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Post by Adam in Stroud on Jul 19, 2022 14:36:51 GMT
Isn’t that just a case though of whoever’s behind in the polls making excuses and wanting to believe the situation is different regardless of the evidence? I remember when I was knocking up for Zac Goldsmith, a normally loyal Tory supporter said there wasn’t any point in voting because he was behind in the polls so I replied with those utterly ridiculous words “the only poll that counts is on polling day”. I think we're all proud of you for that.
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iang
Lib Dem
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Post by iang on Jul 19, 2022 14:37:12 GMT
There was a phase where a few Corbynites maintained that Britain Elects was part of an anti Labour conspiracy, presumably because it kept publicising those opinion polls that elements of Labour then didn't like
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batman
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Post by batman on Jul 19, 2022 14:45:12 GMT
I have noticed recently that a lot of left-wing voters seem to think polling companies are part of some pro-Tory conspiracy and for a while refused to believe them. No doubt that part of this was a coping mechanism while Corbyn's Labour were getting hammered but it's far from impossible that lots of left-wing voters have been refusing to speak to pollsters and therefore the Labour vote has been underestimated in polls. Whether any of those people would still be Labour voters or whether this is still the case is another matter but certainly recently I suspect there has been a pattern of Labour voters not answering polls I have tended to find in my transport surveys that response rate has tended to be slightly worse in Labour areas than non-Labour areas. It was particularly good in Ickenham (the area also included a similarly non-Labour chunk of Ruislip), which is one of the least Labour wards in London. However, my worst area so far has been in Hillingdon East ward, an area with what for London is probably an above-average number of white working class Tory voters. Of course it's a completely different kind of survey with different methodology. I did get very good figures in central-ish Hammersmith, where Tories are pretty few & far between nowadays.
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Post by Adam in Stroud on Jul 19, 2022 14:51:24 GMT
I have noticed recently that a lot of left-wing voters seem to think polling companies are part of some pro-Tory conspiracy and for a while refused to believe them. No doubt that part of this was a coping mechanism while Corbyn's Labour were getting hammered but it's far from impossible that lots of left-wing voters have been refusing to speak to pollsters and therefore the Labour vote has been underestimated in polls. Whether any of those people would still be Labour voters or whether this is still the case is another matter but certainly recently I suspect there has been a pattern of Labour voters not answering polls The Conservative headline figure (plus leader approval, which party is trusted more on specific issues, competence of govt etc) is dire and pretty consistent. The only reason the Labour lead isn't 15+ points is that the figures for LD, Green, nationalists and "other" all remain pretty robust. I've no doubt that in a GE campaign those would firm up strongly in Labour's favour due to binary nature of campaigns, with caveat applying to tactical voting for LDs (and maybe PC). The current polls seem quite explicable to me in terms of Starmer and Labour not quite looking like a government in waiting compared to e.g. 1996-7.
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timmullen1
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Post by timmullen1 on Jul 19, 2022 14:55:49 GMT
There was a phase where a few Corbynites maintained that Britain Elects was part of an anti Labour conspiracy, presumably because it kept publicising those opinion polls that elements of Labour then didn't like Of course they’re all still convinced YouGov is a Tory propaganda machine because they’re convinced Nadhim Zahawi still runs it and dictates the results.
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Sibboleth
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Post by Sibboleth on Jul 19, 2022 14:56:17 GMT
Opinion polling is conducted in such a different way now that there's not much point comparing to the 1992-97 Parliament. Apples and oranges.
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Post by Adam in Stroud on Jul 19, 2022 15:02:07 GMT
Opinion polling is conducted in such a different way now that there's not much point comparing to the 1992-97 Parliament. Apples and oranges. If directed at me, I didn't mean to make that comparison - I just meant that by the last two years of Major, Blair and his team really looked and sounded ready for government while the Conservatives looked tired and divided. Right now the latter is true but I don't think the former is, and I consider that likely to have a depressant effect on Labour's polling now but which will likely disappear when voters are forced to choose one over the other - fewer people will mutter "they're all rubbish, maybe I'll vote Lib Dem/Green/etc".
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European Lefty
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Post by European Lefty on Jul 19, 2022 15:14:21 GMT
I have noticed recently that a lot of left-wing voters seem to think polling companies are part of some pro-Tory conspiracy and for a while refused to believe them. No doubt that part of this was a coping mechanism while Corbyn's Labour were getting hammered but it's far from impossible that lots of left-wing voters have been refusing to speak to pollsters and therefore the Labour vote has been underestimated in polls. Whether any of those people would still be Labour voters or whether this is still the case is another matter but certainly recently I suspect there has been a pattern of Labour voters not answering polls Isn't that just a few nut jobs on Twitter though? Not a statistcally significant proportion of voters I should have thought I definitely heard it from people who normally are otherwise fairly sensible. I don't think it was ever majority opinion but I do think it was more widespread than a few cranks
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Post by matureleft on Jul 19, 2022 15:24:14 GMT
Isn't that just a few nut jobs on Twitter though? Not a statistcally significant proportion of voters I should have thought I definitely heard it from people who normally are otherwise fairly sensible. I don't think it was ever majority opinion but I do think it was more widespread than a few cranks I think that was based on 2017 and the “correction” done after 2015. Almost all polls understated Labour’s performance in 2017 (not YouGov). And people thought that 2017 would repeat in part because of the largely mythical narrative for 2017 of a mobilisation from normal non-voters or young voters not picked up by pollsters.
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Post by london(ex)tory on Jul 19, 2022 16:15:57 GMT
I definitely heard it from people who normally are otherwise fairly sensible. I don't think it was ever majority opinion but I do think it was more widespread than a few cranks I think that was based on 2017 and the “correction” done after 2015. Almost all polls understated Labour’s performance in 2017 (not YouGov). And people thought that 2017 would repeat in part because of the largely mythical narrative for 2017 of a mobilisation from normal non-voters or young voters not picked up by pollsters. Ah yes, the “youthquake” 😂
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Post by matureleft on Jul 19, 2022 16:23:41 GMT
I think that was based on 2017 and the “correction” done after 2015. Almost all polls understated Labour’s performance in 2017 (not YouGov). And people thought that 2017 would repeat in part because of the largely mythical narrative for 2017 of a mobilisation from normal non-voters or young voters not picked up by pollsters. Ah yes, the “youthquake” 😂 Yup. Research showed that that wasn't the big factor claimed in 2017 but that didn't stop Corbyn fans (and some wider Labour supporters) believing that pollsters simply weren't picking up swathes of voters.
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Post by Merseymike on Jul 19, 2022 16:39:37 GMT
Ah yes, the “youthquake” 😂 Yup. Research showed that that wasn't the big factor claimed in 2017 but that didn't stop Corbyn fans (and some wider Labour supporters) believing that pollsters simply weren't picking up swathes of voters. That came down to voter distribution. There were swathes of voters but only in certain types of seats.
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clyde1998
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Post by clyde1998 on Jul 19, 2022 17:11:11 GMT
Yup. Research showed that that wasn't the big factor claimed in 2017 but that didn't stop Corbyn fans (and some wider Labour supporters) believing that pollsters simply weren't picking up swathes of voters. That came down to voter distribution. There were swathes of voters but only in certain types of seats. I don't think it did, there was only a statistically significant increase in turnout among people in their 30s. Of course, Labour's vote share increased more among younger voters (probably from the Lib Dems and definitely the Greens), but this was offset by Conservative gains among older voters (particularly from UKIP). If anything, there was a bigger shift in voting patterns among older voters than younger ones.
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Post by Merseymike on Jul 19, 2022 18:08:08 GMT
I think there were new voters but many didn't vote. And they were mostly in cities and university towns
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batman
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Post by batman on Jul 19, 2022 18:22:26 GMT
All I know is, in Brentford & Isleworth in 2017, we thought it would be very close. And it wasn't. Labour won by 12,000. Where did these extra voters come from? Some of them surely were students, mostly at the University of West London/TVU. There were many voters not reached by canvassers in 2017, and probably at least to some extent pollsters. But in 2019 the swing in that seat & many others in London was much smaller than the average. I think we still don't fully understand where our vote came from in some seats.
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Chris from Brum
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Post by Chris from Brum on Jul 19, 2022 18:29:11 GMT
All I know is, in Brentford & Isleworth in 2017, we thought it would be very close. And it wasn't. Labour won by 12,000. Where did these extra voters come from? Some of them surely were students, mostly at the University of West London/TVU. There were many voters not reached by canvassers in 2017, and probably at least to some extent pollsters. But in 2019 the swing in that seat & many others in London was much smaller than the average. I think we still don't fully understand where our vote came from in some seats. That may be true for all parties generally. Polling companies have, by the nature of their business, to make assumptions about the effects of national polling that don't prove well-founded at local levels. They shouldn't be ashamed of that, but they should be honest about it.
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timmullen1
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Post by timmullen1 on Jul 21, 2022 16:09:56 GMT
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The Bishop
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Post by The Bishop on Jul 23, 2022 9:20:07 GMT
Looks like their not doing a poll last Thursday (14th) was a one off then.
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timmullen1
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Post by timmullen1 on Jul 23, 2022 9:36:51 GMT
Looks like their not doing a poll last Thursday (14th) was a one off then.
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The Bishop
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Post by The Bishop on Jul 23, 2022 10:09:13 GMT
Yes, you just posted that I meant they didn't seem to do a poll the previous Thursday (their Twitter account had no mention of it, or indeed why there wasn't one)
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