UK General Election - May 7th 2015

[Zanas]

These figures show only two seats where LibDem have a higher than 10 pt lead : Orkney and Shetland, of course, and Sheffield Hallam. I would be worried if I were Clegg.

Also, the figures for Buckingham are hilarious, and I didn't know why. I went and learned that the Speaker is uncontested in general elections, which is yet another moronic aspect of tradition in British politics. The thing where an MP is unable to resign and has to be appointed to one of two obscure fake offices of Stewards is another one that I just recently learned about for Clacton. Seriously, why can't the British just implement a real constitution and stop this bullsh**t ? Nobody takes them seriously...

Still, I don't think Plaid Cymru or the SNP will run in Buckingham, so these figures look bizarre.

[Zanas]

If the rise of the UKIP will result in the House of Commons finally being elected by some form of proportional representation, then they will have been a net force for good.

What makes you think their rise would have such a result ?

[Zanas]

http://may2015.com/category/gqrr/

Fun with the demographic breakdowns in polls.

looks like ashcroft's got his sums wrong again, 1497% of people who voted conservative in 2010 will be doing so next year, which should come in handy in those key marginals

That's what you get for having one of your leaders named Boris...

[Zanas]

Well yes they have Brighton Pavilion, and I think they have a realistic shot at keeping it, but not at conquering another one.

[Zanas]

What on earth would these 23 others be ? Plaid and Ulster ? Greens ?

[Zanas]

Does anyone sane here actually believe that the Greens will eventually poll even as high as half what they're polling now ? I mean, come on... As Al said, they'd first have to run a full slate, plus people in the end will choose what matters, and as Lab-Con seems bound to stay rathor-thin till the end, I doubt the Greens actually poll higher than 4%. You heard it here first. Well, no, probably not. Still. And they may well lose their only seat, as CrabCake said.

[Zanas]

If this election's lost because of Green voters, Natalie Bennett and Caroline Lucas deserve to be 'Nader'ed.

Are you becoming BTRD? The Greens don't have the power to tank the election. Labour seem perfectly happy to do that to themselves.

Yes, let's just all end this "the election was lost because of spoilt votes for party Y instead of X" routine. We know better, don't we ? An election is lost because party X didn't convince enough voters to vote for party X instead of party A, B, or even Y, or even staying at home eating crisps watching telly. Period.

[Zanas]

On the contrary, it will take years (and not one or two at that) for living standards to recover to where were before the financial crisis hit, and people are aware of this instinctively (i.e. when people talk of there being 'no recovery' - as they still often do - this is what they mean). It's a good line of attack (and happens to be morally right, though that's by the by), but the question is whether Labour can deliver it effectively during the campaign.

Allied to this though is the rapidly falling petrol and household energy prices (something I didn't expect a year ago but am very happy about as everybody else is I'm sure . Couple this with the personal allowance finally reaching £10,000 in the spring and a lot of people will be feeling quite buoyant about their personal finances just in time for the general election.   

What is the personal allowance finally reaching £10,000 in the spring ?

[Zanas]

I've seen 2 polls this morning. One had Conservatives up 36-34 and the other had Labour up 33-31.

Glad to see UK polling can be just as erratic as ours.

This is not called erraticness ; this is called margin of error.

Oh dear, is there anything by anyone that this forum likes? I may be insufficiently cynical for its tastes.

The correct answer to that question is no. Except maybe Aliya Mustafina.

[Zanas]

YouGov polls only.

It seems that most of the Lib Dem 2010 votes moved to Labour early on, before some moved to UKIP more recently. They seem to be moving back to Labour again.

That is not how votes work.