Peterborough

[Pete Whitehead]

BP    33.5%
Lab  30.0%
LD    13.5%
Con 12.5%
SDP   3.5%
Grn   3.0%
UKIP 1.5%
Oth   2.5%

[Deleted]

You think the Tories will drop by 34%?

[AdminSTB]

That would be the best SDP result in a by-election since William Hague first won Richmond.

[middyman]

Jun 5, 2019 17:20:24 GMT AdminSTB said:

That would be the best SDP result in a by-election since William Hague first won Richmond.

Their candidate is very well-known in the East from his UKIP days.

[greenhert]

Labour 34
Brexit Party 33
Conservative 15
Liberal Democrats 10
Green 4
UKIP 2
SDP 1
Other 8 candidates 1% total.

[yellowperil]

Lab 28
BP 26
LD 19
Con 16
Green 6
SDP 3
UKIP 1
Others 1

[Andrew_S]

BRX 31%
Lab 29%
Con 17%
LD 15%
UKIP 3%
Green 2%
SDP 2%
Others 1%

Turnout 34%

[Adrian]

Brexit Party 38
Labour 30
Conservative 16
Liberal Democrats 8
Green 4
UKIP 2
Others 2

[iainbhx]

BRX 31 LAB 30 CON 14 LDM 12 GRN 5 SDP 3 UKIP 2 OTH 3

[carlton43]

Jun 5, 2019 16:42:17 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

BP    33.5%
Lab  30.0%
LD    13.5%
Con 12.5%
SDP   3.5%
Grn   3.0%
UKIP 1.5%
Oth   2.5%

This must be the third thread with the simple single title 'Peterborough' including the one in the Blue Room.

This contest is all about size of TO, differential TO and the relativity between parties by way of crossover, temporary 'voting away', 'lending vote', second guessing, tactical voting, and perhaps most of all attempting to block the result one least wishes to see. This is very complex and nearly impossible to forecast. We are into intelligent guesswork with many interlocking factors.

Let us start with the minors. How well will the core vote hold up for LDs, Greens, SDP and UKIP? Are the  LDs a minor on basis of past performance or part of the mix of the 'Top 4' because of the recent surge in support? That is the question? Will the LD surge carry through here and take them into the top 4, or will potential 'surge voters' pause and prefer Labour for the 'greater good' of stalling an emergent BP?

Let me muse on the contest, party by party, and to try and get past my own bias and aching hopes, and past being a typical Forum member and overthinking the whole matter. What do I think will happen today as people drift down to the polls? Will there be a lot of last minute thoughts in the booth? And what of those postals already decided before the most recent mood movements?

UKIP.  This party is in serious decline and already reduced to a hard core by the Farage upstart and the effects of the Locals and the Euros. It is in another leadership contest and further damaged by the departure of every known 'name' except for a few oddballs and controversialists. How big is that core going to be here? I think between 1% and 3%, say 2%? Whitby is not going to be an added draw.

SDP. A brand from the past with a higher profile candidate that one might have expected, and one who perhaps wishes he was the BP candidate and back with Farage instead of being locked into a previous promise made in a recent but rather different political background. Is Patrick O'Flynn and the brand SDP as strong a draw as UKIP, BP and Farage? I think not. I don't see them beating 1% after the big event squeeze.

Greens.  This is not '  green country' and it is not a high profile candidate. But there is a lot of green talk and activity. They might make 2% to 5% from enthusiasts who see 'Save the Planet' as bigger than 'Stop the BP'? Say 2.5%?

Other Minors.  There are a lot of them!  Even on derisory votes (and most will be) this will probably amount to a combined 2.5%

LDs.  This is the critical figure. Much hinges on it. It has been very low and why would it grow when the main event is between the three majors for here and now?  Well they are on a bit of a surge. They might draw off some Remainer Conservatives? They are even more likely to attract an element of disaffected Labour Remainers disgusted by the previous member and disappointed at the Corbyn fence sitting? Then a general upsurge as seen elsewhere. Will they be seen as an irrelevance in this time and place or as the main and obvious receptacle for the Remain vote? Probably a bit of both in different minds? I pitch it between 7.5% and 15%.  Say 11%

Conservative.  This is a damaged brand under massive threat and pulls in various directions. Many are disaffected enough to vote away with the BP (as I would myself). That will severely reduce their TO, but by how much? Some will reluctantly go LD as the home for Remainers for this day. A few may go Labour to stall the awfulness of a BP win and as an act of imperative national importance. And a few will go Green to 'Save the Planet'. Some will definitely abstain in distress or disgust. I hope that there will be an element of renewal because of the end of May? So where does that leave us? Big range from 7.5% to 22.5%. I pitch it at 16.5%.

Brexit Party. The Farage insurgent new kid on the block. It has a solid new core vote and this is good country for it. It is on a roll after the Euros but this does not have the particular Euro draw and centrality. It will pick up an element from every party IMO from those to whom Brexit is the main event. There are some Greens and Leaver LDs who will support. I think in the particular circumstances of this election they will attract more former Labour votes than some of you here expect. 
And they will attract more than half of the former Conservative vote. They have the initiative and all others are trying to best them. The Conservatives know they cannot win but are desperate to stall the BP and would by far prefer a Labour hold and in that view are tending to maximise the element of voting away! Many in Labour also fear the BP as a threat to an element of their own vote, but also as a most unwelcome political movement that might just morph into an AfGB and become a major player of a type that appals them. So where to pitch that vote? It is between 25% and 37.5% and I see it nearer the top end of that range. Say 34.5%.


Labour.  This is the holder party but not the natural principal holder.  It is in defensive mode because of the reason for the by-election and because of the poor Euros and because of rather weak Locals and because of fence sitting over Brexit. They ought to be in a two horse race with the Conservatives and probably just behind them? But both the majors are in a bit of retreat and with internal and external problems and threats. I can't see them holding this unless the Conservatives stage a rally and all others parties have a collapse. So they are in the range 27.5% to 33.5%? I pitch them at 30%.


My forecast is therefore

BP 34.5%
Lab 30%
Con 16.5%
LD  11%
Green 2.5%
UKIP 2%
SDP 1%
Others 2.5%    

[Adam in Stroud]

Plausible enough, carlton43.

I doubt there'll be much LD surge here, I detect little sign that the party is trying to pull in volunteers from elsewhere. Tacitly I think there's an acknowledgment that the race is between BxP and A N Other, likely to be Labour and I think keen LDs will hold their noses and vote Labour. I doubt it'll work. Nationally Labour will have put an effort in but it feels a bad time to be Labour on the doorstep.

If Labour had to pick a place they didn't want to fight a by-election, a marginal held by the Tories only a few years ago, with a big Leave vote, a scandal over the outgoing Lab MP, and at a time when the spotlight is on Farage, would be very high on the list.

[yellowperil]

I find Carlton's musings on this really interesting and in his thoughtful mode he sometimes hides away. I find his reasoning quite persuasive even though I come to rather different conclusions- in essence none of us have a clue what is going to happen and there have been few by-elections less predictable in recent years. Certainly though if the Brexit party cannot win here and at this moment in time one might doubt whether they can win anywhere much. I pin my hopes that they can be beaten mainly on the past Westminster election performances of the Faragists under the UKIP banner, where they proved pretty adept at losing what should have been sure fire winners. There was always a concentration on stunts at the expense of intensive groundwork and that seemed pretty effective in some local elections and more particularly in the Euros it was always pretty abject when faced with larger scale FPTP operation- Farage's own parliamentary forays seem to illustrate exactly what I mean. Time will soon tell whether they have learned their lesson.

One of the problems for the anti-Brexit forces is that they are more evenly divided than the pro- Brexit ones. I see the Brexiteers having little difficulty in getting swathes of votes from Conservatives of similar persuasion, and while the SDP and UKIP niche voters will take a small dedicated vote, it will be less of a distraction than the divisions between Labour , Lib Dem and Green parties as the proper inheritors of the Stop Farage vote. I feel the Lib Dems started fairly low key almost as though they hadn't quite decided whether they were seriously in the race or not, but have been going quite hard for it after being buoyed by the locals and especially the Euros. My feeling if it had been made a priority from the off they could probably have won this by-election, it's what they are good at, just as UKIP ( and the Greens for that matter) have traditionally been really bad at it.So my final thought is that Lab will just hang on , Brexit will come second and the LibDems will take third and be closing rapidly- we could have done with another week. Of course it is also possible if it feels like that on the ground there could be a lot of last-minute switches back to Labour at the last moment as a less bad alternative to the BP. Nor of course do I know what has happened to the all important pvs already long cast.

[Pete Whitehead]

Senior Lib Dem declares support for known anti-Semite

[rc18]

Lab 33%
BP 26%
Con 24%
LD 8%
Green 5%
Oth 4%

[johnloony]

Lab 39
Con 27
Brexit 17
LD 10
Green 2
UKIP 1.6
SDP 1.1
ED 0.6
UKEUP 0.4
OMRLP 0.4
CPA 0.3
Common Good 0.2
Renew 0.2
Moore 0.1
Smith 0.1

and I predict a turnout of 36% which would mean something like
Lab 10,100
Con 7,000
Brx 4,400
LD 2,600
Green 500

[johnloony]

Jun 5, 2019 17:20:24 GMT AdminSTB said:

That would be the best SDP result in a by-election since William Hague first won Richmond.

Not quite. Neath 1991 was 5.2% for the SDP (compared with 5.7% for Lib Dem).

[carlton43]

Jun 6, 2019 9:28:00 GMT johnloony said:

Lab 39
Con 27
Brexit 17
LD 10
Green 2
UKIP 1.6
SDP 1.1
ED 0.6
UKEUP 0.4
OMRLP 0.4
CPA 0.3
Common Good 0.2
Renew 0.2
Moore 0.1
Smith 0.1

and I predict a turnout of 36% which would mean something like
Lab 10,100
Con 7,000
Brx 4,400
LD 2,600
Green 500

That is very precise John and rather different from everyone else.  What are your reasons for considering that Labour will have such a very strong result?  Is it the hard work and superior ground activity unable to be even partially matched by any other party against the background of a rather low poll?

I think the TO will be in the range 37.5% to 55.5% and at the upper end of that range. On a low poll I admit that the Labour ground campaign will have a marked effect but that the core BP vote will be a larger proportion of that total and make their win even more likely.

[greatkingrat]

Jun 5, 2019 17:45:01 GMT middyman said:

Jun 5, 2019 17:20:24 GMT AdminSTB said:

That would be the best SDP result in a by-election since William Hague first won Richmond.

Their candidate is very well-known in the East from his UKIP days.

Is he really? Are any MEP's very well-known (with the exception of Farage)?

[Pete Whitehead]

More than most I would have thought, though my perspective may be a bit atypical here. He has been running a very active campaign in the constituency for some time now. If he hadn't prematurely jumped ship to the SDP I expect he would have been the Brexit party candidate here

[middyman]

Jun 6, 2019 10:27:59 GMT greatkingrat said:

Jun 5, 2019 17:45:01 GMT middyman said:

Their candidate is very well-known in the East from his UKIP days.

Is he really? Are any MEP's very well-known (with the exception of Farage)?

He wasn't well known as an MEP,  but as a leading light in UKIP.  I think he may even have been on Newsnight and Question Time.  Certainly, he has been interviewed on news bulletins etc.