UK local elections, May 2018

[parochial boy]

The Tory rout in the north of the borough in 2002 were a fluke - a one-time backlash against an unpopular Labour administration. Historically that area was a Labour stronghold.

Wait, 2002? What was happening at the time from Labour to go from polling 50% at the start of the year to 40% at the end?

I assume the run up to Iraq may have had an effect, but surely not as early as May?

I'm very interested in whart happens in Hillingdon this year, because of the inevitable "Is BoJo's seat in danger???" backlash that will happen if Labour win control of the council.

[parochial boy]

Ooh, I don't think I've ever seen ethnic crosstabs in a UK poll before.

Interesting that the "white" Londoner vote is not all too dissimilar to the national polling, and the huge lead comes from non-white voters backing Labour by 75-13% over the Tories.

Of course, ethnic figures could be highly suspect, especially as I'm pretty sure they're relatively new. But I reckon they're definitely worth including in any polling specifically of London

[parochial boy]

It seems the recent national polling has CON opening a small lead over LAB over the last couple of months.  Given the fact these seats were last fought back in 2014 would we not expect the CON to gain seats this time around?  I guess it really depends on how the 2014 UKIP vote will flow.  2017 UK national elections taught us that a UKIP collapse does not automatically help CON.

Mostly urban areas, especially London, which swung heavily towards Labour in 2017. That's the thing to be thinking about more than headline polling figures

[parochial boy]

Random thought, considering the Windrush scandal, and how this showed up how a large number of legal residents and UK citizens would regularly have no proof of citizenship/ID or whatever; and considering the governments drive to introduce ID requirements for voting, which is being trialled in a few local authorities today.

This is going to be a major problem isn't it?

[parochial boy]

The Greens have had a surprisingly good night.

I would instinctively have thought that Corbynism would kill them off, but anecdotally it does seem that they have a fairly decent appeal to a lot people who are very much not Labour/Corbyn supporters.

[parochial boy]

Hallam students voted Green and Uni students voted Lib Dem #hottake

[parochial boy]

Hounslow is my favourite borough map tbh. Wonder what the difference between Chiswick and the rest of the borough is?