EP elections 2014

[Diouf]

New Danish poll. Epinion for DR.



The conservatives are now within 1 % of a seat. With the Liberals on 24.3 % and four seats in the electoral alliance, the Conservatives will need 6.1 % to take one of the Liberal seats.
The Social Liberals and SF both get a seat with this poll. With the Social Democrats on 22.4 % and five seats in the electoral alliance, they only need 5.6 % to get a seat.
However, DF is not far away from a fourth seat, which would be gained from one of the two electoral alliances and make life very difficult for either SF or the Conservatives.

Also the poll included the referendum on the unified patent court. 42 % will vote in favour, 18 % will vote no, and 40 % don't know. I suspect the final result will be much closer. However, the no-side not only needs a majority for no, it also needs at least 30 % of those entitled to vote to vote no.

[Cassius]

Juncker and SChultz? Are the European parties deliberately trolling us with those choices?

In my own humble opinion, this whole Europe-wide 'election campaign', with debates and 'candidates' for the Presidency of the Commission is basically one spectacular exercise in trolling.

[EPG]

I do not see it as trolling, I see it as an attempt to strengthen the European Parliament versus the very obvious power exercised by the European Council in recent years, by providing the groundwork for a battle on the head of the Commission. I don't think the EP will win because I think they will lack a majority committed to any one candidate, so they will be divided and conquered by the big European People's Party bloc in the European Council, which will work in tandem with the EPP faction in the EP, which isn't strongly committed to its candidate (a contrast to S&D's commitment to Schulz).

[Tender Branson]

The ÖVP and the Greens have now finally realized that they can't ignore the new liberal NEOS party forever, without losing additional voters to them.

The Greens have put out a 10-point flyer that shows the differences between the Greens and NEOS:



...

The ÖVP meanwhile attacked a NEOS's MP for his belief in the "Flying Spaghetti Monster"-religion.

And they started ballons with "ONLY HOT AIR !" on them in front of the building where NEOS held their campaign kickoff (see below).

NEOS and also the European Liberals had their campaign launch yesterday in Vienna, with speeches from Angelika Mlinar (the Austrian frontrunner) and Guy Verhofstadt (the European frontrunner) and Olli Rehn:

[YL]

The 4 Freedoms Party, set up to be a UK branch of the European People's Party, now have a website at http://www.4freedomsparty.eu/, though there isn't much there yet.  They're only standing in London, and I don't see them coming close to winning a seat.

On a different matter, how on the ball is the typical UKIP voter?  Because, in most English regions, when given their ballot paper they're going to find that the first party on the list is "An Independence from Europe - UK Independence Now", which is Mike Nattrass's splinter party; how many of them are going to fall for that?

And another YouGov poll for the UK, commissioned by the Green Party, says Lab 30 UKIP 27 Con 22 LD 9 Green 8.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A possible repeat of the Literal Democrat fiasco?

[Tender Branson]

New Ireland poll (RED C survey conducted between April 28 and May 1 for the Sunday Business Post):

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http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/poll-shows-transfers-may-scupper-sf-in-euro-elections-629527.html

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

On a different matter, how on the ball is the typical UKIP voter?  Because, in most English regions, when given their ballot paper they're going to find that the first party on the list is "An Independence from Europe - UK Independence Now", which is Mike Nattrass's splinter party; how many of them are going to fall for that?

And another YouGov poll for the UK, commissioned by the Green Party, says Lab 30 UKIP 27 Con 22 LD 9 Green 8.

Not particularly, I'd imagine. That's mainly based on the 2012 London elections where UKIP underperformed due to messing up their name on the ballot paper.

Strange news from Greece, where public funding awards biggest election sum to that most relevant of parties, erm, PASOK.

http://www.enetenglish.gr/?i=news.en.article&id=1891

Sorry to post a BNP video, but this has to be seen to be believed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=am2-fVIkf8I

The BNP are going for the lucrative anti-hijab-penguins vote I see. Also Nick Griffin is ten feet tall, everybody else in the party is literally a cardboard cut out and the Fascists have well and truly run out of money/taste.

Did you encounter their van which was driving around Sheffield playing loud music last month?  Apparently they were playing their version of the Wurzels' Combine Harvester song in Hillsborough.

Hahaha, the one good thing about UKIP's rise is how much the "traditional" anti-immigration parties are unnerved. (Also I hope the Wurzels sue them)

[EPG]

New Ireland poll (RED C survey conducted between April 28 and May 1 for the Sunday Business Post):

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http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/poll-shows-transfers-may-scupper-sf-in-euro-elections-629527.html

Very different to what we were told last week. As in the presidential election and single-constituency general election polling, you can't trust the polls!!!

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Very different to what we were told last week. As in the presidential election and single-constituency general election polling, you can't trust the polls!!!

Funnily enough, that's UKIP's next slogan.

[Tender Branson]

How much will the parties spend on the EP election campaign ?

* ÖVP: 4 Mio. €
* SPÖ: 4 Mio. €
* FPÖ: 2.5-3 Mio. €
* Greens: 1.75 Mio. €
* NEOS: 1.2 Mio. €
* BZÖ: 500.000 €
* EA: 100.000 €
* EU-STOP: 10-20.000 €
* REKOS: unknown

Which means the parties will spend some 14-15 Mio. € on their campaigns (20-21 Mio. $).

Parties who enter the EP will get 12.8 Mio. € back in public financing.

http://www.vienna.at/eu-wahl-millionen-kosten-fuer-bund-und-wahlkampf-der-parteien/3949269

[Tender Branson]

What to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon ?

Yes, making the Austrian Wikipedia article about the EP elections readable and expanding it a bit.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Swedish EP-poll by Sifo:

31,2% - Social Democrats
21,7% - Moderates
16,1% - Greens
8,1% - People's Party
5,8% - Left Party
4,1% - Sweden Democrats
3,7% - Christian Democrats
3,6% - Centre Party
3,2% - Feminist Initiative
2,2% - Pirate Party
0,3% - The June List

[Tender Branson]

Swedish EP-poll by Sifo:

31,2% - Social Democrats
21,7% - Moderates
16,1% - Greens
8,1% - People's Party
5,8% - Left Party
4,1% - Sweden Democrats
3,7% - Christian Democrats
3,6% - Centre Party
3,2% - Feminist Initiative
2,2% - Pirate Party
0,3% - The June List

How reliable is Sifo ?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Lib Dems in 5th:

[Antonio the Sixth]

MP being so high and SD so low makes that poll look like a huge outlier.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

YouGov's solution to the EuroParlPollProblem seems to be to release a billion polls so that at least one of them is right.

[Tayya]

MP being so high and SD so low makes that poll look like a huge outlier.

MP tends to overperform in EP elections, partly thanks to right-leaning environmentalist voters not having to care about putting a left-wing government in place. SD's voters are hard to turn out, many of them being low-income and presumably low-info voters.

The EP polls are more volatile, though, since turnout can shift more considerably than in the national elections. EP polls being rare doesn't help.

[Jens]

Danish EP-poll in Børsen today
First line is the poll in percent
Second line the result in 2009
The lineup is: Social Democrats (A, S&D), Social Liberals (B, ALDE), Conservative (C, EPP), SF (F, Greens), Liberal Alliance (I, ?) People's Movement against (N, GUE), Danish People's Party (O, EFD), Venstre (V, ALDE)
Conservatives retain and Social Liberals gains a mandate because of electoral alliances.


DF largest party... sigh

[Diouf]

Danish EP-poll in Børsen today

DF largest party... sigh

That looks unavoidable, but by those margins!!!

[Tender Branson]

Turnout could actually increase here compared with 2009, a new poll for the ÖGfE shows:

"Are you going to vote in the EP elections on May 25 ?"

48% Yes, definitely
19% Likely, yes
15% Likely not
  8% Definitely not
10% Undecided

http://www.oegfe.at/cms/uploads/media/Grafiken_EP_0414.pdf

History (also in polls taken before federal elections) shows that only those who say "I will definitely vote" and a few of those who say "likely, yes" will actually turn out.

A ÖGfE poll taken just before the 2009 elections showed the following:

39% Yes, definitely
31% Likely, yes
12% Likely not
13% Definitely not
  5% Undecided

http://www.ifes.at/sites/default/files/downloads/1243943202_PRESSEUNTERLAGE.pdf

...

Actual turnout in the election was 46% then.

Which means that there's a chance for a 50%+ turnout this year.

[Tender Branson]

The current poll also shows that Austrian voters do not think that the parties are currently discussing/treating the issues well enough that are important to voters:

30% Yes, the parties are discussing/treating them well enough
51% No

...

Which issues are most important to you in the EP election campaign ? (multiple choices possible)

19% Energy/Environment/Climate/Animal Protection/Consumer Protection
15% Social Policy/Health/Pensions
12% Migration/Asylum/Borders/EU-Enlargement
  9% Tax- and Econmic Policy/Freetrade agreement between EU/US
  9% Jobs/(Youth-)Unemployment/Wages
  9% Financial Policy/Crisis Management/Euro
  8% Education
  7% National Identity/Centralism/Bureaucracy
  5% Solidarity/United Europe
  4% Security Policy/Ukraine/Peace/Common Foreign Policy
  1% Corruption/Lobbying/Transparency
15% Other issues
28% Don't know

[Jens]

Danish EP-poll in Børsen today

DF largest party... sigh

That looks unavoidable, but by those margins!!!

It do look like an outliner - Turnout will probably also be significant. DF voters are more likely to stay home

Have you tried SF's talking posters?

[Diouf]

Danish EP-poll in Børsen today

DF largest party... sigh

That looks unavoidable, but by those margins!!!

It do look like an outliner - Turnout will probably also be significant. DF voters are more likely to stay home

Have you tried SF's talking posters?

Yeah, normally they would be more likely to stay home, but i don't know whether that's the case now. Have you seen any polls with crosstabs? I actually think DF now could have almost ukippish numbers with a massive lead among the 60+ which are generally more likely to turn up than younger voters.

I've barely seen a SF poster yet, so that's a no. Nice initiative though

[Diouf]

Some ehh... interesting views from the leader of the Congress of the New Right which currently looks like crossing the threshold in Poland and getting three seats.

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http://euobserver.com/eu-elections/124011