Just before PMQs, I think this could be one of the grimmest ever PMQs for a Prime Minister in a long time, I don’t have enough popcorn for this. The most important question. Is this the first of many? This red wall polling might focus minds. TSE
“Too clever by half” – not a phrase instantly associated with Priti Patel. Yet her decision to make some significant substantive amendments to the Police, Crime and Sentencing Bill after the Commons had discussed it, amendments many of which were voted down by the Lords Monday night, now means that the government cannot reintroduce them when the Bill returns to the Commons. Not without introducing a fresh Bill. If they were so necessary she is now stuck. Alternatively, they were…
The Tweet from “‘Forgotten Genius” – for many years a PB regular – hits the nail on the head. The Tories won their big GE2019 majority not because of their leader but as a result of the threat of Corbyn becoming PM. As the Tweet rightly points out Johnson was in negative ratings territory On election day in December 2019 Opinium carried out a survey. One aspect was to find out why previous Labour voters were switching and this chart,…
The PB get together now planned for March 2nd This is being held at the Smarkets HQ close to the Tower of London. More details soon
The big political betting news tonight is a new CON Members’ poll from Opinium for C4 which has Chancellor Sunak’s chances looking very strong indeed. As we all know Tory MPs vote in a series of ballots to decide which two go to the membership in a secret postal ballot. The polling has these splits. The biggest issue with this at the moment is that there is no vacancy and it is hard to predict if there will be a…
Further to the previous post on the latest Opinium PM approval ratings I thought it might be useful to also look at Keir Starmer’s numbers region by region. The Opinium data is the basis for the above and as can be seen Starmer is viewed positively in London but this is not replicated elsewhere. In the North and Midlands regions of England he gets a net of zero. This is caused by the total of those approving of him being…
The region where CON made so many GE2019 gains The above chart is a regional breakdown of the Opinium approval ratings that came out in the poll Saturday night. This had a stark decline of 42% in the PM’s ratings with London at one end showing the best for the PM but with Scotland, the North and the Midlands showing big negatives. The latter two English regions, sometimes called the “Red Wall”, are where the Tory big majority was built…
What have CON voters been telling their MPs? Clearly this is a period of high danger for Johnson. With CON MP’s returning to Westminster they will be able to report on the reaction in their constituencies to what came out before the weekend. My guess is that a collective view will emerge. Johnson great strength is that he is seen by many as being an election winner – but his critics might note that defeating the discredited figures of Livingstone…