The pollsters have Labour running away with it in Oldham East
Peter Hoskin 12:16pm
The same, but completely different. That's the electoral paradox that emerges from a
couple of opinion polls on the Oldham East & Saddleworth by-election this morning. The same, because both
the Lord Ashcroft survey for the Sunday Telegraph and the ICM survey for the Mail on Sunday produce the same result as in the general election: Labour first, the Lib Dems second and the Tories in
third. Completely different, because this is no longer the achingly close contest that it was back in May.
Both polls have Labour soaring 17 percentage points above the yellow bird of liberty.
Of course, the polls aren't always right. Yet these latest will surely furrow some brows in Coalitionville. While neither forecast the nightmare scenario for Nick Clegg – a third-placed finish for the Lib Dems – a hefty Labour lead would still provoke a similar sort of backlash. A seventeen-point advantage for the party whose previous candidate was dethroned by the courts, triggering the by-election in the first place? Many would exploit it as proof that the coalition has hobbled the Lib Dems as an electoral force.
For Labour, of course, these polls are considerably more encouraging. A convincing performance in Oldham could be just the tonic for Ed Miliband's stuttering leadership so far. But the Labour leader shouldn't rest complacently on one by-election result. The Ashcroft survey also discovers that, even in the Labour hotspot of Oldham, David Cameron is seen as the most effective party leader, with the best economic prospectus. So, even a dam-bursting victory for Labour might just propel a narrative that I speculated about last week: that the party's successes are coming in spite of, not because of, their leader's efforts.
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TomTom
January 9th, 2011 12:47pm Report this commentPhil Woolas may have been a good Constituency MP - I don't know - but he might have had a good personal vote. The LibDem literature attacking him ad hominem and Sayeeda Warsi addressing some Conservatives in Urdu might have antagonised other voters.
Tuition Fees get their first outing at the polls and people in Oldham are not best pleased. Water cannon will not get them to vote for the Government.
Labour could reinvent itself but it is an incompetent party and just part of the merry-go-round.
It would seem logical for Labour sans Gordon Brown to win this seat
Cjamesk
January 9th, 2011 1:07pm Report this commentStick a red rosette on a piece of poo and they'd still vote for it like generations of Labour drones it's in the DNA.
Owen Morgan
January 9th, 2011 1:29pm Report this commentSo, labour's "reform" of postal voting is bearing fruit for the party at last. Stand by for a one hundred and twenty per cent turnout.
Nicholas
January 9th, 2011 1:37pm Report this commentIf the polls are correct the hubris of Son of Brown and the rest of the Brown Gang will be something to enjoy, as will the triumphalism of the BBC and watching how they go about trying to make the story run and run as a "significant narrative".
There is no doubt in my mind that socialists form the most powerful and influential body in British society, despite being in a minority, and of course they have the advantage of "not being Tories" and getting the full backing of the BBC. How quickly their crimes are forgotten.
Peter From Maidstone
January 9th, 2011 1:38pm Report this commentWhy is the likely result any sort of surprise at all. People don't vote in a vacuum. They are not choosing from a neutral position. This is a left wing seat. The electorate will probably elect a left wing candidate.
Nor is it a surprise that the LDs might do worse. They are now part of the Government and not an option for a protest vote.
Have thousands of people in the constituency come off the dole and other benefits and chosen to become entrpreneurs? Havv thousands of people in the consituency realised that their public sector jobs are just a drain on other people's income? I would expect not.
So the situation hasn't changed and the result is the same. How is that any sort of news, how is it any sort of reflection on the Coalition, or even on the LDs?
Your headline could easily have said 'Stupid Labour supporters will vote Labour'. That is not news.
Brian Vissian
January 9th, 2011 1:42pm Report this commentAre there still enough insane people to vote Lib Lab Con after they have given the governing of Gteat Britain to Europe
Dennis Churchill
January 9th, 2011 2:45pm Report this commentThe change from Conservative to UKIP, by a section of the electorate, plus the disillusionment with the Liberal party by its previous supporters should enable Labour to easily win this seat.
This would be a good result for the Conservatives as it will make it very difficult for Miliband to be replaced before the next election and he is a Conservative asset being too “foreign” to appeal to their core voters.
yank
January 9th, 2011 2:49pm Report this commentHeh. So Dave and the London boys selected their candidate here... and they chose somebody named "Kashif Ali" ? I suppose that's just a coincidence, and it's not really a well oiled but unspoken plan for post-election spin, to blame a drop in Tory votes on "racism", while simultaneously benefiting a coalition partner by any such movement, if it drives voters over to the LD candidate (as desired).
No, Dave would never do that. Why, not even in the darkest corners could such have been spoken. None but the slimiest of political tricksters would ever do that. So rest easy.
And remember, the UKIP and those others are racists, especially if their vote totals go up here. No need to say it... everybody knows it, right?
Aubrey Herbert
January 9th, 2011 3:31pm Report this commentI hate to say this but about 6 months ago, I suggested that, boring as the Labour leadership contest seemed, it was important because it would produce the next PM of this country. Electing a man who was clearly hanging up the coats when God handed out charisma makes no difference, other than providing continuing amusement for afficianados of baffling moments in political history.
The lasting achievement of Blair and Brown has been to turn us into a welfare-dependent society that continues to look to the State to do our thinking, control our pocket money and ride to the rescue whenever anything unpleasant happens. Tackling the underlying problem of our indebtedness, even in the half-hearted way this Coalition has, will send the electorate running back to the comfort of the familiar, reality-lite Labour Party and more hand-outs, state benevolence and sympathetic gestures.
Doesn't the Old and Sad poll prove this? They will vote for the candidate of a party that bankrupted the country, disgraced the constituency at local level and has a nonentity as its national leader, as will the rest of the country when the Coalition falls apart. Any takers for 18 months max, with EU the fault-line issue?
Then the only hope will be for Nicholas and me to put together a Coffee House Cabinet to rescue the country. Richard of York need not apply.
Bill Fraser
January 9th, 2011 3:43pm Report this commentWould be newsworthy if they were NOT going to win this seat by a large margin...
GerryBoy
January 9th, 2011 5:51pm Report this commentI love this sort of thinking from Nicholas:
There is no doubt in my mind that socialists form the most powerful and influential body in British society ....
What country has he been living in the last 30 years? Clearly not the UK under Thatcher and Blair: now thanks to their efforts the fourth mopst unequal society in the entire developed world.
What per chance is Nicholas's definition of a socialist, that he somehow thinks they are running the UK? Anyone even slightly to the left of full-blooded right-wing Conservatism? Sorry Nicholas but that isnt a definition of socialist.
Boudicca
January 9th, 2011 7:47pm Report this commentI doubt this will happen, but I'd like to see the UKIP candidate get a good vote. It might send a message to Cameron that his pro-EU policy is losing him vital votes.
If the LibDems come third, I'll be delighted. If they came fourth, I'd be ecstatic.
Nicholas
January 9th, 2011 8:30pm Report this commentGerryBoy, no need to be sorry but you clearly haven't been paying attention on this site. My definition of a socialist is a communist bastard who says he means well. The ones who believe they are on the Left for purely altruistic purposes can best be described as "useful idiots" for the others who want all the authoritarian stuff. There that should at least match your description of "full-blooded right-wing Conservatism" (And "full-blooded"? You are the ones with the red flags).
And please stop that annoying lefty rabble rousing trick of pointing at me but talking to the room at large to garner support for your ridicule.
Alex Gallagher
January 9th, 2011 8:35pm Report this commentyou lot seem to have surrendered the seat already, before the vote.
sems like cowardice in the face of the enemy to me.
John David Barnett
January 9th, 2011 9:54pm Report this commentIt's a pity that the Conservatives look to do badly.
2trueblue
January 10th, 2011 1:11am Report this commentWait and see, it will not run to the BBC.
GerryBoy
January 10th, 2011 1:41pm Report this commentSo Nicholas you basically dont have a definition of socialist beyond your own prejudice and abuse; thats not going to stack up or convince many people.
A definition of a socialist is someone who wants to see the abolition of capitalism and the creation of a socialist society with common ownership of public services, equality and widespread nationalisation. On this definition between 5-10% of the electorate of the UK could be classified as socialist; probably the same sort of amount as are on the fundamental market right.
Your definition - beyond the abuse - takes in anyone who is centre-left, liberal or liberal Tory. It wont convince many people here and no one in wider debate. And abuse and invective show the inadequacies of your argument.
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