United Kingdom General Elections: December 12th, 2019

[Cassius]

For reasons that genuinely escape me, the LibDems seem to have endorsed the same "permanent government surplus" plan that went down like a cup of cold sick when Liz Kendall put it forward in the 2015 Labour contest.

As I understand, the proposal is for ‘current spending’ (welfare payments et al) to be covered by taxation, whilst ‘worthwhile investment’ will be funded by borrowing, so not quite a British version of a balanced budget amendment.

Of course, it’s just posturing for the ‘fIsCaLlY cOnSeRvAtIvE but SoCiAlLy LiBeRaL’ technocracy crowd that the Lib Dem’s have been gunning full bore for since Swinson took over. Not that most of them will understand the distinction between current and investment spending.

[Oryxslayer]

Its actually the first TV debate (a straight Johnson v Corbyn one) just this Tuesday (on ITV)

Anyway, the SNP have now joined the LibDems and filed a legal suit with ITV over their decision to make the first debate 1v1. The SNP is citing their position as 3rd largest party, the LibDems cited their competitive poll numbers, numbers that are similar to what Clegg had before the surge. Essentially ITV needed to set out SOME parameters for getting into their debate, they could have been high AF and restricted it to the top two, but setting out none and saying top two looks like you're playing favorites.

[Silent Hunter]

For reasons that genuinely escape me, the LibDems seem to have endorsed the same "permanent government surplus" plan that went down like a cup of cold sick when Liz Kendall put it forward in the 2015 Labour contest.

As I understand, the proposal is for ‘current spending’ (welfare payments et al) to be covered by taxation, whilst ‘worthwhile investment’ will be funded by borrowing, so not quite a British version of a balanced budget amendment.

Of course, it’s just posturing for the ‘fIsCaLlY cOnSeRvAtIvE but SoCiAlLy LiBeRaL’ technocracy crowd that the Lib Dem’s have been gunning full bore for since Swinson took over. Not that most of them will understand the distinction between current and investment spending.

That seems a rather reasonable stance to have with allowances for recessions.

[Oryxslayer]

Good chart. The tories are standing three more than labour because 3 NI conservatives are running in safe unionist seats and won't get their deposits back.

I can't see the image. Can you upload it to an image host (such as imgur)?

fixed.

[Cassius]

For reasons that genuinely escape me, the LibDems seem to have endorsed the same "permanent government surplus" plan that went down like a cup of cold sick when Liz Kendall put it forward in the 2015 Labour contest.

As I understand, the proposal is for ‘current spending’ (welfare payments et al) to be covered by taxation, whilst ‘worthwhile investment’ will be funded by borrowing, so not quite a British version of a balanced budget amendment.

Of course, it’s just posturing for the ‘fIsCaLlY cOnSeRvAtIvE but SoCiAlLy LiBeRaL’ technocracy crowd that the Lib Dem’s have been gunning full bore for since Swinson took over. Not that most of them will understand the distinction between current and investment spending.

That seems a rather reasonable stance to have with allowances for recessions.

From what I can see on current spending it’s a return to the Osbornist view of surpluses needing to be maintained regardless of the wider economic picture, so I guess no allowances for counter-cyclical expenditure. Also, the definition of investment can be argued - from what I’ve read it will only apply to capital projects in the Lib Dem package, even though many (not me, but I’m not an economist) would argue that education and even childcare could be viewed as a form of investment.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The chances are that this won't lead anywhere, but it's worth keeping half an eye on just in case.

[cp]

The chances are that this won't lead anywhere, but it's worth keeping half an eye on just in case.

Indeed. This also seems unlikely to have much lasting impact ... but a girl can dream.

[DaWN]

For reasons that genuinely escape me, the LibDems seem to have endorsed the same "permanent government surplus" plan that went down like a cup of cold sick when Liz Kendall put it forward in the 2015 Labour contest.

It's far from the best policy they could have come up with, but a policy that doesn't go down well with the internal Labour electorate isn't one that will necessarily go down badly with the types of voter the Lib Dems need to win seats.

[Pandaguineapig]

The chances are that this won't lead anywhere, but it's worth keeping half an eye on just in case.

Indeed. This also seems unlikely to have much lasting impact ... but a girl can dream.

Given that Corbyn was endorsed by David Duke this would be a stupid game to play

[Oryxslayer]

Three London constituency polls were published by Deltapolls and reported on by The Guardian here. Overall, they show a similar picture  to what I talked about a while back on the wealthy, remainy, 'slice' of Western London. There's a third constituency here from the Jewish Barnet region, which confirms that even as the non-slice London keeps moving towards Labour, the Jewish vote remains Corbyn's metaphorical ulcer.

Important quote from guardian, which probably signals that all three would go LD if the Oranges keep polling well enough:

-Most Labour and Lib Dem supporters are prepared to vote tactically if their preferred party is out of the running.

-Labour supporters are willing to switch to the Lib Dems in overwhelming numbers – in all three seats by enough to give the Lib Dems victory.

-Lib Dem supporters tend to prefer Labour, but far less decisively. If they can’t have a Lib Dem MP, quite a few would vote Conservative, in each case by enough to increase the Tory majority.

Images sourced from guardian article in post.

[God-Empress Stacey I of House Abrams]

FPP is a cancer. There's a lot I like about Ed Miliband, but his contribution to torpedoing AV will go down as a black mark in history.

[cp]

The chances are that this won't lead anywhere, but it's worth keeping half an eye on just in case.

Indeed. This also seems unlikely to have much lasting impact ... but a girl can dream.

Given that Corbyn was endorsed by David Duke this would be a stupid game to play

No he hasn't. Duke commented on the reports about Corbyn's 'English irony' statement (widely misreported in the press, but never mind that) in 2018. Duke hasn't made an endorsement and if he did Corbyn would likely have the political sense to denounce it right away. Unlike Johnson.

FPP is a cancer. There's a lot I like about Ed Miliband, but his contribution to torpedoing AV will go down as a black mark in history.

Miliband did lots wrong, but this one isn't on him.

In any case, in the case of Finchley and Wimbledon, this is probably good news for the anti-Tory forces, as those seats are currently held by Tories and have never really been in reach for Labour. Kensington is currently held by Labour, but it was a *super* marginal seat, and the Tory candidate's showing in that poll is actually down about 4 points on their 2017 total. If some wise dame does a bit more polling in the lead up to election day and gives a clear indication of which party is in second place, I suspect there will be a bit of anti-Tory herding behind them.

[afleitch]

Some good new for the Tories in this weekends polls

BMG 0 0 0 0
YouGov +3 0 0 0
Deltapoll +4 +1 -5 0
ComRes +1 +3 -2 -2
Opinium +3 -1 -1 0

[DaWN]

We don't all have to have the constituency poll discussion again, do we?

[Oryxslayer]

We don't all have to have the constituency poll discussion again, do we?

We don't. However they are rare enough to post when they show up.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Some good new for the Tories in this weekends polls

BMG 0 0 0 0
YouGov +3 0 0 0
Deltapoll +4 +1 -5 0
ComRes +1 +3 -2 -2
Opinium +3 -1 -1 0

From some of them yes. Though with the caveat that some of the ones showing the best numbers look very strange, and we all know what that often means. The general lack of agreement between firms continues...

[CumbrianLeftie]

The polls showing the Tories on 44-45% are apparently saying some other weird and wonderful things, such as 90% of over-60s are going to vote. One also apparently has a massive (and unexplained) rise in Johnson's personal rating.

The constituency polls are also not that recent, in particular the Kensington one was taken before Gyimah's comments about Dent Coad - which do not appear to have gone down well locally.

[Annatar]

According to the Economist's General Election tracker, on October 30th the Conservatives had a 10% lead over Labour, on November 16th they had a 12% lead. So far there has been no narrowing but Labour still has 4 weeks left to gain votes.

[parochial boy]

see what you wanna see innit

[Filuwaúrdjan]

see what you wanna see innit

Doesn't help that if you drew up a list of 'Britain's most obviously dodgy pollsters' then the Venn Diagramme between that list and the list of firms with contracts with the Sunday papers right now would... well...

[Pericles]

see what you wanna see innit

Doesn't help that if you drew up a list of 'Britain's most obviously dodgy pollsters' then the Venn Diagramme between that list and the list of firms with contracts with the Sunday papers right now would... well...

I usually am not receptive to the "Polls are junk, ignore them!" argument but I am more receptive to it for the UK than most contexts.

[Pericles]

Electoral Calculus has made some changes to their model that I thought were interesting. https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

This latest update has cut the predicted Conservative majority from over a hundred to around fifty. We have also improved the handling of seats where parties do not stand candidates, and improved the tactical voting feature in the user predictor.

The major change is the new baseline. Our modelling works by applying regression techniques (sometimes also called MRP or RPP) to detailed polling information to learn how voters with particular demographic and political characteristics tend to vote on average. This information is then applied to the census and political data of each seat to get an estimate of the current voting intention of each seat. The new baseline is based on recent polling and should give a more accurate "shape" of political opinion through the country.

Following the Brexit party's decision not to stand in half the seats, our predictors now assume that Brexit support is only counted by respondents who live in a seat where there will be a Brexit candidate. Using this convention, measured Brexit party support will appear to have halved, being around 4pc-5pc rather than 8pc-10pc. YouGov have announced they will poll on this basis, but other pollsters might not. When using the user predictor, use the smaller number to avoid over-estimating Brexit support.

The current estimate, based on a 10-point Tory lead, is reasonably in line with expectations (perhaps slightly higher than expected), showing around 350 Tory seats and 215-ish for Labour. For the purposes of this post, I'll focus on uniform swings from the Tories to Labour from the projections, to keep things simple (of course a major factor will be where support for other parties ends up). A 1% swing from the Tories to Labour (a swing from the projected percentages, not from 2017) results in 326 Tories to 232 seats for Labour, even though the Tory popular vote margin over Labour is 8-9 points. Another 1% swing means the Tories have a slight net loss from 2017, while Labour also loses 20 seats, this is with a 6-7 point Tory popular vote lead (so a significant national swing to the Tories from Labour). From there the changes are less, a further 1% swing results in 308-247, then 302-253, and with a virtually tied popular vote the Tories still have a significant lead in seats, 300-255 (of course they probably are ejected from government in this scenario).

This is just one model, though the use of MRP may make it more credible. It is an interesting dynamic, and if true the Tory position is a lot more precarious than the national polls make it seem. It does seem to go against the fact that Leave won most constituencies. However, a lot of the constituencies with very high Leave votes that Boris is trying to flip also seem to have strong Labour majorities, so a big swing that reduces but does not eliminate the Labour majority in these seats would be useless to the Tories in terms of seats. I haven't researched this in depth, please link me to research others have done on this, but this is another source of uncertainty for this election.

[Silent Hunter]

I think a Conservative majority of 50 is at the top end of realistic projections here.

[cp]

I think a Conservative majority of 50 is at the top end of realistic projections here.

I must confess, I'm all over the place how to read the state of play. The polls aren't good for Labour, but they're also not bad, and not really as positive for the Tories as the commentariat portrays them. Labour's policy announcements are going down well and Corbyn's TV appearances have been pretty good, but his rock bottom personal approval numbers seemed baked in. Johnson hasn't had a great week, but his middling/positive personal approval rating seems untouchable; why he isn't as unpopular as Corbyn still baffles me. With 3 1/2 weeks to go, anything from a Labour plurality to a Tory landslide seem possible, but the upshot of most people's analyses is that the Tories have a near-to-full majority locked in.

Meanwhile, I think IPSOS is going to release a poll for Esher & Walton some time soon. My landline just got called for a pretty extensive survey.

[Pericles]

If the polls look like this on Election Day then Boris clearly wins. However, I think that the margin will most likely be closer and there is a significant possibility of a big Labour surge.