pockets or at the expenses of new investment into the market? Who knows, we might even have proper 3G coverage by now if he hadn’t done this.
210 Sir Norfolk - “The effect on roll out and pricing to consumers was negligible.”
That, with all due respect, is complete tosh.
The effect was dramatic, setting back the 3G roll-out by several years, reducing competition, and killing off expansion plans abroad.
The saving grace was that much of the dosh actually came from non-UK sources, so the effect on the UK economy as a whole may not have been too bad.
Having said that, the telecoms companies shouldn’t have allowed themselves to get sucked into paying ludicrous prices, although they did have a gun to their heads.
On a more serious note
Quentin Langley: Do the Tories have a mountain to climb at the next election?
Quentin Langley read Politics under Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher at the University of Plymouth and now teaches Public Relations and Political Communications at Cardiff University.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2009/11/mountaintoclimb.html
184
But Brown did not release the specified quantity of gold at once, he did however announce his intention to sell that quantity.
This is a website which originally was broadly supportive of Brown
http://www.taxfreegold.co.uk/bankofenglandgoldauctionsales.html
But here is a less supportive viewpoint
http://oikonomikablog.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/eric-hommelberg-puts-british-gold-sales-in-perspective-2/
Meanwhile, back to the way he actually sold the gold; this was said at the time:
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-58958244.html
Hmmm
http://twitter.com/edballsmp/status/5645890416
227: I wouldn’t expect tim or the other usual suspects to answer. The point/smear is done for them.
Never mind that it’s hypocritical or purile or stupid. The smear is out there, job done.
232 - what confused me about that is that he appears to claim that proportional swing is highly accurate. I thought it had been discredited?
More on Ed Balls and bullying
http://blogs.ft.com/westminster/2009/11/ed-balls-joins-n-dubz-to-fight-bullying/
Including this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hEeflUzX_4
!!
Great cartoon in The Times,
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00644/TTM123501CC_RGB_ONL_644087a.jpg
It seems our Nad hasn’t apologised
http://blog.dorries.org/Default.aspx
238
225 Calm down, Noisy.
That looks to me like a ‘palpable error’. Nobody could seriously have thought they were giving 40/1 Labour for York Central, a 1/5 shot.
Money back is the best you can hope for here. You might get a free bet out of it if you are lucky.
IBAS is the official ‘complaints’ body, but I’m pretty sure they will give you he same answer as me.
236. He says:
” But, like any model, the PLH is a simplification. And, of necessity, things get more complicated when there are three or more parties involved.”
196 - The answer is fairly clear.
If a politician is photographed at the Cenotaph while attending the memorial service then no problem.
If a politician arranges a private photo shoot before the service begins then thats vain and using the Cenotaph as a back drop for your photographer.
Had Brown done the same then the Tories on here would be slating him.
221 Note the one hand dapping away tears whils the other hand is on the book, strategically placed to allow everyone to read the title - and place the scene as Auschwitz, everybody. Cynical? What Labour?? And a photo of Cameron at the Cenotaph is supposed to be beyond the pale? Leave it out…
There aren’t going to be any winners in a PhotoWars. Which is not good enough for Brown. He needs some wins. And there are plenty of losses - Brown does not photograph well, to be charitable. The photos of him desperately running to the loo, the recent one of him jogging, the “wanking” gesture - and my personal favourite (and has anyone got a link?) - the Orange Blob on the forehead…
“When I started my journalistic career in 1968 the paper ambitious young graduates aspired to work for was the Mirror.”
Including ambitious young Conservative graduates, Mike? I hardly think so.
re 243. Keep trying Tim. The story simply does not have legs and there is sod all that you can do about it.
Every time Labour think they are onto something they blow it because they don’t understand the news business any more.
They have the PR skills of a previous age.
243: And Auschwitz?
Timesonline - Goldfinger Brown’s £2 billion blunder in the bullion market
Didn’t realise the link to this article was not working last night, well worth a read in full.
244 - What, this one?
http://img101.imageshack.us/i/gordonbrownbo8.jpg/
243. Oh dear.
Leader of the Conservative Party David Cameron looks at Remembrance crosses for servicemen killed in conflict in the Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey before attending a commemorative service to mark the passing of the World War 1 generation. London, Wednesday November 11, 2009.
So, “If a politician is photographed … while attending the memorial service then no problem.”
Are you going to stop now?
243 ‘If a politician arranges a private photo shoot before the service begins then thats vain and using the Cenotaph as a back drop for your photographer.’
TIMBOT, if you’re going for a smear can you at least get the basic facts right about the photo location - it was in front of Westminster Abbey, not the Cenotaph.
Any news on your ‘Fine Wine’ investment strategy?
219, perhaps, but it’s legitimate to keep asking a simple and valid question. I doubt I’ll get an answer, but maybe if Timmy Ponting takes a break from getting all hot and bothered over the Mirror’s epic masterpiece “Man gets photographed - what a Bastard!” maybe he’ll find time to show a little anger over needless deaths caused by Brown’s ill-treatment of the Armed Services.
246 It has been rather sweet to see the Tory regulars circling their wagons around Dave this morning. And their arguments that Dave’s PR is similar to Browns is certainly an innovative defence.
But you’re right this is not big news. Last weeks Thick of it told the story of times changing.
231 - I don’t think the evidence supports you on that. Licences included roll out obligations which were met. MNOs complained bitterly about having to pay out a lot of money but they are basically whining about their own hubris and the fact 3G has been much less popular with consumers than they hoped. Auctions are the appropriate market solution - to go for allocation by beauty pagent would be to say that the public sector is somehow better placed than the private sector to measure value.
There was also discussion of it last night as if it was a form of tax. Total rubbish - spectrum (and protection from somebody else using spectrum) is a resource which the state is perfectly entitled to sell. To give away to a handful of private companies a highly valuable thing you are perfectly entitled to sell would quite rightly be seen as pretty outrageous. So people overpaid? More fool them.
1030am Sunny in Glasgow
246 - I agree with you its not a big story, just a bit of fun pointing out the hypocrisy of the Conservatives on here.
Although you expected the Sun story to damage Brown rather than the Sun so we can’t all be right all of the time.
What our friend tim and the other repetitious rabble want of course is not for Brown to win this remembrance shambles but for everyone involved to lose…thus the attack on photographs…if your man can’t win, then make everyone lose. Expect to have this repeated indefinitely until we move to the next media cycle…it will then go back onto the list of attacks to bring up again later (see the Poland, Latvia, Ashcroft etc. list)….I will update the timbot smear list pool….
Even worse, tim, is that the photos of Cameron on the front page of the Mirror look so much more natural and human than the photos of Brown at the same place which took so long to pose.
Does anyone else think that Mandelson adding ‘Minister of Information’ to his government portfolio sounds a bit creepy?
And that we are in the twilight zone when the ‘defacto PM’, Mandelson taking over selling Labour’s CV to the public because the current PM is useless at it?
253, you may recall many considered Tory regulars, and myself, ‘circled the wagons’, around Brown regarding the letter and telephone call.
191. Indeed Edmund but it seems you aren’t getting the hang of this site.
256: I have fun pointing out your hypocrisy..makes me all warm and fuzzy inside..
252 - To answer your question I have no idea how many more or less troops would have died in Afghanistan if their were more helicopters, do you?
There are many different opinions
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/5530143/helicopter-reality.thtml
239
Errr I’ve read it, now I’m forwarding it onto GCHQ for a decipher.
115. …an MP who has an excellent chance of finding himself in prison for claiming expenses for non-existent repairs and shelving.
If so he’d better sue Nadine PDQ. Any damages awarded for harm to his good name will apply only while he still has one.
Otherwise he could be looking at, say, a quid.
Oh no.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/nov/12/channel-4-tower-block-of-commons
re 256. I think it’s too early to say about the damage either way.
I don’t know how you make a living Tim but you seem to spend your entire days trying to get traction for hopeless causes.
The list of your failed attempts just goes on and on. You sound totally desperate.
265 - Could Nadine lose a libel case.
It would involve proving she had a concept of the truth, and anyone who claims that Ministers have been “bought by the Abortion Industry” is unlikely to possess such a faculty.
260 I was away/busy for most of that sorry episode. But if you circled for Gordon too, that is equally sweet. Bless.
BTW Any news, now the dust has settled, on how the libertarians are digesting Dave’s Lisbon policy.
266. Pretty sure IDS has done similar stuff before, with all his CSJ work.
Mark Oaten will presumably be lost living somewhere without glass coffee tables.
Nadine hasn’t apologised apparently and the whole incident is related to Labour MP Kerry McCarthy - I’m confused.
According to the air waves and Sky News, who have just called, I’m supposed to have apologised to Jim Devine - If the following is an apology, then I hold up my hands.
I think the underlying issue here is that the Labour party are trying to ‘do over’ Kerry McCarthy MP and have whipped this up in order to assist.
http://blog.dorries.org/Default.aspx
267 “The list of your failed attempts just goes on and on. You sound totally desperate”
Coming from a Lib Dem!
263, I know there’s at least one. Young chap, called Janes, I think. His mother wasn’t best pleased about it.
The fact is that foot patrols will always be necessary. But so will transportation, and for that helicopters are far better than land vehicles. But there aren’t enough helicopters because, whilst pissing money away on everything he could domestically, Brown didn’t give the services enough money, and still doesn’t.
It’s telling you have no problem goading people by endlessly banging on about a matter which is of no importance, but have to be asked repeatedly to answer a simple and much more significant question regarding preventable deaths which the Prime Minister is responsible for.
Anyway, thank you for finally replying. I’ll leave you to get back to mocking a man for having his photograph taken.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/6547724/Plot-to-give-Harriet-Harmans-husband-a-safe-seat.html
259 Why doesn’t Mandelson give up the pretence and simply declare himself to be PM? It’s pretty apparent that Brown is playing ‘lets pretend’ and that the Dark Prince is really the wizard behind the curtain pulling all the levers.
270 AndrewG
Politicians should stay well away from reality TV.
I thought after George Galloway on Big Brother that had become an article of faith.
254 Sir Norfolk - As it happens, I know quite a lot about this, since my wife specialises in this field and was active in telecoms financing at the time. Believe me, the auction had a huge negative impact, and continues to do so.
Saying ‘More fool them for overpaying’ would be right in general, but the auction was deliberately structured in such a way that it was very hard for telecoms companies to walk away. With hindsight, they should have done so, but that was not so obvious at the time.
Having said all that, I don’t think any blame attaches to Brown and the government in general on this; the ludicrous overpaying happened because of a number of factors, and the extent of it was not readily foreseeable when the process was set up. Nonetheless, it did have very negative consequences.
Where Brown does deserve blame is in burning the massive windfall on wasteful public expenditure. But that is another matter, and one well-rehearsed!
271 - It seems to me that all the people involved in that whole story are bonkers in one sense of the word or the other. Is that about right?
ToneyBaloney @230: “Please, so where did the money for the great windwall come from, if not out of customers’ pockets or at the expenses of new investment into the market?”
The big telecom companies are internationally traded public companies. If the British government sells them something for 10 pounds that turns out to be worth 5 pounds, that’s an effective transfer of 5 pounds from investors who hold their stock (individuals, financial institutions, pension funds etc) to the UK government.
Gold is an internationally traded commodity. If the British government sells something onto the markets for 5 pounds that turns out to be worth 10 pounds, that’s an effective transfer of 5 pounds from the UK government to the investors who end up with the gold (individuals, financial institutions, pension funds etc).
But the point that we’re trying to make with the spectrum auction counterexample is that some of the calls the government makes about what to sell when will turn out to be fortunate with hindsight, and some will turn out to be unfortunate. The markets have already priced in the best available information at the time about how much the asset is worth. If the government has an asset it doesn’t make sense for it to hold, it makes sense to sell it at the rates available at the time it wants to sell it, rather than trying to speculate about how the price might move up or down in the future.
(Unless you think the government has the predictive abilities to seriously out-perform the markets - in which case you’d probably be advocating for a much bigger role for government in our economy than we currently have…)
31 - Mr Dickson on Smeato:
I mentioned this piece last night. The Scottish Sun gave him two days of splashes and major spreads to launch his campaign and he has written his weekly column throughout the campaign. This is much more coverage than the by-election has got. But reading his columns, I don’t think he’s enjoyed his foray into politics.
On topic:
The decline of The Daily Mirror is proof that people find very little interesting about a paper that attacks only one side regardless of politics or the people at the top. The public are far less party-identified than they were in the 1960s. This is why the Mirror, and its political coverage looks tragically old-fashioned and is heading towards the 1m mark rapidly.
The Mirror website is a complete joke and anyone at Canary Wharf reading this should frankly be ashamed. They recently relaunched a standalone 3am gossip site. It’s real cover your eyes with shock stuff, it’s that bad.
Today’s front page is an embarrassment. But the inside spread with its ‘hot personal photographer’ playschool arrows makes the front page look like ‘Freddie Starr Ate My Hamster’.
The Mirror has enough readers for a brilliant new editor who can add some light and shade to the paper to be able to turn it around as there is definitely room for two proper red-tops in the market. But I think that if they wait until they crash through the 1million floor then they will have joined the Express in the knackers yard.
119 - Wibbler: If cricket is the best weapon they have Sky will lose about 10 West Indian subscribers. The Premier League is the sole plank Sky needs.
131 - Wibbler: The Express and Mirror look well equipped.
Mike Smithson,
Sorry if following already in hand but it would be fun if you today you had a mini-poll of the Glasgow NE by-election result to include the order of the top 6 candidates.
157. Good analysis, Lee, but the issue was not the decision to sell a huge load of gold per se, but rather Broon’s utterly stupid pre-announcement that he was about to do so.
This was guaranteed to reduce the price and hence the proceeds of the sale, no matter what the price level or trend prevailing.
That is why he is (correctly IMHO) slated to this day for this decision. It was completely avoidable ineptitude.
John Bercow’s wife is going to stand for Labour
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/11/speakers-wife-to-stand-for-labour.html
277 - I also work in the industry. It’s my view that the early noughties crash and consequences for financing and investment would have hit telecoms as it did the broader IT sector regardless of auctions. The stocks were quite simply grossly overvalued because they overestimated the prospects to obtain revenue going forward - i.e. they fell because they were far too high in the first place and not because the high level of debt they took on made them less valuable (high debt in itself isn’t a massive problem it you generate cash - at least that was the case until the more recent crash).
And in any event, you have to have a credible alternative to auctions. It seems to me that the only one is freebies based on beauty parades - which is insanely profligate speaking as a taxpayer and no more likely to arrive at desirable outcomes.
282 John R
See 184.
“Keep trying Tim. The story simply does not have legs and there is sod all that you can do about it”
In itself it’s not a big story. It’s just another piece in the Cameron jigsaw. ‘The huskies’ ‘the camels’ ‘the Notting Hill windmill’ the cycle and the chauffeur’ ‘Cameron-Cam’ ‘Cameron’s Conservatives’ and now his own ‘grief photographer’ or ’sad-snapper’ as he’s known at CCO.
Nothing wrong with a leader having an ego. It didn’t do Mussolini any harm.
230 - The answer is very simple. Investors. A lot of people in the UK and abroad lost their shirts investing in telecoms in the very early noughties. But that was entirely their choice.
202, 211, etc. WRT MOD bonuses - sorry not to go with the flow of ritual denunciation, but a couple of points need to be borne in mind.
Firstly, the bonus structure was imposed on the MOD by the treasury as a cost saving measure. If you read the BBC article already linked to, it makes it clear the bonuses come out of the salary pot not any other budget - however bonuses do not count when it comes to calculating pensions, redundancy payoffs, etc. The bonus may have a high profile and be bad politics (but then, three guesses as to who was running the Treasury when they were brought in…) but they are cheaper in the long run than paying out the same money as salary increases would be. You msy think that MOD civil servants should all work cheap or for free for the sheer privilege of doing the job, but believe it or not they have to feed their families too.
Secondly, the equipment budget and the salary budget are not the same. If the bonus pot was cut the money wouldn’t go to equipment, it would go back to the Treasury. I’ve no idea what it would get spent on there, but I doubt it would be body armour.
Thirdly, if you really want to get angry at waste, there are so many better targets in the MOD (why are we spending ca. £90M each on Typhoons when the Israelis bought the latest model F-15 for less than £4M each? Typhoon may be better - though I wouldn’t bet too much on it - but it’s not 20x better). But this is squarely down to politicians - of all parties - treating the defence budget as mainly a means of providing a de facto subsidy to British industry (though they call it “protecting jobs”) and only secondarily at best as a means of equipping the armed forces. By comparison with this sort of waste the bonus pot is barely a rounding error. Read “Lions, Donkeys, and Dinosaurs” by Lewis Page to get a better feel of this sort of thing.
285. I haven’t seen the relevant post from yesterday. I do know a bit about energy markets, however, and if a trader of oil or its products were to pre-announce a huge sale and then enact it, they would in most jurisdictions find themselves under investigated by regulators for wrecking the market.
Governments should not be allowed to perpetrate acts that, if done by a private company or individual, would look remarkably like market or client abuse.
Bwrcows wife to stand for Labour.
Where is Nigel farage when you need him?
This will set the cat among the Tory pigeons.
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2009/11/speakers-wife-to-stand-for-labour.html
Re 283 John Bercow’s wife is going to stand for Labour
What price is Farrage?
RAIN CHECK!
Ernesto had a great link for precipitation radar, heres another and sometimes that link does not work:
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/uk/radar/index.html
As you can see the trailing tail to the precip means glasgow will get several hours of rain yet
288. Random. No informed posts please.
Can’t you just google some pictures of Gordon Brown looking stupid like all the other (Tory) posters on here do?
Mike S. I’ve e-mailed you the article.
282 - Some have definitely argued that it was the decision to sell the gold at all, or to sell it at that point in time which was the problem, rather than the means of sale. I’ve not seen anybody suggest an alternative means of sale either (although there are a few).
The sale of a large quantity of anything is bound to reduce the price. If you wanted to sell 3% of a FTSE 100 company, you would probably have to take a discount of 5-10% to the current prevailing market price. The thing to do is to try to minimise this discount. There are several ways to do this. Definitely the worst thing to do would have been to sell as much as you could each day because that would have dried up any buyers pretty quickly.
Let’s put it in betting terms. You are making a market on betfair laying 40/1 for something you think really unlikely. You get hit. You put a new price up at 39/1. You get hit again. You put a new price up at 35/1 you get hit immediately. What would you do next? I suggested you’d pause and think about what is going on. Is there someone prepared to bet at any price. How much do they have to invest. Should you wait? Much uncertainty. Uncertainty is very bad for markets.
The interesting thing of course, is that if the amount being sold is small compared to the volumes already being traded (which it looks more like it is today, gold volumes are massively up) then it doesn’t really matter if you pre announce or just start selling. Pre announcing doesn’t matter if you’re doing it into a liquid market because, whilst someone might like to take advantage of the information you’ve given, someone else will just want to take it at the prevailing price. If it’s enough size where the pre-annoucing matters then just selling would have skewed the price too.
For anyone really interest in this stuff, which is called market microstructure, essentially the theory of how the equilibrium between buyers and sellers is realised the best book is called “Market Microstructure Theory” by Maureen O’hara. I have a copy here on my desk and it has a great line: liquidity is like pornography… (I’ll leave it as an exercise to finish the quote).
So I don’t agree that the auction and pre-announcement was guaranteed to reduce the price any more than the actual selling itself (although it certainly might have, we will never know what the other options for selling might have done - there might have been other imaginitive options like selling the gold to a company and selling that company to retail investors).
Very good action on the betting markets these last 24 hours. The main huge move has been for Gordon Brown staying.This is reflected on the Party Leaders market where I (perhaps recklessly) got matched at 4.2 for ‘Cameron Only’ and on the ‘Next Prime Minister’ market, where someone else (lucky bleeder) got matched at 1.30 for Dave Cameron.
Elsewhere, NOM is fairly popular and Labour are not without friends. I think people are making a huge long term blunder in equating a good week for the PM with a good result for Labour.
I don’t often delurk, but I feel that I must, over Brown’s gold sales.
Brown did several things wrong:
1) He sold large lumps at fixed times
2) He pre-announced it.
Claiming that (2) was necessary to avoid a big drop in price is not acceptable. If you want to drop a large quantity of any asset on the market, you don’t do it in large lumps. You trickle it onto the market whenever there is an upturn. It is naive to drop it in large lumps, and then claim that you had to pre-announce to avoid a massive price fall.
If you wanted to reduced the proportion of the reserves held in gold, the correct policy was to run down the gold reserves over a period of years (even a decade), so as not to spook the market.
Brown got it wrong, and no amount of re-writing of history will make it look sensible.
The Mirror shouts absolute rage and hate against towards Cameron and his party to the extent that the paper is no longer readable for any one other than Labour core voters.
All it would take is a slight shift to be more balanced and re-build their circulation.
It’s just not worth reading at the moment unless you want to enjoy the journalistic ‘car crash’ of it all.
I say that as someone who is a Conservative but has read the Mirror via my wife who bought it long-term up until recently. She’s dumped it now because “it just goes out of it’s way to attack David Cameron day after day and it’s getting beyond a joke. They’ve lost the plot.”
At least they’ll be able to get a comforting slap on the back from Labour as they go down with the ship. Not good business though when you need circulation to stay in the game.
Ironically, The Mirror’s latest problems started when Morgan did try to move it into the middle and upmarket. I admired him for it (unlike his present career) and despite the fake photographs that cost him his job, the scoop was right. Since then, it’s reverted to type, has a cheap new look and is being alientated by its support for a poor PM at all costs. It needs, ironically, to return to the middle ground…but who the hell reads the middle ground in tabloid land? The problem Sly faces…
The Mirror is a joke. Nobody takes it seriously and I don’t think it is capable of damaging Cameron because its readership would never vote for him anyway.
Columnists like Kevin Maguire and the cretin Paul Routledge are completely pointless. Nobody cares a shit what they have to say and they are merely writing to satisfy the deluded demands of an already convinced, but ever shrinking readership.
The Mirror may well cease to exist before too long and ironically it is because it Mirrors it readers….Pointless idiots living in the past.