Welsh Assembly Elections 2011

[Filuwaúrdjan]

We have a poll...

Constituency: Labour 42, Plaid 20, Con 19, LDem 12
List: Labour 40, Con 20, Plaid 19, LDem 12

Labour would win a majority on those figures. Also...

Referendum: Yes 55, No 28, Don't Know 17

YouGov/ITV Wales.

The record of Welsh polling is, of course, less than entirely great and the election isn't until next May, so a degree of caution would not be misplaced.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Lib Dems HOLD Montgomeryshire (Lib Dem 39% Con 30%)

Does Lembit losing imply rough seas ahead for the Liberals at assembly level?

Opik's (deserved) defeat was entirely his own doing. However there may be other problems...

Also, there were some ominous shifts towards the Tories in the Montgomery towns in the 2008 locals; Tories won the most seats in Newtown which had been the LibDem stronghold in Montgomery from the Alex Carlile era onwards (before then the main Liberal stronghold was in the extremely rural west; where they've obviously lost a lot support to Plaid in recent years).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

New YouGov/ITV Wales poll shows a similar pattern to the last one with all changes within MoE...

Constituency: Labour 40, Plaid 22, Con 20, LDem 13, Other 5
List: Labour 37, Plaid 20, Con 20, LDem 14, UKIP 4, Green 2, SLP 1, BNP 1

Regional breakdowns (laughably high MoE, not to be taken seriously, posted only for amusement)...

North: Labour 31, Plaid 29, Con 22, LDem 14
Mid & West: Plaid 34, Labour 27, Con 23, LDem 9
South West: Labour 39, Con 23, Plaid 22, LDem 12
South Central: Labour 51, LDem 20, Con 18, Plaid 10
South East: Labour 50, Con 18, Plaid 15, LDem 11

Referendum poll shows a much tighter race than the last one: Yes 48, No 34, Dunno 14

Plaid voters are shown as being overwhelming in favour, Labour voters as mostly in favour, LibDems not sure and Tories strongly against.

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Usual remarks about the problems of Welsh polling inserted here.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

People's Voice has effectively disbanded, fwiw. It's not been formally disbanded, but it won't run official candidates in elections anymore.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

So will Law run for reelection as an indy, or not at all?

I'm not sure if she's said anything on the subject, but it's rumoured that she won't run again.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

So will Law run for reelection as an indy, or not at all?

I'm not sure if she's said anything on the subject, but it's rumoured that she won't run again.

She's just announced that she intends to run next year. Not entirely convinced that she actually will, but it now seems more likely than not.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Another poll (YouGov/ITV Wales, again).

Constituency: Llafur 39%, Plaid 23%, Tories 22%, LibDems 10%
List: Llafur 39%, Plaid 23%, Tories 21%, LibDems 9%

MoE changes for Labour from the last poll (down a tiny amount on constituency, up a little on list), Plaid and the Tories, poor for the LibDems. Usual remarks about the problems with Welsh polling, etc.

(Llafur, btw, is a very pretty word)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

No, she has decided that she won't be running. And has said so in public, so it's basically final.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

(Llafur, btw, is a very pretty word)

How's it pronounced? Like Laugher?

Ll is, of course, the famous 'll' sound, a is what you'd expect, 'f' is 'v' and 'ur' is 'ir' (but not quite).

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Gareth Jones (Plaid, Aberconwy) is to retire. He's 71 so it's not really a surprise, but it's a bit of a blow for Plaid all the same; only reason he won in 2007 was his personal vote.

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Do you still have the list figures?

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Another YouGov/ITV Wales poll (it's nice to see regular polls of Wales; it's the only way that they'll ever improve)...

Constituency: Llafur 44%, Tories 22%, Plaid 19%, LDems 11%
List: Llafur 41%, Tories 21%, Plaid 19%, LDem 12%

Apparent movement from Plaid to Labour at constituency level (but could easily be because of where was sampled; that's more of an issue in Wales than elsewhere), list vote nowhere near as catastrophic for the LibDems.

Referendum figures: YES 49, NO 30. I would be happier if that was just a tad higher...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The latest YouGov (because no one else is even daring it seems) doth say...

Constituency: Llafur 44%, Plaid 21%, Tories 19%, LibDems 9%
List: Llafur 40%, Plaid 23%, Tories 18%, LibDems 9%

Not seen the referendum figures yet.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

52% Yes? Excellent news. Excellent.

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Yeah....Wales had never exactly been the Lib Dems' hotbed.

It's never really been a hot bed for anything other Labour since the 1920s...

I'm reasonably sure that it's been Plaid's best region throughout their existence

But it was also the best for the Liberals until the 1950s and always better than average for the CPGB. The LibDems have also done well in urban areas in local elections for a while and managed to translate some of that into General Election votes in May; though that's all gone already, probably.

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The latest YouGov (I suspect that I may have missed one, but it doesn't matter greatly right now) has attracted attention elsewhere, but here it is here also:

Constituency: Llafur 44, Con 23, Plaid 21, LDem 6
List: Llafur 42, Con 22, Plaid 21, LDem 5, UKIP 5

Referendum: Yes 48, No 30

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The voting intention figures remain pretty stable, though that's an especially awful LibDem poll. UKIP creeping up like that is quite interesting. The refendum poll is a bit of a concern though; as noted before Wales is a very small 'c' conservative country in many respects (because it is also an unusual rural - or at least non-urban - country for somewhere in the West, basically) and the tendency for undecideds to stick with what they know is stronger than most of the rest of the U.K. Hopefully a desire to give the government a kicking will drag it over the line comfortably enough...

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For reference:



So, yeah. The Communists are not going to poll 3% in the North Wales region. Statistical noise.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Any reason the Greens do comparatively well in rural Wales?

I don't think there's a single reason, but it's part of a general pattern. Greenies can do alright in agricultural areas in England as well; two different rural divisions in Herefordshire have elected Green county councillors over the past decade, for example. In places where environmental concerns are obvious there will always be a small number of people who prioritise them to an unusual extent. Of course you also have the Stroudie phenomenon; people with 'alternative' lifestyles moving to the countryside and voting accordingly. That can be overplayed; most incomers are Tories.

Still, I suspect that the decent Green percentage in Ceredigion came from Aber, and the percentage in Clwyd South (which is very rural in terms of settlement patterns) was on the low side. Clwyd West as well, but the population there is concentrated in the retirement centres on the coast (hardly anyone lives in the south of it).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Part one of my first set of ramblings... future ones probably won't need all the national stuff...

Introduction

These elections will probably turn out to be the most important in the short history of devolved politics in Wales, as they will be the first held with a Conservative-led government at Westminster and the first held in which the Welsh Assembly Government is in direct political opposition to central government. The future pattern of devolution in Wales will almost certainly be shaped out of whatever happens next, much as the current pattern of devolution was largely shaped by the hostility of the people of Wales to the Thatcher and Major governments. Or, to be brief, this election matters a great deal in constitutional terms, and not just because of the referendum. It will also be a very interesting election because the mood will be utterly different to that of previous elections, something that will also make it very unpredictable. So it isn't really possible to make any predictions until some thought is given to the likely mood of the electorate by May and of the situation as it stands.

The National Situation

The most important thing to remember is that the Cameron government is already unpopular in Wales and is likely to become even more so over the next few months. Why does this matter so much? Because the established pattern in Britain is for turnout patterns in non-General Elections to be heavily influenced by a desire by supporters of the opposition to give the government a kicking and by relative apathy on the part of supporters of the government. There is also a small section of the electorate that appears to vote reflexively against the government, irrespective of how they vote in General Elections (though that's more a phenomenon of the Midlands than Wales). The trouble is that it's often hard to tell how important all of this is until the votes are actually counted. Still, it's probably enough to be reminded of the existence of those patterns every now and again; keep them in mind and there's less chance of being surprised by any results. Usually.
The second thing to remember is that the Assembly Government is pretty popular; Carwyn Jones is not as charismatic as Rhodri Morgan, but he has managed to portray himself as someone prepared to stand up for Wales against a distant and uncaring central government and, consequently, has high approval ratings. The Labour/Plaid coalition has also proved far less fractious than many had feared, and the Assembly Government has made its ideological differences with the Cameron government as clear as it can and will enter the election with both its constituent parties pledged to maintaining its universalist policies as far as is possible. Plaid are unlikely to make major gains (and increased Labour turnout may cause problems - or at least reduced majorities - in Y Fro Gymraeg) but oughtn't suffer serious losses, and Labour will, rather obviously, make large gains; though most of the gains in terms of votes will be piled up in safe industrial constituencies. The majorities in some might look amusingly mountainous.

So, an election in which a popular regional government positions itself against an unpopular central one. Sounds pretty straightforward, right? Well, up to a point it is, but then things start getting messy. How will the electoral pain for the parties in government at Westminster be doled out? There are three basic possibilities. The first is that the Tories do about as well as they did in 2007 but the LibDems collapse into near oblivion (we could call this the YouGov scenario). The second is that both parties take a battering (though the balance would be uncertain, of course), while the third is that most of the lost votes are on the Tory side as, actually, the LibDems did pretty poorly in 2007. The third is the least likely, but is not impossible. The LibDems will certainly do very badly in the urban areas where they did well in 2007 (and, for the most part, better in 2008 and 2010) and that will drag down their percentages overall. But will they suffer a big hit in Mid Wales as well? As for the Tories, will all those suburban/retirementland voters they finally managed to unlock from 2007 onwards actually bother to turn out in 2011? There's no reason to assume that they 'will because they're Tories' as they didn't in 1999 or 2003.

Finally, some attention must also be given to the minor parties. I've not had a close look at the figures to see how close any were to winning a regional seat in 2007, but I don't think we can entirely rule out UKIP picking one up somewhere if they work out how to play the system and learn how to harvest protest votes in elections that more than three people care about. The BNP did quite well in 2007 (largely in reaction to Polish immigration; look at Wrexham on the map above) but failed to build on that and will presumably fall back in 2011 due to problems off stage. The Greenies may be able to capitalise on LibDem woes in certain areas though presumably won't actually pick up any seats.

Part two will look at constituencies and make ill-informed and biased predictions about them.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Part two, some of the early constituency predictions. Will also include some very brief descriptions for those that don't know much about Wales or Welsh politics but who are curious; at some point I will also write laughably detailed stuff (or intended to; will depend on other things) but for now...

Aberavon: this is a rock-solid Labour constituency based on the steel town of Port Talbot, the old mining communities of the Afan Valley and several industrial towns south of Neath, such as Briton Ferry. Brian Gibbons is retiring and whoever the next Labour candidate is will win by a massive margin.

Aberconwy: this is a strange constituency and one of the hardest to predict from this early stage. At its core are the resort towns on the eastern shore of the Conwy estuary beneath the Great Orme (Llandudno, Deganwy, etc.) which are English speaking, middle class and conservative (though there are some working class areas, notably Llandudno Junction and some parts of Llandudno itself), but it also includes a Labour-voting coastal strip and the Conwy Valley (agricultural and Welsh speaking, though also including the pretty little tourist trap that is Betws-y-Coed). The constituency was created in 2007 and was won by Gareth Jones, one of Plaid's most right-wing AMs and a man with a large personal vote in the more conservative parts of Llandudno. He's retiring in 2011, something that makes Aberconwy very hard to predict; in the General Election Plaid actually finished fourth here. Turnout patterns and the likely collapse of the GE LibDem vote means that Plaid can't be ruled out here, even without Jones, but an against-the-grain Tory gain is certainly possible, as is a freak Labour victory on a split vote. One to watch, obviously.

Alyn & Deeside: covers the south east of Flintshire and, as such, is quite a diverse constituency, including industrial Deeside, sizeable towns like Buckley and Broughton and various Chester suburbs and commuter villages. There are some major industrial employers here, notably Airbus. The seat has been held since 2003 by Carl Sargeant a popular local AM who has also become an effective minister. He'll win easily.

Arfon: a diverse North Wales constituency dominated by the public sector, Arfon includes the university city of Bangor along with the administrative centre of Caernarfon and a large number of former slate quarrying communities in the Ogwen Valley, the Nantlle Valley and around Llanberis. There's probably no need to point out that the constituency is majority Welsh speaking. It has unusual politics as a result of the odd turnout patterns of North Wales (basically Plaid supporters always vote, supporters of other parties - and the only other party with a large following here is Labour - are more fickle) which has recently made for a tight marginal at Westminster but a big Plaid majority in 2007. Alun Ffred Jones ought to be re-elected, but there are reasons for him to be wary; Labour did quite well in North West Wales in the General Election (relative to the overall picture anyway), Labour voters will be more motivated simply by being in opposition at Westminster, while Bangor is home to around ten thousand students and it is no longer safe to assume that they will be basically apathetic. Actually, there's another reason for concern; Llais Gwynedd (a populist local political party) might run a candidate and they'd likely poll especially well in the rural area south of Caenarfon; which is usually one of Plaid's strongest areas in Wales. Potentially interesting.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Part three... and it will actually be just a single constituency and one with a very predictable result. But attention must be paid, and all that.

Blaenau Gwent: arguably the most working class constituency in Britain, Blaenau Gwent covers, as the name indicates, the highest of the Monmouthshire Valleys and the eastern Breconshire Valleys.  The entire area made the transition from iron to coal in the late nineteenth century (and also to steel in the early twentieth in the case of Ebbw Vale) and from coal to a combination of consumer manufacturing and mass unemployment in the late twentieth. The largest town is Ebbw Vale, the second largest is Tredegar (birthplace of Nye Bevan and Neil Kinnock) and these two towns formed the core of the Ebbw Vale constituency held by Bevan until his death in 1960. The eastern third of the constituency is a little different, being characterised by much smaller towns (Brynmawr, Nantyglo, Blaina, Abertillery and Llanhilleth) but is, and has always been, as fiercely proletarian as Ebbw Vale and Tredegar. Recent political history in the constituency has been dominated by the popular populist politician Peter Law who was elected for Labour in 1999 but who had extremely poor relations with the Labour leadership in the Assembly. Law's ambitions within the Assembly were blocked and an attempt to become the area's Labour MP was blocked by the imposition of an all-women shortlist before the 2005 General Election. He ran as an Independent Labour candidate, won easily and died shortly after. In the meantime his supporters had joined up with various failed local politicians and misfits (not an exaggeration) to form the populist local party 'People's Voice' (which, of course, denied that it was a political party). In the by-elections that followed his death, Law's widow was elected to the Assembly and Dai Davies, his agent, to Westminster. Trish Law was easily re-elected in 2007, but the wheels started to fall off People's Voice in 2008 when they performed below expectations in local elections. Blaenau Gwent CLP, meanwhile, benefited from the defection of deadwood in various stages, selected a pair of ambitions Tredegar-born candidates (Nick Smith for Westminster, Alun Davies - a list AM for Mid & West Wales and the latest politician to follow in Elystan Morgan's footsteps) and, basically, got its act together. Smith obliterated Dai Davies at the General Election, People's Voice essentially disbanded and Trish Law decided not to run for re-election. Another independent (backed by Law) will be running, but she's from Merthyr and has no real connection to the area. It would be a massive shock if Davies doesn't win by miles.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

(Oh, also: you meant to type "in Britain", surely.)

Yes! I'll go back and change that...

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He's never run in a direct election as anything other than an also-ran, so it's hard to tell. When he was in Plaid, he got 4.8% in Blaenau Gwent in 1992 (very low, but slightly higher than Plaid's previous candidate managed) and 10.6% in Cynon Valley in 1997 (essentially stable on the 1992 result for Plaid there, which was normal for South Wales that year). For Labour he took 12% in Ceredigion in 2005; 3.4pts lower than the candidate in 2001 and 6.3pts higher than the candidate last year.

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Another YouGov poll...

Constituency: Llafur 45, Con 21, Plaid 21, LDem 7
List: Llafur 41, Plaid 21, Con 20, LDem 8

...and once again, no major changes. Slight Tory slippage, but that could easily be noise.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Well we took 30 out of 60 with 40% and 36.6% back in 2003.

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Are you sure that they'd get so badly smashed on the regional top-up lists? They took three such seats in 2007 despite polling only 11.7% of the list vote.