United Kingdom General Election: July 4, 2024

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Hopefully without error. The 2019 notionals;

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Given that the poll was conducted during the media bacchanalia, it's not that bad for the SNP. They improved their standing on the Holyrood polling too. And 'Yes' only one point behind.

The best outcome, if they don't lose their heads, is taking a slap down at the GE, then facing the electorate at Holyrood in 2026; eighteen months to two years into a Labour government. If Labour are seen to be a disappointment (if) that could still be to their benefit.

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I think waiting 5 years for an election is insane!

It's not that unusual. There was just a very busy five years prior in which we had three general elections and two big constitutional referenda.

What's made this election unique is that it will, seemingly, demolish what should historically be a 'two term' proof majority in one go due to the churn of PM's and the post Brexit 'comedown'.

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The Postwar norm was that a standard parliament should be four years with the fifth year as a 'reserve'.

Speaking of, today is the 50th anniversary of the February 1974 election.

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https://twitter.com/Dylan_Difford/status/1763255954479468658

Fun fact.

Age polarisation is so insane it's estimated that nearly 1 in 10 2019 Tory voters have now died.

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Would love to meet some Labour 2019/Tory 2024 voters. Who even are they? Accelerationists? Mark Latham imitators? Idiots? Leicester East?

Someone who was an apolitical 22-year old student in 2019 (probably opposed to Brexit) and is now an apolitical 27-year old consultant making decent money (while Brexit is irrelevant). Many such cases.

It is fascinating how poorly you understand English politics. An apolitical 27-year-old consultant making decent money has literally no reason whatsoever to vote Conservative.

'Decent money' is in itself relative.

A difference of say 10 to 20k a year gets you disproportionately less when set against property and that has gotten far worse over five years with the cost of mortgages, energy and food bills soaking up any advantage.

If you're young and you vote Tory you do if for cultural reasons, or because you're insanely online.

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One big question mark - which I haven't seen much discussion about - is the extent to which unhappy 2019 Conservative voters who now claim to be voting for Reform will, in the end, 'come home' for the Tories when they start looking at their own constituency more than at the national picture.

Most '2019 Conservative voters who now claim to be voting for Reform' are a mirage caused by sampling issues related to the fact that overly online pensioners (and older people in general) tend to be absurdly right-wing. They barely saved their deposit in Rochdale: it's not happening. But I guess when the GE does happen we'll all get this narrative instead of the reality that they never existed to begin with so whatever.

Very important and salient point. It's also why voluntary/commercial panel polling companies, which have a slightly older and engaged (enraged?) pool, tend to have Reform higher.

Long standing flow of the vote analysis suggests that Reform voters, like Brexit and UKIP before it, are 'anti-system' voters. Some of whom also voted Lib Dems in elections past. Crucially, a sizeable bloc voted Labour in 2017 too.

I expect some flow back to the Tories but there are also a number who aren't going to vote Tory.  They might not vote. They might vote whatever party they think will take them out.

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And Scotland is a mess. SNP vote is high enough to win Edinburgh West from the Lib Dems (doubt), and all Tory seats. And yet they’re losing Ayr *to Labour*, in what’s likely an SNP hold thanks to unionist vote split between Tory and Labour. And thats not touching on Labour doing better in Edinburgh than Glasgow, which just seems intuitively wrong, based on the past five years of local and national results.

I’m not saying the SNP *couldn’t* hold 41 seats in the election (although it’s at the top-end of their likely seat total). I’m just pretty sure they wont hold *that* combination, if they’re doing that well.

Good MRP relies on census data, which isn't available for Scotland at the moment (and may not be before the next GE)

Using 2011 data has issues given its age. This I expect is likely to impact where it matters, particularly given voter churn in Glasgow and Edinburgh. And it might be applying some demographic divides in rUK across Scotland that might be a step out.

It looks like the MRP is based on a five point lead which is what Survation found in their most recent regular poll.

Similar seats (41 to 40) as with Electoral Calculus which assumed a seven point lead.

It is in line with earlier MRP's (some of which had an effective tie) that if they are telling us something it is that the SNP vote actually may be more efficient than Labour's when the parties are closer together (YouGov and others show the same), which is somewhat contrary to assumptions and the UNS.

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Handy prediction map/tool updated for 2024

https://principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/?map=predictit_new

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Worth noting that Labour's lead is down or no change with every other pollsters in post locals polls.

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An early July election clashes (mostly) with the start of the school holidays in Scotland. Not sure what the average stats are on foreign holidays and 'staycations' but it will be sizable. Postal votes will be a key part of GE messaging here.

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I'm tempted to host/run an all nighter livestream for this place on election night. Might need some help but would be better than a Kuenssberg snooze fest.

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https://twitter.com/dp_williamson/status/1793309718796018123

A good way to visualise a Tory purgatory.

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Also GE date in-between last 16 and quarter finals of the Euros. So expect 'I dreamed of being a football' grandstanding from all sides. Depending on the results of course.

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Sky News just forcibly removed from Tory campaign launch.

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Corbyn himself was elected in 1983 with his 'colourful' predecessor Michael O'Halloran standing as an independent (having jumped to and then not being selected by the SDP.)

Different sides of the political spectrum of course.

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A few points on polling.

The polling across the mayoralty elections in May was actually pretty good. Not all pollsters polled of course but if we look at the last poll from each company in April/May and bearing in mind a third of these were in London, the polls underestimated the Tories by 1.5 points and overestimated Labour by the same. Outside of London the errors were much tighter.

The Lib Dems and Greens were overestimated by 0.5 and Reform overestimated by 2 points though in a number of polls the overestimation was significantly higher.

More In Common, who polled outside of London were the most accurate, followed by Savanta. Both of which currently show higher Conservative shares and Labour leads of 17 points.

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-The Bridge-

'Iceberg, right ahead Sir!'

'So it's not a Woke Blob? Where's the damage?'

'A huge hole in third class, almost exclusively in fact. The ships Post Office is damaged, but they're all currently in the brig. The boiler room is over worked. We tried clapping but to no avail.'

'We all remember those dark days mid voyage. Everyone confined to their rooms. Sea sickness. I have demonstrated that I'm the most effective man to lead this ship. Don't place your trust in someone who has made u-turn after u-turn'

'Sir, you're soaking wet'

-Somewhere in third class-

'If elected your Captain, if you place your trust in me, I promise you I will open these gates.'

'Sir, there's not enough lightboats.'

-beat-

'I know what it's like to be in third class. To aspire towards a better life. But I also understand the tough decisions needed during this moment of nautical crisis. Now is not simply not the time to overwhelm the upper decks '

'But you just said...'

'This is a changed landing party. We have demonstrated that we have changed.'

(audible swimming)

-In the Marconi wireless room-

'Send out a distress signal!'

'Quiet man! Can't you see I have all these messages to send to the New York Times concerning access to women only lifeboat spaces!'

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https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1793975180143775920

Those numbers. Can't breach 10% amongst under 40's (they got 24% amongst that age group in 1997)

It's extinction level.

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National Service in Northern Ireland will be a literal riot.

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The Conservatives say the scheme would involve 30,000 selective military placements where "the brightest and best" would get involved in cyber security, logistics, or civil response operations full-time for a year.

Everyone else would do 25 days, or one weekend a month for a year, with non-military organisations including the fire service, the police, the NHS or charities.

From a BBC article on this.

So it seems no one would actually be forced to do assault courses and get yelled at by a corporal, but I think that’s exactly the picture most people will have in mind when they skim the headlines about ‘national service’. Presumably the Tories would not be too unhappy to cultivate that impression in the minds of the voters this policy is clearly supposed to be aimed at, but I suspect that, for the most part, it will just work against them even more for all the reasons already discussed here as to why this is a laughable electoral ploy.

There's a genuine merit in having 'mandatory' voluntary work. If anything, retirees might get the most benefit in terms of wellbeing. It should fall on everyone to varying degrees.

Instead it's being used as a stick against the 'youth blob' with no payoff. You'll still have to pay student loans, you might have apprenticeships delayed etc. You get nothing from it.

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You have to be so derangedly poll-brained to think that just because this gimmick has a plurality of support in the abstract that a single voter is going to actually change their vote over it.

And it doesn't even have that: the suggestion is very unpopular.

And polling is nebulous if it doesn't define what it is and who it applies to. Now that is been narrowed down, it's bombed.

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I have noticed, and it's been reiterated a bit on the Sunday's, that Labour are tentatively 'vibing' a bit more centre-left than pre-campaign. No substance yet, but I think it demonstrates confidence going into the campaign.

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First Scottish poll of the campaign, from More In Common:

• Labour 35%
• SNP 30%
• Conservatives 17%
• Liberal Democrats at 10%
• Reform UK 4%
• Greens at 3%

If you plug that into a universal swing model, it puts us roughly on 28 Lab, 16 SNP, 8 Tory, 5 Lib Dem. Usual disclaimers about universal swing and tactical voting apply - we don't know how well anti-SNP unionist tactical voting will hold up compared to anti-Tory tactical voting.

They haven't polled Scotland before but they are an accurate. (especially in May) A deep dive suggests their weighting method prompts don't knows which is something you want to see at this point in polling. That is favourable to Labour. Also a more realistic Lib Dem vote.


On a personal note, a five point deficit isn't what I want to see, but the fundamentals are not as bad as they could be for the SNP especially compared to more recent polls, particularly on voter retention.

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Con to Lab switchers care about the economy and public services, while Con to Reform switchers are basically single issue anti-immigration voters.

Relatedly, Reform voters are once again shown to be very disproportionately politically engaged, which makes their underperformance in basically every election even odder (read likely big polling error).
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The question is, what are Reform voters engaged with.

Terminally online. And that's been bleeding into the heart of government for the last few years despite it having increasingly negative returns.