Browsed by
Category: UK Elections – others

Tonight’s battle grounds – the seats that are being defended

Tonight’s battle grounds – the seats that are being defended

There is a whole series of different sets of elections taking place today and the chart focuses on English council seats which were last fought in 2013. Mostly the seats being contested are in the old shire counties so this is not fertile territory for Labour in any circumstances period as can be seen. The Tories completely dominated last time these were fought. 2013 was the third year of the coalition waspretty bad year for the Lib Dems. It was…

Read More Read More

Get ready for a big psephological debate on Friday on how much you can read in to the locals

Get ready for a big psephological debate on Friday on how much you can read in to the locals

How much a general election pointer will the locals be? The timing of the 2017 General Election has created an almost unique situation. This is the first time in the modern era when a general election has been called before the May local elections and the campaign period covered those elections. Since 1992 all general elections have been held on the same day as the local elections scheduled for those years. The impact has been that the turnout in the…

Read More Read More

A week tonight and we have 2017’s first big set of elections

A week tonight and we have 2017’s first big set of elections

Harry Hayfield looks forward 7 days So as there are no local by-elections this week, here’s the final part of my estimates for the local elections in Wales and Scotland. Wales As for the estimates for the English counties, I had a look at the by-elections in Wales since the referendum, tallied the changes on 2012 and noted if the council had voted to REMAIN or LEAVE and made the following observation. In REMAIN councils, the change was Lab -6%,…

Read More Read More

Labour’s May 4th prospects are looking appalling in England, Wales and Scotland

Labour’s May 4th prospects are looking appalling in England, Wales and Scotland

And UKIP are in for a pounding as well UKIP’s set to have more losses that its actually contesting Today I have been in London for the annual local elections briefing organised by the Political Studies Association. The panelists were Professors Colin Rawlings and Michael Thrasher for England with Rodger Scully for Wales and Professor John Curtice for Scotland. Rawlings and Thrasher focused on their by-election prediction model which just covers England and suggested that there’s a possibility that Labour…

Read More Read More

What ‘good’ will look like for the parties in this year’s May elections

What ‘good’ will look like for the parties in this year’s May elections

Who should win what, and what will the misses and bonuses mean? The expectations game is an unavoidable part of politics and one that pundits and practitioners play with relish. It is, of course, such an intrinsic part of betting that it’s difficult to meaningfully isolate betting from expectations. There are more direct practical consequences of how a party performs against expectations. It’s one thing to lose seats; it’s another to lose more than people expect – or, for that…

Read More Read More

More of those who actually vote in local and general elections went for REMAIN not LEAVE

More of those who actually vote in local and general elections went for REMAIN not LEAVE

Prof John Curtice LEAVE won because of its success with the politically disengaged It has become very common since the referendum to view all other elections through the prism of what happened on June 23rd last year. Thus parliamentary constituencies are divided into leave or remain depending on how they voted and this becomes the shorthand for describing a place. We are told, for instance, that twice as many Labour MPs are in constituencies that voted leave than remain leading,…

Read More Read More

Next month’s Super Mayoral elections – the starting points for the parties

Next month’s Super Mayoral elections – the starting points for the parties

On the face of it all but two should go LAB – but will they? In a month’s time we see the first elections for the Mayors of the 6 new combined authorities in England. Elections are via the supplementary vote system so all voters have a first and a second choice. This is the same system that was first used for the election of Ken Livingstone in London in 2000, and has become a model for all elected mayors…

Read More Read More

The signs are that UKIP will get a pasting in the May 4th elections

The signs are that UKIP will get a pasting in the May 4th elections

They’re defending seats won at their 2013 highpoint For me this week is all about the May 4th elections. Yesterday the Tory psephologist, Lord Robert Hayward, gave his annual presentation and predictions and there’s a fair bit of coverage in today’s press. Unlike the Rallings and Thrasher seat projection which is confined to the English local council elections Lord Hayward embraced Wales and Scotland as well and in the latter suggested that would produce more big problems for LAB including…

Read More Read More