We’re into August, the dead political season, so doubtless we can expect plenty more media stories about the collapse of the Lib Dem vote, the imminent collapse of the Coalition, the collapse of Nick Clegg’s ratings etc, etc.
The latest miniplosion of noise has been sparked by YouGov’s latest poll, showing the Lib Dems polling 12% (compared to the Tories’ 42% and Labour’s 38%). For some, strange reason the papers seem much keener to report this poll finding than they were to report ICM’s 19% rating for the party a few days ago. We’ll be looking back fully on July’s polls later today on LDV, and party members of our discussion forum might be interested in the discussion taking place there.
Lib Dem climate change and energy secretary Chris Huhne has given short shrift to the latest polls, though:
I can remember a time when we had opinion polls where we were just an asterisk. We were literally within the margin of error of zero. So, frankly, it doesn’t worry me. I’m absolutely convinced…people will look back and say: ‘They did the right thing: here we have a real recovery with lots more prosperity coming through.’ People will turn round and say actually we deserve credit.”
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80 Comments
Of course, what should concern Chris Huhne (and I’m sure does – despite what he says) is that this poll shows a halving of Lib Dem support since the election, while the Tories are actually five points higher.
Tory voters are perfectly happy with the coalition so far. It’s the Lib Dems who are suffering deep unpopularity, only 3 months into the exercise. One wonders what will happen when the real spending cuts are unveiled in the Autumn…
For some, strange reason the papers seem much keener to report this poll finding than they were to report ICM’s 19% rating for the party a few days ago.
You mean what they term in the profession of pollsters an outlier or a rogue poll ? Because this poll that you are clinging onto with your chewed-down fingernails is the only poll from across three companies to give the LD’s more than 15% since the 9th July??
tut tut tut Stephen- you are increasingly viewing the world through partisan tribalist spectacles.
That is what happens when a person is hold up in a bunker….. 😉
I wouldn’t call it a ‘rogue poll’ or an ‘outlier’ in the conventional sense, since YouGov has consistently shown figures of 14-15% over the last few days, which would put 12% within the margin of error.
Presumably the polls in North-East Somerset were “rogue” as well?
Chris Huhne isn’t worried because he has a government job,so when this coalition splits in 4-5 years chances are he wont stand as an mp again as he will be able to earn vast sums of cash in the private sector,we saw the same with the last tory lot and with labour.
@Oliver-
I was referring to the 19% poll that Stephen repeatedly quotes and will probably still be doing so at the time of the LD conference 🙂
Though IMHO that 12% is also a outlier- as UKPR suggests as well. The running trend is a steady 14.5%: equivalent to a 37% collapse in voting intention that is now an irrefutable sustained trend.
In fairness it’s also only one of two non-Yougov polls we’ve had. Yougov didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory at the general election, and it’s quite possible their polling is being too volatile now. ICM weren’t perfect either but at the election they were certainly closer than Yougov. We really need more non-yougov polling to be sure.
@Sesenco..you need to look at the whole of july not just one area even if it does make you feel a little better to think of one in isolation.
Heres what happened in july.
Analysis of a large sample of 19 results in July suggests a projected 0.9% nationwide Labour lead over the Tories – the first for four years.
A calculation based on 13 contests fought both times by all three major parties gives a line-up of C 34.7%, Lab 33.8%, Lib Dem 21.5%.
some more results for you.
From last week:
Babergh District – Great Cornard North: Lab 340, C 201, Lib Dem 141, Ukip 72. (May 2007 – Two seats C 459, 455, Lab 338, 322). Lab gain from C. Swing 17.3% C to Lab.
Basildon District – Nethermayne: Lib Dem 605, Lab 461, C 372, Ukip 280, BNP 70, Ind 18. (May 2010 – Lib Dem 2017, C 1727, Lab 1312, BNP 487).
Lib Dem hold. Swing 2.3% Lib Dem to Lab.
Camden London Borough – Frognal and Fitzjohns: C 1061, Lib Dem 329, Lab 235, Green 71. (May 2010 – Three seats C 2624, 2490, 2382, Lib Dem 1151, 1046, Lab 910, 870, Lib Dem 864, Lab 724, Green 546, 359, 342). C hold.
Swing 6.1% Lib Dem to C.
Cherwell District – Kidlington North: Lib Dem 526, C 419, Lab 216, Ukip 86. (May 2010 – Lib Dem 1540, C 1334). Lib Dem hold. Swing 0.7% C to Lib Dem.
Kensington London Borough – Holland: C 649, Lib Dem 146, Ind 70. (May 2010 – Three seats C 1832, 1771, 1760, Lib Dem 659, 544, 466, Lab 453, 439, 354, Green 344). C hold. Swing 9.2% Lib Dem to C.
Rhondda, Cynon, Taff County Borough – Cymmer: Lab 740, Plaid Cymru 470, Ind 142, C 41, Green 23. (May 2008 – Two seats Lab 721, 658, Plaid Cymru 652, 625). Lab hold. Swing 7.6% Plaid Cymru to Lab.
Torbay Borough – St Marys with Summercombe: Lib Dem 801, C 365, Lab 195, Ukip 159. (May 2007 – Two seats C 894, 884, Lib Dem 678, 585, BNP 295).
Lib Dem gain from C. Swing 21.4% C to Lib Dem.
Warwick District – Warwick South: C 1107, Lab 648, Lib Dem 298. (May 2007 – Three seats C 1579, 1570, 1561, Lab 538, 534, Lib Dem 510, Lab 415, Lib Dem 402, Green 401, Lib Dem 371, Green 361). C hold. Swing 7.3% C to Lab.
West Berkshire District – Thatcham South and Crookham: Lib Dem 936, C 787. (May 2007 – Two seats Lib Dem 898, 861, C 817, 764). Lib Dem hold.
Swing 1.6% C to Lib Dem.
In fairness it’s also only one of two non-Yougov polls we’ve had. Yougov didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory at the general election, and it’s quite possible their polling is being too volatile now. ICM weren’t perfect either but at the election they were certainly closer than Yougov. We really need more non-yougov polling to be sure.
We had a MORI poll with the same field dates as the Saintly iCM:
The numbers for that were 40/ 38/ 14
🙂
Just been outside and asked the first five people I saw how they would vote if there was an election today.
Two said they didn’t know, two only spoke Polish and didn’t understand the question and the old lady in Number 39 thought that the Prime Minister, ‘that nice Mr Wilson’, would probably get her vote again……………!!!
Doesn’t sound too good for the Lib Dems does it ??
“I can remember a time when we had opinion polls where we were just an asterisk.”
Yeah and we’ve moved on since then surely? I do agree we did the right thing but sitting around and waiting for the press to start writing about it is quite lazy, we need to be a tad more proactive and frankly, he should be concernd about our poll ratings.
Chris Huhne does of course have the luxury of not facing the voters again until 2015. Perhaps he should come to Wales and Scotland and talk to AMs and MSPs who, although they support the coalition, face voters in 10 months time. For that matter it would be nice to see Nick Clegg in Wales too.
Republica,
I have been waiting patiently for Labour’s excuses for North-East Somerset, and I am met with a wall of silence.
However, thank you for confirming that the Lib Dem vote in real elections has not collapsed (the inclusion of contests with missing major party candidates notwithstanding).
I highlight North-East Somerset for two reasons:
(1) These were both wards which the Lib Dems have never held. Unlike Torbay, where we recaptured a seat we had lost to the Tories.
(2) They show that the faultline between areas where the Lib Dems are the opposition to the Tories and Labour is the opposition to the Tories continues to retreat in the Lib Dems’ favour.
Reason (2), I suspect, is why Labour doesn’t want to talk about North-East Somerset.
Now, tell me, Republica, if you really truly believe that the Lib Dems are doomed, and pose no conceivable existential threat to Labour, why are you spending your time trolling on this site? Methinks you’re deeply worried.
@Keith Browning – drugging the people questioned doesn’t count 😉
Sesenco,
Isn’t it likely that the voters of North-East Somerset can recognise good local candidates when they see them, and recognise that they simply have nothing to do with national goings-on?
Huhne is a millionaire. He doesn’t give a damn about that. Politics is his third career; he already made vast sums of cash in his first one. Not likely to quit until he retires for good (he’s 56, so another couple of elections at least).
@Andrew Suffield
Huhne is a millionaire. He doesn’t give a damn about that. Politics is his third career; he already made vast sums of cash in his first one. Not likely to quit until he retires for good (he’s 56, so another couple of elections at least)
He will lose Eastleigh- massive Labour tactical votes for him in May. You can chalk up Eastleigh as a Tory gain come the election of 2012/ 2013 😉
@Sensesco
However, thank you for confirming that the Lib Dem vote in real elections has not collapsed
I don’t think it is anyway near as clear as that !
Here are the LD vote share changes for those wards where the party has stood the last time the seat was contested (rather than an Independent who might sit with their political grouping). Note this does not include Radstock but more later.
These are all ‘principal authorities’ BTW.
22 July -3/ -1/ -18/ -8/ +1/ +18/
15 July -11/ +3/ +1/ =/ -6/ -10/ -3/ -1/
8 July -2/ -4/ +19/ -5/
1 July +22/ +18/ +3/
24 Jun -10/ +5/
4 Jun -0.5/ +2.6/ +10
27 May -11
Turnouts range from 15 to 33%
No full detail for all of Thursdays seats yet though one that stands out is Wolverhampton Bilston- a Lab gain with a 13% swing from the Tories to Labour.
I note that the By-election in the rural market town of Radstock did not have a LD tally for May 2007- so one of those scenarios’ where an independent has stood before. I also have to say that I am from that neck of the woods (Bristol) and have relatives in both Bath and dotted around Somerset and Gloucester. The idea that Radstock is a Labour stronghold is farcical. But when one is in need of some straws to grasp…..
David Allen,
I guess (but may be wrong) that you are old enough to remember the late 1970s, when Liberals were unable to win anything, however exceptional the candidate. That was meltdown. The present situation isn’t even remotely comparable.
Now take a look at the result in Worplesdon:
Surrey CC, Worplesdon
Thursday 15 July 2010 12:00
Con 1844 (53.6%; +5.1)
LD Paul Ronald Cragg 1286 (37.4%; +2.3)
Lab 193 (5.6%; +1.5)
UKIP 78 (2.3%; -9.9)
Peace Party 39 (1.1%; +1.1)
Majority 558
Turnout 31.3%
Con hold
Percentage change is since May 2009
This is a Surrey County Council division that we used to hold (we won it in a 1984 byelection with no Labour candidate) but subsequently lost to the Tories. Note that the Tory increase largely comes from UKIP, that the Lib Dem share goes up slightly (since 2009), and that Labour rises by only 1.5%. Now, if 1.5% is the worst that the Coalition can do to Labour tactical voting, we can sleep easy, I say. Note, too, that 37% is probably roughly what we got here at the General Election, in a division that is split between Gyuildford and Woking.
Now let’s talk about Wolverhampton. What we have to realise here is that the Lib Dem vote dropped by only 4.7% since May 2008, so this is an area of longstanding extreme weakness for the Lib Dems. Paradoxically, that is good news, because it shows that our support is becoming more concentrated geographically.
Now let’s have a look at some town council results from 29th July:
Falmouth TC, Boslowick
Thursday 29 July 2010 12:00
Con 604 (75.2)
Ind 199 (24.8)
Majority 405
Turnout 18%
Con gain from Ind
Redruth TC, South
Thursday 29 July 2010 12:00
LD Mary McWilliams 427 (75.4)
Lab 139 (24.6)
Majority 288
Turnout 10.84%
LD gain from Ind
Crewkerne TC
Thursday 29 July 2010 12:00
LD Sandra Jackson 1008 (60.6)
Con 655 (39.4)
Majority 353
Turnout 29.1%
LD gain from Con
Haywards Heath TC, Franklin
Thursday 29 July 2010 12:00
LD Vivienne Northorpe 512 (47.8)
Con 488 (45.5)
Ind 72 (6.7)
Majority 24
Turnout 30.68%
LD gain from Con
You will see that we made a gain from the Tories in Yeovil, so maybe the people of Somerset are not as conservative in outlook as our enemies would wish.
“I note that the By-election in the rural market town of Radstock”
What?! Radstock is a former mining town!
(I mean coal mining, not the Roman lead mines at Charterhouse-on-Mendip.)
“The idea that Radstock is a Labour stronghold is farcical.”
I suggest you check historical results for Radstock. I don’t have any to hand, but from memory it was common for Labour to get mroe than two thirds of the vote.
Where is the market in Radstock?
@RRRROOOOOBBBBBB SSSSHHHHEEEEFFFFIIIIEEEELLLLDDDD
WHY SHOULD WE CARE, SO LONG LABOUR DOESN’T WIN?
(STUPID TROLL)
(AND WHAT IS IT WITH THE CAPS?)
@Sesenco..Labour hasn’t won north east somerset for at least two decades and we don’t expect to any time soon so that was a bit of a red herring,its always been lib con in north east somerset but overall during the last week there has been a 0.9% nationwide swing to labour so no i am not deeply worried at all,the fact is 2015 elections will be won or lost on nationwide swings. You sound like you lost a quid but then found a penny.
@Paul McKeown.are you sure your not really a tory,i have read your inflamatory remarks on the guardians comment page the other day and it is indeed you who sounds like swivel eyed demagogue.
Republica:
Do get your facts right. Wansdyke (as the constituency was known up until May) was held by LABOUR from 1997 to 2010.
@Sesenco..Now thats just being pedantic.
Republica,
I see. So pointing out the utter falsehood of your claim that Labour has not held North-East Somerset for at least two decades is just being pedantic.
Now, why did a former mining town go Lib Dem last Thursday? Any ideas?
@Senseco
What?! Radstock is a former mining town!
Wansdyke- of which Radstock was one ward- was a ‘new labour’ win in 1997 until 2010 when Rees-Mogg’s kid took it as NE Somerset: Labour never had a lead of more than 10% and in 2005 it was 3%. It included the Longwell, Oldland and Keynsham wards which is where the Labour vote would have been concentrated (if you know your Bristol subregion political geography- which you clearly do not).
Prior to that 1997 all the way back to 1983 it was a Tory seat.
This council has never been Labour OC- in any incarnation and Labour currently has *5* of its 65 council seats- that tells you- if you are a person without partisan tribal blinkers- what kind of political place this is 😉
I can find Radstock ward results back to 2003- Labour has never got more than 611 (2007) when that was effectively a double election (2 seats) and the total Independent vote was 1496 (Lib Dems not standing- most probably they were the Inds).
There has been no coal mining in that part of Somerset since before I was born– and that was 1966. All coal mining in the west country ended by 1973.
That entire swathe of the west country is a middle and upper income dormitory for Bristol, Exeter and Swindon commuters to name but three work locations.
Tut Tut Tut……
@Paul McKeown@
WHY SHOULD WE CARE, SO LONG LABOUR DOESN’T WIN?
(STUPID TROLL)
Ah- the sound of ‘liberal’ Britain 😉
It’s because Texan billionaires have instructed their acolytes not to talk about North East Somerset., nor Mid Shropshire, the left hand bit of Norfolk and most certainly not the bottom bit of Rutland.
Sesenco,
Yes, I remember the late 1970s, when our party had just split, the public were unconvinced we would survive at all, and the Greens beat us in the Euro elections. Yes, that was meltdown, and yes, things are not as bad as that. Not quite. Not yet.
Frankly, the polls should worry you. The trend is steadily down. Do you think the trend will bend or will it go lower. Some time past I forecast that before next May’s elections it would reach 8%. Can you think of any reason why it would go up?
Rob Sheffield,
You have obviously never visited Radstock and know nothing about the town if you think it is a middle and upper income dormitory for Bristol. Take a trip there and see for yourself.
Your claim that North-East Somerset has never been Labour is prestidigitation. The North-East Somerset UA also includes Bath, which is mainly Lib Dem (Don Foster). The Parliamentary constituency of Wansdyke, now known as North-East Somerset, but with the same boundaries, was Labour from 1983 to 1997. You will also find that the former constituency of North Somerset (it stretched across to Clevedon) was Labour from 1966 to 1970, mainly on the basis of the strong Labour votes in Radstock, Midsomer Norton and Keynsham.
Another sleight-of-hand on your part is to omit to mention that the Radstock Independents are a Labour Party faction.
I am not surprised that Labour megaphones are so unfamiliar with the Bristol/Bath area. It is a part of the country from which their party is rapidly being eliminated. Is Bristol South next on the list?
@Sesenco..i live in north somerset you numpty and ne somerset was taken by a tory not a lib dem so what the hell is you point?
As agent for the by-elections in Bath & North East Somerset, I may be able to help here.
Radstock is a former mining town with a Labour dominated Town Council and one incumbent Labour unitary councillor. Dan Norris was the Labour MP for this area until May. They were expecting to win the by-election for the second unitary seat. They didn’t; they lost badly to the Liberal Democrats. Naturally, Simon Allen was an excellent candidate and we fought a good campaign – but we always do!
On the same day in Keynsham there was a Town Council by-election to replace a Labour resignation; they were hoping to win this too, although it was more of a three way split. Andy Halliday won for the Lib Dems with half of the vote.
In real elections, the Lib Dems are still winning against Labour and the Conservatives.
Republica,
No need to be rude when you lose an argument.
@Rob sheffeild..i live in north somerset mate and it hasn’t seen a labour mp for decades,my mp is bloody liam fox and the runner up at the last election was brian mathew who had his share increased by mainly labour voters trying to un seat the right wing nut job liam fox but fox increased his vote by +7.5% so sesenco is doing the usual lib dem trick of speaking with a forked tounge.
Replublica,
Was Liam Fox around from 1966-1970?
North Somerset was a Parliamentary constituency that was abolished in 1974. It is also the name of a Unitary Authority and a Parliamentary constituecy created in 1983 (?) that was formerly called Woodspring.
Again, check your facts before reaching for the megaphone.
I got it slightly wrong there. North Somerset was Conservative from 1966-1970, but it was on Labour’s target list due to the small Tory majority, which is why I remember it. I cannot for the life of me find the figures.
@Senseco..are you still in that politically sensitive job you used to talk about and does that job happen to invile spinning for the lib dems?
CORRECTION invile should read invole.
CORRECTION 2 invile should read involve.
@Sesenco..This was the line that (Lib-Dem)Brian Mathew used to get labour to vote lib dem in (Woodspring) North somerset,he said this after hustings at gordaon school!
I was at Gordano School along with Stephen Perry Hearn, the Labour candidate who has recently been appointed. Stephen is a great guy, but as I said on the day, there is a real chance at the coming General Election that the Tories can be defeated in North Somerset for the first time since the 1920’s. However for this to happen, the left of centre needs to unite. If the question then is, ‘under which banner’? Then the answer has to be the Liberal Democrats, who have come second in five out of the last six General Elections in this constituency.
No megaphone there,just a good old fashioned quote strait from the horses mouth.He says himself the tories have held north somerset since the 1920s or was he lying?
Republica,
Before you make an even bigger fool of yourself, read what I say above.
@Sesenco..more spinning than a hotpoint,what about that politically sensitive job?c,mon your on the lib dem payroll aren’t you?Your man Brian Mathew said the left of centre needs to unite but i can see you are so wedded to the tories that the chance of that happening now is pretty damned slim,thank christ i saw through mr Mathews lies when he visited me,we will be making sure that people get to hear exactly what the lib dems really stand for which is basically protecting the status quo and keeping ministerial jobs.
@Sensesco
The Parliamentary constituency of Wansdyke, now known as North-East Somerset, but with the same boundaries, was Labour from 1983 to 1997
The parliamentary constituency of Wansdyke was Conservative from 1983 to 1997- Jack Aspinall was the MP (who defected from the Liberals to the Tories from an East Bristol seat).
but with the same boundaries
The boundaries are also different NOT the same ! The 2010 boundaries for the new NE Somerset seat favoured the Tories in comparison to the 2005 Wansdyke boundaries.
Northern Somerset (outside of the usual demographic neighbourhoods such as the post war social housing in Bath and in enclaves of small settlements) is middle and upper income dormitory territory (as the Radstock Action group itself refers to its changing character).
I got it slightly wrong there. North Somerset was Conservative from 1966-1970
Oh yes you most certainly did get it wrong 🙂
Is Bristol South next on the list?
You really don’t know what you are talking about on this do you !!
@Nicholas Coombes
Radstock is a former mining town
This is the same kind of fraudulent extravagance as Paul Crossleys own site which states “Labour had expected to win the seat in this former mining town” as if we were talking about a Yorkshire pit village !! This is Somerset !!
All coal mining in the west country ended by 1973. In the Midsomer Norton/Radstock area they closed before that- in the mid-to-late 1960’s.
You could also say that Notting Hill is a matchmaking community- it would be true of sites on its eastern and northern border: but it means absolutely nothing when trying to encapsulate its fundamental character now 😉
@Republica
@Rob sheffeild..i live in north somerset mate and it hasn’t seen a labour mp for decades,my mp is bloody liam fox
You are in N Somerset formerly Woodspring; we are debating Radstock which is in NE Somerset formerly Wansdyke.
Neighbouring but different constituencies.
@ Rob Sheffield
Paul Crossley and I have been knocking on doors in Radstock solidly for the last month. It was (until last Thursday) a Labour area!
Then they lost.
This is another way of being utterly relaxed about collapsing voter intention (in a GE) numbers:
“Now, a new survey by ConservativeHome, has found that 55 per cent of Tory members are open to a “non-aggression pact” between the coalition partners in seats where they are first and second-placed, with 11 per cent describing such an agreement as “ideal”. But a significant majority — 35 per cent — are opposed to any pact with the Lib Dems.”
Rob Sheffield,
I think I said that Wansdyke was Labour from 1997 to 2010. That would be correct. It was Labour and is now Conservative. I do sometimes make mistakes with figures when writing in a hurry. I don’t wilfully invent like some of these Labour trolls do. If your narrative is correct, this is just the kind of place where the Labour fightback would begin.
On the subject of old mining towns, you should note that there has been very little coal mining in the UK for 20 years, but towns and villages still exist that consider themselves mining communities. However, through its treachery in voting Lib Dem last Thursday, you summarily expel Radstock from the former mining communities club. What does Yorkshire have that Somerset doesn’t? Coal mining is coal mining. If you check your facts, you’ll find that the Somerset coalfield had some of the most dangerous pits in the country.
I see you are getting all defensive about Bristol South. So you should. Check the figures.
Oh, and before I forget it. In 1966 Labour came within 1,000 votes of winning Bath. Remind me what Labour polled in Bath last May?
You are the kind of person who loses votes by the wheelbarrow load when let loose on the doorstep. Hector, lecture, shout, never admit you’re wrong. Any wonder Labour is so unpopular.
@ROB SHEFFIELD .I know its a different constituency,i was making the broader point that labour mps are very rare beasts down in these parts and the fact that most of the seats taken from us were taken by the tories and not the lib dems.
@Sesenco..Any wonder Labour is so unpopular??? con 42 lab 38 lib dem 12 .you win the gold medal for use of double speak.
@Senseco
You are the kind of person who loses votes by the wheelbarrow load when let loose on the doorstep. Hector, lecture, shout, never admit you’re wrong
I suggest you re-read this thread: not just comments to myself but also to others. Because this quote is a perfect description of you: as the phrase goes a man thinks as he is
I have noticed- or rather heard your complacent and ill-thought out pontificating on many threads prior to this one.
A persistent vein of invective strewn with error-laden fallacies.
Rob Shffield,
Why are you posting on a Lib Dem site? Do you merely love the sound of your own booming voice, or is there method in your madness? If you want to weaken Lib Dem support for the Coalition, then you are having precisely the opposite effect. If you wish to ruin this site and thwart any attempt by Lib Dems to engage in a free and open discussion about these issues, then you are succeeding. Your motto seems to be: “He with the loudest voice wins the argument.” That is a prevalent attitude in the Labour Party, as I well recall. It is one of the reasons your party crashed to 29% in May and shows only modest signs of recovery, despite the impending cuts. And here”s another thing. I think you’re scared. Behind your facade of bluster and bravado, I sense fear. Fear that in the long-term, Labour is doomed. You deride people as not real coal miners because they live in Somerset, not Yorkshire? What kind of an attitude is that?
@Sesenco..you do like to give out your fair share of bluster and verbal dyspraxia too,you want to know why we come here,well,its simple really, its because were allowed to,in a democracy we can say are allowed to disagree with one another and believe it or not many in the labour party USED to think your had some morals but all we get now is the news that Oceania is winning the war against eurasia so what do you expect?
David Allen
Yes, I remember the late 1970s, when our party had just split, the public were unconvinced we would survive at all, and the Greens beat us in the Euro elections. Yes, that was meltdown, and yes, things are not as bad as that. Not quite. Not yet.
I don’t remember any party split in the late 1970s, and weren’t the Green Party still called the “Ecology Party” then? If you mean the late 1980s, then there wasn’t a split. There was a harmonious merging of the two alliance parties, with only a few people – in many cases people who it was a relief to lose – not joining in. It was reported otherwise only because of gross media bias and bad handling of the situation by the party leadership. Fortunately our decent local members carried on working as they always do and saved the party, it required the Bootle by-election to show what rubbish the media had been reporting, but they never apologised, they never do, do they?
In the late 1970s, the Liberal did the decent thing in the Lib-Lab pact – for which we never received a jot of thanks or acknowledgement. That, perhaps, is more likely how today’s coalition will be reported. Probably along with the lies we get today about the Lib-Lab pact, all that stuff from the Tories which dates what happened BEFORE the pact as if it happened during the pact. The truth is we stopped it, but to this day we get accused of causing it.
Really not that massive, and those votes aren’t going to jump Tory.
The fall in the LDs’ poll ratings since the General Election is broadly in line with what’s happened following other recent elections, apart from 2005. Here are the ICM figures for a couple of months (or closest available) since 6 May, and other years. I’ve taken ICM because they provide a consistent, long-running series and are readily available on the Guardian website:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/oct/21/icm-poll-data-labour-conservatives
11 June 1987: 23%
15 Oct 1987: 13%
9 Apri 1992: 18%
7 June 1992: 13%
1 May 1997: 17%
28 June 1997: 12%
7 June 2001: 19%
19 Aug 2001: 17%
5 May 2005: 23%
17 July 2005: 23%
6 May 2010: 23%
25 July 2010: 19%
Local byelection results largely confirm this trend. There’s undoubtedly been some falling off of support since the Election, but it’s limited.
Detailed discussion of individual council results, of course, is larely irrelevant as far as the national picture is concerned.
@ Rob Sheffield
You quoted below. That looks like a median change in the LD vote of -1, so very much even stevens.
These are all ‘principal authorities’ BTW.
22 July -3/ -1/ -18/ -8/ +1/ +18/
15 July -11/ +3/ +1/ =/ -6/ -10/ -3/ -1/
8 July -2/ -4/ +19/ -5/
1 July +22/ +18/ +3/
24 Jun -10/ +5/
4 Jun -0.5/ +2.6/ +10
27 May -11
“The fall in the LDs’ poll ratings since the General Election is broadly in line with what’s happened following other recent elections, apart from 2005.”
I must be missing something here.
The latest YouGov poll shows a fall of 12 points. How is that “broadly in line” with the examples you give, which show a range of falls between 0 and 10 points, with a median of 4-5?
@ Anthony Aloysius St
“The fall in the LDs’ poll ratings since the General Election is broadly in line with what’s happened following other recent elections, apart from 2005.”
I must be missing something here.
The latest YouGov poll shows a fall of 12 points. How is that “broadly in line” with the examples you give, which show a range of falls between 0 and 10 points, with a median of 4-5
YouGov isn’t broadly in line. I’ve just used ICM for the reasons stated. If anyone, would care to repeat the analysis, for other pollsters, feel fee.
“YouGov isn’t broadly in line.”
Well, in late June YouGov was very much in line with ICM:
YouGov/Sunday Times 2010-06-25 43 36 16 7
ICM/Sunday Telegraph 2010-06-24 41 35 16 6
YouGov/Sun 2010-06-24 43 34 17 9
It’s no good just picking the single best poll out of 35 or so carried out over the last 5 and a half weeks, and basing your “analysis” on that.
Chris Huhne is insane if the poll ratings cause him no concern. It would be fine if both parties were down, but the Tories have increased their support, which is why I worry about our position.
UK Polling Report has unearthed evidence that the Lib Dems were showing an opinion poll rating of just 3% back in 1989. If Chris Huhne and the other Orange Tories keep on doing the bidding of their Blue Tory masters it won’t be long before Orange Tory ratings fall back to this level.
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/
Matthew,
Yes, sorry to have slipped a decade, I was talking about the late 1980s, when (as MacK shows) we were in a worse state than the late 1970s. I think I would call it a split when a party leader drifts away to the Right and walks out, even though he didn’t take that many people with him. Will history repeat itself I wonder?
MacK:
“Chris Huhne and the other Orange Tories”
Do you really think that your repetitive goadings are going to win hearts and minds on this site?
Would I be more or less likely to convince you of something I believe if I kept calling you “neocon warmonger” or “Blair puppet”?
Let’s all grow up a little, shall we?
David Allen wrote:
“I think I would call it a split when a party leader drifts away to the Right and walks out,”
It was the SDP that split, not the Liberal Party. Dr David Owen did take quite a few people with him, not all of them useless, and only a minority ever came back.
The merger was a thoroughly good thing, and would have been perceived by the public as such, if Owen and his supporters had not behaved the way they did, and people on the pro-merger side had been a little less careless with their mouths on occasions (eg, John Cartwright being jeered at Sheffield). The recovery was a combination of Ashdown’s inspirational leadership and Chris Rennard’s campaigning brilliance. Local government performance did suffer during the merger and its immediate aftermath, but nothing like to the same extent as it did during the Thorpe affair and the Lib-Lab Pact. Our local government performance today is good, but we must not be complacent. It could go still go very wrong if the Coalition becomes unpopular and Lib Dem leaders outside Westminster fail to speak out.
A party maintains its popularity by continually proselytising its policies and values, something that it very hard to do when our Parliamentary Party is propping up a government we do not support and cannot and should not defend.
Nick Clegg must be made to realise that an exit strategy is required, and that certain lines cannot be crossed without consequences for the internal cohesion of the party and its wider public support.
@Sesenco
“Do you really think that your repetitive goadings are going to win hearts and minds on this site?
Would I be more or less likely to convince you of something I believe if I kept calling you “neocon warmonger” or “Blair puppet”?
Let’s all grow up a little, shall we?”
Call me what you like. A nation that has a healthy disrespect for its politicians preserves its freedom.
@ Sesenco
“Nick Clegg must be made to realise that an exit strategy is required, and that certain lines cannot be crossed without consequences for the internal cohesion of the party and its wider public support.”
When that exit strategy is implemented I’ll stop regarding you as the Orange Tories.
@ Sesenco
“A party maintains its popularity by continually proselytising its policies and values, something that it very hard to do when our Parliamentary Party is propping up a government we do not support and cannot and should not defend”
Well said! Now you really are going up in my estimation. But that’s probably the kiss of death from a Blairite Puppet and Neocon Warmonger! As for giving people loaded sobriquets, I seem to recall someone once describing a certain G.Brown as being on a continuum from Stalin to Mr Bean! It certainly didn’t reduce the impact or the seriousness of the chap’s message. Now I wonder who that was?
Sesenco
It was the SDP that split, not the Liberal Party. Dr David Owen did take quite a few people with him, not all of them useless, and only a minority ever came back.
Media reporting grossly exaggerated the contribution the SDP made to the Alliance, and grossly exaggerated the contribution made by those in the SDP who left it to try (and fail) to form a new party under David Owen when the Social and Liberal Democrats became the lgal successor to both the Liberal Party and the SDP. The consequence was that what was actually the loss of a rather small faction was reported as if it was a massive split into almost equally sized parts. The media lied to the people of this country, it was disgusting, even the supposedly neutral BBC reported the first conference of Owen’s new party with the lie that this was the SDP continuing as it always was, rather than the truth that it was a small breakway faction illegally using the SDP’s image.
OK, the leadership of the Liberals and the real SDP made a gross mistake in trying to promote the SLD as “it’s a brand new party with no roots” supposing they could repeat the 1981 SDP boom. I told them at the time they had it wrong, they didn’t listen (people may note my history of getting it right and being ignored is very long – how many peope now regret not listening to me when I warned against voting in Clegg as leader?). But the reality remained that almost everywhere the merger went smoothly, and anti-merger but realist people like me went along with it because we accepted it was what both parties voted for and we had to make it work. There were a few exceptions – more I think on the Liberal side – but most of those who refused to go into the merger were, well, how can we put it, the “nutters”, people who it was actualy quite beneficial to lose.
What a depressing thread, although currently par for the course, with Labour trolls trying to shout down the Lib Dems. Of course that has never happened before! Seems to be getting a bit desperate, though. Eventually daylight will turn them all to stone…
@ Paul McKeown
Why is it that the blue and orange Tories always say you’re shouting them down when all you are doing is disagreeing with them? As for literally shouting people down I think the Blue Tories are definitely the Gold medallists. I vividly recall Clegg standing up at a PMQs late in the period of the last administration and being drowned out by loads of redfaced blue Tories shouting at the top of their voices the name of the man who gave the Lib Dems loadsamoney and then scarpered. Clegg simply could not be heard! At the time I remember thinking surely the Lib Dems could never work with the Tories in a hung parliament. Funny old world.
Sesenco, you say the recovery of the party after the Liberal-SDP merger “was a combination of Ashdown’s inspirational leadership and Chris Rennard’s campaigning brilliance”, but I think it was simpler than that. The parties had not disappeared. At the time I was fairly mobile, moving around quite a few places, and everywhere it was the same – all the people who were doing the campaigning work before the merger were doing just the same after. What the media reported, some big collapse with the “SLD” just one of several warring mini-parties just hadn’t happened. Everything went remarkably smoothly, and the loss of the overhead of Liberal-SDP coordination gave more time to do more productive things. The people who dropped out over the merger were mostly the people who were liabilities, or those who were just paper members anyway, people who never did anything and we never saw. So it was actually quite a good clean-up of dead wood. The consequence is that we were left with those who had long-term commitment, on the SDP side with those who had learned from the Liberals how to party the third-party game, we lost those in the SDP who had joined supposing it an easy route to getting a political job and who either never wanted to get their hands dirty with campaigning, or had completely unrealistic ideas about how to do it.
Had the media reported the truth rather than lies, the collapse in poll support we saw would not have happened. Imagine how differently it all would have been had the newspaper headlines been “Liberal and SDP merge harmoniously”, which was actually the truth. But it took until the Bootle by-election really to get the media to believe that, it took the MRLP beating the SDP-tick to show the SDP-tick was a non-party, a few nutters who had no idea how to campaign led by an embittered control-freak who could not accept that other people did not rate him as highly as he rated himself. Rosie Barnes accusing the Liberal Party of being “sleepy” when we were developing the campaign tactics that got her elected says it all, they were clueless, they were arrogant, they had not learned what their better colleagues who kept with the SDP into the SLD had learned.
Following the merger, and working hard to try and recover from the media lies, local campaigners threw all their effort into the first local elections after the merger. The results were ok, not good but a share of the vote much higher than the opinion polls. After all, people on the ground where we were winning council seats could see we were still there doing what we had already been doing all year round before. Unfortunately, this left us exhausted and short of money, so we more or less gave up on the Euro-elections, hence the low share of the poll, below the Greens there.
To put it all down to Ashdown and Rennard is wrong. Rennard took over tactics already well developed and used, unfortunately the toll of trying to explain them to the SDP had meant their original intentions had become attenuated and were never recovered. They became just a way to win elections rather than something more radical in which winning local elections would just be a small part of a people-power movement. Ashdown was an ok leader, but that’s all. Kennedy proved a much better leader than expected (I put him last in my leadership vote), mostly because his personal circumstances meant other stars were allowed to shine, so we got over the “one man band” liability that Ashdown had tended to create in our national image.
MacK – will you accept that the Liberal Democrats are more than Nick Clegg and his pals? As Sesenco is saying, clued-up and experienced people in the party are already planning the exit strategy. As my previous message suggests, some of us have been around long enough to have plenty of experience of picking up after the mess our leaders have left us in.
Nothing I have heard from Labour convinces me I want to be a member of the Labour Party. If they wanted to attract me, they’d have to use very different lines. All I can see from them is still the old and ultimately Leninist way of thinking, which is that all politics should be within one party (theirs) which has an internal authoritarian “the party is always right, everyone outside it is the evil enemy” culture. Ugh, ugh, ugh, I HATE all that stuff, every time I have wavered in my support for Britain’s only viable third party I only have to get a sniff of Labour’s anti-pluralism to remind myself why I have stuck with the political choice I made in the 1970s all these years.
@MacK
And what is it with the Red Tories and their permanent politics of rattle and scarf?
@ Mathew Huntbach
“MacK – will you accept that the Liberal Democrats are more than Nick Clegg and his pals?”
Yes, I do.
http://www.gwydir.demon.co.uk/byelections/gains10.htm – Doesn’t look good, does it?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11037124 – If any of this is true I am deeply depressed about the future for the Lib Dems. Some of the leadership need a reality check and Nick is behaving like a rabbit caught in the headlights.
Simon, Vince & others in Parliament act now to save the Lib Dems, Nick needs to get out of Cameron’s pocket.
I was very active in Bath & Bristol, recruited hundred + members, canvassed extensively thousands of households and been a council candidate, I fear Labour will receive the protest vote from disillusioned Lib Dem supporters.
I only voted for the LibDems once.This time I am afraid.To prop up a Conservative Government that routinely slags of the unemployed and sick,the poor and defenceless in society.To say you will cut jobseekers housing by 10% if they are unemployed for over a year,whether or not they have been actively seeking work is cruel and vindictive.And no I am not on Jobseekers.I have been in the past and it is not nice,nor easy.Its depressing living on the poverty line,especially when millions are unemployed.
Or the Vilification of the Sick and Disabled by the ConDems and the right wing press.You show a few tapes from the fraud investigation team on T.V.and suddenly everyone is fiddling.By the DWP,s own records the Fraud of DLA is only ..06%.The persecution of people on incapacity by ATOS,a American firm that was stopped in some American States because of its unfair methods.And its LIMA computer software that has been throwing genuine sick people of I.B. onto JSA.Grayling says some people are sick for years.Well Cancer,MS and quite a few other illnesses often are life long events.
The Pensioners are worried about the Winter Fuel Allowance and their bus passes.But what do you do to get the Tax Dodgers.After all they are defrauding the state and nothing happens to them.Their is no war declared on them or vilification in the press.Or the Bankers that got us into this financial mess.Its the easy targets that are having to pay for this mess caused by Bankers Stateside and Here as well as other countries.But no the poor will be made to pay.
VAT up to 20%.This will effect all equally.I think not,if you only have £60 a week to live on a VAT increase is frightening,but if you are wealthy its not going to hurt that much.
I expect to see the LibDems drop further in the polls because I for one will never vote for them again.Cyril Smith a Great well remembered Liberal M.P.died recently.He was never afraid to speak out.Its a pity there are not more of his ilk.Then you might see your ratings go up.
I have been watching this board for a wee while, not long but long enough and I guess I fall into the category of left wing of the Lib Dems and occasionally right wing of the labour party/left wing of the labour party depending on the press of the day and whose in charge. Basically I tend to listen to Charlie Kennedy and think I like him and Charles Clarke and think he’s a twat. Yet still I have found myself mostly thinking Labour if not voting for them.
But here is the rub, I voted for Allan for Hallam in ’97 with a big sign in my front Garden saying Labour supporter proudly voting Lib Dem. A lot of us did and we unseated Sheffields last Tory to proudly hand the Hallam constituency to our brothers in the lib dems. In a failed attempt to recreate the stand in Croydon I voted Lib Dem again to try and stop the Tory there. So now obviously I cannot do that again. David Camerons own words “vote Blair get Brown” now haunt me, I voted Nick got Dave, voted Vince got George. I cannot do that anymore that is obviously the reason the polls are going down because I’m not alone.
Given the Libs new found viscousness in removing the leader that will unseat the most MPs at the next election. Who is likely to be the first to break cover? Hughes, Fallon, Hancock? and which Milliband will most likely preside over a march of people like me to the Labour Party? (Oh god why can’t I vote for Ralph?)