Poll results including Green Parties

[Devonian]

swanarcadian suggested, and I'm inclined to agree, that it would be a good idea where possible to include the percentages for the Green parties when reporting poll results on this forum. With that in mind I thought I'd put up the poll results for the last two months including Green Parties. This would be the combined polling figure for GPEW and the Scottish Green Party. I haven't had time yet to go through the Populus and YouGov figures but here are the others (I could not find the Green figure for the ICM poll)

TNS/BMRN
14 Oct - Con 24% Lab 36% LibDem 9% UKIP 13% Green 3%
14 Nov - Con 30% Lab 38% LibDem 8% UKIP 12% Green 4%

Ipsos-MORI
17 Oct - Con 35% Lab 35% LibDem 9% UKIP 10% Green 4%
15 Nov - Con 32% Lab 38% LibDem 8% UKIP 8% Green 7%

Comres Independent
29 Oct - Con 28% Lab 36% LibDem 11% UKIP 12% Green 5%
26 Nov - Con 32% Lab 37% LibDem 9% UKIP 11% Green 3%

Comres IoS/Sunday Mirror
19 Oct - Con 32% Lab 35% LibDem 9% UKIP 16% Green 3%
17 Nov - Con 29% Lab 35% LibDem 10% UKIP 17% Green 5%

Opinium
1 Oct - Con 31% Lab 36% LibDem 7% UKIP 15% Green 4%
15 Oct - Con 27% Lab 38% LibDem 9% UKIP 17% Green 4%
29 Oct - Con 31% Lab 37% LibDem 7% UKIP 16% Green 3%
12 Nov - Con 28% Lab 37% LibDem 9% UKIP 16% Green 4%
26 Nov - Con 28% Lab 35% LibDem 8% UKIP 19% Green 4%

Survation
13 Oct - Con 27% Lab 37% LibDem 11% UKIP 18% Green 2%
27 Oct - Con 29% Lab 35% LibDem 12% UKIP 17% Green 2%

[Deleted]

Dec 4, 2013 7:49:38 GMT Devonian said:

swanarcadian suggested, and I'm inclined to agree, that it would be a good idea where possible to include the percentages for the Green parties when reporting poll results on this forum. With that in mind I thought I'd put up the poll results for the last two months including Green Parties. This would be the combined polling figure for GPEW and the Scottish Green Party. I haven't had time yet to go through the Populus and YouGov figures but here are the others (I could not find the Green figure for the ICM poll)

TNS/BMRN
14 Oct - Con 24% Lab 36% LibDem 9% UKIP 13% Green 3%
14 Nov - Con 30% Lab 38% LibDem 8% UKIP 12% Green 4%

Ipsos-MORI
17 Oct - Con 35% Lab 35% LibDem 9% UKIP 10% Green 4%
15 Nov - Con 32% Lab 38% LibDem 8% UKIP 8% Green 7%

Comres Independent
29 Oct - Con 28% Lab 36% LibDem 11% UKIP 12% Green 5%
26 Nov - Con 32% Lab 37% LibDem 9% UKIP 11% Green 3%

Comres IoS/Sunday Mirror
19 Oct - Con 32% Lab 35% LibDem 9% UKIP 16% Green 3%
17 Nov - Con 29% Lab 35% LibDem 10% UKIP 17% Green 5%

Opinium
1 Oct - Con 31% Lab 36% LibDem 7% UKIP 15% Green 4%
15 Oct - Con 27% Lab 38% LibDem 9% UKIP 17% Green 4%
29 Oct - Con 31% Lab 37% LibDem 7% UKIP 16% Green 3%
12 Nov - Con 28% Lab 37% LibDem 9% UKIP 16% Green 4%
26 Nov - Con 28% Lab 35% LibDem 8% UKIP 19% Green 4%

Survation
13 Oct - Con 27% Lab 37% LibDem 11% UKIP 18% Green 2%
27 Oct - Con 29% Lab 35% LibDem 12% UKIP 17% Green 2%

Thanks for this Devonian, these are interesting and surprisingly varied figures for the Greens - the kind of ratings UKIP were getting during the last Parliament. They could be a potential home for future voters who become disillusioned with Labour, who perhaps would have lent their support to the Lib Dems pre-2010.
But at they still don't seem to making enough of an impact for anyone in the media to notice. If anything they seem to be chipping a point or two off the LibDems rather than Labour - for the time being at least.

[Sibboleth]

The Green Party is too comfortable in its electoral ghetto for its own good.

[BossMan]

Dec 4, 2013 17:11:28 GMT Sibboleth said:

The Green Party is too comfortable in its electoral ghetto for its own good.

I would strongly agree with this from my own experience with the Greens. Within a branch like Glasgow, there is obviously a heavy emphasis on a certain area (the West End) where the majority of the members live, and all activity took place. When by-elections came up elsewhere, like in Glasgow East and then Glasgow North East, the branch generally just didn't care. You'd get one person willing to be a paper candidate, and one or two dedicated campaigners who might actually go out and do some work (which always included me from 2008 until 2010).

[marksenior]

Last 2 ICM polls have had Greens on 3% . Last 3 Populus polls have all had Greens on 3% . Last 3 Yougov polls have had Greens on 2/2/3%

[Deleted]

They need to get their act together. Not that I particularly want the Green Party to do well, but it would make the psephologist's life more interesting to have some actual competition for the left of centre vote, especially for those on the right on the political spectrum.

Do any of our Green colleagues have any thoughts on what has been written above?

[Devonian]

Populus Poll results for the Green Parties' % for October

3/3/3/3/2/3/3/3/2

and November-start of December

3/3/3/3/3/2/3/3/3

[Devonian]

YouGov Green Parties % for October

1st - 2%
2nd - 3%
3rd - 2%
4th - 2%
7th - 3%
8th - 3%
9th - 3%
10th - 2%
13th - 3%
14th - 2%
15th - 2%
16th - 2%
17th - 2%
18th - 2%
21st - 2%
22nd - 2%
23rd - 3%
24th - 3%
25th - 3%
28th - 3%
29th - 2%
30th -2%
31st - 2%

[greenchristian]

Dec 4, 2013 17:11:28 GMT Sibboleth said:

The Green Party is too comfortable in its electoral ghetto for its own good.

I'm not sure what you mean by our "electoral ghetto". If you mean that we don't do much work outside our target wards, that's entirely a matter of making the best use of our extremely limited resources. If you mean that we're stuck targeting a very particular (and narrow) subset of voters, that's definitely not true in my neck of the woods. The two election campaigns I was active in this May were polar opposites (Leamington Brunswick - always been Labour, most deprived ward in Warwickshire, and Nuneaton Weddington - always been Conservative, thoroughly middle class), and we won both.

[Sibboleth]

...and you assume I mean local campaigning stuff (in which a Green candidate is generally a de facto left-ish independent), which is, I reckon, pretty telling.

[Deleted]

Just a side note as I have done my real votes not opinion polls calculations

over the past three set of 15 by elections The Green Party dropped from 5.2% share of the vote down to 2.6%

[libfozzy]

I think electoral ghetto is probably a fair term. The Greens are - at least to an outside observer, perfectly comfortable where they are, which doesn't give them much drive to expand into other areas.

[BossMan]

The Green Party is sufficiently large to be expected to field at least a paper candidate in every single local by-election that comes up. I'll need to work out the exact percentage, but a quick glance at recent by-elections suggest they only contest about 30% of by-elections. It just comes across as not caring about electoral politics.

EDIT
From this post, the Greens seem to have stood in 33.54% of by-elections in 2013 so far, so I was about right.

[greenchristian]

Dec 5, 2013 0:07:39 GMT Sibboleth said:

...and you assume I mean local campaigning stuff (in which a Green candidate is generally a de facto left-ish independent), which is, I reckon, pretty telling.

If you're talking about national campaigning instead, that's rather difficult to do effectively without a decent media presence. And that's far harder to get as a small party than it should be. So whilst we are trying, it's difficult to make substantial progress.

Dec 5, 2013 12:38:59 GMT BossMan said:

The Green Party is sufficiently large to be expected to field at least a paper candidate in every single local by-election that comes up. I'll need to work out the exact percentage, but a quick glance at recent by-elections suggest they only contest about 30% of by-elections. It just comes across as not caring about electoral politics.

EDIT
From this post, the Greens seem to have stood in 33.54% of by-elections in 2013 so far, so I was about right.

I wouldn't say we're large enough to be expected to field at least a paper candidate in every local by-election. The post you linked to shows that nobody (not even Labour or the Tories) has managed to stand a candidate in 100% of by-elections in 2013. But yes, this is an area where we are weak and need to get a lot better. Whilst we have, historically speaking, been anything but election-minded, that is definitely changing.

[BossMan]

Well, I would still personally expect at least the Tories to stand everywhere. When they don't it suggests there's something gone wrong locally. Labour of course have an issue with some southern rural councils where they have very little organisation. I suppose the Greens might face this issue here and there, but really they ought to just appoint one activist per council area in every area that has at least one activist to always be paper candidate for any by-elections that come up.

[greenchristian]

Dec 5, 2013 17:18:43 GMT BossMan said:

Well, I would still personally expect at least the Tories to stand everywhere. When they don't it suggests there's something gone wrong locally. Labour of course have an issue with some southern rural councils where they have very little organisation. I suppose the Greens might face this issue here and there, but really they ought to just appoint one activist per council area in every area that has at least one activist to always be paper candidate for any by-elections that come up.

You're right, we should. Whilst there definitely are councils where we don't have any activists at the moment (North Warwickshire being an example near me), it doesn't account for all of those missed by-elections. Like many Greens, I'm pleased that we are getting better and more ambitious when it comes to elections, but am frustrated that changing attitudes are coming in unevenly, and that we don't have the resources to step up our electioneering more quickly.

[The Bishop]

I would say the low number of parliamentary by-elections the Greens have contested recently is even more telling.

There really should be an aim to stand a candidate, however token, in every GB vacancy as a matter of principle. When did UKIP last leave one uncontested?

[Pete Whitehead]

Last week in Caithness

[greenchristian]

Dec 5, 2013 18:13:14 GMT The Bishop said:

I would say the low number of parliamentary by-elections the Greens have contested recently is even more telling.

There really should be an aim to stand a candidate, however token, in every GB vacancy as a matter of principle. When did UKIP last leave one uncontested?

I think that speaks more to our lack of money than anything else. UKIP have a number of very wealthy donors, we don't. Therefore, even before their poll surge, they could easily afford to lose their deposits. And now, with that increased level of base support, their deposit is more likely to be safe. For us, it's £500 we're unlikely to retain, and it might be quite a big drain on the local party in question's resources.

[Devonian]

Dec 5, 2013 18:13:14 GMT The Bishop said:

I would say the low number of parliamentary by-elections the Greens have contested recently is even more telling.

There really should be an aim to stand a candidate, however token, in every GB vacancy as a matter of principle. When did UKIP last leave one uncontested?

Glasgow North East 2009

The last two English by elections it sat out were Haltemprice and Howden in 2008 which they sat out because of the issue of the by election. The last one before that was Cheadle in 2005 (where Veritas stood). The last Welsh by election they sat out was Blaenau Gwent in 2006.