Tory lead cut to 6% in poll ..

[DotCommunist]

The sooner 'free' market economics are shown up as a total lie the better. Central state planning would never have led us to this shit.

 

[butchersapron]

a neo liberal free marketeer who knows something about economics, or a neo liberal free marketeer who doesn't have a fucking clue?

I think someone who knows about economics is the last thing we need. Who does that leave?

 

[FreddyB]

Of all the free marketeer types kicking around I reckon Ken Clarke is the best option. He's a cunt but everyone knows it. Cable doing the job and screwing us over would see us plagued by disillusioned depressed Liberals

 

[butchersapron]

Of the Chancellors, Obsorne and Cable are the far right, darling the left. (Within the obvious bounds)

 

[fakeplasticgirl]

I think someone who knows about economics is the last thing we need. Who does that leave?

osborne?
maybe he isn't clueless... but he certainly comes across as useless in interviews...

 

[Kaka Tim]

lots of lib dems and media getting very excited.

But then the lib dems should be doing well - with labour discredited and the tories still widely hated and the expesnes scandal.

However a few polls and a bored media looking for an exciting story does not make clegg suddenly turn into Barrack Obama.

Its not maddly impossible that this could turn into a sustained surge for the lib dems that gives them the largest share of the vote - but the FPTP systme makes it very difficult for them to get the largest numbers of mps - let alone an overall majority.

The likleyhood is that this will not happen. Tory and labour still have around 30% of the electrolate who are bed rock support and I cant see Clegg eating into that.

But the lib dems could very possilbe see a much improved performance - say around 25% of the vote. Which would be very bad news for the tories and wierdly good news for the labour

Go here to see the effects of this on the BBC's rather fun electrol seat claculator
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politi...10/8609989.stm.

If this happens it makes it very very difficult for the tories to get an overal majority, and the more likely result would be labour being the biggest party.

e.g - consider a split of the vote along the following lines
Tory 36% 271 seats
LAbour 30% 278 seats
Lib Dems 25% 72 seats.
Others 9% 29 seats.

Labour get 6% less of the vote than the tories - and are still the biggest party. Theres even combinations where labour have the most seats if they come third.

Now this is based on a uniform swing - and there will be lots of local factors at play in this election. But by some calculations a higher lib dem vote is even worse for the tories than under a uniform swing.

So we are looking at a pretty good chance of lab being the largest party in a hung parliament but with the case for electrol reform looking pretty inargualbe.
Much as I enjoy seeing the tories fail again and to be further fucked by FPTP - you really cant have a system where a party which barely manages 30% of those who bother to vote forming a government. I think the media and the public would be up in arms. The tories would have to seriously condier supporting electrol reform as well.

So hung parliament followed by new elections with PR (or similar) within a year?

All very interesting -

(reported from similar thread in general)

 

[FridgeMagnet]

osborne?
maybe he isn't clueless... but he certainly comes across as useless in interviews...

They all subscribe to the same principles, and those principles are the ones that have fucked us all and will continue to. The worse they are at upholding those principles the better, really, but none of them are *that* bad at it.

 

[butchersapron]

A labour administration with the lib-dems taking the flak for all the cuts is ideal for them actually.

 

[ymu]

Well, I started to understand why the tories needed a greater than 7% lead over labour to be sure that they had a majority - mu understanding was that this was because most labour seats were city ones with fewer voters in eah seat. While most tory seats were country with greater numbers of voters.

But I am not sure that makes sense anyhow.

But as regards the LibDems I am not sure no!

There are 3 sorts of votes:

1. Those that get them to the winning post
2. Those that make the majority stronger
3. Those that are in a seat that someone else wins

Labour have more of 1 than the Tories and the Tories have more of 2 than Labour, and the Lib Dems more of 3 than the other two parties. The Tories are too geographically concentrated, and the Lib Dems too geographically diffuse, Labour has the best balance in terms of winning seats.

 

[aylee]

For my money, what we need isn't a new politics, it's a new electorate. Oh, that they had but one head.

So what are you proposing? Culling all those that don't agree with you?

 

[aylee]

All I really want, come the day after the election, is to be able to juxtapose these pictures:

 

[butchersapron]

New Ipsos MORI poll of 57 lab/con marginals - these are not the closest marginals, they're in the second or third tranche - the tories need swings of 5%- 9% to take these:

The latest voting intention figures here are CON 32%(-6), LAB 36%(-5), LDEM 23%(+12). The swing in these seats is now 5%. In comparison, Ipsos MORI’s monthly GB poll had a swing from Labour to the Conservatives of 3.5%, so even beneath the Lib Dem surge, the Conservatives still seem to be performing slightly better in their Labour held target seats.

Another interesting finding is that the number of people saying they would vote Labour and Conservative has not fallen. Rather, there has been a jump in Lib Dem support amongst those previously unlikely to vote (who MORI wouldn’t normally count) and don’t knows.

So the swing in these marginals is 5%, whilst nationally it's 3.5%. Not good enough right now, even with a collapse in the lib-dem vote that means they keep their CON/LD marginals.

 

[weltweit]

There are 3 sorts of votes:

1. Those that get them to the winning post
2. Those that make the majority stronger
3. Those that are in a seat that someone else wins

Labour have more of 1 than the Tories and the Tories have more of 2 than Labour, and the Lib Dems more of 3 than the other two parties. The Tories are too geographically concentrated, and the Lib Dems too geographically diffuse, Labour has the best balance in terms of winning seats.

Sorry, that does not seem to make it any clearer for me.

I may come back and read it again later !!

 

[ymu]

Sorry, that does not seem to make it any clearer for me.

I may come back and read it again later !!

The only votes that count are the ones that get the party to the winning post (hence voters in marginals being the only ones that can actually make a difference by voting). The Tories waste the most votes in safe seats and the Lib Dems waste the most votes in seats they cannot win. Labour wastes fewest - hence they need fewer to win.

 

[weltweit]

The only votes that count are the ones that get the party to the winning post (hence voters in marginals being the only ones that can actually make a difference by voting). The Tories waste the most votes in safe seats and the Lib Dems waste the most votes in seats they cannot win. Labour wastes fewest - hence they need fewer to win.

OK, I can kind of follow that.

But why does labour "waste the fewest?"

 

[ymu]

OK, I can kind of follow that.

But why does labour "waste the fewest?"

It's just the way their voters are distributed geographically. Labour get a narrow majority in a lot of urban areas whilst the Tories get a huge majority in fewer rural ones. The Lib Dems present a widely acceptable alternative nearly everywhere so their votes are spread very thin.

 

[TAE]

That is a great way of explaining it, thanks ymu.

 

[butchersapron]

Ipsos MORI poll to be announced tmw:

CON 36%(+4), LAB 30%(+2), LDEM 23%(-9)

 

[mk12]

I bet you fucking love that poll

 

[two sheds]

That is a great way of explaining it, thanks ymu.

Yep ta from me too, veh clear.

 

[JHE]

I wonder if there other polls to be announced tomorrow. One set of results showing a (partial) return to normal could be an aberration.

 

[butchersapron]

I bet you fucking love that poll

The best is yet to come!

 

[butchersapron]

I wonder if there other polls to be announced tomorrow. One set of results showing a (partial) return to normal could be an aberration.

There are but save them for later. Savor the moment.

 

[Kaka Tim]

Ipsos MORI poll to be announced tmw:

CON 36%(+4), LAB 30%(+2), LDEM 23%(-9)

According to the BBC seat calculator that mean

LAb 279
Con 279
libdems 63

Its could be a very long night on may 6th.

 

[Kaka Tim]

Other of tommorrows polls tell a differnt story according to

http://www.ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/

Most are showing the lib dems fading and the tories gaining

"We have details of two more polls – YouGov’s poll for the Sunday Times has topline figures, with changes from yesterday, of CON 35%(+1), LAB 27%(-2), LDEM 29% (nc). BPIX in the Mail on Sunday have figures, with changes from a week ago, of CON 34%(+3), LAB 26%(-2), LDEM 30%(-2)"

 

[butchersapron]

Don't ruin the atmos

edit: hang on thought you meant these other two polls.

 

[weltweit]

It's just the way their voters are distributed geographically. Labour get a narrow majority in a lot of urban areas whilst the Tories get a huge majority in fewer rural ones. The Lib Dems present a widely acceptable alternative nearly everywhere so their votes are spread very thin.

So boundary changes to effect that most constituencies had the same population (as proposed by Cameron) might or might not make the system fairer!?

 

[ymu]

So boundary changes to effect that most constituencies had the same population (as proposed by Cameron) might or might not make the system fairer!?

It would make little or no difference. Constituencies should be as equally-sized as possible, of course, but that's not the reason Labour votes count for more. I doubt they have a preponderance of smaller constituencies anyway - it's usually rural constituences that are smaller than average, isn't it?

 

[London_Calling]

An interesting contribution:

In fact in the period between the Chancellor’s Debate and the afternoon of the Leaders Debate, polling was already moving up for the LD’s and down for the Tories and Labour.

The more you decide the polls are only partly about the Leader’s Debates, the more you can see how the Lib Dem numbers are very hard to pin down, hence the fluidity I spoke of in my last post.

 

[ymu]

Here ya go:

Parliamentary Constituency Boundary Reviews and Electoral Bias: How Important Are Variations in Constituency Size?

Galina Borisyuk, Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher*
LGC Elections Centre, University of Plymouth, UK

Ron Johnston

School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol, UK

Correspondence: * Corresponding auhor: [email protected]

It is frequently canvassed by some politicians and political commentators that the current British electoral system is biased against the Conservative party because of variations in constituency size: seats won by the Conservatives at recent elections have been larger than those won by Labour in terms of their registered electorates, thereby disadvantaging the former. As a consequence, it is argued that equalisation of constituency electorates by the Boundary Commissions would remove that disadvantage. The validity of this argument is addressed in two ways. First, we demonstrate that the rules and procedures applied by the Boundary Commissions when redistributing seats in the UK preclude the achievement of substantial equality in constituency electorates. Secondly, we use a recent adaptation of a widely-used procedure for establishing electoral bias in three-party systems to show that variations in constituency electorates had only a minor impact on the outcome of elections after the last two redistributions. The geography of each party's support base is much more important, so changes in the redistribution procedure are unlikely to have a substantial impact and remove the significant disadvantage currently suffered by the Conservative party.

http://pa.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/63/1/4