UK General Election - May 7th 2015 (The Official Campaign Thread)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Ah, but that would not be odd: swings with a distinct regional dimension have been the norm in British elections since basically ever. The narrowness of Wilson's victory in '64 was largely down to a poor result in the West Midlands, while Labour's recovering in 1935 was much stronger in places that had been hit particularly bad by the Depression. And I'm not so sure about missing out on loads in the Midlands: all indications here - as is so often the case - is that all is to play for...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It seems that there is a very strong Independent candidate running in East Devon (a safe Tory seat). Normally local government independents who try to transfer to General Elections are lucky to poll 10%, but there are indications that this one might be a little different.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, but I suspect it's more that Dan Norris isn't running again.

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It was (in one form or another) Tory from 1950 until 1997, though until the 70s you'd have called it reliable rather than safe.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Tonights YouGov: Labour 35, Con 33, UKIP 13, LDem 8, Greens 5

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Remembering the one of Hornsey & Wood Green they put out a while ago then it is almost certainly a push poll and should be ignored.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Regarding the earlier discussion; I'm not convinced that UKIP actually need (and I suspect would not in any case want) a calmer leader less prone to publicity stunts and metaphorical firebombs. Remember that this is a party without a loyal electorate or a firm social base that thrives (on those occasions when it thrives) on grumbles and discontent...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Another YouGov Wales poll: Labour 40, Con 23, UKIP 13, Plaid 12, LDem 6, Greens 4

Insert the usual remarks.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Ipsos MORI phone poll: Lab 35 Con 33 UKIP 10 Green 8 Lib Dem 7.  They were ramping this as "definitely worth watching"...

MORI were the first to whore themselves out in their press releases and are still the worst for it. I presume those headline figures are their usual Certains Only ones? What are the Everyone figures?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Richard 'Dirty' Desmond, pornographer and media magnate, has donated a £1 million to UKIP. As everyone knows, Desmond owns The Daily Express and The Daily Star and used to own Channel Five.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I still don't get why they do that you know.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

What does everyone think of the YouGov nowcast - is it actually worth anything, or is it just a bit of fun?

They haven't revealed their methodology in full, so I can't really tell how sensible it is, but without a variety of reliable constituency polls it's hard to do a good 538 style prediction in the UK.  (They're using their own data, but they don't really have enough members in each constituency IMO.)

That said, it seems to look reasonably plausible in most places.

It does seem to be quite vulnerable to outside manipulation though. Sigh.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Nothing else on telly at that hour this time, so I watched it. Not particularly edifying, but then a debate using that format is never going to be. Miliband put in a good solid performance which (from my partisan perspective) is the main thing.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Though it's worth noting that Farage was... off. He lost it a couple of times and even insulted the audience. His closing statement was embarrassing: he was sweating profusingly, breathing heavily and his speech seemed rushed.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

To put the Glasgow SW swing into some context, the largest GE swing between Labour and the Tories since 1945 was around 19% - Brent North, 1997.

That's more a case of placing it into a misleading context though: Labour-Tory swings are much lower than between any other combination of parties (one of several reasons why they're more interesting actually). The 'swing' to the Liberals in Southwark & Bermondsey in 1983 was around 36%, for instance (more recently the 'swing' in Brent East in 2005 was 30.6).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Just to clear this up: the convention is that the Sovereign appoints as Prime Minister the person who is most likely to be able to command the confidence of the House. If there is a majority government, then matters are blissfully simple. If not, the convention is that the previous Prime Minister retains office (effectively as a caretaker) until it becomes clear who that person is. Technically they have the right to tough it out even if their position is hopeless and wait to be voted down by the Commons, but this feels... archaic. There aren't really any rules beyond that, though in practice the largest party has a significant advantage, even if it isn't the incumbent party (see 1974).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It seems likely that both parties will poll better in Glasgow than in Edinburgh. Actually given the relatively similar patterns of support for both in central Scotland (something likely to be even truer than before if we assume referendum voting patterns will play a big role) the actual distribution of seats could well look almost random.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Blank map of Scottish constituencies (which leaves just Northern Ireland to do). Might be a few errors that need fixing and I've not added the Shetland and the Orkney's yet, so treat it as a beta version or something.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Full YouGov: Labour 36, Con 33, UKIP 13, LDem 9, Greens 5

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Bunch of polls today.

YouGov: Labour 35, Con 34, UKIP 13, LDem 8, Greens 5, Others 6

Populus: Labour 34, Con 32, UKIP 15, LDem 9, Greens 4, Others 6

ICM: Con 34, Labour 32, UKIP 11, LDem 10, Greens 5, Others 8

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Useful blog post on the conventions around Prime Ministerial appointment, with particular regard to hung parliaments:
Ed can enter No. 10 without Nicola’s keys - Head of Legal, 19 April

Excellent post and well worth reading.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Murphy's way of phrasing things is not always perfect, but it's hardly an unreasonable point.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Bunch of polls today.

YouGov: Labour 35, Con 34, UKIP 13, LDem 8, Greens 5, Others 6

Populus: Labour 34, Con 32, UKIP 15, LDem 9, Greens 4, Others 6

ICM: Con 34, Labour 32, UKIP 11, LDem 10, Greens 5, Others 8

And also a Cashcroft/Rubber Ball which I'm adding here purely out of completeness: Con 34, Labour 30, UKIP 13, LDem 10, Greens 4, Others 9

The last figure does not inspire confidence.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Actually the national polls do show a fairly consistent pattern when you remember all the disclaimers. Trouble is, when it comes to seats there's a large difference between a national swing of 2% and a national swing of 5%.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

538 asks, "Is Constituency Polling Worth It?" (Spoiler: yes, more or less.)

Curious to hear what Sibboleth thinks of their analysis.

They are certainly correct to suggest that many of the changes between different batches of constituency polls of the same set of constituencies is most likely statistical noise. The article is wrong to suggest the constituency polling is new to the UK; it had a long and erratic* history here but had largely died out by 2010. What's new about Cashcroft is the scale of his constituency polling operations and also (as the article does correctly observe) the frequency.

Anyway, I'm not actually opposed to constituency polling; it's just that I'd like to see people treating them with appropriate levels of scepticism rather than (as is often the case) far less than is applied to national polls.

_{*There was a period in the 1960s and 1970s when quite a few local newspapers ran ones of their own. And published breakdowns for different parts of the constituencies in question. I suspect they were not terribly well conducted, but dubious social surveys were very much in style at the time!}