18-OCT 2023 : LAB 44% / CON 28% / LDM 9% / REF 7%

[peterbell]

guymonde wrote :-

"I occasionally weaken and watch a bit of Question Time. Fiona Bruce asked the audience - no doubt carefully selected for balance - for those who supported Rwanda policy to put their hands up. One hand wen up and a rather weedy support was given. She said surely there must be others. Another hand went up but it turned out he didn't support Rwanda!
That ship had sailed"

I also watched the program and yes, Fiona introduce the program saying it was a Con constituency but as usual that the audience was balenced. I found it difficult to believe that Fiona had such difficulty finding anyone supporting the government position on Rwanda (perhaps that is because no-one knows what the true position is)

However, during the previous couple of days Sunak and several ministers referred to the fact that the Rwanda program was what voters wanted. I thought at the time that, as usual, it was a Tory lie and this audience confirmed it.

[James E]

Dec 10, 2023 17:41:32 GMT pjw1961 said:

Dec 10, 2023 16:40:50 GMT c-a-r-f-r-e-w said:

...... Regarding target seats etc… as the swing towards Labour has mounted, to what extent do Labour shift resources away from the marginals with smaller conservative majorities they might now be expected to win easily given the polling, towards taking on some of the bigger Conservative majorities that now might come into play given the expected big swing? (Versus to what extent do they play it safe?)

I can't tell you what Labour should be doing, but I can tell you what they are doing, which is ignoring the polls and MRP predictions and behaving as if the next GE will be a tight one where they need to concentrate resources on the marginals as based primarily on 2019. Locally most of the north Essex and some south Suffolk CLPs are being told to send all resources to Colchester at the GE and ignore the fact that MRPs are suggesting that a number of other 'non-target' seats are currently vulnerable. Based on my colleagues in Braintree and Witham not everyone is happy about that as they want to campaign in their own area. ........

It is worth noting that this is what happened in 1997, with Labour HQ sticking to its list of targets drawn up after 1992 and sending most resources there, only to find that the anti-Conservative mood meant that they won loads of seats they didn't expect to. It is possible this could happen again at the next GE, but I don't see Labour centrally changing its approach. 
 

As you have mentioned 'what happened in 1997', I was reminded of some contemparary analysis of how Labour fared in Conservative-held seats 26 years ago.

Per page 14 of 18 in the article below, Labour performed better than the overall GB swing in Conservative-held seats in 1997, many of which would have been well beyond the 90 (of 335-ish) they targetted. As the tables show that there were 63 'marginal' Con seats with Lab in second, 43 'possible' and '69' safe', so it seems logical that Labour's 90- targets would have included all the 'marginal' ones, plus around half of the 'possibles'. Labour performed above UNS in all Con-held seats, but did best of all in the untargetted 'safe' ones.  

www.dannydorling.org/wp-content/files/dannydorling_publication_id1318.pdf

Conservative held seats from 1992-97, vote change

Marginal : Con -12.3%, Lab +12.2%
Possible: Con - 12.2%, Lab +13.7%
Safe: Con -13.1%, Lab +13.8%

These figures compared to an average Con vote-share fall in all GB seats of 11.5%, and an average Lab rise in all seats of 9.5%. 

[alec]

Some really significant signs of nervousness in European health circles this weekend. In Austria, waste water samples show covid at the highest levels since the pandemic started (not 100% reliable in terms of actual numbers infected but very clear signal for the trend), Italy is seeing a very rapid surge of hospitalisations and deaths in Finland and Sweden are at levels not seen all year. Germany appears to be the first European country to break rank, and after warning on Thursday about about the risks of incurable long covid afflicting 3% after each round of infection, today their health minister appeared in public to warn about the coming wave.

He advised Germans to mask on buses and trains, work from home where possible, avoid indoor Christmas parties, test before meeting up with people and book whatever vaccine boosters you are eligible for.

It's a similar story in parts of North America, where health officials in many territories are trying to ramp up protective measures again (the US is giving free LFT tests out again, for example).

Without making too much public fuss over this (until today) it's clear that governments around the world have been getting increasingly concerned about the JN.1 variant, and those fears appear justified. While significant uncertainties remain, it looks like this will be the second biggest wave of the pandemic in terms of infections, and there are early signs that hospitalisations are rising faster than infections in some areas.

I think we're in for a difficult winter, and there is total silence from the UK authorities.

Edit: Netherlands now also reporting record levels of covid in wastewater samples. Austria not a sampling blip - this looks real.

[hireton]

crossbat11

"Whereas most people right across the UK have much different priorities. I listed most of them in the post you were replying to and I still stick with my contention, that you both contested and derided, that Starmer is starting to speak to this body of opinion and pitching his flag on that terrain where, in my view, a great swathe of voters reside too."

The first issue with your analysis is that the 'centrist' terrain you identify is a shifting not static terrain. For example, not long ago "the centre" did not encompass equal marriage, today - for the time being- it does. That change would not have come about without insistent and what you might label "divisive" campaigning and political leadership. And that's also the case for many other issues. We can already see that a lot of money and effort is being spent on moving the "centre" radically rightwards.

The second issue with your analysis is your list of "centrist" concerns. In the main, they define in very broad terms a liberal democracy but not much else which gives character to it. So nothing about, for example, social justice, equalities of all types, environmental priorities, constitutional reform issues and so on. It is as anodyne and pointless as John Major’s la la land of warm beer, regional train companies, and cricket on the village green.

The third issue is that you assume that "most people across the UK" agree with you and, by implication, if they don't they are either being divisive or have misdirected themselves under pressure from those who are divisive. This doesn't leave much room for political debate and change on major issues.

So if Starmer is "pitching his flag" where you say it will be a terrain without much if any political substance and one where he will have to move as the "centre" does. So he will be a political follower and not a leader. Some might say that describes Starmer very well.

[chrisc]

Dec 10, 2023 17:59:37 GMT alec said:

chrisc - just wanted to say that I do fundamentally agree with you. More physical exercise is the first and most important step to improving health

Thanks. I think it’s difficult to actively change people’s attitudes here, but rather cheap to at least remove some barriers. 

[pjw1961]

Dec 10, 2023 19:36:27 GMT James E said:

Dec 10, 2023 17:41:32 GMT pjw1961 said:

I can't tell you what Labour should be doing, but I can tell you what they are doing, which is ignoring the polls and MRP predictions and behaving as if the next GE will be a tight one where they need to concentrate resources on the marginals as based primarily on 2019. Locally most of the north Essex and some south Suffolk CLPs are being told to send all resources to Colchester at the GE and ignore the fact that MRPs are suggesting that a number of other 'non-target' seats are currently vulnerable. Based on my colleagues in Braintree and Witham not everyone is happy about that as they want to campaign in their own area. ........

It is worth noting that this is what happened in 1997, with Labour HQ sticking to its list of targets drawn up after 1992 and sending most resources there, only to find that the anti-Conservative mood meant that they won loads of seats they didn't expect to. It is possible this could happen again at the next GE, but I don't see Labour centrally changing its approach. 
 

As you have mentioned 'what happened in 1997', I was reminded of some contemparary analysis of how Labour fared in Conservative-held seats 26 years ago.

Per page 14 of 18 in the article below, Labour performed better than the overall GB swing in Conservative-held seats in 1997, many of which would have been well beyond the 90 (of 335-ish) they targetted. As the tables show that there were 63 'marginal' Con seats with Lab in second, 43 'possible' and '69' safe', so it seems logical that Labour's 90- targets would have included all the 'marginal' ones, plus around half of the 'possibles'. Labour performed above UNS in all Con-held seats, but did best of all in the untargetted 'safe' ones.  

www.dannydorling.org/wp-content/files/dannydorling_publication_id1318.pdf

Conservative held seats from 1992-97, vote change

Marginal : Con -12.3%, Lab +12.2%
Possible: Con - 12.2%, Lab +13.7%
Safe: Con -13.1%, Lab +13.8%

These figures compared to an average Con vote-share fall in all GB seats of 11.5%, and an average Lab rise in all seats of 9.5%. 

There is some evidence to support that is also happening now in the MRP that was posted recently (https://lodestonecommunications.com/election-hub). I had a look at the local seats I know well and while Labour was shown as winning Colchester - the obvious marginal in these parts - the forecast swing was only 11.3%, whereas Labour was shown as capturing Harwich and North Essex on a 22.5% swing and Witham on a 24.9% swing. I don't actually believe the latter two results will happen, but it does support the idea that currently the movement from Con to Lab is higher in strongly Conservative areas in 2019. 

[alec]

hireton and crossbat11 - I'm getting sucked into the debate on what the centre ground is, but here, I go with hireton. The centre shifts, and, once upon a time, Labour tried to fight against that rightward shift.

My solution? No one will ever back this, but I believe that we need to ban all political donations from anywhere other than voters on the electoral roll, and have these capped at £5k per person per year. I'd include unions in this, although would permit unions to collect individual members donations by consent.

Once we get to the point where big business can't fund politics, we'll then find out where the real centre ground is, and I bet my mortgage that is won't be anywhere near where Labour or the Daily Mail thinks it is.

[alec]

chrisc - Have you come across the Finnish experience in improving health? They did a great job encouraging healthy lifestyles. Will see if I can dig out some links that I once had on that.

[pjw1961]

Dec 10, 2023 0:45:22 GMT mercian said:

Dec 9, 2023 23:48:14 GMT pjw1961 said:

That system was the result of the Lansley 'reforms' and never worked. It was quickly dropped in favour of specialist commissioners with token GP oversight, but now that has gone too. The purchaser/provider split and commissioning have been quietly buried and replaced with the integrated care system model. That is a good model but isn't working due to the gross under funding of local authorities, primary care and the NHS generally, with demand vastly exceeding resources. 

Thanks for the more up to date view. I worked in the NHS from around 2003-2016 and in that time it was reorganised 3 times if I remember correctly. You say that it has been reorganised twice more since then. That's 5 times in 20 years. I wonder whether the various political parties will eventually realise that reorganisations won't work unless the fundamental culture changes.

I note that you didn't comment on my examples of wasteful practices. Another one from my time was the automatic moving up the pay scale every year on top of the headline pay rise.  It didn't happen for those at the top of a scale of course, but I never heard of anyone who didn't move up a step apart from that, however mediocre their performance was. IMO moving up a step on a scale should only happen if your performance is better than average at least.

I ignored the examples as there is no point in getting into that kind of debate. The biggest waste of money in the English NHS is on constant government interference, target setting, regulation and assorted bureaucracy to support it (with both political parties guilty of that). I certainly don't share your opinion of NHS management as far as middle management is concerned. Most private sector managers wouldn't last long on the NHS when they realised they were expected to manage an impossible workload while being regulated and monitored to death so that they are given little discretion but plenty of blame. 

However, you will be delighted to know that automatic increments no longer occur. They are subject to review and require a positive statement on the HR systems from the line manager that objectives have been met to go through.  

[c-a-r-f-r-e-w]

“Twice as many people now think Rishi Sunak handled the pandemic badly than well, a new poll has revealed ahead of the prime minister’s crucial day of evidence to the Covid inquiry.

More than half — 52 per cent — of those asked in a YouGov survey for the Times said Sunak’s flagship Eat Out to Help Out scheme was a “bad idea,” with just a third — 32 per cent — saying it was a good idea.

….

A separate poll by Focaldata has revealed that 59 per cent of voters believe Sunak intentionally hid his WhatsApp messages from the Covid inquiry. Even among Conservative voters, 48 per cent believe he deliberately kept his the messages hidden.

The YouGov polling delivered better news for the prime minister on his estimated £400 billion of financial support handed to households and businesses during the pandemic.


More than a third — 35 per cent — said Sunak had given the “about the right level” of financial support, with 23 per cent saying it was too costly and 24 per cent saying he did not go far enough and more support should have been given. A majority — 52 per cent — of Conservative voters backed Sunak’s handling of financial support, while even a third of Labour supporters said he had got the right balance.

Sunak’s furlough scheme was seen as one of the then-chancellor’s more successful measures, which protected an estimated 12 million jobs at a cost of about £70 billion.

However, the YouGov poll carried out last week reveals how the public’s opinion of Sunak’s handling of Covid as chancellor has changed since the end of the pandemic.

It found that 56 per cent of people believe he handled the pandemic “badly” while just 29 per cent said he did “well”.

This is a complete reversal of how the public viewed hiss role during the first lockdown in spring 2020 when twice as many people thought he was doing a good job than bad. It was not until February 2022 until the public began scoring him negatively.”

[James E]

As we've touched on the 1997 General Election, here's another bit of analysis. I've done my usual YouGov cross-break analysis by 'region' and class, but here the comparisons are to where things stood after the 1997 landslide. For anyone expecting the individual constituency results to look like they did in the Blair years, the short answer is that isn't going to happen.

These figures reflect the 8 YG polls from 18 Oct onwards, which currently average as a Labour lead of 22%. Some allowance for 'swing-back' really should be made - say 4% for a winning margin of 14%. 

London
Lab 55% (+6)
Con 20% (-11)
Swing Con to Lab 9% since 1997.

South of England
Lab 40% (+9)
Con 28% (-12)
LD 13.5% (-10)
Swing Con to Lab 10.5% since 1997.

Midlands
Lab 46% (-2)
Con 28% (-6)
Swing Con to Lab 2% since 1997.

North of England
Lab 53% (-2)
Con 21% (-4)
Swing Con to Lab 1% since 1997.

Scotland
Lab 32% (-13)
Con 14% (-4)
SNP 36% (+12)
Swing Lab to SNP 12.5% since 1997.

Wales
Lab 45% (-8)
Con 17% (-3)
Swing Lab to Con 2.5% since 1997.

ABC1 Voters
Lab 48% (+14)
Con 21% (-18)
Swing Con to Lab 16% since 1997

C2DE Voters
Lab 41% (-13)
Con 27% (+3)
Swing Lab to Con 8% since 1997

Some of these changes are already visible. The shift in London towards Labour has been evident in the past 3 elections, and as of 2019 the Tories were already faring better with C2DE voters than ABC1's (per YouGov's analysis, at least) . However, this has become even more pronounced in the past 4 years. Labour is likely to fare less well in Wales than in 1997 and very likely also to less dominant than it once was in the North of England. On the other hand, the South is going to look very different. Even if we take Opinium's figures as an alternative, these show a 6% Con to Lab swing from 1997 in the South, with Labour 4 points ahead where they trailed by 9 points in the 1997 landslide. And this is in the context of Opinium's re-weighting methodology which reduces Labour average lead from around 22% to 15%.

[Deleted]

Farage has just finished third on 'I'm a Celebrity'. He might conceivably be back in the UK by Tuesday. Might add to the spice before the Rwanda vote that evening.

[c-a-r-f-r-e-w]

Chart from the Times, of IPSOS polling, concerning what people consider to be signs of success. (Click on the image to see a bigger, more readable version), see what you think. Any surprises?

[c-a-r-f-r-e-w]

From the same article as the Ipsos polling…

“When asked to rate the elements that are key to “getting ahead in life”, the top three, by a long way, were (in order): “treating others well”, “hard work” and “having ambition”.

Middle of the table were “your skills and talents” plus the kind of “leg up” assistances available to the middle classes, such as “having a good education” and “knowing the right people”. “Luck” came near the bottom of the list. Why?

“It’s telling,” Clemence says, “as it is one of the more important aspects in life. People don’t want to acknowledge a role for luck, they find it a really difficult idea. There is a lot in this research about control. The more successful you think you are, the more in control you feel. That’s a strong relationship. If you’re very successful, you don’t want to put it down to luck.”

People who rated themselves as “extremely successful” in the survey placed more weight than others on the role of talent and hard work. Successful British people consider themselves “self-made”. The least successful blamed their circumstances: they were four times as likely as the former to link family wealth to getting ahead in life.

“We hate luck,” says Paul Dolan, a professor in behavioural science at the London School of Economics and author of Happiness by Design.

“People will say, ‘Oh, you make your own luck,’ but you can’t make your own randomness, by definition. There is a lot of research that looked at leaders, showing they were tenacious, resilient, hard-working. Then someone thought, ‘Why don’t we look at unsuccessful people too?’ They had the same traits. The only thing that makes a successful person different is randomness.””

[hireton]

A thread about Labour and where it is "pitching its flag":

[pjw1961]

Dec 10, 2023 21:56:02 GMT @isa said:

Farage has just finished third on 'I'm a Celebrity'. He might conceivably be back in the UK by Tuesday. Might add to the spice before the Rwanda vote that evening.

Keeping up his record of never winning in a FPTP election then. 

[mercian]

Dec 10, 2023 9:14:33 GMT Danny said:

Dec 9, 2023 21:42:54 GMT c-a-r-f-r-e-w said:

Currently the lead article in the Times:


“Wes Streeting: NHS uses every winter crisis as an excuse for cash
Britain’s medical chiefs must accept that money is tight, says the shadow health secretary, and they can learn lessons from Singapore’s high-tech hospitals

Key points

Speaking on a visit to Singapore, Wes Streeting accused the health service of “waste and inefficiency”

He said he would bring back a family doctor system if he became health secretary

Patients would get more power to swap GPs via the NHS app, he pledged

He would push managers to perform better, regulating them like nurses and doctors”

It seems the GP service is being privatised by stealth. Instead of sole doctors or partnerships, we have a growing model of companies operating GP services. If thats going to happen, then better the NHS itself operates practices and employs GPs directly.

We should perhaps ban large companies from owning GP practices and operating them?

I agree that it would be better if the NHS directly employed at least some GPs, but I can't see why a large company would be worse than a small one. There would be some advantages because if they controlled multiple practices they could move staff around to fill vacancies, cover for sickness and so on. Anyway how large is large? This process started in my time at the NHS and I know of at least one case where a group of local GPs banded together to form a limited company and run a number of practices. Would you ban that?   

[alec]

c-a-r-f-r-e-w - Absolutely agree about the role of luck. I set up my own business around 18 years ago, and I've never advertised or done any kind of marketing. It has been successful, in a modest way (I don't run a global corporation but it's given us a decent living) and while some of that must come down to the work I do, and the fact that I get a lot of recommendations, a huge slice of this is luck. I made a pretty good start in 2007 when oil prices hit $150 a barrel and everyone wanted energy efficiency work, rode through the crash because there was plenty of grant money in community renewables. The Ukraine war has been very good for business more recently, but there have been lots of incidental events and connections that were just random. I could have expanded but my ambitions aren't to employ lots of people, so it's been a good life, but I'd never dream of claiming it's all down to me.

[Deleted]

Dec 10, 2023 22:31:37 GMT pjw1961 said:

Dec 10, 2023 21:56:02 GMT @isa said:

Farage has just finished third on 'I'm a Celebrity'. He might conceivably be back in the UK by Tuesday. Might add to the spice before the Rwanda vote that evening.

Keeping up his record of never winning in a FPTP election then. 

Indeed. Not a problem, though. They'll just make him Lord Farage of Brexit.

[chrisc]

Dec 10, 2023 20:37:23 GMT alec said:

chrisc - Have you come across the Finnish experience in improving health? They did a great job encouraging healthy lifestyles. Will see if I can dig out some links that I once had on that.

not specifically. Although I always assumed Scandinavian countries exercised more. Low population density, easy access to green spaces etc. But apparently this is not so. 

academic.oup.com/eurpub/article/31/4/840/6277121

in fact UK doesn’t come out too bad in this 2021 paper. Above Finland actually, though below Germany. I have no idea what’s going on in Italy though. They seem really inactive.

Usual caveat that these are self- reported questionnaire studies. The best studies uses data from trackers of course, but it’s harder to get large sample sizes. So people could be lying (as you poll aware people know only too well). Maybe Italians like people to think they are lazy…..and Estonians and Germans brag about their fitness. 

I guess for full disclosure the data I commented on earlier saying that people eat no more than they did 10 years ago is also by and large self reported food questionnaires. The same questionnaire types so no reason a priori to doubt the data. Unless we have suddenly got shyer en masses about reporting how much we eat. 

[alec]

chrisc - "Unless we have suddenly got shyer en masses about reporting how much we eat."

I read once that we always claim to drink less, eat less etc on surveys. Not sure if that's true but I could easily believe it.

On Finland, I dug out this old article, but I think basically they used to have the highest heart attack rates for men in the 1960s and decided to do something about it, and the results have been impressive. It can be done.

www.theguardian.com/befit/story/0,15652,1385645,00.html

[mercian]

Dec 10, 2023 13:03:19 GMT leftieliberal said:

Dec 10, 2023 6:01:22 GMT neilj said:

I noticed that there is now a split in the Green Party of England and Wales over the gender issue. www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67546751

They have kicked out their Womens Group, which holds gender-critical views. This is an issue where the splits are within parties rather than between parties.

I think the Greens would be more successful if they ditched all the woke stuff and just concentrated on (sensible) green issues such as preserving woodlands, encouraging people with gardens to make them friendly towards birds and animals together with a gradual approach to reducing reliance on fossil fuels, encouraging house insulation and so on.  If they did that I'd consider voting for them myself.  

[mercian]

Dec 10, 2023 19:16:02 GMT peterbell said:

guymonde wrote :-

"I occasionally weaken and watch a bit of Question Time. Fiona Bruce asked the audience - no doubt carefully selected for balance - for those who supported Rwanda policy to put their hands up. One hand wen up and a rather weedy support was given. She said surely there must be others. Another hand went up but it turned out he didn't support Rwanda!
That ship had sailed"

I also watched the program and yes, Fiona introduce the program saying it was a Con constituency but as usual that the audience was balenced. I found it difficult to believe that Fiona had such difficulty finding anyone supporting the government position on Rwanda (perhaps that is because no-one knows what the true position is)

However, during the previous couple of days Sunak and several ministers referred to the fact that the Rwanda program was what voters wanted. I thought at the time that, as usual, it was a Tory lie and this audience confirmed it.

I gave up watching QT years ago but when I accidentally catch a few minutes it always strikes me that the audience seem to be 90% loony lefties akin the the Just Stop Oil fanatics. Perhaps they're balanced in the sense of 50% Corbynites and 50% Militant?

[mercian]

Dec 10, 2023 20:35:28 GMT alec said:

hireton and crossbat11 - I'm getting sucked into the debate on what the centre ground is, but here, I go with hireton . The centre shifts, and, once upon a time, Labour tried to fight against that rightward shift.

My solution? No one will ever back this, but I believe that we need to ban all political donations from anywhere other than voters on the electoral roll, and have these capped at £5k per person per year. I'd include unions in this, although would permit unions to collect individual members donations by consent.

Once we get to the point where big business can't fund politics, we'll then find out where the real centre ground is, and I bet my mortgage that is won't be anywhere near where Labour or the Daily Mail thinks it is.

I agree with that. It would be well to the right on social matters and probably to the left on economic matters (however misguided that might be).

[ptarmigan]

Dec 10, 2023 9:57:44 GMT Danny said:

Dec 10, 2023 0:56:17 GMT ptarmigan said:

Israeli politicians at the outset said they are embarking on a final solution to the animals in the Gazan strip. There are only two ways this could be ended, either Israel giving them all their homes and rights back, bearing in mind most are already refugees from somewhere else displaced by Israel, or get rid of them all. Israel is not going to surrender the land it already has or allow them back into Israeli land. So the only solution is to get rid of them, and presumably that is what they told Biden.

Biden cannot stop them doing this. He might send in US troop to defend gaza from Israel, but that would amount to the end of Israel itself if the arabs piled in too. It would destroy what the US considers a strategic ally in the region. Presumably it would make him unpoplar amongst jews in the US, dont know how many votes that would lose him in a tight re-election race? Its not as if the US average citizen is likely to be very keen on arabs of any sort, having been at war with them on and off for years. 9/11 comes to mind, so never mind jews, just the avergae christian or agnostic may prefer some arabs get a bashing from Israel.

The goal here is very likely to force arabs entirely out of the Gaza strip and integrate it into the state of Israel. Force them into a kettled and makeshift region on the Egyptian border so that international demands fall on Egypt to allow them into their territory. Failing that, just make whats left of their homeland so small and uncomfortable they emigrate.

So what actually can the US president do to prevent this, against the wishes most probably of the US population too?

The US is already failing to back one strategic ally Ukraine, does it want to be seen to be failing anotehr, Israel? Oh the Russians are laughing!

Yes, I'm pretty much with you on Israel's strategic objectives. I think it's been evident for a little while that the Israelis are trying force the Palestinians out of Gaza entirely and UNRWA have now been fairly explicit that this is what's happening. 

I'm not so much in agreement on the US stance though. Israel is reliant on the US for military aid and international diplomatic support so the US clearly has quite considerable clout. In terms of the domestic picture I think Biden has more scope to act than one might assume. Recent polling on the conflict in the US has suggested declining support for Israel with respondents increasingly of the view that Israel has gone "too far" and most Americans backing a ceasefire. There's a sense that they're somewhat losing control of the narrative. What's potentially quite dangerous for Biden is some of the splits: Republican voters are significantly more pro-Israel, Democrats and Independents tend to be much more on the fence. There's evidence of particular disquiet with the way Biden is handling the conflict among both younger voters and non-white voters, voting blocs which tend to be strongly pro-Democrat. Given things are only likely to get worse in the conflict, if I were a Democrat strategist I'd be eyeing some of these figures with concern as turnout is often crucial in US elections. I'm not aware of any canvassing of Jewish voters specifically but I think we ought to be wary of making too many assumptions on that front as past polling has tended to show some widely differing views on Israel. Anyway, some quite interesting breakdowns here.

[mercian]

c-a-r-f-r-e-w
"A separate poll by Focaldata has revealed that 59 per cent of voters believe Sunak intentionally hid his WhatsApp messages from the Covid inquiry. Even among Conservative voters, 48 per cent believe he deliberately kept his the messages hidden."

I wonder how many Don't Knows were excluded from the figures? I like to think that I follow politics more closely than average and I didn't even know Sunak had been accused of hiding messages. Or did you mean Johnson?

[mercian]

Dec 10, 2023 22:06:31 GMT c-a-r-f-r-e-w said:

Chart from the Times, of IPSOS polling, concerning what people consider to be signs of success. (Click on the image to see a bigger, more readable version), see what you think. Any surprises?

View Attachment

I don't suppose any two people would produce exactly the same order, but I was pleased to see that stuff like designer clothes and holidays abroad came quite low down. I was surprised that 'Being happy' wasn't there. Possibly it wasn't on the list that was presented to people.   

[neilj]

Has he looked down the back of the sofa...

[neilj]

Dec 10, 2023 21:56:02 GMT @isa said:

Farage has just finished third on 'I'm a Celebrity'. He might conceivably be back in the UK by Tuesday. Might add to the spice before the Rwanda vote that evening.

Farage as popular as people's favourite
Matt Hancock who also came third...

[steve]

"also watched the program and yes, Fiona introduce the program saying it was a Con constituency but as usual that the audience was balenced

As I understand it the" balance" the BBC apply is based on the 2019 parliamentary outcome and the Brexit referendum vote.
Consequently the audience has a majority of Tory supporters and brexitanians, it's clear that both of these criteria don't remotely reflect current opinion.

Other than the odd clip on YouTube I haven't watched question time for years, the constant appearances of far right loon politicians and their media hacks with an unrepresentative audience was book throwing at tv viewing.

One of the gems of their balance was during the period of 2015-16 they had 20 appearances by European union parliament meps, at the time the large majority of UK Meps were Labour, lib dems or Tory , however the BBC decided that 18 of the 20 times they had an MEP on it should be Nigel Farage on the other two occasions they managed to find another UKIP member for " balance ".