Lord Ashcroft has published the results of a poll his organisation conducted with 13,000 voters on election day. The output from the 29 questions gives some interesting insights and can be read here, complete with clear graphs and downloadable xls data tables. A few observations from me. Based on this sample: It is noticeable that a high proportion of our voters were "AB" in socio-economic terms. 15% of ABs voted for us (two points of the across-the-board total of 12% in this poll). But we did dreadfully amongst C2 and DE groups getting only 9% and 7% of those respectively. ...
Second paragraph of third chapter: Eliza mode! she managed to instruct, feeling queasy, bloated, constipated and overstimulated all at once as the machinery of the coffin laboured to bring her back to something resembling active life. I thought this was a tremendous book. It combines loads of different SF themes - the starship whose population are mostly in hibernation, and whose society degenerates; a very non-human civilisation; a couple of AIs who find themselves adapting to a new situation (I hate anthropomorphic robots, but these AIs go in a very different direction). On top of that, the plot is intricate ...
I have received a lot of calls, emails and messages about the future of the 292 service between Ludlow and Kidderminster. R&B Travel has surrendered its licence to the Traffic Commissioner after its directors faced a public inquiry over repeated failings. The contract for the route is let by Worcestershire County Council with Shropshire Council contributing part of the subsidy. We understand that final details of the contract and timetable from 5 January are being finalised. I expect details to be available by the end of the week. Until 4 January, it is expected that the current R&B operation will ...
There always comes a time after an election when the adrenaline clears out of the system and we can usefully reflect on what happened and what we should learn from that. BUT I'M NOT GOING TO WAIT THAT LONG. Perhaps ... Continue reading →
The first use of the Single Transferable Vote was on 17th December 1819, so the bicentenary will fall on the day when our new parliament assembles. It couldn't really be more ironic, with a Prime Minister claiming a "powerful new mandate" on 43.6% of the vote, and where a majority of votes were cast for parties opposing the Brexit deal that was the key policy on which he fought the election. A meeting tomorrow at the Royal Statistical Society will celebrate the anniversary, and give an opportunity to discuss the prospects for electoral reform. Klina Jordan of Make Votes Matter ...
We see you. You, who would return our party to the comfortable, squishy, managerial centrism of the past. You, who would lay the blame for our defeats solely at the feet of a leader who had the temerity to be a young, outspoken woman. You, who are desperate to hark back to the 1990s when the 2020s are upon us in days. We see you and we will resist you, as we have at every previous election review. It would be wrong to apportion any election result to a single cause. But let us not forget that Bollocks to Brexit ...
Michael Mullaney, our candidate in Bosworth at the general election, says the party's decision to adopt the Revoke policy harmed our chances in many seats. With the election over I thought I'd pen some words on my experience of fighting in a strongly leave seat where there was a significant base of Lib Dem support. I noticed a graph circulating on twitter which appeared to indicate that the Lib Dem vote rose by almost as much in Leave seats as it did in Remain ones. What this failed to pick up was that in the vast bulk of Leave seats ...
In the final episode of season one, Mark and Stephen pick over the general election result, another less important election result and the plans for Season 2 of Never Mind The Bar Charts: Find Never Mind The Bar Charts on social media Like the show? Do follow on Twitter or Facebook. It's a great way to hear more about the podcast – and to let your friends and colleagues know about it too. Subscribe, rate and review If you like Never Mind The Bar Charts, you can find us on Acast, Anchor, Breaker, Google Podcasts, iTunes, Overcast, Pocket Casts, PodBean, ...
I've now had a chance to catch up on sleep and am able to think rationally about the election and what has happened to us as a party. Go back to election day itself and, having spent 8 hours knocking on doors in Cheltenham in the cold and rain, I got home, had a hot bath and sat down to watch the BBC exit poll before going to my local count in Cirencester. I can honestly say I loathe exit polls - I've only ever been pleased with two in my whole life (1997 and 2005) but the rest have ...
As everyone will now agree, we are leaving the European Union in short order. Well, sort of. We lose our MEPs and seat on the Council in a few weeks time, once the Withdrawal Bill passes parliament, but after that we go into a transition period in which everything apart from our having a voice in anything stays the same. Boris and his lieutenants have declared that this transition period, due to end at the close of 2020, will not be extended. Many have pointed out two key points in relation to this: one is that Johnson promises many things ...
Sun, 12:01: RT @chrishanretty: It's time for the Twitter election world cup! Eight brackets of elections across 120 years... Sun, 14:33: RT @MSmithsonPB: The Oxford dominance continues. The last time that an alum of a university other than Oxford led his/her party to a Genera... Sun, 15:02: RT @ParrConnal: Hopefully there'll be more coverage of Roy Johnston's passing and some assessment of his legacy. Johnston's own tome A Cent... Sun, 15:45: Boris Johnson can 'win back trust' of unionists by building bridge between NI and Scotland, claims Sammy Wilson... https://t.co/LV1WJXET5C Sun, 17:54: 2019 travels https://t.co/bfCSEwo9UZ Sun, 19:30: So the Lib ...
It has been four days since the General Election, one which, I`m sure, will be considered one of the nation's most historically significant, as well as one that will have longer lasting implications. This is true not only for the country, but for the Liberal Democrats as a party. From my perspective there are two, major, ways in which this may impact this party, with decisions needing to be made regarding them. The first is the one which, irrespective of the outcome of Brexit, will be something the party can, and already is, talking about. This being whether the party ...
Tactical voting, so much talked up amongst progressives before and during the 2019 GE campaign, was in the main a failure as it did not deliver what those running the the sites expected/wanted and all but promised. I think the first failure was a lack of understanding of the mind set of voters. Yes at face value if say Labour were the best/2nd placed in a particular constituency then the third place Lib Dem voters could be asked to support the Labour candidate. But being asked is one thing, what the voters actually do is another. Some would follow the ...
I'm a pro-European. I've been involved in European politics as an active ALDE Party member for some years now. And it grieves me to say this but... we've lost. Complain about the voting system, about the lies, the sheer injustice of the thing, but it doesn't change the fact that the Conservatives got their majority and will end the debate about our membership of the European Union in seven weeks. They've got a mandate, like the one we would have claimed had we won. I've received a number of invitations to join a group seeking to campaign to rejoin the ...
Back in May, Shropshire Council declared a climate emergency. Officers have been working to draft council policies to make tackling the emergency a priority. Now, climate is set to be one of the main topics on the full council meeting on Thursday 19 December, with a petition and a council paper. A Lib Dem and Green proposal to double the tree cover in Shropshire is also on the agenda. There will be a discussion about the long awaited replacement of streetlights with LED lights. 20mph limits outside schools and on resident streets will also be discussed. Among other items, the ...
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