Who is betting on the blues in Buckingham?
November 28th, 2009
Is laying the Tories here an almost total certainty?
Like one or two other punters, it seems, I have been taking as much as is available on lay bets on the Tories in the Betfair Buckingham market.
My reasoning is quite straightforward - this is the seat of John Bercow, the Speaker, who in the traditional way renounced his link with his former party and all others when he got elected to the post in June.
At the coming general election he will stand as “The Speaker” and the convention is that he will not be opposed by the main parties. Certainly there will be no Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democratic candidates in the constituency.
So Betfair appear to have made a big cock-up in listing the Conservatives as a runner. The party won’t be standing and if you think that Bercow is going to do it then the correct option is “Any Other”.
Fortunately the market has only recently gone up and only £945 has been traded. But of that the vast bulk, £882, has been for or against the “Conservative”.
My guess is that those who have bet on the party have done so in the belief they were backing Bercow. Those who’ve “laid” have recognised this error and are taking as much as becomes available.
I couldn’t decide whether to go on quietly placing my bets here or to write a post about it. I’ve decided on the latter course.
Mike Smithson
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Very tricky one this. You can’t lose but the mkt. might get suspended and reopened.
It just goes to show the naievete of the compiler.
“I couldn’t decide whether to go on quietly placing my bets here or to write a post about it. I’ve decided on the latter course. ”
I think you have done the right thing.Always have hated ambiguity and have never been ‘palped’ in my life.
Honesty IS the best policy and I state that quite cynically !
*** RAMBLING POST ALERT ***
This has been a very quiet week on the markets once all the excitement died down. The only thing of note to report is that I Bought the SNP for small money at 11.0 on the Betfair Line.This was a mild shock but I was pleased to get the bet matched.
The overall effect of MORI and ARS has been a tiny swing towards Labour on the Spreads and on Betfair.The latest poll from YouGov hasn’t changed anything.The Hung Parliament narrative lingers like a bad smell and long may it linger.
Baxter states that the Conservatives are ‘ only 62% to have an overall majority’.
Betcha, Baxta !
a palpable error? no,just poor research!
Is betfair making the same error as the people betting on it? If they think that it will lead them into an orquard situation, they will just abolish/cancel the betting, and set it up with “Speaker” instead of “Conservative”.
Gary McKinnon: The optimistic bit of me thinks that Obama is feeling awkward about the McKinnon case, and is waiting to give him a pardon as soon as he is convicted. It would be too controversial if he were to intervene at an earlier stage and give him a pardon for something he hasn’t been convicted of yet (like Ford/Nixon).
The pessimistic bit of me thinks that he is hardly aware of the issue and will let the courts do what they will do.
The political bit of me hopes that whatever happens will happen at the most inconvenient moment for the Labour government.
Having said that, the possible sentence of 60 years is a hypothetical maximum and I guess not anything like the likely real sentence - if he is convicted.
Lord Pearson of UKIP: On Channel 4 news he was interviewed in which it was put to him that he had said that Muslims in the UK were breeding ten times as fast as us. He clarified this by saying that what he had meant to say is that the Muslim community is growing (by birthrate, immigration and conversion) ten times as fast as ours.
Who is this “us”? Who is this “ours”? Unfortunately Krishnan Guru-Murthy (for it was he) did not press him on the point and left the question unanswered.
Sixth?
I have been in sixth place in 3 of my 18 elections.
Evening all - just a swift post before bed: Mike is clearly being very astute laying the Tories here, but I wonder if UKIP are good value at over 3.0?
Independents and minor parties only stand a real chance when 2 main parties step aside (or 3 in Scotland and Wales) leaving the outsider against one main party. Here, UKIP don’t have to beat any of the main parties - they are, amazingly, the biggest political machine in town.
Bercow has won what was the safest Conservative majority in the country by being the Conservative candidate. Now the Speakership contest (”voted in only by Labour MPs - wife now standing for Labour”) has exposed his ideological distance from the regular party, I can imagine many Tory voters would be disinclined to vote for him (either abstaining or voting for a more right-wing candidate). He doesn’t get the ‘donkey in a blue rosette’ vote any more.
Combine with that the fact that it is almost impossible for the Speaker to campaign - he can’t take a position on any issue of policy, and on the one issue he should (expenses and reform) he is far from being on solid ground. There were complaints about his expenses before he was elected Speaker, and many people feel the issue has not been dealt with by his elevation to the Chair.
UKIP will come out swinging (they don’t stand a slightest chance in any other seat, I suspect) knowing that they don’t have another election to fight until the next Europeans in 4 years, all focussed on this one seat. They will mobilise activists, give out leaflets, and all the time Bercow has next to nothing: if he doesn’t campaign, he loses ground. If he does campaign, it diminishes him, and he can’t say anything about policy, so the whole question becomes incumbent-MP-turned-Speaker-with-expenses vs well-known-outsider-closer-ideologically-to-voters.
I can’t imagine a harder constituency campaign to run than Jon Bercow’s. That doesn’t mean he won’t win - some of the Labour and Lib Dems might be much more likley to vote for him now, though many Labourites are now voting UKIP too - but the norms of crafting a message, campaigning on issues, etc are all unavailable to him, and he has no institutional support from the Conservative Party (and if he does get any, expect it to be a campaign issue for UKIP…you can just imagine coverage like “Speaker isn’t really non-partisan, still using Tory email lists” etc)
Speaker-Seeking-Re-election should be narrow favourite, but I’d put UKIP at 2.5 or less…
6….”us” and “ours” refers to the non-Muslim residents of the country.
8. Now that the slightly-charismatic Nigel Farage has been replaced by the sublimely-weird Lord Pearson as UKIP leader, Farage hasn’t got a chance of getting anywhere near winning. He will probably only get 3,000 or 4,000 votes and might be pushed into third place by some local independent.
I can’t find the market. Is it still there ?
Found it now under ‘constituency betting’. It won’t be there this time tomorrow; at least not in its present form.
ladbrokes list just John Bercow and UKIP. such a learned “Magic Sign”!
Why doesn’t Farage pull another trick out of his hat, and stand as a Conservative?! EUKIP is so discredited now with multiple resignations, convictions and rumours that the title - ‘European Union - Keep It Paying’ is about right for them now.
Farage would stand more chance if he called himself not EUKIP, but the ‘Real Conservative Party’.
14 - He can’t stand as a Conservative, without the Conservative Party nominating him (and they wouldn’t, and won’t nominate anyone vs the Speaker).
He could only stand as ‘Real Conservative Party’ is the Electoral Commission accepted the party name. They might well say it is too similar, and would confuse voters, so wouldn’t be allowed. Think UKIP probably has better brand-recognition anyway…
Really must sleep. Night all.
Pricewise on Lib Dem Seats. 102%
70+… 9-2 appx. with Betfair.I average almost 5-1.
60-69 …9-2 with Fred.
50-59…11-4 with Fred
40-49…7-2 General
39-……5-1 with bet365.
[8] - I think it was Lord Pearson of UKIP on Today this morning and, while I didn’t listen too closely to what he said, he seemed quite impressive: calm, reasonable, not-obviously-a-whack-job
All other previous leaders of UKIP have seemed to come across less impressively: a bit shifty, incoherent, inept.
I’d agree with Yellow Submarine’s posts on the subject. There’s potential for an advance there.
I’d have kept quiet Mike. Posting here will have now cost you money as the money against Conservative dries up.
On the contrary, a party lead by a Lord will look and sound ridiculous.
19. A Millionaire Lord
19 Quite. Can you imagine, for example, if Labour were to be led by a Lord? Preposterous thought….
[18] - The most likely outcome is that Betfair would have suspended the market eventually, after realising their mistake. By flagging this up as an issue now, Mike avoids wasting his time in the interim.
15 - Morus
Why are you so certain that there will be no Conservative candidate in Buckingham?
Bercow is loathed by the mass of the Parliamentary Conservative Party and the so-called “convention” re. Speakers is only a recent practice.
Why would Dave want to throw away a safe seat when he could bin Bercow with minimum fuss during the hub bub of an election campaign (at the last minute)and elect a new shiny Speaker for a new Conservative Government?
Wouldn’t you consider it?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/27/gmtv-slimy-padded-seat-power
Musings on the fall from grace of GMTV and the new-labourness of it.
Interesting Yougov poll yesterday. A relief for MORI and disappointing for PB’s own pollster to be out on a limb.
The most significant finding for Labour is the IHT one. That 61% of voters believe their proposals show they want to help the rich not ordinary people is the sort of opening Labour have been waiting for.
Whole advertising campaigns have been based around a lot less. The Tories have been working hard to be the ‘everyman party’ and with some success. If Labour’s admen can work this into a coherent narrative about privilege and fairness the centre and left of centre alliance could again become mobilized.
Now (8:41am) the market on BF is identical to the screenshot mike posted, except that the two prices available on Con (1.4 and 1.45) have gone. However the amount traded has not changed. That means the money that had been laid (and waiting to be matched) has been withdrawn, which doesn’t make sense (why withdraw a cert win?) unless BF has cancelled those bets.
23: It won’t happen. A speaker is is the equivalent of a held seat if you’re in power so why would Cameron open up the can of worms on a fight which isn’t wanted or needed?
Sky News challenging integrity of You Gov Poll of marginals[8.42] Mark Longhurst:”Though it is a TELEGRAPH poll”.
Lyn Faulds-wood on Sky: “Hung parliaments are good; how about just voting Labour to upset them?” [the Telegraph pundits who are talking about a Tory 'landslide'.]
I heard Lord Pearson on Today this morning and thought he came across as nice but amateur and bumbling with a very posh accent. The ‘deal’ story that Toady is pushing has no substance at all. Conservatives didn’t even bother to get back to him. Nige was a far superior media performer.
25
As one with the contacts, Roger, do you think Labour admen can cope with dealing with the “sh*tty, white working class” ?
Well done Angus Reid!
Although not directly named it’s latest poll has been mentioned in this week’s The Economist. Maybe Rod should buy a copy….
Rogerdamus still clutching at straws?
Even if the 61% WERE significant, it doesn’t wipe out the impression that most voters have of this Prime Minister and this Labour Government: Tired, exhausted, dishonest, deceitful, clapped out and ready for the knackers yard.
Get back to the usual morning tincture on Cap D’Antibes Rog and let those of us who actually live in the UK make our own mind up?
29. Is this the first time in British history that hung parliaments have been promoted as being a good thing? ‘Vote for a fudge to keep the Tories out’. I guess this is a gambit to trick voters into keeping Labour in power. Politics of deceit and desperation.
Will the Cons be a non-runner then?
Or is this antepost rules?
Morning all and so now we hear what we have long suspected, namely that the marginals are making a mockery of UNS.
Equally the ludicrous Sir Bob (I could never say anything positive about the Tories) Worcester and his organisation is adrift of reality contrary to Roger’s desperate hopes above.
Meanwhile in Scotland Labour has hoisted the white flag above Kilmarnock town council HQ with the news that Des Browne is going to cut and run “to campaign for nuclear disarmament worldwide”. Kilmarnock was the SNP’s 3rd top target and Labour has now gifted it to them on a plate. So in addition to Dundee it looks as though Kilmarnock will become a “Labour free zone” at the GE with SNP Westminster and Holyrood representation and an SNP council running the show. Good stuff.
Now we only need Alistair Darling and Jim Murphy to find some compelling reasons not to seek re-election and the entire pack of cards will be played.
Tentative 2010 General Election Result prediction:
Conservatives 37%
Labour 33%
Lib Dems 23%
Hung Parliament, Labour 33 Seats Short.
No doubt there is a massive rumpus to follow about the undemocratic voting system (which has been pointed out to Tories for years and years btw).
Interesting the reports this morning that UKIP offered to disband if David Cameron had promised a Lisbon referendum regardless.
Clearly Dave realised that with Lord Pearson as leader, UKIP now faces the death of 1000 cuts (on the editor’s floor).
I assume his title refers to Rannoch Moor, that desolate, windswept mountain valley on the borders of North-west Perthshire and Argyll where no-one in their right mind would want to go from October to April.
Abu Dhabi will not underwrite all of Dhubai’s debts - just cherry pick.
34. And why not? As I said a couple of years back nothing terrible has happened in either Scotland or Wales, or for that matter in the numerous councils throughout the UK which are hung. Fear-mongers just sound ridiculous.
We are obviously being subjected to “PR by instalments” within these islands, and only the Tories stand four-square behind the Penny-Farthing electoral system. Ludicrous…
37 Ben did you eat something past its sell by date last night leading to a sleepless night or are you a cousin of Tim and Coldstone?
Well done for pointing this out, Mike, and if you have not already done so, you should point this out to Betfair. If you want bookies to play fair with you, you have to play fair with them.
This isn’t quite a ‘palpable error’ but fairly close to it. Most punters would have assumed Bercow was the Conservative and that seems to be what Betfair have done. They should void the existing bets (fortunately there aren’t many) and set up a new market.
37
You clearly know nothing. Those totals add too 93%, leaving others with only 7%.
Back to the drawing board. Better still, why don’t you spend your Saturday visiting a council estate and see what the opinion of Labour is for yourself.
Good Morning Golf Crashing Voters For Nick Palmer Worldwide
Meanwhile …. Bbqbob @ 35. There’s no evivdence of a putative Conservative candidate in Buckingham. The local association and indeed the constituency are taking the usual pride in have the Speaker as “theirs” and nationally not a peep from Cameron, Pickles et al on inserting a Tory into the frame. Why rock the boat in such a highly controversial issue ?? They have much bigger fish to fry and Pickles the appetite to consume the lot !!
Bercow will have a clear run against Farage and the latter will get monstered.
37. Not impossible, and I expect the result to be with +/-1 of those figures…
For your delectation - Boris opening a new Morrisons in south London. One for Roger, Tim, Gabble and BenM.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBGIVlgAi8Q&feature=player_embedded
Hmm, I think you’d be wise to get written confirmation from Betfair of the interpretation of this market - you recall the problem we had with the US Senate market when (if I remember it correctly) I received an email confirming one ruling of how independent pro-Democrat senators would be counted, and then when it came to it they said no, we’re not doing it that way, we’re doing it this way. (If the amount involved for me had been more than £1.50 or whatever it was I’d have argued the toss and probably won, but I didn’t bother.) They could easily say that “Mr Bercow is commonly regarded as a Conservative so as we match people rather than setting our own market we have to go by the usual view” or something like that.
On the substance, I think Bercow would be best advised to fight an above-the-battle campaign himself - clean up Parliament, support your local MP - but have an unofficial support campaign lashing out at UKIP: “don’t let’s replace our Speaker with a Euro-obsessive”. That’ll mop up the Lib/Lab vote and most mainstream Tories won’t be feeling especially pro-UKIP in an election where UKIP is drawing off votes. He shouldn’t have too much of a rpoblem.
45, you think the Tories will gain 3-5% based on their last GE performance?
(I think it was Lab 36, Con 33).
Baxter’s suggestion that the current poll position (C 39-42 with a 10-14 point lead) results in a likelihood of majority of only 62% is risible.
46
He’s a star.
47 Nick P. Correct on Bercow. It’ll be more a progress through the constituency than a campaign.
45 Rod you know that we all think your predictions are a joke. No doubt with your swingback Gordon Brown is looking at a majority of 100 and there will be 150 LibDem MPs. Go and lie down in a dark room with your friend Mr Senior.
48. Yes, probably towards the upper end of that.
49. Why, exactly?
28
Polling report isn’t entirely convinced either.
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/
41
Even though I’d be more than happy to have Ben as a relation, I don’t think we are related: are we?
46
Is that one of the Supermarkets, that Cameron’s guru, Mr Blond wants to shut down?
50. He is. Upbeat, funny, and women flinging themselves at him. Of course Gordon does have flings - with nokias.
52. There is no finer sight than a Scottish Tory sh1tting a brick…
Meanwhile …. I wonder who was indicating that the shadow cabinet hasn’t even the experience of “running a piss up in a brewery.” ??
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/localgovernment/2009/11/tory-leader-of-hammersmith-fullham-says-shadow-cabinet-havent-run-a-pissup-in-a-brewery.html
56, even for the internet that’s a pretty niche interest you’ve got
49 It may be risible, but at least Baxter is completely upfront about how he comes to that figure. The basic assumption is that the rolling average is “in the middle” - that is, it is equally likely that the polls understate the Conservative lead as it is that they overstate it.
If you read the whole page [http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/hungparl.html] there is an interesting bit at the bottom: if you add in the assumption that the rolling poll average is slightly understating the Conservative’s position, then the model produces odds that correspond very closely with the “wisdom of crowds” odds on BF.
Since the marginal polling we have does indicate the Tories doing slightly better than a straight UNS would give, the BF punters come out rather well… who needs a Multivariate Beta Distribution when you have a load of people putting their money where their mouth is.
53. RodCrosby: Why, exactly?
Because there is no polling position in the current range that does not lead to a Conservative majority.
I know you believe in magic, Rod, but I don’t.
Is BenM one of the new campaign workers that Labour have just recruited ?
24 GMTV is like my local radio station. How amyone watches GMTV is beyond my comprehension.
58.
56 Rod. You were somewhat garralous there by the last four and a half words !!
“There is no finer sight than a Scot…”
To be fair to the Bellylarf, it does say this on the poll, not much commented on.
But there are awkward questions for Mr Cameron in the detail. The poll found that voters believed Mr Brown did not understand their everyday problems, by a margin of two to one. Unfortunately for Mr Cameron, they thought broadly the same of him.
The challenge facing the Conservatives becomes apparent on questions of policy. The poll in the marginal seats found that on major issues such as crime, health, and education, barely a quarter of voters thought the Tories would improve things.
Overall, voters were hardly thrilled by the idea of a Conservative government. Asked what would be the best result for Britain at the next general election, 31 per cent of those in the marginals said a Conservative government, while others were evenly divided between a Labour government or a coalition of some sort.
The good news for Mr Cameron is that he is doing better in the North and in marginals than we gave him credit for, but he has not yet escaped from the threat of a hung parliament.
Did You Youv do 2 polls or did they extrapolate the Northern marginals into national shares? I havent seen any detail yet>
61
He certainly appeared all of a sudden with some boringly scripted comments.
Rod C
Don’t be childish. You endorsed BenM ridiculous numbers at post 37 because you *want* to. Your not being objective, otherwise you would have spotted his numbers for the main parties add to 93%, which is clearly absurd.
Having a go at Scots tories, for whom the depths of despair is an old fried, is just spiteful. Wait till after the next election and Labour will be in the same position in the south.
aaargh You Gov
56
Hopefully all of the bricks produced by Easterross can be used to rebuild Hadrian’s wall.
61. Looks that way - but lacking the charm of Tim and Gabble.
68 MTF. Meant in the “aaargh Bisto” way ??
RodCrosby
You suggested the other day that “Labour did about 24 seats better in 1997 than UNS predicted, although only 8 of these could be ascribed to tactical voting.”
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/23/is-alex-right-about-the-system-bias-towards-labour/comment-page-2/#comment-1320062
What’s your source?
71 WRT Seat betting Meurig’s PB2 posts are highly recommended for Cambrian seats.
Just a warning to anyone with a Facebook account, mine got hacked yesterday and all my friends got messages wishing them a happy thanks giving from a Canadian website and a link to said website. Internet hackers are a special kind of scum.
re 66. There were two totally separate polls MTF.
Mandy realises that tim is becoming obsolete - BenM is the new model being test driven around PB.
Watch out tim - your days are numbered.
Possible Outcome Odds Chance % Comment
Con majority government 8-5 on 62% Conservatives govern on their own
Lab majority government 9-1 against 10% Labour govern on their own
Con - Lib coalition 6-1 against 14% Lib Dems only have enough seats to support the Conservatives
Lab - Lib coalition 11-1 against 8% Lib Dems only have enough seats to support Labour
Lib Dem choice of government 18-1 against 5% Lib Dems have enough seats to choose which party governs
Fragmented parliament 125-1 against 0.8% Lib Dems do not have enough seats to form a two-party coalition
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The shortest financial suicide note in history from Baxter.
How amyone watches
GMTV is beyond my comprehension.78, didn’t Emma Crosby move there from Sky? I don’t watch GMTV, but she would be a tasty reason.
66
On the subject of which, YouGov also carried out a parallel poll of Lab-Con marginals in the north (as far as I can tell, this was the 32 Labour seats in the North-West, North-East and Yorkshire and Humberside that the Conservatives would need to win to get a majority of 1 on a uniform swing). YouGov found voting intention in those seats to be CON 42%(+8), LAB 36%(-8), LDEM 12%(-5). Changes are from the 2005 notional election results, and suggest a swing of 8 percent. This compares to a national swing of 6.5% in today’s nationwide YouGov poll – if marginals elsewhere behave like those in the North, this would deliver a healthy Conservative majority.
From polling report: did Yougov poll in all 32, or did they take a sample, then extrapolate across all 32?
79:
You gotta point.
Roger of course is right, this is the first polling evidence we have of the amazing miscalculatio that the Conservatives made by keeping their IHT pledge in a recession.
36 - Easterross.
You say Kilmarnock will be and SNP gain.
I’ll bet you £50 at evens that Labour will hold that seat.
Is Lord Pearson a bit of a joker? Since when has UKIP’s raison d’etre been “a referendum on Lisbon”?
82
tim are you going to post the same stuff every time there is even a glimmer of hope for Labour,… that its all a result of IHT. Its nonsense and you know it.
72 - Presumably something like this
Oops - this.
What % of the activists will campaign for Bercow? 50%, 40% , 30%?
It will be a lot lower than normal and some will be working on the quiet for Bercow. Indeed some delivery networks will be completely disrupted.
re 86. That runs against the Curtice/Stead study in 1997 which concluded that “The scale and impact of tactical voting was unprecedented.” According to their estimates, the Conservatives lost 15-21 seats to Labour and 10-14 seats to the Liberal Democrats solely through tactical voting.
72. “Anatomy of a Labour Landslide” Pippa Norris, Parliamentary Affairs, Hansard Society, Vol. 50, Nº 4, 1997 , pags. 509-532
http://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/pnorris/Acrobat/landslide.pdf
“Note 10: There were eight seats which Labour gained from the Conservatives where the percentage point fall in the Liberal Democrat vote exceeded the regional average, and also exceeded the percentage size of the 1997 Labour majority: Harwich, Castle Point, Braintree, Milton Keynes North East, Harrow West, Romford, Kettering, and Wellingborough.”
83. I would imagine UKIP’s thinking is that any vote on Lisbon now after ratification would in effect be one on our relationship with the EU
Pearson himself said: “A referendum on a ratified Lisbon Treaty would have become about in or out, which is why the political class wouldn’t do it.”
This is what it’s going to be like after the election, isn’t it - “Well, the Tories didn’t really win as clearly the public aren’t thrilled and they didn’t get anywhere near what Labour did in 1997. Disappointing for them, and encouraging for Labour.”
Here is a Pricewise for a LAB Majority. 8.6% or 21-2.Remember that the 21-2 figure derives from an overround book. As Baxter says, Betfair will give you 14-1 and they are not being generous !
325-349… 33-1 with Ladbrokes.
350-374… 50-1 with Ladbrokes and VC.
375-399… 66-1 same two firms.
400+…… 50-1 with Hills.
re 82. Tim - well taxation of any kind barely figures in the latest MORI issue index. It even rates below the EU.
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/Assets/Docs/Polls/poll_Nov09%20issues%20topline.pdf
88 - There is presumably a difference between “the number of seats lost to tactical voting” and “the error in UNS caused by tactical voting”.
If the error in UNS was really 30-35 seats then when you factor in differential turnout and the rest you might end up with UNS predicting a hung parliament!
90 - Well why is he calling for a referendum on Lisbon, rather than the EU then? Having a referendum on the former, on the basis that it is “really” a referendum on the latter is dishonest.
Anyway it is hardly likely that they would disband if the vote went against them, is it?
93 - Mike, I’m afraid that observation only serves to discredit the whole survey. Taxation is clearly a major issue for most people.
Apologies if posted previously, but Frank Field has a article in the Guardian pushing for cuts in government spending NOW.
” Horsemen of the economic apocalypse. If we don’t convince the market how serious we are about cuts soon, there simply won’t be any recovery”
His four horsemen are:
1.Public Accounts deficit for this year - he estimates at £220bn
2.The threat of significant inflation
3.A rapidly collapsing taz base
4.A jobless recovery.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/27/economy-cuts-recovery
I still don’t see how Labour, having opposed the excellent (former Conservative) Speaker Weatherill, can not oppose the new (former Conservative) Speaker Bercow.
93 - Mike, you know as well as I do that the IHT issue has little to do with tax.
88. I find Norris’s criterion more transparent. It disentangles TV from regional effects and targetting effects.
However, yes, there will always be a difference of opinion and Norris’s calculation may be best viewed as a minimum estimate, while I think Curtice et al have it too high…
90/95
Pearson is obviously cannier than many have giving him credit for. By releasing this story he’s got much more airtime and comment than his election would have normally generated.
It would be interesting to know if this represents a genuine outperformance in marginal seats, by the Conservatives, or else reflects the fact that Labour support has held up well in Scotland, but nowhere else.
A swing to the Conservatives of 1% in Scotland (according to the last Scottish Yougov poll) would have to be matched by a swing of nearly 8% in England, to reach a swing of 6.5% across the country as a whole.
WRT the IHT question, it’s a leading question which would be unlikely to generate any other answer.
It will be useful to see the data tables from the 2 latest Yougov polls but from the published results so far it is not possible to conclude that the Conservatives are doing better in the marginals in the North than nationally as some have claimed .
Both polls will be subject to normal M of E effect and the national 6.5% swing quoted could easily be 8 % and the 8% quoted Northern marginals swing could easily be 6.5% .
o/t The BBC initially reported Mark Francois’s response to the UKIP referendum on Lisbon story by quoting him as saying the Conservatives ‘don’t make policy by striking secret deals with other parties.’ In their latest news bulletins the BBC has omitted the word ’secret’ - thereby entirely changing the meaning of the statement. It’s through such stealth edits that the BBC changes the political narrative.
77. Does ‘coalition’ in your post refer to a formal coalition in the sense of ministerial appointments etc or is it shorthand for the range of seats in which such a coalition would have a majority if it existed?
Frankly, I see the prospect of a formal coalition at Westminster after the next election as smaller than that of a Labour outright victory.
If the Tories win most seats, they won’t agree to a coalition with the Lib Dems because they won’t compromise on PR and the Lib Dems can’t take a coalition without that promise. Besides, as Salmond has shown in Scotland, minority government can work, especially when the government is incoming (ie on the ascendant rather than a fag-end administration hanging on).
If Labour win most seats, there’s a greater scope for coalition, perhaps under a different PM, but would the Lib Dems really want to prop up a government that is tired, authoritarian, controlling, brutal towards internal opponents (though I accept that that aspect may go with Brown) and for which the tide is flowing the wrong way? On top of which, they’d have probably won fewer votes than the Tories (and even more so in England and England/Wales, to which most Westminster legislation applies), which would be a difficult position to hold for a party so keen on PR.
He is the only party leader who owns a moor, deer forest and country estate in the Highlands. Lord Pearson of Rannoch arrives for our interview clutching a scarlet briefcase embossed with a gold coronet and the initials P of R. This peer of the realm seems like the ultimate Establishment grandee.
Come on out Easterross, admit it, its you!!
My figures would be.
CON MAJ = 72%
LAB MAJ = 5%
HUNG PARLIAMENT = 23%
In other words I would take 20.0 a LAB MAJ and maybe even 19.0 just to balance the books, but no less.
Rod, have you had any sleep? You appear to have been posting all night? :O
“Why I believe Blair should stand trial - and even face charges for war crimes” - General Sir Michael Rose firmly criticises the Chilcot Enquiry
“He (Sir John Chilcot) added that he was not there to determine the guilt or innocence of those responsible for the invasion of Iraq.
The object of the inquiry is simply to identify the lessons that should be learned from Iraq in order to help future UK governments who may face similar situations.
No doubt, Sir John’s inquiry will be both frank and impartial. No doubt, where appropriate, some criticism will be made of politicians and officials alike.
But although these are worthy objectives, they fall scandalously short of the crucial issue which millions of people in this country - myself included - believe this inquiry should be about.
With respect to Sir John, there is really no point in holding a further inquiry unless it does apportion blame, unless it does hold to account those who led us into this unnecessary, unwinnable and costly war in Iraq.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1231540/Why-I-believe-Blair-stand-trial–face-charges-war-crimes.html
109. Yes, I’ve had sleep, but have a bad cold, so woke up early for some reason…
111. Whisky and lemon. You can’t go wrong. Three or four of them and your symptoms will disappear.
On topic, there is a simple solution for Betfair and that is to list ‘Speaker’ as a separate option.
It is not wrong to list ‘Conservative’, as there has been talk of Bercow having to resign over his own expenses. Were that to happen, a Tory would without question be an extremely strong candidate in Buckingham (though such talk is highly premature).
The market rules do clearly state that all bets stand whether or not the party runs. That should be a pretty clear indication that bets made on ‘Conservative’ (of which none are currently available either way) should stand irrespective.
The Boris tartan connection (this should boost the Conservative vote over the border)
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Have-we-got-trews-for.5866466.jp
113 David Herdson. Disagree ! What about the people who Backed ‘Any Other’, including one chap who bet 1.22 ?
114
Devolution a big success, well so Labour got something right.
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Holyrood-could-get-new-powers.5866391.jp?
Good ol’ Ken.
112. Ta, but its too early in the day for me, and I have to do a bit of driving, but this evening I’ll take your advice…
89. This study and others found that the prime determinant of increased TV was the perceived ideological closeness of Labour and the LibDems. There is no such analogue between the Tories and LibDems today, so I expect anti-Labour TV to be minimal…
It’d be nice if one of the Sundays was carrying an ICM poll wouldn’t it?
101. Really. The story merely shows how powerless EUKIP is, and how it is focused in its thinking on attacking the Conservative Party. It shows that EUKIP has no strategy to get Britain out of Europe at all, only one to keep Conservatives out of Westminster, and use that threat as leverage. It won’t work as Francois says.
EUKIP ensures we can be more quickly consumed, pushed into the Euro and consigned to permanent impotence. Farage was wary of such deal-making with the Conservatives, as it exposed the uselessness of EUKIP.
It’s a bit like Lib Dems being seen as only able to act as partners in a possible coalition. If you want rid of Labour, don’t vote Lib Dem. If you want the EU in power over Britain, vote EUKIP.
110 - Blair should wear accusations of war criminality from Sir Michael Rose with pride.
He should worry if Rose, a man who considered Ratko Mladic to be a man of his word and those who wanted military intervention in Bosnia to be the puppets of the “Jewish lobby”, had a good word to say about him.
117 So negative tactical voting does not exist? That is to say rallying against a party even where their challenger is not close idelogically at all to the tactical voter. BG & B, Blaenau Gwent, Manchester Withington etc say otherwise and those are just examples from the last election. With the Tories up to ten points up in the polls and the forced choice question having shifted heavily in their favour yours is a bold view.
98. Perhaps Labour now accepts the ‘Speaker is reelected unchallenged’ principle?
Traditions begin for all sorts of reasons but often it’s simply the assumption that a tradition already exists, even when it doesn’t. Hence, the practice that Speakers came from the governing party became, due to the coincidence of rotation of parties in office and when the vacancies fell, a ‘tradition’ that the Speakership is rotated between the parties. It didn’t quite get as far as a fully-fledged tradition, petering out as a sort of urban myth but could easily have become one had enough people believed in it (and the notion that it was the Tories’ ‘turn’ was still a powerful factor in Bercow’s election).
If Labour is happy to stand by the principle that the Tories and Lib Dems have kept in recent years towards Speakers Boothroyd and Martin, it will become established as a tradition.
As an aside, the Liberal-SDP Alliance also stood against Speaker Wetherill in Croydon.
117/121 The forced choice question suggests that Lib Dems are more or less evenly divided as to which of the other two parties they’d prefer in government, whereas they preferred Labour by a big margin in 2005.
122 Are Meurig’s PB2 posts worthy of featuring on the main thread. They are excellent.
115. OK - fair point. I’ll rephrase that. There would have been a sensible option that Betfair ignored, which would have been to have listed Speaker as a separate option.
As that’s not where we are, then it really ought to be made clear in the rules of the market what the Speaker will count as (if he stands), and ‘Other’ is the only sensible solution.
120. Do you have any evidence for what is on the face of it a nasty antisemitic smear? (And a rather daft one as intervention in Bosnia was intended to benefit muslims, not jews?).
123 Indeed. The point at 121 also was that you don’t have to be ideologically close to a challenger if you are sufficiently motivated to kick the incumbent hard enough. In all those seats it seems clear some Tory votes went to challengers nowhere close to them simply to kick Labour. BG & B being the most noteable of them.
In other words voters don’t have to like the Tories to vote tactically for them if they simply want to punish Labour enough.
121. I meant from the perspective of LibDems voting Labour to oust Tories. The centre party, and occasional mavericks, have often been the beneficiary of tactical voting.
I don’t expect much LibDem tactical voting to oust Labour at the next election.
126 - He wrote it in his meoirs “Fighting for Peace”, I’m sure you’ll find the references if you google Sir Michael Rose and “Jewish Lobby”
60. I see you don’t understand at all what Baxter is saying….
110. Why are so many senior military figures so obviously stupid? Is it that the military with it’s continuing class system promotes ‘Colonel Blimps’ when in a more openly competitive market place they wouldn’t get a look in?
My old school used to provide ‘officers’ and what a bunch they were! Here Sir Michael Rose claims he wants a ‘far reaching and open enquiry’ and then then goes on to prejudge it!
“….there is really no point in holding a further inquiry unless it does apportion blame, unless it does hold to account those who led us into this unnecessary, unwinnable and costly war in Iraq”
You really have to feel sorry for the other ranks being led by these donkeys.
128 There doesn’t have to be much. Simply not voting tactically for Labour would have a big impact in many seats. In any case the ideological divide between Labour and the Lib Dems looks rather wider than in 1997 and so a fresh study would be needed to see if voters would feel now as they did then.
All this talk of a hung parliament is interesting. I have a lucrative position on an overall Conservative majority, with a covering bet on them to win most seats which effectively insures me against a hung parliament. Does anyone think any other insurance is necessary, e.g. is there a scenario where Labour could win the most seats?
131. “Why are so many senior military figures so obviously stupid? Is it that the military with it’s continuing class system promotes ‘Colonel Blimps’ when in a more openly competitive market place they wouldn’t get a look in?”
What utter bollocks.
I don´t think Nick Palmer is right in assuming that all Lib Dems in the Buckingham seat will automatically vote for Bercow.
I don´t live there, but if I did, I would unhesitatingly vote UKIP on this one occasion. I have disliked Bercow intensely for about 25 years.
131 Rose isn’t a Colonel Blimp figure, although he does come over as somewhat defeatist.
There are (whatever one thinks of Iraq) no grounds to prosecute Tony Blair that I could think of.
The prosecution might not be successful, Sean, but I would like to see it take place…
OT A litte joke for those who have been following Climategate
http://plato-says.blogspot.com/2009/11/warning-agw-virus-alert.html
138 - Plato, have you seen this one?
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_PxZyE6Jgabo/Sw6YAcxWi_I/AAAAAAAAMJA/axWcg5GpFI8/s1600/theo2.gif
My god, the boy Brown appears to have played a blinder.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/world-cup-2010/teams/england/6673200/Jack-Warner-performs-2018-World-Cup-bid-U-turn-as-Gordon-Brown-intervenes.html
138 - If I say “It’s a bit chilly for the time of year” will you stop spamming?
Baxter is not including Angus Reid in his polling average:
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/index.html
Maybe he’s not aware of this new pollster? Does somebody want to tell him?
142. Need to click on Opinion Polls in left hand margin.
133. I don’t think you’ve got the first clue about what’s going on.
http://the-tap.blogspot.com/2009/11/political-betting-hoax-shows.html
142 Perhaps he does not rate it!
141. You saying something about someone else spamming, I hope you understand how ironic that sounds for someone who spends days doing that.
131. As usual Roger, you appear to have also decided on someones character and history based on one interview you don’t like.
144. OK, I own up, I’m really Peter Mandelson…
140. If only he’d put this kind of effort into running the country. BTW that hand gesture of Brown’s is interesting. What could it refer to - the size of his latest ‘brownie’?
146. So true cuddles. Pot kettle and black doesn’t come anywhere near describing Tim’s hypocrisy.
And Plato - please carry on supplying the links. They’re highly informative.
140. That has all the appearance of being a rerun of Blair for EU Pres - a belated attempt to bolster a doomed campaign. Brown’s certainly right to meet Warner but I’d have thought that from No 10’s point of view, the less coverage this gets, the better.
I do find it amusing that 6months before a general election tories (it is a tory website) are so assure of themselves that they will win here and win there. I guess that the affect of having a private education - if you keep repeating a myth maybe it can become reality - but then again I’ve never understood with all that money you have to entertain yourself the only imaginative thing you can come with is to go out and kill a fox. What a modern 21st century activity.
Oh I’m sorry I should know my place. How dare I - a single mother with twins aged 15 months old who grew up in a cardboard city - challenge you supreme beings. I should forget my children and go out and get a job. Sorry I work but I claim child benefit working tax credit and housing benefit. Without this money I wouldn’t be able to support my children. I guess I’m the person tories the daily mail and the telegraph absolutely dispise. I work but I sponge of the state. So an elected tory government will cut my housing benefit cut my working tax credit just to do what exactly? taking 100 a week from me to save the public finances? What about my children? Wat have they done so wrong to be punished or should I go back to my council sponsered house and keep my mouth shut.
It will be a great day for this country when the nationalist margaret thatcher dies. She was never a patriot as she put the interests of the individual ahead of the interests of her people. I have never voted my parents haven’t voted since 1997 but we will in 2010. I looked it up my parents live in birmingham nf and my constitunency is birmingham sellyoak.
A usually tory response is to just look down at me and mock.
Tapestry
No conspiracy, no hoax - just cock-up.
1. King Harold 15:29
“@ANTHONY WELLS
Andrew Grice has just blogged COM RES poll in tomorrows Indy give Conservative 16 point lead. No other figures.
This on top of Angus Reid does not leave Ipsos Mori with egg on its face, more like an omlette I think.”
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/2357#comments
2. King Harold 15:34
“@ANTHONY WELLS
Sorry Anthony I should have cheched the date its about 3 months out of date. Its me with the eggy face.”
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/2357#comments
3. planetnokia 19:01
“What’s this I hear about a 16 point lead for the Tories in tomorrow’s Independent?”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325544
4. planetnokia 19:06
“ukpollingreport: “Andrew Grice has just blogged COM RES poll in tomorrows Indy give Conservative 16 point lead. No other figures.
This on top of Angus Reid does not leave Ipsos Mori with egg on its face, more like an omlette I think.”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325559
5. Mike Smithson 19:16
““COMRes not expected until after the weekend”
I am reliably informed that this is the case. I can’t find anything on UKPollingReport or Andrew Grice on the Indy site.
Looks like bum information”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325579
6. Gabble (after a Google search) 19:18
““But there’s not much cheer for Labour in the poll, which puts the Tories 16 points ahead. Full details in tomorrow’s paper and at http://www.comres.co.uk” http://todayinpolitics.independentminds.livejournal.com/33890.html”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325587
7. Gabble (after he read it properly) 19:19
“92. Old link”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325592
8. Mike Smithson 19:34
“New thread on ComRes”
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/27/stand-by-all-you-punters-on-northern-seats/#comment-1325617
151 Anyone who knows anything about the FA will be cringing at the prospect of them trying to run such a high profile event as The World Cup. Best if we are quietly eliminated at an early stage.
144. You are then Evil personified according to Charles Moore in today’s Telegraph.
Does anyone know where I can find prices for Exeter at the next GE?
test
Any chance of releasing #152 from moderation?
Don’t suppose there’s any point in asking Mike, when he makes a mistake as we all do from time to time, to just own up to the cock-up rather than claiming he was deceived by an “elaborate hoax”? The ComRes thing the other day just seems to be an ordinary mistake, and the Gael Poll one which he referred to the same way apparently consisted of a couple of e-mails to bloggers, with nothing elaborate about it.
The next question you ask if you think there’s an elaborate hoax going on is to try to figure out who and why somebody is elaborately hoaxing you, leading to people like Tapestry wasting their time trying to figure out who’s using elaborate hoaxes to try to discredit Mike, when his energy would be better spent investigating the EU rigging British opinion polls.
148 RodCrosby
Rod I hope you always keep posting even under the attack of the majority on here.
As it is always intresting to get a differing perspective.
Thanks
159. Edmund in Tokyo
I’ve tracked the trail of comments leading up to the erroneous ComRes thread. It’s currently held up in moderation (11:37am)
‘Cock-up’ is correct.
Those of us who remember the attacks the Tories made on devolution, whince when you read this stuff.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2009/11/murdo-fraser-msp-embracing-devolution-and-moving-it-on-is-the-way-to-faster-progress-and-greater-suc.html
I’m sure by the time of the next GE, we’ll have Cameron telling us all it was a Tory idea in the first place.
152. As a matter of interest Susanna who will you be voting for?
153 - After Blair getting the Olympics, if Brown secures the World Cup Dave will have to go for the Winter Olympics.
Here’s exclusive film of him practising the new event he intends to introduce.
“Throwing Snowballs like a Girl”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7865775.stm
159. I enjoy the rough’n'tumble and can hold my own, and I think those who launch their puny slings at me know that too…
Thanks for the thought though!
152 Susanna you are correct it is a vastly majority tory posting site at the moment .
165. 76% Tory versus 2% Labour of those cats who expressed a preference…
Sorry, Mike, but you know it’s true. No real problem as long as everyone accepts it, and adjusts expectations accordingly…
Getting the Olympics is another thing to blame Blair for.
Still what’s another £20bn pi55sed up the wall compared to what we waste every year.
155 - http://www.oddschecker.com/specials/politics-and-election/exeter/winning-party
Best Exeter odds are 5/6 Labour (Ladbrokes), 11/10 Tory (SkyBet), 16/1 Lib Dems (either).
My personal view is that like Ed Balls in Morley, the odds are driven more by hope than expectation and there is value in a Bradshaw hold.
152. Who let this smelly, bleating pleb in? Mike can’t you do something about this. Some ghastly unwashed slapper from “Birmingham” is cluttering up the comments with a nasal whinge about her working tax doles.
Does she even know what a d’Hondt voting method is, or the correct attire for beagling with the Trinity Foot?
Dreadful.
158
Lets feel sorry for Tapestry, having to put a link too
his own site on this one, in the hope of getting at least half a dozen readers.
As for the elaborate hoax, the date attached to the poll was a bit of a give-away.
The truth is that Mike (sorry) was so keen to prove his contract, (did you actually pay) with, ‘Dodgy polls of Moosejaw ltd’ was worth the money, he didn’t look.
168 - Careful Sean, you may be the absentee father.
152. susanna: A usually tory response is to just look down at me and mock.
Not surprising when you say risible things like describing this as “a Tory website”.
The rest of your bunkerbot drivel isn’t even worthy of comment.
166. RodC
That Labour supporters can’t even be bothered to fill in an online questionnaire does suggest that morale isn’t too high.
Are you willing to accept that the swing is likely to be higher in marginal and Labour seats than on average?
170. Quite possibly. In which case, YOU are paying for the upkeep of MY progeny. A flavoursome irony.
173 SeanT, I thought you had some standards. But shamelessly admitting that procreating with some-one from Brum isn’t off limits….well, my opinion of you has gone down.
152. “So an elected tory government will cut my housing benefit cut my working tax credit just to do what exactly? taking 100 a week from me to save the public finances? What about my children? Wat have they done so wrong to be punished or should I go back to my council sponsered house and keep my mouth shut.”
The public finances can not be restored by taxing the rich alone. Whoever wins the general election will cut benefits, spending and raise taxes across the board, and the scale of it all will beggar belief. Any party claiming otherwise is lying. If you think you’ll be better off with Labour in power vote for them, but why you’d think that given their record is beyond me.
173
I think its amazing, Seant is quick to attack anyone who lives a, ’state supported’ lifestyle, errr never taken any yourself have you Seant, perhaps you’d like to take this opportunity to come clean?
re 166. I prefer to trust a proper polling organisation rather than you Rod and that is what we’ll be getting in the New Year.
173 - We paid all your social costs until about five years ago, so whats a couple of kids?
152 - susanna, don’t take Sean seriously most women don’t give him their real name, and he’s unused to dealing with one thats on an electoral register.
140: So footy fans can kiss goodbye to England hosting the World Cup in 2018.
That’s the second time this week…
http://order-order.com/2009/11/27/friday-caption-competition-jonah-dubai-edition/
Bunkerbot! What a wonderful word!
Mike
Can you please release my 11:37 comment from moderation.
It explains why yesterday’s aborted thread was not a hoax but just a cock-up.
182. “…just a cock-up.”
…,mainly on my part.
re 142. Martin Baxter, quite rightly, only includes polls from BPC members in his calculations. The Angus Reid application for membership is in the pipeline and should be resolved by the end of the year.
177. Well I hope you weight it by the respondents’ propensity to post here, for that is what matters when characterizing your site as “Tory”…
165. It’s a non partisan site, that is attracting Conservative support at the moment, reflecting the national mood. Many, like me, will be first time Conservative voters. For the record I actually went to the same school as Sarah Brown, (tho’ I’m a bit older than her and I don’t remember her). It was a school that generated a lot of independent thinking. So long as it was on the left!
175. No, Tory cuts should be focussed ON the poor. I think it’s time we had a REGRESSIVE tax system. We need to tax the sponging Jocks and the leeching Geordies a lot MORE than the rich.
After all, why are these people poor? Because they are stupid, lazy, drunken and feckless. They need to be punished for this, and motivated to do better, not rewarded with credits.
If you take away nearly all of their money and benefits and force these lowlifes to crawl the streets eating pebbles, maybe some of them will look a little lively, and get proper jobs, and stop relying on hardworking ordinary international thriller writers to pay for their “scratch-cards”.
The money saved by starving the lower orders can then be given to
the more intelligent and productive middle classes in southern England.
re 181. Gabble - you had too many links which caused it to get held up.
Tapestry
See post #153 for the trail of comments leading to the unfortunate ComRes thread. No conspiracy, just cock-up.
http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/11/28/who-is-betting-on-the-blues-in-buckingham/comment-page-2/#comment-1326481
8 “Speaker-Seeking-Re-election should be narrow favourite, but I’d put UKIP at 2.5 or less…”
Morus, normally such an astute reader of political markets, is way off beam with these odds (whether he means 6/4 or 5/2).
If he really believes this, he should take Ladbrokes’s 3/1 when he next returns to the UK, or better still have a bet with me to win my £70 against his £20 (applies to Morus only, available until 31.12.09).
Tapestry, according to your blog, you are a man who rejoined the Tories when they picked the most useless leader in their history. If the Tories were following your leader there would be no need to ‘rig’ a hung parliament because Labour would be heading for another comfortable majority.
And you were part of the mafia who stitched up Michael Portillo, a man who would clearly have given Blair much tougher opposition.
And now a long rant about a bit of a mess up on another blog being part of a Labour conspiracy when it is much more of a problem that borderline UKIPers are actively working against the Tories by trying to foist unelectable right-wingers as party leaders.
For Labour, with enemies like you, who needs friends?
190 Yup, he’s way out there, PfP. I think you should let him off though. You never know what strange influences his new environment are having on him.
162. And Labour all unanimously supported devolution? Ho ho ho. What about the deep rifts between Robin Cook and Gordon Brown? Splits over devolution in the Scottish Labour party were deep and bitter.
192 Michael Portillo did not have the character to lead the Conservative Party successfully.
187
Are you including the Cornish amongst the feckless, hardly the most productive of counties is it?
My sister-in-laws husband, was made redundant from a highly paid and pointless job in London. He decided to train as a teacher, (thought it was going to be like Goodbye Mr Chips) and was most pleased to obtain a post at Liskeard Community college.
He was rather upset when I said, ‘Teach ‘em teach ‘em what, how to fill in a benefit form, or the bright ones,how to buy a ticket from Bodmin Broadway to London, thats all you have to teach ‘em’
He was really, really upset with me, thought it was disgusting. He lasted a year, he gave up when he was attacked by a pupil.
My sympathy was with the pupil, who was condemned to two days tidying up a church yard. I always felt my campaign, ‘Free the Liskeard One’ didn’t get the media attention it deserved.
The poor chap now works in Bahrain, he’s not happy: such is life!
Brown probably feels quite at home dealing with a corrupt chump like Warner (See “Foul” by Andrew Jennings for full details).
195 - He’d have been about 900 times more effective than IDS.
And I would rather have him in the shadow cabinet than about half of the people there.
IDS being elected leader was the lowest point the Tories have ever reached in my lifetime. It was a staggering throwing in of the towel for the 2005 election years early.
If Labour go for Ed Balls in 2010 you know they are doing the same thing.
198 I think that his subsequent behaviour shows that he would not have been more effective than IDS.
The only political damage he inflicted was against his own side.
196. Coldstone - I can’t make my mind up if this is supposed to be an advert for Blair/Brown’s Britain or for family solidarity.
199 - You would not have been upset at an organisation after half your colleagues stitched you up and made clear that they would have anyone other than you in a senior role?
If so, you’re a bigger man than I.
166 dez I remember a time when there were only 2 tories posting on this site; benedict white and someone called blue2win. Its amazing how things change over the years, now there are barely any lab supporters.
200
I don’t do family solidarity, I’m really worried about the Dubai thing, it might bring my youngest son home. It has always amazed me, things that we’d tear the throat out of a non-family member for, we accept from our family as a matter of course.
Most of the problems we will suffer in life comes from our own families, very little from outside.
202. Ah, Benedict White. I wonder how his blog is.
152. Susanna - rant against Tories: Sorry I work but I claim child benefit working tax credit and housing benefit. Without this money I wouldn’t be able to support my children.
Given that something like over 60% of the tax take is paid by those who support the Tories, this option would not be available without them. By the way, lots of women worked long before tax credits and housing benefits were invented.
203 - You don’t want you son home?
Dubai is a bubble. A castle built on sand. At least the other emirates have oil.
Though, as someone who did apply for a job out there a few years ago, I do feel sorry for the people atuck in what looks like a bit of a mess.
Woods faces police queries. I said this story had more to it last night. We’re just scratching the surface here.
202 “I remember a time when there were only 2 tories posting on this site”
…which was when Labour were winning elections!
It would be somewhat ironic if despite all the hundreds of thousands of posts on fancy theorising about margin-of-error polls and swing-back and the like, all you had to do to see who was going to win the next election was to count up the posters for each party on the site.
Simples!
204 Did Benedict White have a blog? He kept that quiet….
Has he been heard of recently? Seems many a moon since he posted.
202, 208 - Can one have urban myths in cyberspace? There have always been numerous Tories posting here since pb took off after the May 2004 elections.
199? Are you serious. His later actions towards his own party are no guide to his talents and how he would have led them in 2001. Frankly with IDS I Struggle to get past single figures with trying to think of those Tories who would have made worse leaders. He wasn’t hated by the public much worse than that he was pitied.
210 - Those were the day eh, John!
206
No! I don’t want him back, we’ve never got on, he’s a Jeremy Clarkson clone. He only went to Dubai to indulge his passion for fast cars.
I did my best for him, he went to Uni. etc, but remember you love your children, you don’t have to like ‘em.
209. Last I remember him was during the presidential elections. His blog still seems to be a going concern though:
http://aconservatives.blogspot.com/
190. OK cock-up, it is. But that’s taken a day to explain since it happened. The fact that it was reported as a hoax shows how much distrust there is in the sources of the information. I’ve made mistakes like that before now, missing the dates. Easily done.
212 - Hi Max
We thought they’d never end….
209
I miss Benedict, he was funny, he didn’t keep his site secret, in fact he was always mentioning it.
211 I’m not saying that IDS was a good leader (he wasn’t). I just have no reason to believe that Portillo would have been.
202,204 Yes - it’s a shame that Benedict appears to left the PB community. The same applies to any number of former posters, perhaps most surprisingly was the one time seemingly ever present “Penny for them” right up to the time last December when she was one of four finalists for PBer of the Year - an amazing feat for a rookie, then without warning she simply disappeared.
Tapestry @215: “The fact that it was reported as a hoax shows how much distrust there is in the sources of the information.”
No it doesn’t, it shows that Mike’s a big flouncy drama queen.
Benedict White went off to back up his claim that Hitler had maintained a legal Zionist party throughout the Third Reich and said he’d be back with the evidence.
218 I know but given IDS I defy you to say how Portillo would have been worse. Factionalism anyway? Probably yes. Disliked? Maybe. But at least not pitied as IDS was. Frankly if the Tory Party had brought back Ted Heath as Leader they would probably have been better off with the public than with IDS. I do think you are letting your frustration at Portillo’s later actions colour your view.
Thanks… bound to say that is the way it looks now. Suprised Betfair do not have it up as one of the few real chances of a Cabinet defeat.
213 I must say I am not surprised you don’t get on with your children, you seem like the authoritarian type who inevitably creates rebellious children. Also with SeanT he is taking the mickey out of Suzanna who is so obviously a labour plant(if not she would realise that Brown created the debt mountain and that under Labour she already has to go out to work), do try and get a sense of humour.
Had Portillo been elected leader in 2001 instead of IDS,it is perfectly plausible IMHO the 2005 election could have seen Tony Blair lose his majority altogether-as it was,it was more than halved
211. IDS held 35% in the polls. He was pitied in a sense for his lack of skill as a communicator, for his apparent lack of guile, but by the same token, he was admired for being an honest soul surrounded by the evil spinners of Labour who in the early 2000s ruled supreme pre-Iraq.
He was eliminated early in the piece, but many Labour voters admired him, as he was not seen as an arrogant privileged Tory. He might even have succeeded, but the Political Class refused to keep him on, orchestrating his assassination by media in October 2003. He was turning the Conservatives towards withdrawalism, and they saw it the safest option to eliminate him before he made too much further progress.
Cameron learnt the lessons from seeing how the media could so easily destroy a Conservative leader, and launched himself as of the Political Class, but now his declaration of an intention to repatriate powers from Brussels has drawn a media narrative of the Hung Parliament and attempt to block him from power.
That attempt is still being played out.
The ARS poll has been studiously ignored while the MORI has been universally reported and commented on. This is the power of the narrative, which all media feel obliged to follow, like a flock of starlings where every bird turns in unison as if by a hidden command. They still fear the power of Mandelson if they don’t comply with his narratives, even if they no longer fear Gordon Brown.
Sites like this that operate outside the ‘narrative’ with its own polling to boot, will be one place where free discussion and balanced views (like mine!) can be aired. Smithson must battle on, cock-ups, studious ignoring by the MSM and all.
202 Galloglass surprisingly most of the Lib Dems opposition have taken umbrage and stopped posting comments leaving the tory dominated posters in England to themselves in full agreement.
221 Do you think he is stuck in some kind of Indiana Jones type scenario. “Benedict White and the Nazi Gold”
207 David - it sounds like you know more than you’re prepared to divulge. Is the Wapping rumour mill working at full tilt on this?
It does seem strange though, especially to have happened at 2a.m.
229 - No I don’t know anything but the newsroom is nothing if not a good place for spotting when stories don’t add up.
The news came out 12 hours late. He was reported as unconscious from a very minor car crash outside his drive at 2am. his wife was standing over him with a golf club.
It’s a very very odd story and the nonsensical statements about his ‘very serious’ injuries from a car accident is a huge case of paraffin on a BBQ as far as I’m concerned.
207
The mainstrream media here in Florida has had interviews with the police chief who’s bods attended the scene. He suggested that there was no evidnce of substances being involved.
226 - Have you read the works of Mr Icke?
231 - Oh I think it’s a very human story.
207. Though there is a rumour his wife went nuts with that golf club as she had a fit over a story about him having an affair.
23…..a New York hostess…
225. Had Portillo been Tory leader from 2001 after Hague, the Conservatives would not have adopted a policy of permanently banning the Euro, which was IDS’ first measure as Tory leader.
In Alastair Campbell’s The Blair Years, Portillo is mentioned as a key ‘ally’ by Blair. At the time unkind comments were made about the ‘Gay Mafia’ in Westminster, where, for a while, a cross-party pro-EU alliance seemed to hold total power.
Portillo was a key part of keeping the Tories out of power throughout the Blair era, having more loyalty to Blair and Mandelson than to the Conservatives.
Had be become party leader, Cameron would not be there now. Cameron is son of IDS.
152
The trouble with this site Susanna is that even the fiercest Labour supporters, like Roger,look down on you.Don’t let either of your kids join the army.
236. “Cameron is son of IDS.”
I know IDS’ son. Looks nothing like Cameron. :p
Lord P, good choice imo.
That’s a really, really useful link by alex at 86 - as we keep coming back to the question of whether the Tories need a 10% lead of what to win a majority, it answers in detail. Repeating it here:
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/index.html?conlabgap.html
It appears that Mrs Woods is not averse to a spot of nightclubbing.
241. *golf clap*
re 226. “battle on..” I’m sort of planning to scale things down a bit after the election.
Looking at UKIPs chances they are continuing to lose members faster than the other main parties. UKIP may have gone up in the Euro election in terms of votes and MEPs but their membership has dropped to 13,439. That is derived from 9,945 votes in the Leadership election and the reported 74% turn out.
From the 28,000 that they had at the last GE that is more than a 50% drop. A bigger % drop than the main 3 parties have suffered.
Maybe it is the age of their members? They are just dying off quicker?
240 That’s an excellent summary.
Sky News @ 13.50, “Sorry, one or technical problems with the Prime Minister”.
46
“one or two”
141 - tim complaining of someone spamming? looool
246,247 fr - What does this Sky comment relate to?
152: welcome to the site, susanna - you’re just as entitled to post here as anyone else, don’t let the sarcastic types put you off.
BTW, while I wouldn’t quite call it election fever there is really a lot of interest out there now. A team of us were doing 90 minutes leafleting on Beeston High Road today, and a much higher proportion than usual wanted to take the leaflets and talk - mostly supportive, some firm Tories (one quite indignant that we might win again), some just interested. It’s partly the Conservative County Council cuts that are stirring people up, partly the approaching election. I’d bet on a high turnout if it was tomorrow.
That said, I gather there is a final wave of quite substantial expense stories to come when Legg wraps his report up, and that could turn people off all over again.
164 - in the interests of balance tim will soon be posting video of gordon running like he has sh*t himself
166 - there is a reason for that, its this Labour Government.
Never forget that
Note the last sentence in Baxter’s summary “But tactical voting could alter significantly between the 2005 election and the next one. If public sentiment switches from wanting to “keep the Tories out” to either neutrality or even a desire to punish Labour, then perhaps a third of the 90 seat gap could disappear.”
So rather than a lead of 10% being required it could fall to 7%, possible increase in Conservative seats in over-represented Wales and stronger showing in marginals could reduce that towards 6%.
180 - you’re in a nasty mood today tim (again)
Thought you would have got used to the idea of Labour losing by now?
My, everyone’s a bit grumpy this afternoon.
Well, Cocky’s here to squirt a bit of liquid sunshine into all your lives. Cheer up.
Glad Tiger Woods is O.K-guess it proves he’s not always a brilliant driver
re 240 The critical variable is tactical voting and I’m not totally convinced about its impact on the Tories.
Here in Bedford - a critical LAB-CON marginal - the Lib Dems believe they can make headway presenting themselves to Labour voters as the only way of stopping the Tories.
This worked in the big Mayoral by election last month and that outcome of itself gives this proposition a lot more validity.
I can see the same approach having resonance in three-way marginals like Watford.
Surprised there hasn’t been more discussion here of the story about UKIP offering to take their ball home if they got a promise of a referendum.
- firstly, UKIP must be trusting souls. The track record of UK politicians delivering on their promise of a referendum is not good!
- for Cameron not to pursue it raises several possibilities:
a) he thinks UKIP are a busted flush and rather than vote for the Cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face Party, voters will support the Tory position anyway, as the best deliverable option on offer (the falling UKIP membership might support this view);
b) Tory polling shows that UKIP hurts Labour more than the Tories, so “do your worst!”
c) Cameron knows that only an “in or out” referendum is practical. He doesn’t want to risk promising a vote that has to be given, which then delivers a result requiring him to leave the EU - or at least, not until he has tested to destruction his ability to try to get results from arm-twisting with Brussels
d)(for completeness) its the lizard people who control all aspects of our lives, so he can do what he wants - if the lizard people want him as PM, he will be; if they don’t, he won’t…
STOP PRESS
“STJOHN 2010″ betting service. 2nd tip of the season below. Record so far. I each-way tip, came 4th at 6/1. + 0.5 points.
2.40 Newbury. Hennessey Gold Cup.
What a Friend. 1 point each way at 8/1 with Skybet, who pay on 5 places.
Good luck to all our subscribers.
Minor F1 news: Liuzzi and Sutil stay at Force India. Both decent drivers, Liuzzi made a very good start when he replaced Fisichella. Be interesting to see if they can get another podium.
250 “It’s partly the Conservative County Council cuts that are stirring people up”
Which will be as a gnat bite compared to what will have to be undertaken by a responsible central govt. The question is whether Labour can continue being irresponsible with the nation’s finances until after the election. The PBR will give some clues…
Someone isnt very positive about the outlook for the UK
“Is Britain on the brink of financial armageddon?”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1231563/Is-Britain-brink-financial-armageddon.html
e) it wasn’t a genuine offer, and was only made to try and put the Conservatives on the spot with their own supporters.
I mean, seriously. Conservatives offer a (pointless) referendum, and UKIP reverse their intention to “disband” (other than perhaps on a technicality to cancel their debts), Then what?
243 “battle on..” I’m sort of planning to scale things down a bit after the election.
Sorry to hear that Mike, although I’m hardly surprised after all your intense hard work over 6 years in making the site what it is today.
We’re a very demanding lot and if PB were to diminish in terms of quality and/or quantity most of us would I’m afraid simply move on. Hopefully, therefore, over the coming months you will be able to introduce a couple of partners to bring you some well-deserved financial reward as well as taking a good deal of the pressure off your shoulders.
256 - Tiger’s wife was annoyed when he asked her to do some ironing.
“I don’t do family solidarity”
Seems like you don’t do humour either Coldstone
254. As Harry Enfield might have called him ‘Tim But Not Nice’
264/243. Yours is a hard life,Mike. You can do 99 things right and 1 thing wrong and there is always some idiot to have a go.
In truth they have a go when you are doing things right.
My advice is to delegate more and have a cull of The Tory Herd. They are stinking up the place.
257.That is interesting Mike, at the last Holyrood elections our Libdem MSP had a leaflet sent out with the headline ‘vote for the Libdems or the Tory gets in’. Your Mayoral election was not about who will run the UK for the next 5 years, or a vote of confidence on either Gordon Brown or David Cameron as the next PM.
Going to be interesting to see if the tactical voting coalition between the Libdems and Labour will hold this time around, or whether it will fracture or unwind enough for the Tories to grab that all important majority. It also sends out the message that the Libdems will not be too keen in forming any kind of coalition with the Conservatives too. Quite a contrast with the message that the Libdems sent out back in the early years of New Labour when their star was in the ascendant in UK politics.
265.Maybe he was giving her golf lessons and it went wrong?
67
Moo
About those Islamic schools ……
http://www.hurryupharry.org/2009/11/28/newsnight-close-links-between-hizb-ut-tahrir-and-the-isf-school/
“It really is time for the Government to act.
How did OFSTED miss what was obvious to anybody with any knowledge of this dangerous jihadist cult?”
240. good effort from Baxter, but rigorous analysis using the Brookes algebra produces some different figures, and this paper shows the changing values of the components of bias over the years.
http://tinyurl.com/ybu9ck9
[Ron Johnston is a world expert on electoral geography]
I’m not sure which is more astonishing: betfair making such a politically illiterate mistake or that the seats markets on betfair have had bets matched. I haven’t looked at these in months, I’ll give them a look later.
267 - So when Coldstone, Gabble or say Edmumd have a pop thats ok?
Agree about the delegation though.
Learning to delegate more effectivley made my job so much easier.
265 I think we are a fair way from knowing the truth. He was always a very private man - now he may just retreat into the Bunker….
It’s funny,Floater, the great affection I feel for some of The Tory Herd at times.
You are exempt from the cull !
I yearn for a Knight of the Long Knives, post-election, when I get to choose which Tory deadweights to cull. In fact I would cede first place to JackW…..Jack is a knight for sure.
Ominous news that OGH is going to “scale things down”. What will we all do?? Migrate to commentisfree? UGH!
Why doesn’t some billionaire buy Mike’s site, its by far the best independent British political resource on the Net. Then the Bald One could make a shilling and have proper and professional support.
Come on Ashcroft. Cough.
274 - He does play off scratch after all.
276 - A few of us will have to pool resources to try set up something?
277 Maybe his wife was less than happy at finding out that his playing around involved 18 different holes…?
275 - why thank you URW but I really have to let you into a little secret.
I’m not a tory, I do however (now) hate Labour with a passion.
But hey, I hated the tories in the 90’s so fair is fair
This site needs more bonhomie, less mindless partisanship, a proper appreciation for the epic work put in by our host and a big chocolate cake. This is my favourite site on the internet and I am prepared to overlook the lack of chocolate cake on that account.
267. You needn’t worry, URW, the Great Migration of the Tory PB Wildebeest, from opposition to government, will see a natural cull of its own, as righteous anger at Brown and Labour fades, replaced by sullen dissatisfaction at a disappointing Tory government.
Many Tory voices will fade away at that point.
Similarly, the left will bounce back once they are no longer embarrassed by the gross failures of their time in office, and they are agreeably roused to fury by the nastiness of the Toffs in Number 10 and 11.
These things have natural cycles. We are probably at the very peak of Toryness on pb.
@276:
An obvious thought, Sean, is that we start a Herd blog.
If a few of the herdsmen of the apocalypse were to draw some of the herd away to a new home, that would help make things easier for Mike.
In fact, I might register a domain and set up a blog host just in case.
Suggested names please? Herdsmenoftheapocalypse.org?
280 antifrank - Very well said. The problem is the sheer deadweight of mindless,witless, non-contributing Righties.
Have a cull of those and we got Paradise.
Can’t wait for Cameron to win the election.
The happiest moments of my life have been attacking the policies of awful Tory government after awful Tory government.
The saddest? The years from 1997 to 1999 when I tried to justify NuLabour. What a pointless task that was.
Now that I am free from tribal necessities there is great joy in pointing out that both the Tories and NuLabour are a bunch of hypocrital liars, and that the others are equally as unnecessary to the British people, even part-timers like me.
“a proper appreciation for the epic work put in by our host..”
This is why I have nominated Robert Smithson for the poster of the year. Not only did he redesign the site several times to keep us all happy - and do this unwaged - he also gave us VIPA, again for free.
And then Rod Crosby and Stuart Dickson moaned about it. TSK.
280 I am prepared to fund the purchase of a large gooey chocolate cake for the next gathering.
If that is what it takes to get the site nearer to perfection.
275 - lost a post, lets try again before I risk the shops.
Thanks URW, but I feel duty bound to tell yuo I am not a tory.
In fact I hated the tories in the 90’s and cheered their defeat.
However, we now have this Labour shambles which shows me my earlier hate was just irritation, my hate of Labour and its works is now of epic proportions.
Actually, the more I think about it, the more I think it’s a good idea.
Anyone here would be interested in writing for a Herd blog, let me know. DM me on Twitter, or email me at [pseudo dot meta at gmail dot com].
281 sEANt - You have posted like a hero today. I really enjoyed your passage with susanne, in contrast to the grim-faced, deadweight Tories and the (for once) half-witted NPMP.
It is a 70% chance that susanne was a troll.
286 - I’m slathering now. If there’s another informal meet-up at Dirty Dick’s, I could whisk one round from the local branch of Patisserie Valerie in Spitalfields. I’m still vexed that I missed the meet-up.
@289:
Do you know one thing would make PBC 700% better?
And end to your endless, self-pitying, debasing, irritating, pathetic WHINING.
284 Malcolm, I’ll be more than happy to see you carping on about the failings of the next Conservative Govt - on one condition. That you accept some responsbility for the cluster-f*ck that has been this Govt. Rather than behaving as nearly all on the Left do - suggesting that Britain progresses from one wretched Tory Govt. worthy of criticism to the next, as though nothing happened in between them…
I took OGH’s comments about scaling back after the GE to mean taking a well earned sabbatical from the period in the run up to the GE?
Its going to be absolute mayham on this site in that period between the political chatter and betting, and its going to take up a lot of Mike’s time maintaining the site, and increasing the number of daily articles to keep up with the traffic?
He will hopefully have made lots of money on his GE betting, and that will enable him to whisk Jackie away for a nice long break away from it all. Lets hope there is not a Hung Parliament and another possible GE anytime soon afterwards.
280 “This site needs more bonhomie, less mindless partisanship”
We should all say aye to that. The level of abuse has decidedly increased on PB over the past year - perhaps the main reason why so many quality posters have left.
Speaking personally, most of the people I most like and respect on PB are political opponents and some of those I like and respect least share my political allegiance.
288. But a herd blog would be just a blog where we all agree. Yawn. All you’d hear is the sheeplike bleats of tedious concord.
The vim and vigour of pb derives from the arguments we have with our opponents, disciplined by the potential rigours of betting.
Anyway, for reasons averred by me, above, we are right now at the peak of Tory dominance of pb, the highwater mark. This tide will recede pretty swiftly after Cameron is installed.
So the “problem” will solve itself.
There will likely always be a slight dominance of rightwingers on this site, as it attracts the more intelligent, politically motivated and financially and verbally articulate members of the blogosphere. They *tend* to be rightwing.
But this dominance will not be as pronounced as it is right now. In fact I reckon a slight lessening of pb Tory supremacy might already be detectable.
291. Martin Coxall…or Martin BORMANN. You decide!
@295:
Nonsense, we could find plenty to argue about. We could get Tim to write guest articles. We could get you to write articles about Israel.
Believe me, I can argue with *anyone* when I put my mind to it.
280
That’s a bit harsh: without the huge right wing readership Labour will have no incentive to employ tim, BenM, coldstone, gabble etc. Have you no compassion, creating unemloyment at this time of economic hardship ? Roger will have to go into therapy to work out his minor public school inferiority problems.
294, I agree. I don’t know if, were I a lurker now, I’d bother to start posting. There’s still a lot of insight and humour here, but too often hostility as well.
Of course, with my giant space cannon, solar powered death ray and shoal of enormo-haddock, I fear no man, but most lurkers aren’t fortunate enough to have their own range of deranged superweapons and genetically engineered fish-guardians.
267. OMG! URW is bleating again.
About time you of all people showed your true credentials.
True red communist? Trotskyist? Militant Labour? Old tyme Labour?
Sloppy Lib/Dem with Knobs on?
Above all get a life.
289 Martin Coxall - I never whine. I do slag people off and always append their name when I do.
Later on down the thread it may seem you were slagging off your silly self.
The quacking plums of URW.
289 URW, Labour has started hiring staff again. Fully expecting to see a few new arrivals on the blogs, especially those who claim to be unemployed/in poverty/single mothers/asylum seekers/those in negative equity, going on about how the Tories would metaphorically want to poison them and throw them down a mineshaft - so pressing all the buttons that should make their sentiments incapab le of being questioning. Those posters I shall probe with particular vim and vigour.
I’d say your 70% assessment was a tad on the low side…
297. Is this another episode in your quest for a new political blog that you can post on from work?
@301:
You may not write it as whining, but a lot of people clearly read it as such.
In any case, I’m suggesting a Herd blog, so you should support me in my endeavour. You might actually get your wish.
@304:
The mere thought hadn’t begun to insinuate itself into the slightest possibility of crossing my mind.
“most lurkers aren’t fortunate enough to have their own range of deranged superweapons and genetically engineered fish-guardians”
*choking from laughter*
HELP
*going blue*
Chocolate cake gone down the wrong hole.
*passing out*
Anyone know the Heimlich man…..oooo….ver….
“I’d say your 70% assessment was a tad on the low side…”
Absolutely,Marquee Mark. I was being polite to the witless. Let’s go with 82%.
282 - There is a whole ‘herd’ site already called conhome.
307, *whacks Marquee Mark on the back with his wiffle stick*
Did that help?
309, isn’t that the UKIP homeworld?
309. It’s infested with UKIP, trolls, and Tim Montgomerie’s ego.
295. The thing is SeanT, there are many right leaning PBers on this site that are not Tory but will, like me, vote for them just to get rid of Gordo and Co.
The Conservatives as a party, at present gives me the creeps. Perhaps after the election, and depending on the majority, Cameron can get rid of all the old deadwood. Then we’ll see.
310 Cheers mate! Add “life-saver” to the magical properties of your whiffle stick. If you need references….
It’s usually about now that someone says, “This used to be a good betting site”.
@309:
I cannot be arsed with ConHome. Full of UKIP cretins.
A right-leaning blog with contributors of the intelligence and general loveliness of a SeanT, Richard Nabavi, David Herdson, The Screaming Eagles, Sean Fear, Andrew G, Casino Royale etc. etc. would be LITERALLY AMAZING.
We could be the real Conservative Home?
315 - “politicalbetting.com - not as good as it used to be since 2005″.
There is no Tory “herd” and anyone who thinks so doesn’t look closely enough.
313.This group actually covers both left and right on the political spectrum, and it will hopefully be picked up in Mike’s survey of the PB.com community in the New Year.
Martin Coxall - the name you are looking for is “my blue heaven”.
Or “the blue grotto”. I can’t make up my mind.
@320:
That would make it sound like a “gentleman’s establishment”.
316 - I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and I was going to approach you about a blog.
The gap in the market is for a blog with all sides reporesented, you me and a Lib Dem.
We could have our own teams of writers but it would need to be roughly balanced, and the time of a new Govt is the time to do it.
I’m serious, are you interested?
(I’ll do the witty intelligent political stuff and you can do the bum jokes)
This site has not deteriorated since 2007 in terms of good quality contributors, moreover the good contributors have got better and have been reinforced with other great ones.
The difference between now and then is that there are too many deadweights stinking up the place who never contribute anything positive and in some cases merely exist to harrass the good posters.
303 - Labour are offering fairly decent salaries for very little qualification for what looks like people to infest blogs.
They might get a halfway decent class of fresh out of college trolls.
I’m definitely looking forward to meeting them.
315 Is there any evidence that people no longer make money following pb.com? Although you’d have to think that if we caused the bookies to lose too much money, then
“Mr Smithson - he sleeps with the enormo-haddock…”
292 Mark
Surely you recognise my hatred for this treachorous bunch of liars and hypocrites that describe themselves as NuLabour.
I am ashamed that the Labour party of my grandfather and father has become this cheap bunch of muggers that styles itself NuLabour.
There, I guess my position is now very clear. The way I differ from most of the posters here is that I don’t drool after Cameron’s Tories because I genuinely believe that they will be as bad as the government we know.
“It’s infested with UKIP, trolls, and Tim Montgomerie’s ego.
by AndrewG November 28th, 2009 at 2:59 pm”
*APPLAUSE*
UPDATE:
What a Friend 2nd in a fantastic race. Denman the winner. Amazing performance by both horse and trainer.
Record of “STJOHN 2010″. 2 bets. Both placed. +1.5 points. 75% profit on total invested stakes.
(Warning. Investments can go down as well as up).
323 - Thing is, URW, that most people provide the occasional gem.
@322:
I like the idea in theory (though surely SeanT has a monopoly on talking about bottoms?) but I wonder how we could keep it politically balanced?
I mean, if we were to mainly start it off with PBC contributors, we’d already have an inbuilt Tory majority.
Unless you’re proposing some strict round-robin for posts?
328 - Thanks St John, I was on
321 - think of the page impressions.
322. Trying to set up a new Left-wing site on the cheap tim?
Bet your bosses will give you a pat on the back for a good try.
320 Or maybe “the Blue Flamingo”
As in “I don’t know whether voting Tory will many any difference at all, but after 10 years of Blair and three of Brown, I’ll give it a flamin’ go…”
Why don’t those who despise the herd avail themselves of Labour Home where they can join in the rivetting debate on “Chavez calls for 5th International” ?
322 Things really that bad at the Guardian, tim? P45’s, is it?
OT For those interested in economic data coming out of the US, here is preliminary news of the Black Friday sales:
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1943270,00.html
Good news: more sales across the board (cyber, specialty, department), smaller discounts
Bad news: 20% smaller inventories, longer and earlier sales
330. Treat it like the South African rugby team. A modest quota of a couple of Labour contributors for now, but with the idea that they’ll inspire others with their performances. Until one day we reach a beautiful harmony of togetherness, and Nelson Mandela declares world peace.
331. David Roe. You are a man of real courage!
334 “will MAKE any difference…”
Young Smithson must forego any hope of being crowned Poster of the Year until he brings back the edit function…
Late Luncheon commences.
Well, unless anybody has any suggestions for a better name, I’m gonna register herdsmenoftheapocalypse.org.
330 And Martin, there’s balanced - and then there’s the (unbalanced) Nits. Do they get a go too, in your new realm?
330 - Round Robin, three posts per day.
330
Treat it like the South African rugby team. Tolerate the herd until they look like winning then gouge their eyes out.
@343:
We could have a cold and desolate area of the blog where nobody goes for the Nits. They’d feel right at home there.
@343:
To be honest, I don’t think a blog should be that proscriptive. If a contributor has something interesting to write, they should write it.
Tim’s plan for setting up a new blog is the most encouraging news I’ve heard for ages.
259. stjohn. Unlucky. Fortunately for me I logged on too late to see your tip, especially after suggesting last night you might be ahead in the tipster of the year stakes.
Great run by Denman (4/1), and Paul Nicholls 1st and 2nd (10/1)
Nice!
347 - OK then.
With 100 new Tory MPs to sympathetically profile, plus Chris Grayling as Home Secretary, there’ll be no shortage of material.
349. Let me try that again…
Unfortunately…
Call me Corporal Contrary, but I actually think pb is BETTER than it used to be.
About six months ago it was in mild danger of becoming Conhome with odds on, but people like tim have given the left a bit of spirit (much as we might despise him etc etc) and that has made the rightwingers sharpen their arguments.
Plus the site is probably as influential now as it has ever been, and is regularly cited by the MSM, for innovations like VIPA, ARS and some other ACRONYMS I can’t recall.
Hooray for pb! And a viscountcy for OGH.
Incidentally, someone asked prethread, of us rightwingers, why the Tories have gone down a couple of notches in the polls.
I think there is one simple answer: Lisbon. Whatever the eloquence and sophistry of Cameron’s rationale for not offering a referendum, I am sure this “betrayal” has disenchanted quite a few natural Tory supporters.
They might return for the GE; equally, they might not.
Well, unless anybody has any suggestions for a better name, I’m gonna register herdsmenoftheapocalypse.org.
How about the blue oyster
Now here’s a story to fire up Mike.
Balding David Cameron forms close links with hair loss clinic
By James Lyons 28/11/2009
EXCLUSIVE:
Balding David Cameron has formed close links with a clinic treating hair loss.
The Trichological Clinic Limited, which operates out of Harrods, gave the Tories £10,000 in the summer.
Proudly bald Labour MP Stephen Pound said: “I’m not sure Cameron is the best advert. The gaps are really starting to appear in his hair.
“Presumably, he will now speak in the Commons with a sign on his head saying ‘Sponsored by…’” Two years ago, Mr Cameron changed his hairstyle - to hide his receding hairline.
The Trichological Clinic Limited was founded by hairdresser Philip Kingsley, who said: “Our anxiety about hair is often beyond belief.”
I agree with seanT that Lisbon has knocked a few % off the Conservative numbers it might even be more than 5% as I suspect that there maybe a trend of Labour even losing a couple % to the Conservatives lost within the overall totals.
@350:
As long as you’re paying for the libel insurance…
326 “There, I guess my position is now very clear. The way I differ from most of the posters here is that I don’t drool after Cameron’s Tories because I genuinely believe that they will be as bad as the government we know.”
Malcolm, your candour about the failings of Labour is noted - and due credit given. But I think you over-estimate the desire of people for a Tory Govt. IN ITS OWN RIGHT. A lot of the posters here primarily want to see this Labour govt. of Gordon Brown ended for the huge long-term damage it seems prepared to inflict for minuscule short-term political gain. “Mummy, make the scary man stop! He’s frightening me!”
Cameron will make mistakes. He has some people who will fail the test. There will be cock-ups and there will be f*ck-ups. And I will criticise them. But I don’t see any of the swivel-eyed looniness that wants “power at any price”. And Tory Govts. rarely get a decent crack of the whip - they end up having to do horrible things and take drastic steps and generally p155 people off because Labour are just serially shite. The Tories never get in on a wave of euphoria; they always appear like long-suffering parents, getting to clean up the next morning after the excesses of the teenagers the night before.
354 tim
I think OGH would be a natural addition to Question Time panel for the Wooten Bassett edition.
It already includes William Hague, Bill Rammell and General Sir Richard Dannatt.
@354:
tim = wage slave
KHAMEROROEONN.
54
I thought you were going to do the witty intelligent political stuff.
352 - I’m not sure thats true, the Tories peaked in summer 2008 at around 45% and there’s been a drift down to 40%.
357 - 100% bald, 66% Tory panel then.
355. The news that UKIP offered an election armistice to get a referendum, which was refused by Cameron, will not help, either.
Essentially, Cameron was offered the election on a plate. Without UKIP standing againt Tories and with the consequent and passionate backing of the eurosceptic newspapers, he would surely have won the GE at a canter.
And all he had to do to secure this was…. the honourable thing. Call a referendum. He refused.
Hm. Now I can see why he did refuse, long term it would be politically messy, it would guarantee an EU row early in his premiership, yadda yadda, but he could have finessed this. He could have promised a referendum “at some point in his first term”. It needn’t have been “in or out”. It could have “this far and no further”.
And look at the damage his decision has done to Tory polling. A small but significant fall.
I reckon this might be his first serious strategic mistake.
352 - Sean. I’ve just written my post for tomorrow morning which looks at that very issue.
The mistake was to let the feeling linger that there would be a referendum, and that x, y or z would stop Lisbon.
And the letter to Santa Klaus made less sense than my daughters do (which I’ve just posted to Prague)
He should’ve adopted a different tack and put forward a plan to democratise Europe after Lisbon rather than his Canute act.
362 - Nonsense, Sean. Cameron is (was) negotiating from a position of polling strength and UKIP are (were) in no position to dictate any sort of terms. You also appear to be repeating the seemingly erroneous canard the UKIP voters are disproportionately ex-Tory.
Curiously enough, it is the Liberal Democrats among the major parties who have been calling for an “In or Our” referendum over Europe. Both Labour and the Tories refused to back them in the Commons at the time.
The Tories wanted a referendum over the relatively meaningless Lisbon Treaty and Labour didn´t even want that.
I wonder if UKIP could be persuaded to disband in favour of the Liberal Democrats?
re 360 Mind you the Tory position is much more stable compared with Labour’s peak under Gordon Brown on September 28th 2007. Then YouGov had them at 43%. Just compare that with the latest ARS 22%.
328 I was on too stjohn, albeit modestly, as I haven’t yet fully recovered from your previous run of occasional (thank God) tips.
On Con Home, Roger Helmer seemingly wants the Tory Party to follow the US Republican Right.
Meantime across the pond, Republicans are reacting against wets and liberals and leftists standing as Republican candidates. They were prompted by candidates like the improbably named Dede Scozzafava running for an up-state New York Congressional seat recently. Her leftist views prompted a proper conservative to enter the race. When opinion polls showed Dede that she was on to a loser, she quit and endorsed the Democrat, who won.
Unwilling to fall into that trap again, Republicans have proposed a “Reagan Test” for candidates. They would be invited to endorse ten conservative principles. Anyone endorsing fewer than eight would be automatically excluded. I was pleased to note that the ten principles included low taxes, balanced budgets, the right to bear arms, and market-based solutions to health and energy policy — but no commitment to “fighting climate change”!
I wish them well. And I’d like to emulate them. It’s time we had a “Thatcher Test” for Conservative candidates. Meantime I suggest that any Conservatives wishing to sup with Mr. Blond (sic) should take with them a very long spoon indeed. ResPublica? ResPopuli? ResSocialistica? No thanks. I’m quite happy as a conservative. A Thatcherite Conservative with Jeffersonian principles.
re 367 CORRECTION - MORI had Labour at 44% on September 26th 2007.
So even the latest 31% is still 13 points adrift.
Blimey Tim, that’s 45 lines of text in c. 15 minutes. Have you got an intern supplying you with pre-prepared comments ?
364. No, the mistake was not offering a referendum even after ratification.
Imagine how astonishing and electrifying it would have been if Cammo had surprised us all, and offered a referendum NONETHELESS.
A British politician would have STUCK TO HIS PROMISE ON EUROPE.
But what happened? We were all expecting a fudge, and a fudge is duly what we got. As the dish of fudge was served by Cameron, who is a deft politician, it was covered with the toffee sauce of Etonian charm. But it was still fudge. No referendum, reasons of realpolitik. Blah bleah.
But this has damaged, quite badly, Cameron’s USP. “I’m a different honest politician”. No you’re not, you’re another Euro-liar. You’re just like Blair, and you haven’t even reached number 10. Feck off.
He should have offered a referendum. He should have surprised us. Amazed us! This would also have fired up virtually all his activists - and kept people like Hague and Hannan onside.
I thought at the time that he handled the problem well. But in retrospect, I have changed my mind. He blew it.
372 Eh? What would be the point of offering a vote on something that had already happened?
It’d be like choosing something from the menu after being told it was off.
*scratches head*
366. curious: The Tories wanted a referendum over the relatively meaningless Lisbon Treaty
Relatively meaningless, you say? Is that the LDs’ excuse for reneging on their manifesto promise?
373. That’s the sophisticated realpoliticking answer, and it is of course logically correct.
But emotionally, it sucks, it doesn’t work on a gut level. We were promised a referendum on Lisbon by all parties, Labour and the Lib Dems betrayed us. The Tories have folded.
BUT WE STILL WANT A F*CKING VOTE ON EUROPE. JUST LET US SPEAK. That’s the attitude of millions of voters, many of them Tory.
A cleverer politician than Cameron would have come up with some referendum promise that satisfied UKIP and his activists without entirely boxing himself in.
He failed to find this solution. Ergo, he failed.
What “referendum” solution is there that makes any sense? None.
372 Seant Cameron handles most things very well.
That might be his problem the perception of being to slick after Blair might not resonate well.
A few rough edges and some frightening honsety like sticking to his promise of a referendum might have shocked even his hard core critics.
376 – David, are you referring to the situation we have now, or are you referring to pre-ratification?
375. SeanT: BUT WE STILL WANT A F*CKING VOTE ON EUROPE. JUST LET US SPEAK.
On what question?
Oh Christ - are people still trying to claim he promised a treaty post-ratification? Screw this, I’ve better things to do. Like trim my toenails.
375 I disagree Sean. I recall Farage mentioning the ’stand aside’ issue a few months ago - it was predicated on a Lisbon referendum, which UKIP know full well would be pointless post-ratification. Had Cameron come up with ’some other’ referendunm, UKIP would have reneged (not the referendum we wanted) and he would have been boxed into a corner.
UKIP are a joke party who are pretty much bankrupt. It would be a travesty if the incoming government were to be in bed with the swivel-eyed loons.
Anyone for whom Europe is *the* issue would probably be voting for them anyway, much of their current 4% will drift away come the election
373. e.g. Why didn’t he say:
“As Lisbon has been ratified, albeit against the will of the British people, it is impossible to change this. But we said we will not let matters rest, and that is the case.
“My Tory government will seek to renegotiate the terms of British relations with Brussels, to make them more stable and satisfying for all parties.
“At some point in my first term in office, I will then offer a referendum to the British people - so they can give their verdict on our status within the EU. That is my guarantee, here and now.”
That’s off the top of my head. But such a promise is suitably vague but also sounds spectacular. You will get a referendum!! - but only if I am PM. That would have kept nearly all the UKIPpers onside, and impressed people who think Cameron is another liar.
The actual precise wording and parameters of the plebiscite could have been worked out later, and finessed, natch.
369 - There appears to be a strange cult within the Conservative Party that thinks we should model ourselves on California.
328 Congratulations St John.
Two successful bets must constitute a winning streak! Only wants Villa to scrape a lucky draw and your day will be perfect.
Nobody could have been under the illusion that Cameron was promising a referendum even if Lisbon had passed. He got massive criticism for his position at the time. The idea that he broke his promise is just mandelsoniam mischief making.
We want more from our politicians than “cleverness” but at the same time I believe Cameron is the most intelligent, crafty and tactically acute politician that we have seen for ages.
225 - No poll showed Portillo doing better than IDS and many showed him doing worse (his image as a hard-edged Thatcherite had left him with too much baggage to appeal to floating voters). Clarke was the only candidate to reach 35% and therefore prevent Blair maintaining his majority (although he may well have split the Tories in the process).
385 - Anyone who is pushing the claim that Cameron suddenly “broke his cast iron promise” on a referendum must have been asleep during the Conservative Party conference.
386 - Single polls about who and who would have done best were meaningless. IDS wasn’t a mistake because the polls during the leadership said he was a bad choice. He was a mistake because he manifestly wasn’t up to the job.
Whether Portillo would have been? Who knows?
382 - Maybe you were speaking more generally, but Lord Pearson was quite clear on the Today program that for UKIP support the referendum wording had to be agreed in advance:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8383903.stm
“We offered that if we got a clear, written promise with an agreed wording for a referendum on whether we stayed in or left the European Union… then we would stand down for the general election, providing we had this absolutely clearly in writing.”
387. I’m not pushing that claim. Cameron was careful in his wording. The trouble is the nuances of his position are lost on voters, and that is what Labour have exploited. The “cast eye-ron” stuff unfortunately hits home.
Also, most people who care about this Just Want A Vote. If they are like me (or like I used to be) they don’t even especially mind if they lose. They just want to be heard. To be respected. To be asked.
It’s this constituency that Cameron has offended with his too-sophisticated solution to the Lisbon problem.
Like Blair, he should have simply offered a referendum, and left fate to sort out the details. It worked for Blair.
352 SeanT, 360 tim: I partly agree with tim on this, but there were several separate things happening. IMO the Tory support level has fallen since the peak of 2008 for several reasons:
1) The MPs’ expenses scandal, which hit both main parties (and to an extent the LibDems).
2) Labour was in utter chaos in Summer 2008, with Brown looking as though he were about to have a nervous breakdown, and a massive loss of discipline. Mandy’s return, and even more the financial crisis, rescued Labour from imploding completely.
3) The 10p tax issue clobbered Labour’s core vote (this could happen again with the PBR).
So has the confirmation from Cameron that there will be, as everyone expected, no post-ratification referendum on Lisbon made a difference? Perhaps some, but looking at the polls in detail the timing doesn’t look quite right, unless it has had a delayed effect.
If Cameron had accepted the Ukip deal it would have been greeted with the universal media scorn that has kept the conservatives out of power since 1997. Dr David Owen would have got a better reception if he had accepted the political pact offered by the Raving Loony Monster Party.
349 Scott P: “Fortunately for me I logged on too late to see your tip”
EH??? stjohn’s tip, backed each way as suggested, produced a profit.
391. I’m referring to the recent, small but noticeable fall in Tory support from about 42-43 to 39-40. The larger Tory fall over the last years from the heights of 45-48 is of course down to many things, chiefly Expensesgate. As you say.
I know its MOE stuff - ! - but my hunch is that this recent drop is down to Lisbon, the timing is kinda right.
Also such a fall is significant in that it could be the difference between a whacking great Tory victory and a small Tory majority, or even a hung parliament.
Of course these annoyed potential UKIPers may well return to the Tory fold, in sheer horror at the idea of Five More Years of Brown.
Thank God Gordon is still there, or Cammo would be in real trouble.
How about this for a bad luck story:
Barnsley AWAY at Plymouth - not exactly a short hop
Leading 4-1 and match abandoned with a waterlogged pitch.
390 - I’m not sure that Blair WOULD have done that pre-1997. It is the sort of thing he began to do as support began to slip away from Labour and he shifted from being a strong leader sticking to core principles, to a weak leader using every trick in the book to try and delay the decline.
LondonStatto, you Tories do go on regardless, don´t you?
The Liberal Democrats promised a referendum on the European Constitution.
That was blown out of the water by the French and the Dutch. They did not promise a referendum on a the few bits and pieces that made up the Treaty of Lisbon.
Instead, they promised (and still do, as far as I know) a proper referendum: EU - in or out?
Which is what UKIP want too.
What do the Tories stand for?
Anything that will get them elected.
395 - Burnley are 5-0 down at West Ham.
I suspect we’re all going to bed without supper.
390. SeanT In my view Cameron’s mistake, was not failure to offer a post ratification referendum which is pointless, but not to make clear from the outset what he would do in event of ratification.
“We will not let matters rest there” sounded vague but also rather threatening like he had some concrete policy up his sleeve which he clearly didn’t.
Cameron should have been more clear from the start, but he clearly wants to fudge the EU issue away - which of course it won’t.
397 - “the relatively meaningless Lisbon Treaty”
Curious, “relative” to what exactly? As I’m sure you are aware, the Lisbon treaty is the EU Constitution in another guise. It is hugely significant in and of itself, I find it hard to believe you are unaware of this.
97
“What do the Tories stand for?
Anything that will get them elected.”
Thank goodness our other political parties are unsullied by such considerations.
396. The idea that Blair ever had core principles is just too scrumptious to be ignored.
lol.
Blair was a great politician with virtually no principles. He also had *luck*, in the Napoleonic sense. He got lucky with his referendum promise and never had to fulfil it.
Cameron should have followed his Blairite hero, and done the same - offered a vote - while showing some principles. The Tory leader says he is eurosceptic, he says he is honest, he says he is different, he says he’s not just another lying selfserving politician…
Well, go on then David, prove it: give us the referendum you promised.
Ah, no. I see. Of course.
FAIL.
I say all this from a neutral perspective. I am now a contemptuous europhile. I just think Cameron played the issue badly, in retrospect.
And now I am off to watch the end of series 2 of Deadwood. Very poingnant. Anon.
398 Burnley pull 2 back - now 5-2.
Maybe a small bowl of gruel…
No, Simon, I don´t see the Lisbon Treaty as the same thing at all. Only bits of it.
But if you Tories really believe that Lisbon=Constitution, all the more reason why you should go for an “In or Out?” referendum, to settle the mattter.
And Cameron does not dare to do that.
402 - No politician who had ambitions of doing a good job in Govt would adopt a policy which is reliant on “something turning up” half way through their first term.
If it would genuinely make a difference between gaining power and not gaining power then it might be worth considering. But to do something like that to gain a landslide rather than a reasonable majority? Why?
I’ll bet with hindsight Blair wishes he had known in advance that he was going to get a landslide and would have traded in dozens of those superfluous seats so that he wasn’t hampered in what he could do by the promises he had made in advance.
Ladbrokes have settled the election year market, check your account!
Imagine if Blair hadn’t made a ridiculous deal with Gordon Brown in 1994 promising him free reign over whole swathes of public sector policy?
Wonder if our Burnley supporting genial host is still making West Ham fans welcome on this site?!
404. To say that the Lisbon treaty is not the same is to go against virtually every EU leader that says it is, the select committee who reported on it, and the architect of the treaty itself.
The only real difference is the original constitution abolished all other EU treaties, whereas Lisbon implements the constitution by reforming them instead. The end result is still the same - the EU now has a constitution via a self-amending treaty.
393. PfP. I know. See 351. Doh!!
406. Yahoo! £260 quid for me.
Is the Betfair market featured in this thread still up?
I think the noble Lord Pearson has made a misstep by so aligning UKIP with sceptic Tories (and by his anti-muslim rhetoric).
UKIP made gains in EU elections by appealing on the European issue across partisan divisions. Farage & now Pearson have tried to move UKIP into mainstream politics away from just the EU issue to attract the old fogie Tory vote weakening their appeal to sceptics from centre left and left.
Its understandable as both came from the old Conservative Party but it limits their attraction outside of EU elections. There will be potential Conservative voters lost to UKIP, especially those who cannot accept that once Lisbon was ratified the UK could not by itself turn back the clock to before Lisbon but I think faced with Gordon Brown, 5 more years, many of those will choose to put their X against a Tory when it’s a GE.
I got £1300
Not as much as good old William Hill will be sending my way soon though!
Hurrah,
another 60 billion for me !
British Banks
Tom Harris blog - Dropped from Question Time? I feel your pain
“I know how she feels, though in my case it was a senior minister who ordained that I should not appear, despite the Beeb actually wanting me on the panel. This was in the aftermath of the hoo-ha over my blogpost asking why everyone was so bloody miserable. I was still a minister at the time, and wanted to remain one. So, cravenly, I submitted and withdrew.
“Thanks, Tom, we’ll make it up to you,” I was told. Weeks later I was sacked.
Politics, eh?”
413. I also have a big stack coming from Betfair…
Hmm
Outmanoeuvred Brown endangers recovery
The Times’ Ian King writes that Dubai’s predicament presents an opportunity for the City to attract new business. There is no reason why, with attractive incentives, London shouldn’t capitalise on Sheik Mohammed’s momentary lapse of reason. However, the appointment of Michel Barnier, an evangelical protectionist who makes Joseph Chamberlain look like the father of Free Trade, as EU regulating supremo is a disaster for Britain.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/5579338/outmanoeuvred-brown-endangers-recovery.thtml
Gordon Not the Only One Outwitted in Brussels
http://order-order.com/2009/11/28/gordon-not-the-only-one-outwitted-in-brussels/
Tom Harris blog - Dropped from Question Time? I feel your pain
test
Hello?
Blue Square have given me a sort of “free” £50 football bet. I’ve just had it on Villa to beat Spurs 3-2, at 28/1.
Fingers crossed!
Has Mike apologised for ‘misleading’ us yesterday about the conspiracy?
368. PfP. Glad you kept the faith. The horse looked like he was going to win. But what a race.
419 Good luck,one day medical science will reach an answer for Spurs fans,but I’m not holding my breath!
OT This is a very *interesting* development re AGW aka Tories eat polar bear cubs after hitting them on the head with clubs en masse
http://blog.conservatives.com/index.php/2009/11/27/the-copenhagen-summit-is-of-historic-importance
The comments in response to last night’s email to supporters is about 95% against the carbon/Copenhagen stuff in the light of Climategate. Bet Cameron didn’t expect this response - I emailed him direcly to say ARGH NO.
As the story develops - it may be worth a thread on its own given the upcoming conference and scandal storm in it offing.
After the humiliation & retreat in Iraq, Gordon Brown announces his next retreat & humiliation.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6678695/Gordon-Brown-announces-timetable-for-Helmand-handover-to-Afghan-control.html
Handover to Afghans in 1 year…yeah, because Helmand has clearly been stabilised.
Imagine if Gordon Brown and Labour were in charge of National security. Oh bugger. They are.
What i find interesting is that Britain’s President is a Belgian and Foreign Policy is represented by CND.
The world must be in awe at the EU.
424.Should I call that a dishonest or a fantasy pre GE pledge from this discredited PM? It reminds me of his infamous troops home before Christmas announcement in Iraq back during the 2007 Conservative Conference when an Autumn GE was being contemplated.
He does seem to like making dishonest promises like this before elections.
404 The Lib Dems were disingenuous with their promise of an “in-out” referendum. Could you honestly see Lib Dem MPs voting to leave the EU, if a very narrow majority of the public voted to pull out, in a referendum?
No, the only purpose of the proposal was to force voters into either accepting a highly unsatisfactory treaty - or else going for the “nuclear” option of leaving the EU.
WRT Lisbon, yes, I think the Conservatives’ stance has knocked their support slightly.
402. SeanT: give us the referendum you promised.
What, “should the government of the United Kingdom ratify the Lisbon Treaty?”?
What would the point of that be when it already has and the treaty is in force?
Come on Sean, you can do better than this.
431.Gordon is going to set the Afghan army targets!!
BBC - Afghan President Karzai to be set international targets
435
Don’t worry. I’m sure he will appoint corrupt dictator “sensitive” inspectors.
435 - works so well with Schools, Police and the NHS.
Labour, making things worse since 1997
435 - Christina I wonder if they’ll be like the NHS ones, the ones that nobody checks, so Karzai just ticks the right boxes on the form. Also GB doesn’t seem to have yet decided on if it’s milestones v targets v benchmarks, c’mon man stop dithering. Election on the way ?
Karzai will comply with the anti-corruption requirements. If you pay him enough…
427
OT This is a very *interesting* development re AGW aka Tories eat polar bear cubs after hitting them on the head with clubs en masse
I thought I was the only one! I like to barbecue them over a bed of tropical hardwood and serve them on the patio, under floodlights. You might think that was a bit chilly at this time of the year, but you wouldn’t say that if you saw the size and number of my electric patio heaters.
440 And I trust that you garnish them with panda kidneys.
440 I have a mobile polar bear BBQ, fitted onto my Hummer.
I prefer to serve it in a rare-species melange, with panada and gorilla. With a little rhino-horn grated over the top - just to add a bit of spice later in the evening (if you know what I mean!)
URW: with respect, I *always* welcome newcomers when I spot them, including people whose first appearance is to slag me off. Sometimes they may be trolls, but cliquiness kills discussion sites and everyone deserves a chance. Several regular contributors here started pretty trollishly but we civilised them. Some remain untameable, of course.
Plato - yes, I’m on Cameron’s mailing list and after reading clouds of anti-global warming stuff here I was amused to get his piece saying how important it was to Conservatives. He has me solidly in his camp on this - pity he doesn’t seem to have most of his party. Perhaps I can recruit him for Conservatives for Palnmer, eh?
When you read that kind of crap from Brown, you see a political strategy grid from a con artist. He ain’t fit to be a PM.
442 Panada is rare indeed.
292: Like antifrank, I too am sorry that I missed the Dirty Dick’s meet. I am new here - and only occasionally post - but it’s my favourite of all the blogs I read so very happy to bring my chocolate muffins along to the next gathering.
Nice to see how seriously the Government takes the terrorism threat
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6672806/Hidden-threat-from-al-Qaeda-sleeper-cells.html
“Counter-terrorism police and Whitehall officials believe dozens of extremists could have arrived here by posing as students or legitimate visitors.
They are concerned both by the relatively lax checks that are made on the visitors before they arrive and by the ease with which they can outstay their visas without anyone noticing.
As many as 13,000 visa applicants may have entered the country from Pakistan in a seven month period since October last year without any checks on their supporting documentation.”
Bearing in mind Gordo said Pakistan is part of the crucible of terror…..
” one senior counter-terrorism officer told the Daily Telegraph: “There is a lack of control and supervision at our borders in the broadest sense.”
“”Part of the problem seems to be that foreign students generate a huge amount of money and there is not a lot of incentive to do proper checks.”"
So, they may be dangerous but cash trumps all.
447 - actually to follow that up
Figures released in a series of parliamentary questions show that in the seven month period from the end of October until May this year, just 29 of 66,000 applicants from Pakistan were interviewed and in 20 per cent of cases there were no checks at all on documents giving qualifications, references or travel plans.
A leaked report for the Border Agency warned that immigrants were arriving with false bank accounts, letters of introduction from non-existent British companies and pretending to be tourists when they had left their wives and children at home.
Weird betting post - betting on the weather
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNQy2rT_dvU&feature=player_embedded
He says he’s made money betting on W Hill against the Met Office.
Fair enough NPMP @ 443.It looked as though you were trying to capture susanne’s vote.
Today’s troll could be tomorrow’s Hung Parliament.
re 446. I’m hoping that we might be able to arrange a similar event in the next couple of months. It really did work well.
Fat Steve did a great job and we didn’t have all the hassle of booking a venue or having the need to charge.
443 - Perhaps a Malcolm Turnbull fate awaits Dave, torn to shreds by amateur scientists who believe Norwich is the hub of the world conspiracy.
415 - Certainly right-wing Tories in the marginals will return to the Cameron fold to get Labour out, but those in safer seats may well be attracted by Lord Pearson who is far closer to them than Cameron and will vote UKIP in protest at Cameron’s support for the 50p top rate, his failure to support a referendum on EU withdrawal or new grammar schools and assisted places.
450 - Do William Hill have a weather market?
I know they do the snow on Xmas day thing, but haven’t seen anything else.
442 Unfortunately due to a bit of fuss by WWF & Pamela Anderson you can;t now get minke whale foreskin leather unpholstery for your Hummer….
http://www.performancecar.co.nz/Members/adamm/my-blogs/the-skid-mark/luxury-suv-denied-whale-foreskin-leather-interior
453. Yes, surely Pearson’s election is bad news for the Tories if only because any support UKIP do pick up will be even more disproportionately from the Tories - he’s hardly to going to be attracting many natural Labour voters.
Also on Pearson, as JohnLoony mentioned this morning, that C4 News interview last night was truly extraordinary, with the constant use of words like “us”, that could only be taken as meaning that Muslims cannot be truly British. It reminded me of Ross Perot’s “you people” gaffe, except it was actually much worse than that.
The Tories selected Fiona Bruce in Congleton today…finally…so we don’t have to see her name popping up in other 123 shortlists between now and May 2010
Catherine Mckinnell selected by Labour to defend Newcastle North
455 Plan B then - marmoset fur….
They make really great dice too!
449 - Plato, isn’t that the guy who reportly predicted the Cumbrian floods 100 days in advance ? Not sure how true that is or if there is anyway that can be verified, I remain a skeptic in both camps.
I see from the UK discussion Forum, there is now a BNP candidate in Aberdeen South.
430 Should someone be dissed a troll because:
(a)They do not fit the usual plotical leaning held by a majority here?
(b)They do not come from the same socio-economic background as I’d guess a majority on here do?
(c)Their lifestyle/circumstnaces do not fit our general jellymould?
Not having a go,merely posing a polite,reasonable IMHO point of view.
(P.S Villa are 1-0 up at HT,come on you Villans!)
459 Re dice,I saw a car (smallish hatchback) t’other day,with:
(a)Fluffy dice hanging from the central drivers mirror
(b)Mathcing furry seats and steering wheel cover
All it needed was a sunvisor stating ‘I’m a total f***ing chav!’ to complete the ensemble!
Adam Boulton on the Boulton&Co blog - This Sunday: Brown On The War
“On Sunday Live this week I’ll be interviewing the Prime Minister about Aghanistan as Britian’s bloodiest year in the conflict enters its final month.
There’s a big week ahead for policymakers.
At West Point Military Academy on Tuesday President Obama wil deliver his long awaited speech detailing how many extra troops he is deploying.
Gordon Brown will also make a statement to the Commons on British troops levels and whether conditions to send extra forces are being met.
This weekend the Prime Minister has announced an international conference in London next 28th January on “Afghanization” of the struggle.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister is also visiting London and will face intense pressure to do more against members of al-qaeda harbouring in his country.
And all this at a time when the spotlight is on that other post-9/11 conflict, Iraq, because of the Chilcott Inquiry.
I’ll be putting all this to the Prime Minister – along with key questions about the economic and election battles at home.”
457 Before anyone gets too excited, that’s not the Fiona Bruce we all love from the Tory-loving BBC Newsroom!
Coming up on ITV shortly,
“No, I am your father!”
following on from the talk re targets above
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/6670433/Police-forces-still-mired-in-red-tape-and-targets-Home-Office-adviser-to-warn.html
“The country’s police forces are still mired in red tape and obsessed with chasing targets, despite repeated attempts at reform, the Government’s own police bureaucracy tsar will say next week.”
463
“All it needed was a sunvisor stating ‘I’m a total f***ing chav!’ to complete the ensemble”
Gosh, I hope people like that don’t post on here.
For Plato
A week after my colleague James Delingpole, on his Telegraph blog, coined the term “Climategate” to describe the scandal revealed by the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, Google was showing that the word now appears across the internet more than nine million times. But in all these acres of electronic coverage, one hugely relevant point about these thousands of documents has largely been missed.
The reason why even the Guardian’s George Monbiot has expressed total shock and dismay at the picture revealed by the documents is that their authors are not just any old bunch of academics. Their importance cannot be overestimated, What we are looking at here is the small group of scientists who have for years been more influential in driving the worldwide alarm over global warming than any others, not least through the role they play at the heart of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/6679082/Climate-change-this-is-the-worst-scientific-scandal-of-our-generation.html
468 Mind you,in today’s PC world,multi-whatever,I suppose a few chavs would complete the picture,make us a truly representataive cross-spectrum of society (which I suspect-no,I KNOW this site,excellent though it,is far from
469. Huh. He’s out of date - it’s 10.6 million now.
And Dellingpole wasn’t first with ‘Climategate’ - it was a poster on WUWT, last weekend.
Mind you someone did suggest it ought to be ‘Climaquiddick’ ‘cos sure as eggs, those to blame would escape scott-free.
470 – The PB community partook in a How-chav-RU test the other month..?
I seem to recall one of the highest was JackW on account of him owning a Burberry trench coat circa 1937 and Easterross because he shops at the CoOp.
I think that’s quite enough chavs for one blog don’t you?
6 “Who is this “us”?””
Perhaps the meaning of “us” is non-muslims.
Certainly in the Islam world there is a idea of “them and us” where the “them” are non muslims.
There are also terms for non-muslims, non-muslim land and non-muslims who are helpful to the spread of Islam and the conquering of non muslim land in the creation of a world Caliphate.
I imaginem “they” would have a word for “you”.
Good evening Rosslyn Park Fans worldwide
Rosslyn Park 48 Henley 3
Shockingly bad weather here in Sussex tonight.
474 - That’ll be global warming.
I have ordered my 21.5 inch iMac and await it’s delivery (about 10 days), and cant wait to use a keyboard with discernible letters on the keys.
Being a two fingured typist it’s increasingly difficult when the letters rub off.
Numbers still there though.
472 Jack W at a hundred and however many must be the world’s oldest chav!
P.S IMHO being economical and shopping at the Co-op does not justify dissing poor old Easteross as a chav (unless he drives a souped-up Nova with 12 inch wide exhaust!)
474 Grim here in Oxfordshire tonight too. Was supposed to be sending up some big rockets - but they are staying put, yet again.
6 “Who is this “us”?””
I suggest you have a look at the Koran.
Surah 9:29
Surah 47:4
Surah 48:29.
The meaning of “them” and “us” becomes clear.
Any polls expected out tonight?
477. Easterross is having you on, the co ops in those parts are quite smart. You can pick up some very posh totty in the Beauly one (the one on the NE side of the main street, that is: don’t go near the one opposite).
481 NW side I mean.
480. We’re not expecting any polls (though that doesn’t mean there won’t be an unexpected poll)
477 Patrick driving a 17 year old Shogun jeep and 6 year old Saab 95 so what does that say about my Chavtastic credentials? Ifyou give the wrong answer I may need to rip up my Letters Patent
On a more serious note, are we due any polls this evening? I would hate Rod to have no excuse to achieve his monthly 0rgasm working out his swingback.
478. It’s dry in NI for once but it’s been foggy all day, seriously depressing!
481 CT apart from Marquee Mark, MTF and Jack W, no-one else would know whether you were referring to the side of the square with the Priory Hotel or the other one with Sam’s Indian restaurant and Ian Marr’s rather splendid antique shop up the side street.
For anyone interested in 18th centur Scottish silver, Ian Marr is THE expert and his establishment is a positive emporium for such wondrous items.
484 Saabs are nice-I heard somewhere a disproportionate number of accountants/financial middle managers favour them.
I’ll forgive you re the 17 year old Shogun,as their secondhand value has fallen so sharply you may as well drive it till its just hopelessly uneconomic to renew its MOT- I usually snarl in disdain re 4X4s ,but as I like you I’ll make an exception!
486 Are you still confident on East Renfrewshire. Also will Murphy move to Holyrood if he is beaten. It looks like he has the capability to give Salmond some concern for 2011 if he did return north.
485 Its been cold and wet down here on the central southern coast of England,but the rain is easing -just in nice time for my visit to my local pub
REMINDER
John Pienaar’s interview with Our Glorious Leader on R5 at 8:30.
Who knew there was a “wrong side of the tracks” in downtown Beauly!
Just direct people by the fabulous deli/cafe…great cakes, even better pies and quiches - and seriously attractive ladies looking after you.
486 the one next to Corner on the Square (= what MM is referring to) home of the most expensive olives on the planet.
Delingpole and his swivel eyed friends are going to war with Cameron.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100018236/climategate-the-conservative-backlash-begins/
And Plato gets a namecheck
490 - Have you noticed that Grayling has chosen this week to adopt the pathfinder label and pin it on Boris.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/27/boris-johnson-elected-commissioner-police
Brown on manoeuvres on Afghanistan, Boulton Sunday, pointless conference being organised in January so he can some nice pictures taken.
Rather sadly, based upon his Jonah effect, this means more poor squaddies will now get blown up.
He’s clearly trying to shift the story from Chilcot and avoid any questions about his role both in setting the Iraq war up in the first place, then shafting all the troops by not providing enough funds for proper kit
490 G Brown or M Smithson?
493: I love how you’ve become a fan of the rabid-right winger when he lays into Cameron.
You really are shameless.
Oh and you little bitter campaign against Plato (or is it all women?) is just showing your true side.
496 - Fan?
Can’t you read.
New thread
488. Leaving aside the fact I’ve always felt that Murphy is vastly over-rated, I’m not sure how that would work in practice. Gray resigns as Labour leader and Murphy takes over, despite at that point holding no seat in either Holyrood or Westminster? Or do they somehow choreograph a by-election followed by Gray’s resignation? Also Murphy’s credibility would have taken a considerable knock after losing his seat. No, if there is a threat to Gray at the moment it (incredibly) seems to be coming from Jack McConnell.
499 IIRC The SNP managed with Salmond returning as Leader but not at Holyrood before 2007.
500. I covered that point - Salmond had a platform as an MP at Westminster. In your scenario Murphy would be completely out in the cold.
501 A switch close to the election in 2011 say January should be manageable. As for platform well surely being the Leader of the Scottish Labour Party is that platform. Would the media ignore him anymore than if Salmond had not been an MP? I doubt it. He can tour the TV studios relentlessly while not being questioned in Holyrood. May even be advantageous.
502. Interesting theory, just incredibly unlikely that it would happen. If Gray is defenestrated, you can be 99% sure it’ll be a sitting MSP that will replace him. My guess is that Murphy would see Holyrood as beneath his dignity anyway - he’d probably even regard the Lords as preferable.