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Scott2006
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Independent: Opinion Polls accuracy/Cameron EffectI've copied 2 articles from the Independent - probably best just to skim read them unless you've got a few minutes to spare. They make the point that Cameron for all his Standing-for-nothing-and-everything leadership style has been knocked (from a YouGov Poll) from 25% to 20% on the economy due to the Forsyth Report on the £21bn cuts but still seems to be winning back some conservative voters with 'steady, patient changes' to his party amid mixed polls.
How will the English going to the Conservatives (if they do) alter the political position of Scotland? This I think will have a bearing on the next Scottish Parliament Election, but not for a resurgence of the ScotTory, more likely making it easier to arrive at a breaking point and a split of the UK.
Latest Indy Poll CON 38% LAB 32% LIBDEM 14% OTHERS 16%
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article1919499.ece
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The Big Question: How much faith should we have in political opinion polls?
By Sean O'Grady Published: 24 October 2006
Why are we asking?
Polls are under scrutiny by the political classes this week after a new one yesterday claimed the Tory leader David Cameron has, after a 10-month honeymoon, fallen out of favour with voters. A separate poll, also published yesterday, found that 51 per cent would prefer to see Gordon Brown as Prime Minister, compared with 24 per cent who hope to see Cameron in No 10. Today's Independent poll has bad news for the Government - two-thirds of the public believe the war in Iraq is unwinnable, and 62 per cent say we should withdraw as soon as possible.
How accurate are opinion polls?
The astonishing thing is that the opinion polls are as accurate as they are. Think about it. The pollsters contact 1,000 people and extrapolate from their answers the views of a varied, multicultural nation of 44 million voters. And yet it works. Polls do not always accurately predict election results exactly, but they are good at foretelling which party will get most votes. In a close contest fought under the vagaries of the first-past-the-post electoral system the actual parliamentary outcome will be hard to call, but the polls usually get to some approximation of the actual outturn.
Since the Second World War, only the 1951, 1970 and the 1992 general elections can be regarded as ones where pollsters might have got things badly "wrong". That said, the polls don't usually try to "predict" anything; they are a snapshot of public opinion. People are usually asked how they'd vote if a general election were held tomorrow, not in 2009, and we're bad at forecasting how we'll behave in the future.
So what else should we take into account?
Poll figures should be read in conjunction with results from local, regional, European or by-elections and with common-sense. The "mid-term blues" have long been a tradition in British politics. In the 1950s and 1980s, the Conservatives were often behind in the polls, yet they won all the general elections. The mid-term effect has been a less strong feature since the 1990s, when John Major never escaped his blues and, with the exception of the fuel protests of 2000, Tony Blair enjoyed an unbroken honeymoon with the voters for his first two terms. Three-party politics also make things harder to call.
What about the margin of error?
With regard to voting intention for parties, a poll rating is usually accurate to within 3 per cent. That means that say, a Labour showing of 33 per cent and a Conservative rating of 35 per cent could mean in reality Labour is on 30 per cent and the Tories on 38 per cent. Or that Labour is "really" on 36 per cent and the Tories on 32 per cent, so Labour rather than the Tories is in the lead. All within the margin of error: the Tories could be on a two-point lead or trailing Labour by 4 per cent. The 3 per cent margin of error applies in 19 out of 20 polls with a sample of 1,000.
What makes a bad poll?
Political polling is badly served by people unwilling to tell the truth (ironically given what the public say about politicians fibbing). This became acute in the late Thatcher/John Major era when fewer people were prepared to admit to pollsters that they were Conservatives. This helped to give the Tories artificially low poll ratings that then made it even more embarrassing for people to say they were going to vote Conservative (on top of the perceived stigma of being associated with the "nasty party").
This "spiral of silence" meant that "shy Tories" went underreported and helped to mess up the opinion polls (not least because they were more likely to vote). Perhaps New Labour may become similarly socially unpopular. A bad poll also asks loaded questions. Thus asking the public of they're willing to join the euro would probably get a different response to one where they were asked if they were willing to give up the UK's independence to join the euro. Similarly, human beings are naturally more inclined to say "yes" than "no" so, again, questions have to be framed carefully.
What makes a good poll?
Apart from a degree of luck, the more fastidiously it has been conducted, the better. In the past, the market-research companies weighted answers to get their samples to be more representative of the population as a whole. Thus, in the past, if there were too few elderly men in the sample and too many women in their twenties then the responses of the relatively few old boys would be given more bearing and the young ladies less, until they matched the demographic profile of the nation (as measured by the National Readership Survey).
Nowadays, more pollsters also weight their results to past vote, i.e. asking people how they voted at the last general election. A particular case in point is YouGov, an organisation that polls via the internet. Even now, web use is not universal, but YouGov argues that people are more likely to tell the truth on-line than via face-to-face street or door-to-door surveys, or over the telephone. As always, the question that's asked matters, but sometimes it's impossible to find one that can be accepted by all. Do you ask if people want to ban "bloodsports" or "fieldsports"? The Market Research Society has guidelines for the production of polls.
What about apathy?
People are less willing to vote, and the pollsters have tried to reflect this in their work. They now ask a range of questions to find out how determined people are to vote. An older problem is what to do with those who say they "don't know" how they'll vote. They are usually excluded from the results.
So should we get out of Iraq?
The Independent's poll suggests the public think so, possibly despite the fact they also think a civil war will follow if we do. When the answers are as clear-cut as they are in this poll, the margin of error is not a factor. However, how much such issues "drive the vote" is less clear: many voters might be against the war in Iraq but will still vote Labour in the next general election. It depends on the "salience" or importance of that issue. Iraq may matter less to people in 2008 or 2009 than now, especially as we know Mr Blair won't be a factor by then.
Should we trust the opinion polls?
Yes...
* They're suprisingly accurate when you consider the enormity of the task
* They are fine if taken in moderation and diluted by other evidence such as by-elections
* Even if they're occasionally ropey, they are all we've got
No...
* Polls have been wrong when it really matters, in close-run elections
* Only real votes in real ballot boxes count because people often lie to pollsters
* The public are fickle and volatile so it is pointless to worry about what they think today
Why are we asking?
Polls are under scrutiny by the political classes this week after a new one yesterday claimed the Tory leader David Cameron has, after a 10-month honeymoon, fallen out of favour with voters. A separate poll, also published yesterday, found that 51 per cent would prefer to see Gordon Brown as Prime Minister, compared with 24 per cent who hope to see Cameron in No 10. Today's Independent poll has bad news for the Government - two-thirds of the public believe the war in Iraq is unwinnable, and 62 per cent say we should withdraw as soon as possible.
How accurate are opinion polls?
The astonishing thing is that the opinion polls are as accurate as they are. Think about it. The pollsters contact 1,000 people and extrapolate from their answers the views of a varied, multicultural nation of 44 million voters. And yet it works. Polls do not always accurately predict election results exactly, but they are good at foretelling which party will get most votes. In a close contest fought under the vagaries of the first-past-the-post electoral system the actual parliamentary outcome will be hard to call, but the polls usually get to some approximation of the actual outturn.
Since the Second World War, only the 1951, 1970 and the 1992 general elections can be regarded as ones where pollsters might have got things badly "wrong". That said, the polls don't usually try to "predict" anything; they are a snapshot of public opinion. People are usually asked how they'd vote if a general election were held tomorrow, not in 2009, and we're bad at forecasting how we'll behave in the future.
So what else should we take into account?
Poll figures should be read in conjunction with results from local, regional, European or by-elections and with common-sense. The "mid-term blues" have long been a tradition in British politics. In the 1950s and 1980s, the Conservatives were often behind in the polls, yet they won all the general elections. The mid-term effect has been a less strong feature since the 1990s, when John Major never escaped his blues and, with the exception of the fuel protests of 2000, Tony Blair enjoyed an unbroken honeymoon with the voters for his first two terms. Three-party politics also make things harder to call.
What about the margin of error?
With regard to voting intention for parties, a poll rating is usually accurate to within 3 per cent. That means that say, a Labour showing of 33 per cent and a Conservative rating of 35 per cent could mean in reality Labour is on 30 per cent and the Tories on 38 per cent. Or that Labour is "really" on 36 per cent and the Tories on 32 per cent, so Labour rather than the Tories is in the lead. All within the margin of error: the Tories could be on a two-point lead or trailing Labour by 4 per cent. The 3 per cent margin of error applies in 19 out of 20 polls with a sample of 1,000.
What makes a bad poll?
Political polling is badly served by people unwilling to tell the truth (ironically given what the public say about politicians fibbing). This became acute in the late Thatcher/John Major era when fewer people were prepared to admit to pollsters that they were Conservatives. This helped to give the Tories artificially low poll ratings that then made it even more embarrassing for people to say they were going to vote Conservative (on top of the perceived stigma of being associated with the "nasty party").
This "spiral of silence" meant that "shy Tories" went underreported and helped to mess up the opinion polls (not least because they were more likely to vote). Perhaps New Labour may become similarly socially unpopular. A bad poll also asks loaded questions. Thus asking the public of they're willing to join the euro would probably get a different response to one where they were asked if they were willing to give up the UK's independence to join the euro. Similarly, human beings are naturally more inclined to say "yes" than "no" so, again, questions have to be framed carefully.
What makes a good poll?
Apart from a degree of luck, the more fastidiously it has been conducted, the better. In the past, the market-research companies weighted answers to get their samples to be more representative of the population as a whole. Thus, in the past, if there were too few elderly men in the sample and too many women in their twenties then the responses of the relatively few old boys would be given more bearing and the young ladies less, until they matched the demographic profile of the nation (as measured by the National Readership Survey).
Nowadays, more pollsters also weight their results to past vote, i.e. asking people how they voted at the last general election. A particular case in point is YouGov, an organisation that polls via the internet. Even now, web use is not universal, but YouGov argues that people are more likely to tell the truth on-line than via face-to-face street or door-to-door surveys, or over the telephone. As always, the question that's asked matters, but sometimes it's impossible to find one that can be accepted by all. Do you ask if people want to ban "bloodsports" or "fieldsports"? The Market Research Society has guidelines for the production of polls.
What about apathy?
People are less willing to vote, and the pollsters have tried to reflect this in their work. They now ask a range of questions to find out how determined people are to vote. An older problem is what to do with those who say they "don't know" how they'll vote. They are usually excluded from the results.
So should we get out of Iraq?
The Independent's poll suggests the public think so, possibly despite the fact they also think a civil war will follow if we do. When the answers are as clear-cut as they are in this poll, the margin of error is not a factor. However, how much such issues "drive the vote" is less clear: many voters might be against the war in Iraq but will still vote Labour in the next general election. It depends on the "salience" or importance of that issue. Iraq may matter less to people in 2008 or 2009 than now, especially as we know Mr Blair won't be a factor by then.
Should we trust the opinion polls?
Yes...
* They're suprisingly accurate when you consider the enormity of the task
* They are fine if taken in moderation and diluted by other evidence such as by-elections
* Even if they're occasionally ropey, they are all we've got
No...
* Polls have been wrong when it really matters, in close-run elections
* Only real votes in real ballot boxes count because people often lie to pollsters
* The public are fickle and volatile so it is pointless to worry about what they think today
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http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article1919497.ece
Tories regain poll lead over Labour
By Colin Brown and Andy McSmith Published: 24 October 2006
David Cameron was given a lift last night after a poll showed the Tories have regained their lead over Labour, with a survey putting them six points ahead.
The CommunicateResearch poll for The Independent came as the Conservative leader appealed to his party to give him more time to establish himself. Urging patience, Mr Cameron said: "People are not going to leap out of the arms of Tony Blair into the hands of someone else."
He said his leadership campaign was based on the idea that the Conservatives have to make steady, patient changes to get the party back in touch with the British people. "It is not easy," he said. His remarks on BBC Radio followed an Ipsos MORI poll showing his net approval rating had dropped from plus 14 points in January, shortly after he was elected, to minus two points. It also suggested that among those who said they would definitely vote, Labour had a two-point lead over the Tories.
Those figures were a crushing blow to Mr Cameron's hopes of establishing a long lead over Labour before Gordon Brown replaces Tony Blair. Another poll by Populus added to the Tory gloom, with figures showing Mr Brown was more popular than Mr Cameron with floating voters.
But the Independent poll showed the Tories on 38, with a lead of six percentage points over Labour on 32 per cent and the Liberal Democrats trailing on 14 per cent, with others at 16 per cent.
The Tory leadership had feared a backlash by traditional supporters over Mr Cameron's refusal to endorse tax cuts totalling £21bn which had been proposed by his tax commission under Lord Forsyth. A third survey by YouGov for The Daily Telegraph found support for the Tories on taxation had dropped from 25 per cent to 20 per cent.
Tory leadership sources said the poll findings were more in line with a poll of polls presented to the party in private last Friday showing the Conservatives were sustaining a small lead.
Mr Cameron made a direct appeal for the "baby boomer" vote by warning against allowing care homes to become ghettos. The elderly had been "airbrushed" out of popular culture, he said at a meeting of Age Concern. In a direct riposte to Mr Blair's speech to a Labour conference celebrating Britain as a "young country", Mr Cameron said: "It isn't. The fact is we are an old country, with our best years ahead of us."
Alan Milburn, the former Labour health secretary, has called for the Government to introduce an NHS credit that could be "spent" by patients in obtaining long-term care of their choice. Mr Milburn,who has acted as an "outrider" for Downing Street, said the initial focus should be on those with complex long-term care needswhere services tend to be poorest.
Mr Milburn's remarks will alarm Labour traditionalists who fear further encroachment of the private sector in the NHS.
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SLG
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Interesting take on their acuracy. Far from perfect, but probably the best indicator we have between elections. There should be a standards agency though to avoid polls like that Sunday Mail one though
As for Cameron, I think he will be PM. I think he's got it right to sit back, take his time and avoid any big policy slip ups. He's got plenty time and once Blair leaves, Labour won't be any more united. I doubt Brown will hold them together as well as Blair has done. Cameron should bide his time and wait for Labour to fall apart.
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Scott2006
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The low point of Labour under Tony Blair in a poll of over 1000 people. Its been a long time in coming. Blair is going to hang on to get his ten full years in 10 Downing Street. By the time he hands over power to one of his cabinet colleagues - will it be remotely electable?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/labour/story/0,,1930732,00.html
Labour Support At Lowest Level Since Thatcher's Last Election Victory
LAB 29% CON 39% LIBDEM 22% GREEN 2% UKIP 2% OTHERS 5%
http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-f...uments/2006/10/25/Octoberpoll.pdf 23pages on Iraq & NHS Opinion
Support for Labour has dropped to its lowest level in almost 20 years with the Conservatives opening up a potentially election-winning 10-point lead, according to a Guardian/ICM poll published today.
Labour has the backing of only 29% of voters, equal to its lowest-ever level of support in a Guardian/ICM poll - recorded in May 1987, a month before Margaret Thatcher won a third term.
The party's support has fallen 3 points since last month, despite Labour's successful annual conference in Manchester and a lack of public conflict over the succession to Tony Blair. The Conservatives have climbed three points, to 39%, with the Liberal Democrats unchanged on 22%.
Support for minor parties, growing in recent months, has dropped back 1 point to 9%. The Green party and the UK Independence party score 2% each.
The poll, carried out last weekend, follows David Cameron's attack on NHS cuts as well as the publication last week of a party report advocating tax cuts of £21bn.
The poll comes after other findings suggesting that Mr Cameron's honeymoon with voters may be over. Data published in the Times on Monday from a small sample of 242 voters, gave Gordon Brown a lead among swing voters.
Even if today's Guardian/ICM result were repeated at a general election, the Conservatives would only end up as the largest party in a hung parliament, or hold only a narrow majority, since Labour gains most from the distribution of parliamentary seats across the country.
Labour support remains strongest in the north of Britain, where it retains a lead among voters, and weakest among under 34s and middle-class voters, where it is in third place behind the Liberal Democrats.
· ICM Research interviewed a random sample of 1,019 adults aged 18+ by telephone on October 20-22. Interviews were conducted around the country and the results have been weighted to the profile of all adults. ICM is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.
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SLG
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The link's not working. But this is the least the Tories need to do - I can't believe that a 10% lead by the Tories would probably still lead to a hung parliament. But I wonder if PR will be a red line issue for the Lib Dems if that's the case. Still I expect Labour only to fall once Brown is established as PM.
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Scott2006
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The link is now under labour/story etc. Sorry about that!
The small sample from Scotland in the poll puts one figure for the SNP at 27% but is that 13 respondents = 27% ?
Labour might do what Major did and hang on to power until the polls start to move towards them again, if they do, in late 2009/10. No rush then...
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SLG
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Taking Scottish results out of UK polls is a bit of a waste of time - as you point out, the numbers just get too low. I think it's worth taking the polling populations into account when we're considering accuracy. Although there are other problems with a small polling sample in terms of actual numbers, in terms of proportion of the electorate represented, the Scottish polls are much more representative than the UK ones. 1000 out of 44 million UK voters is 0.0000227% while 1000 out of 3 million voters is 0.0003%.
Aye, Labour will be hanging on in a couple of years time I've no doubt about it.
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Scott2006
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6 month Tory opinion poll leadThe latest YouGov poll from the Torygraph
CON 39% (up 1), LAB 32% (up 1), LIBDEM 16% (down 2), OTHERS 13%http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2006/10/27/npoll27big.gif
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/m...?xml=/news/2006/10/27/npoll27.xml
Tory leader surges ahead of Brown as voters' choice
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinio...ml=/opinion/2006/10/27/dl2701.xml
Cameron forces Brown on to the back foot
These results would probably leave a hung parliament with the Conservatives short by a few percentage points of an overall majority.
Gordon Brown will have to hope for a honeymoon period bounce as PM to get close to Cameron again in the polls. Labour were 22% ahead of the Conservatives at the election in 2005 on the question of the economy now the lead is only 1%.
Labour support must be at its bedrock by now and the Tories will do their best to remain blemish free by not taking any hard decisions on policy for as long as possible. Labour are now just an unpopular more centre-right than left government in the same mess as John Major's government.
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