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However you add it up the coalition is still the brake on Labour

By Angela Harbutt
September 25th, 2011 at 7:00 am | 3 Comments | Posted in polls, Weird and Wonderful

The latest poll (by BPIX) on the state of the parties, commissioned by The Mail on Sunday, shows Ed Miliband in more than a spot of  bother. Voters think he is the wrong leader and that Labour has been rubbish in opposition….No wonder he has resorted to putting his children in front of the cameras… do politicians never learn?…. What is surprising it that Labour is still ahead in the polls…

Our vote still looks poor.. but consider the combined vote of  the Lib Dem and Tory parties…. that makes for a healthier proposition… If that is not enough… then consider the following… 

” when asked if Labour would do a better job in Government than the Tory-Lib Dem alliance, the Coalition wins by 43 to 35 “

 Consider what options the Coalition might consider were this September 2014 ?

My favourite bit of the poll is much less serious – but huge fun. It’s where voters were asked to compare the party leders with characters in the ITV series Downton Abbey…..

For those of you who don’t watch the programme Matthew Crawley is the somewhat earnest solicitor and heir to Downton!

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A fresh breeze from Belize

By Andy Mayer
December 12th, 2010 at 2:12 pm | 2 Comments | Posted in Liberal Democrats, polls

Lord Ashcroft, the former Conservative Party Treasurer responsible for funding target seat campaigns, many against Liberal Democrats, is not an entirely popular figure in this parish. Indeed the media spin on his latest report

 “Lib Dems ‘to lose half their support at the next General Election'” – Telegraph

“The LibDems may cease to be” – Iain Dale

… is unlikely to increase the number of air mail Christmas Cards winging their way to Belize.

However the research he has commissioned is important and there are much useful analysis within it that Liberal Democrats should not ignore.  I note particularly the conclusion of the Summary which states

“Pandering to the party’s oppositionist tendency may win back a few of the voters who don’t like what has happened since May – but at the expense of many more who think the Liberal Democrats are finally getting somewhere.”

Or put another way

“Those who voted Liberal Democrat mainly as a protest against the two main parties, or to stop another party from winning, were consistently more negative about the Lib Dems and their performance in government than those who had voted for a positive reason”

It may be obvious, but if your goal is to govern, you cannot build a sustainable coalition around factions more geared to permanent opposition.

The report also quantifies where disgruntled support is likely to go

“54% of those who voted Lib Dem in 2010 said they were likely to do so again in 2015. 22% expected to vote Labour, 5% Conservative and 8% for another party.”

And highlights the mixed blessing that many (43%) still vote Liberal Democrat mostly because of local issues and candidates, with a hope for a Liberal Democrat government next (21%), and tactical voting a much smaller consideration.

I say mixed as on the upside it means the currently negative national narrative will not be as impactful on individual results as the polls would suggest. But on the downside still implies the party has much to do to build up a core vote who are both instinctive liberals and identify those instincts with the Liberal Democrats.

The rest of the 32-page report is packed with many more useful quotes and numbers that a worth reading directly.

But it will be interesting to see whether the party’s strategists take this data as a sign they need to reach out again to the one in five former and more left-wing supporters who’d rather now vote Labour, or look for new support where a more left-leaning Labour party will alienate. Our preference, given the centre-ground is where elections are won and has more voters, particularly genuinely liberal voters, would be the latter.

What would lack credibility though is if Clegg reaches out one way whilst Farron and local candidates the other. And that remains the central message of this report. Nick Clegg needs to be the first Liberal Democrat Leader since Ashdown to set a direction and stick to it. Going both ways at once is like doing the splits in trousers. Whatever is in the middle ends up looking rather exposed to the political elements. And the breeze from Belize may not always be so tropical.