The bullying story keeps on rolling, but will it affect the polls?

Hawkeye

During the party conferences the tracker polls where all over the place. As such I have little confidence in them.

The run up to the election will at least give us a better insight as to how daily tracker polls compare with the more formal polls normally conducted.

AndyinBrum

So, Tories are on or about 40% and it's Labour taking some Libdem votes & not the Tories losing any?

strapworld

I am used by Yougov but the surveys I am asked my opinions on are never political. Always on shoppping etc.

Now is it because, when first registering, I said I was not a conservative but normally vote conservative? I think these polls are weighted towards the left - Just like Question Time audiences.

I am now of the opinion that these daily polls should be banned

oldtimer

It seems to me that if you are going to run a daily tracker poll, it is a good idea to get the numbers out right first time. That said, I am unconvinced about how reliable a guide they are. They merely encourage more and more meaningless sound bites and news story frenzies. It marks a relentless drive to the bottom of the political market - a world of spin, smears and lies as events of the past few days reveal.

Rhys

Feel sorry for Brown? After all his crap, I think the public deserve a bit more credit than that. Everyone I talk to at work wants him gone. He just can't be trusted and he is now an embarrasment on the world stage. Simple as that.
Cameron should go for the jugular at PMQ and stop pulling his punches.

Rhoda Klapp

I can't possibly keep up with the mad pace of 'no change' around here.

Roger Daley

@ Strapworld. I too do the surveys for YouGov - I think the fact that they asked me which papers I read when I joined kinda eliminated me from any of their acclaimed political surveys.

Vulture

The more we see of horrible Bruin's slack, miserably misanthropic features the less we'll like them.

Yes, some may feel sorry for such a sad sack of decaying flesh - but that won't translate into extra votes. Liebour will still have to rely on their client state payroll vote.

Problem is, with the other slack Alice currently masquerading as the leader of the Conservative opposition, that may just be enough.

Andy Carpark

The prospect of a hung Parliament is a 'story' so I quite understand why the commentariat is pushing it relentlessly. However, you insult our collective intelligence by suggesting we should give a monkey's cuss about these polls.

In 2005, YouGov (prop: Mr Baroness Ashton) consistently predicted a three figure Labour majority. IG Index consistently predicted a majority of 65-69.

Polling organisations feed loaded questions to suggestible couch potatos. Spread betting firms stay in business because punters do not risk their own money chasing wish-fulfilment.

RKing

I have the impression that these polls ARE politically biased. The thinking being the "jump on the bandwagon" effect.

Lets face it the majority of the electorate will vote like a flock of sheep.
It sounds harsh but probably true.

strapworld

Mr Hoskin,

You could ask Yougov how they choose the people to participate in their surveys. i.e. are the daily polls the same people?

I know it is only two people but is it not significant that both Roger Daley and I are never used for political surveys- ever!

Andy H

The polls change in direct proportion to the number of postal votes gerrymandered by Labour.

In order for this con trick to work, they need their political pollsters to show a trend towards Labour as we get nearer the election, or else the public will cry foul.

As they stuff more ballet boxes, they will decrease the Tory lead.

It cannot be anything else, as just on a normal distribution of people, there cannot possibly be that many daft people in the country....

Sir Graphus

Roger and Strapworld; my wife was asked to take part, but they always rang at kids’ mealtimes/bathtimes and we were too busy to talk; so the system is biased against busy people (who would, I reason, be more likely to be right wing).

floater

The irony is that the Brown bullying story will probably do him no harm. First most voters will be annoyed that he is being picked on and will see many of the critism as politically motivated but more importantly he comes out of it as a strong leader which draws even more attention to Cameron's weakness. Brown is revealed as a passionate strong man not a changeable flip flop. Funnily enough many overseas have always been amused at the anti Brown opinion in UK as they always saw him as a determined leader

Richard

@Rhys

Problem is Cameron IS punching as hard as he can but its not enough.....Remember Ali and rope a dope....cameron will punch himself out and Brown will still be there.

2trueblue

Four blogs on the polls?

Nicholas

Yep! I'm another YouGov panelist who never gets invited to participate in political surveys.

Hardly surprising when you look at who their gaffer is married to. I'm convinced YouGov is part of Labour's propaganda machinery.

Bocephus

The theory would seem to be no matter how bad Brown does he can only benefit from it.

Be accused of bullying staff and people will feel sorry for him. Borrow hundreds of billions of pounds and leave David Cameron whirling round trying to explain how he's going to pay it back. Oversee the destruction of the British economy and somehow Mrs Thatcher gets the blame for this 20 years after leaving office. Allow virtually unlimited immigration and let the Tories be accused of racism because they want to reduce it. Refuse to hold the promised referendum on the Lisbon Treaty and somehow leave David Cameron getting the blame for this.

Never mind Britain plunging down worldwide education league tables, quite incredible what the media let him get away with.

toco

Gordon Brown is now a global laughing stock with worrying traits.Cheer yourselves up enormously with Guido's hilarious post courtesy of Taiwanese TV.They take bullying seriously in the Far East!

Richard

The Tories decapitation plan is failing, its awakening the old British trait of supporting the underdog.
Playing the man and not the ball is never a winning game plan.....might make the die hard fans go all orgasmic but in this game its the result that counts.
The more DC hides from policies the less he looks like a man of substance.
Churchill was a grumpy drunken woman hating racist bigot but the public liked him. Not sure Cromwell was that nice to be with when had the hump either.
Maggie had a temper if I remember rightly even has form for some handbagging and skullduggery.

Nicholas

In a country that celebrates foul-mouthed, bullying enterpeneurs (Sugar) and chefs (Ramsay) Brown is bound to do well as a result of this. It aligns him perfectly with the cool Britannia, rough & ready, spiteful, mockney thugs that are such a feature of New Labour's dumbed down "celebrity" Britain. A mean-spirited, malevolent, dumbed-down PM for a mean-spirited, malevolent, dumbed-down country.

An ingenious master class of New Labour spin. War is Peace. Poverty is Wealth. Censorship is Freedom.

anne allan

I am also a YouGov contributor, and the vast majority of the questionnaires i receive are about shopping, employment, investments or insurance. I suspect that if they know you have a political affiliation, you end up with the 'bread and butter' polls. Often, I no longer to do them, as who gives a cuss whether I drink Bacardi or have warm thoughts about Axa insurance?

Victor Southern

I have been asked by YouGov with monotonous regularity to give my opinion on soap powders, mobile phones and advertising recognition. Never have I been asked for a political opinion.

Mind you I have never been polled on politics by any organisation.

Peter From Maidstone

I am also on YouGov and have never been asked to participate in a political poll. You would think that using electronic media would mean that they could easily poll a very large audience, but one wonders if they have a tame team of Labour supporters. Maybe, like Blue Peter, they just conduct the polls in-house.

Trafalgar

Yougov was the most accurate pollster in predicting the last Euro and London mayoral elections. So its track record (and ICM's) is actually better than the likes of ComRes.

Do you really think that a pollster would risk appearing biased? Polls are commissioned sometimes by political parties, mainly by newspapers and the concept that they are skewed is wide of the mark I'm afraid.

Those are the facts. You all sound like Gordon shooting the messenger and not heeding the message. We are in hung-parliament territory right now.

Walter H

Most of the polls I receive from YouGov ask me how much I earn, how much money have I got in the bank and which bank I use.

Watt Tyler

Yes yes, you Islington/Westminster Disconnect journos have it completely right, hence the "watergate" type intensity. The election is on a knife edge. Now Labour might win it because we feel sorry for Gordons psychotic outburts.

In the real world, people always knew that he was strange, and this is no news, and it won't change the way they vote:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1253000/Gordon-Brown-bullying-claims-Why-surprised.html

strapworld

Trafalgar, We were just making out point. Odd, dont you think that so many right of centre people have had the same experience as me?

It is something that Mr Hoskin's could ask Yougov about. They could well be using the same people for these daily polls.

It could be, of course, that they are designed to frighten tory voters into believing all is lost and they vote in numbers. It shows how bad the leadership of Cameron really is!

mitcheltj

Strapworld - if each poll is say, 1,000 people and assuming that no-one is polled twice until all are polled, it would take, say, 50,000 polls to get round everyone. At one per day that's roughly 150 years. Be patient - or perhaps they saw you coming do you think?

Maggie

If you wanted to get to 5000 points it might be better to lie about who you're going to vote for and claim to be a don't know/unaffiliated/Mirror reader.

Dixon

The sheer cynicism of this article beggars belief. Not even the merest fig-leaf of a pretence that the allegations are anything but an attempt to manipulate the polls.

Ghengis

Perhaps the fact of this matter is --- The electorate have lost all confidence in the major parties, and are giving notice of their intention to elect a hung parliament so as to limit its power.

Maggie Stanfield

The most obvious point of all is the one no one seems to have picked up - that is the bullying that has been carried out against Ms Platt and anyone else who has had the audacity to question the generosity of Gordon Brown's behaviour towards his civil servants should be rapidly turned to mush. How can a party that says it opposes bullying so gleefully indulge in it?