Better Nation

46 Comments

• #1 by Stuart on March 31, 2011 - 10:10 am

  

  Graphics Fail! You’ve got Central highlighted, not West.

  • #2 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 10:38 am

    

    So I do Stuart… picked up the wrong image off Google. Amended!

• #3 by Steve on March 31, 2011 - 10:40 am

  

  Really interesting analysis, yet again great reading!

  With regards the Eastwood seat, the Tories have a notional majority of 3500, it would be a very tough ask for Labour to overturn this considering the resources the Tories will put in there.

  Renfrewshire North will be incredibly tight as you say, flip of a coin! If SNP were to win this and hold Cunningham North and Tories take Eastwood, where would this place the list positions?

  • #4 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 11:14 am

    

    Thanks – glad you are enjoying the series. I may have blundered here (specifically on Eastwood) but I’m tending towards incumbents (see General Election 2010, where no seats changed hands, for a good reason!) which means I’ve gone with Labour (despite the 3,500 notional majority).

    That said, to answer your question, if Eastwood ALONE goes Tory, we’d have 8 Lab seats, 1 SNP & 1 Con in constituencies and a list breakdown of 5 SNP 1 LD & 1 CON instead of 4 SNP, 1 LD & 1 CON – meaning a NET CHANGE of SNP taking a seat away from Labour (so I guess for Stuart McMillan if he doesn’t win the constituency he should hope the Tories win Eastwood!).

    If Eastwood is Blue AND Renf North goes SNP yellow, constituency seats are – Lab 7, SNP 2 & Con 1. Lists: 4 SNP, 1 LD, 1 CON & 1 LAB, which means total seats of SNP – 6, Labour – 8, Con – 2 & LD 1 – a change on my prediction of SNP +1/ Lab -1 (which is the same overall impact as if the SNP do not take Renf North but the Tories DO take Eastwood – perhaps the more likely scenario). Hope this helps.

    • #5 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 11:15 am

      

      I’ll put that into the text as well.

    • #6 by Doug Daniel on March 31, 2011 - 11:29 am

      

      Damn, so whatever happens, Labour are destined to get a minimum of 8 seats? I was hoping they could lose Eastwood and Renfrewshire N&W and still not get a list seat.

      Incidentally, do you think you and Jeff will revisit these predictions if we get a few more polls coming through showing Labour and Lib Dem votes dropping?

      • #7 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 11:55 am

        

        The plan (I think!) is to collate what we have, to give a “Better Nation Jeff & Malc combined picture” for the period we looked at. Then yes, update – and hopefully, have a day-of-poll picture. But that’s a ways off yet!

      • #8 by Jeff on March 31, 2011 - 11:56 am

        

        Yeah, I reckon we’ll do a few more total ones after this series is done and election date gets closer.

        I’m still undecided on whether I’ll tough out my ‘prediction’ that Ewan Aitken will beat Kenny MacAskill in Edinburgh East…

        Great analysis btw Malc, especially the tactical voting considerations!

        • #9 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 12:00 pm

          

          My tactical analysis is not a patch on someone else’s – its just this region lent itself to it much more than others!

• #10 by Alex on March 31, 2011 - 10:49 am

  

  not much to disagree with you here malc 😉

  the west of scotland seems in quite a static position, with (notionally) only a couple of really tight seats. People will always say this or that seat will b close based on (insert your own campaign chat here), but realistically i think it is as you suggest.

  Labour and the Libs are the potential losers here, as my model shows the same as yours, with the snp and tories pick up ane extra list of they lose the tight constituency. Labour only pick up a list seat when they lose 3 constit (and even that is close).

  Interesting side issues as you say. the libs need one of the Tories or snp to pick up a constituency to get a list seat.

  For the SNP to go better than five, they really need te tories to pick up eastwood as they would require two wins in the constituencies (possible but unlikely).

  Eastwood is an interesting one. As per the boundary report the tories now have an 11.2% notional majority, though are fighting against an incumbant MSP not relying on the list to get in the back door. I imagine a battle royal is going on. On the TNS/STV poll, UNS has the tories still holding on by almost 2% so this could be very close indeed. I usually take it that the tory vote stays very static for Holyrood (they have been very similar in each of the 3 elections – mid 15%) and even with westminister gov, i think they will be there again. There vote turns out every election, so i feel if labour want to win eastwood, they need to be getting more than the notional troy vote from 2007. they cannot rely on troy vote reducing.

  • #11 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 11:01 am

    

    Steve & Alex – Eastwood’s notional majority is sizeably Tory, as both of you point out. I had missed in my original thinking that it was as big as 3,500… which may well make it a Tory “hold” rather than a notional Labour Gain. I think I was conscious of some of the previous criticism that I was too hard on Labour, which is why I went for them here. Saying that – Ken Macintosh is popular, and he isn’t standing on the list, which is also partly why I went for them.

• #12 by Thomas Widmann on March 31, 2011 - 11:43 am

  

  I live in Eastwood, and I have been concluding the same as in your update (http://blog.widmann.org.uk/2011/03/02/3472/).
  Given that I prefer Scotland to be run by the SNP rather than Labour (preferably with LibDem and Green support), I’m going to give my constituency vote to the Tories (for the first time in my life!) — it’s not going to make any difference to the number of Tories elected, but it just might move one seat from Labour to either the SNP or the LibDems. Obviously I would not in my wildest dreams consider giving my list vote to the Conservatives.

  • #13 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 11:59 am

    

    Actually… you may be advised to do just that (if it is your intention to reduce the number of list seats Labour win….).

    Reasoning is that the scenario where Labour lose Eastwood to the Tories AND Renfrewshire North & West to the SNP, they would be next in line to Labour for the 7th and final seat. In fact, by my numbers, they’d only be 100 or so votes short of taking it off Labour… If they Labour only drop Eastwood, it doesn’t really make a difference – the SNP would win the 7th seat by around 800 votes. Perhaps worth considering – depending what your motivations are! 😉

• #14 by Chris on March 31, 2011 - 1:02 pm

  

  Dear god, I know you guys really don’t like Labour, but not only do you predict almost every Labour/SNP marginal to go the SNP’s way as well as putting a couple of Labour seats in SNP hands just for the sake of it.

  As well you prescribe this mysterious encumbency effect that allows sitting SNP MSPs to buck the trend because one of your friend’s aunties told you that they were well liked locally. But never prescribes that effect to sitting Labour MSPs (presumably none of your friends have aunties in Labour seats)

  To cap it all whether the SNP win seats like Cumbernauld is purely to do with how well the SNP campaign. The strength of the Labour campaign doesn’t seem to feature.

  First of all you really don’t seem to have learnt the lessons of Jeff’s abysmal forecasting last year. Second of all you seem to have ignored the distorting effect of the 100,000 spoilt papers, which affected areas with poorer and older electors more. Never mind being in the middle of a unpopular war, never mind the SNP’s dodgy ballot paper.

  Now you could be correct and not simply repeating last year’s ridiculous optimism. But your analysis doesn’t indicate this.

  I look forward to you predicting that the SNP will not only hold Glasgow Southside ‘comfortably’, but will ‘snatch’ Kelvin from Pauline McNeill, because being merely a Labour MSP she will have no incumbency effect!

  • #15 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 1:15 pm

    

    Why so angry? I can’t speak for Jeff, but I’ve been consistent in giving incumbents the nod in close seats – it just so happens that the ones I’ve looked at have been SNP held, and thus suspect they will continue to be – and the way polls are going at the moment, that looks like a fair consideration. I really don’t get where this rant has come from on West Scotland, since its only Cunninghame North that I’ve gone against Labour for (though I have since amended the Eastwood prediction) and even then I’ve said how tight it is likely to be.

    For what its worth (though since this contradicts your view, I suspect its not worth an awful lot to you) Jeff had Labour taking the Western Isles and Edinburgh Eastern AGAINST incumbent SNP MSPs – and I presume there are other examples in our predictions too.

    We haven’t looked at Cumbernauld yet – so you are putting words in our mouth on that one. Jeff has the Glasgow region and I don’t know what his working looks like at the moment – but yes, I have Nicola holding on in Southside (the incumbency effect is actually bigger than you give credit – however you want to misspell it) but I don’t have their vote share rising enough to take Kelvin, or any other Glasgow seat for that matter. And since you mention it – yes, I suspect Pauline McNeill will get a boost because of her position as an effective Labour MSP for the past 12 years.

    I’m not sure how we can mitigate for the 100,000 spoilt papers, dodgy ballot papers (which will apparently continue) as well as opinion polling and boundary changes – but please, if you think you can improve our analysis, get your own blog and show us how its done.

  • #16 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 1:22 pm

    

    Will Patterson did some work on list MSPs standing in seats where the incumbent stood down (and called it the “Quasi-Incumbency Bonus” or QIB”) which might be of interest. It shows an impact for a “known” candidate against an “unknown” one. I’m not aware of research putting figures on “incumbent” versus “non-incumbent” but since Will puts the QIB (in his average of his four cases) at 6%, I don’t think it is unreasonable to consider the incumbent as having an advantage – especially in cases where the numbers are so tight.

    • #17 by Jeff on March 31, 2011 - 1:57 pm

      

      Further to that, there was some analysis done closer to home on the negative impact of an incumbent stepping down:

      http://www.betternation.org/2010/09/what-price-a-retiring-msp/

      Might be of interest….

  • #18 by Doug Daniel on April 1, 2011 - 12:21 am

    

    I find it bizarre that the incumbency factor would even be questioned, never mind completely denied. People vote for what they know, so if you’re the sitting MSP, you’ve got a higher profile (generally) than your opponents. Unless you’ve done something terrible or have just been an awful MSP, chances are a significant proportion of the electorate will be quite happy for you to continue. The 2010 UK election returned the exact same seats in Scotland as 2005 – I don’t think you could get a more blatant example of incumbency in action. Even if you don’t agree with any of the possible reasons for why the incumbency factor is there, there is one very simple fact that works in an incumbent MSP’s favour: most seats don’t change hands. For this reason alone, an incumbent MSP can be confident that they have a better than average chance of retaining their seat than his opponents have of taking it.

    Also, it’s interesting that you mention the 100,000 spoilt ballots. Are you trying to say that the majority of these ballots would have gone Labour’s way? Are you telling us that people who are – and let’s be perfectly blunt here – of lower intelligence favour Labour over the SNP?

    A final point: it’s far easier to focus on the strength of the SNP’s campaign than Labour’s because the SNP have a campaign to focus on. It must be pretty difficult to focus on a campaign that consists entirely of “yeah, you know that policy we voted against consistently for the past four years? Well, we’re totally in favour of it now. Oh yeah, and have some lies, too.”

    • #19 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 8:35 am

      

      Let’s keep it civil though. I don’t think he was suggesting that the 100,000 spoilt ballots would ALL go Labour, but – and this is consistent with current opinion polls – it may be that Labour voters wanted to vote for Labour on the list vote in 2007 and put an X in that box, but also preferred the option of “Alex Salmond for First Minister” and put an X in that box too, thinking they were 2 different votes. It is conceivable – and it could happen again this time around.

      On incumbency though, I do think you are spot on. The 2010 General Election is part of the reason I’m quite wary of predicting gains for any party.

      • #20 by Doug Daniel on April 1, 2011 - 10:29 am

        

        Okay, perhaps it’s a bit harsh to say older people are thick because they can’t understand how to fill in a voting form (although I’m inclined to think that if people aren’t able to understand a fairly straightforward form, then there’s a good chance they don’t even understand what they’re voting for…)

        There does seem to be a problem with the “second vote” thing, though. I recently saw a comment on Newsnet by an SNP supporter saying they would be voting “SNP 1st, Tories 2nd”, or words to that effect that showed he thought it was a preference vote. Essentially, there’s clearly still a proportion of the electorate that doesn’t understand that the list vote is actually the most important vote, and think that if you place your constituency vote with one party, there is no point placing your list vote with the same party. It has to be said, the Greens saying “2nd Vote Green” doesn’t really help, although fair play to them if it works.

        Maybe the ballot paper needs to make it more clear that the two votes are completely separate?

        • #21 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 10:45 am

          

          I agree – to an extent. Certainly on the public education element – I’m an election geek, so I can talk forever about the intricacies of D’Hondt and AMS versus FPTP or STV. And I just about understand the implications of a constituency gain on the list (and these posts have been quite helpful to me – if not anyone else – in that regard!). But explain it in terms people can understand? Not sure I could do that.

          For the Greens, the way they are using “2nd vote” isn’t as in “2nd preference vote” but as in “your ‘first’ ballot paper is the constituency vote, your ‘second’ paper is the list vote, this is the one we want you to vote for us on” idea. And that I can see as legitimate – especially since that’s the way the press have described the two votes since 1999. But I do accept that it causes a little confusion (especially with the idea of preferences).

          Similarly, the SNP’s “AS4FM” on the list ballot suggests the ‘second’ ballot paper is purely a vote for FM, like in a presidential system. And as much as the SNP protest that this ‘second’ vote decides who is FM, that’s not strictly accurate. In 1999 and 2003, Labour only got minimal seats from the list and could (theoretically) have governed as a minority, irrespective of who people voted for on the list. Indeed, in both 1999 and 2003 Cabinets, the list members were minimal, since both Labour and LDs won plenty constituencies.

          So yes… parties will play the hand they are dealt and make hay out of what they can (to mix metaphors a little). The ballot paper(S) do make clear they are separate votes and not preferences – people just don’t really take enough of an interest to understand it properly. At least, that’s my view.

          • #22 by Doug Daniel on April 1, 2011 - 11:11 am

            

            It’s certainly legitimate, and in all fairness “List Vote Green” and “Regional Vote Green” are not nearly as snappy slogans as “2nd Vote Green”. But I believe most of the spoilt ballots last time round were people taking “you have TWO votes” to mean they had two votes on the same ballot, so the fact it generally gets referred to as a 2nd vote doesn’t help matters. Certainly no criticism of the Greens, though.

            I must admit, I originally thought the “AS4FM” thing was a bit cheeky, but in some ways you are sort of voting for who you think should be FM. You might be saying “right, I actually like the Labour candidate here, but overall I would much rather have Alex Salmond as FM than Iain Gray, so I’ll give my list vote to the SNP”. It’s certainly closer to a system of directly electing a FM than Westminster is, and they were all quite happy to imply that our votes in 2010 were directly electing a PM.

            Both are examples of the media simplifying things to an extent that obfuscation is inevitable, and the parties in question taking advantage of it. Fair play to them both – after all, the other three are hardly top of the Fair Play league…

            • #23 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 11:17 am

              

              But on the SNP – and I’m not criticising them for using the popularity of Salmond here – there’s a wider issue of confusion. As you say, the “you have TWO votes” may lead to confusion on its own, but coupled with “AS4FM” there’s a danger of confusion that I alluded to before.

              The same Labour guy you are talking about – likes his Labour candidate in the constituency, votes for them. Likes Labour party, votes for them on the list. “What’s this? AS4FM? He’d be better than Iain Gray – I’ll put my cross in that box as well”. Boom – you have a spoilt paper.

              That IS entirely possible given A) Some Labour voters (at least in polls) are suggesting they’d pick Salmond over Gray as FM and B) the SNP’s insistence the ‘second’ vote is about electing an FM.

              I don’t know about ‘fair play’ in this instance – especially since the Gould Report suggested that this was partly to blame for some of the spoilt ballots in 2007.

              • #24 by Thomas Widmann on April 1, 2011 - 11:29 am

                

                Perhaps it would make sense to call the constituency vote the “personal vote” and the list vote the “party vote”? I know it would be slightly imprecise, given that a “personal” vote for Labour in Glasgow or the West of Scotland can lead to Labour getting more seats in parliament, but it would probably be less misleading than the current situation.

              • #25 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 11:35 am

                

                Yeah – or “candidate” and “party” vote, which might mitigate some of the issues with “personal”. Though I don’t think its actually about names – its more about perceptions. Voters consider the list vote less important – when in some cases it is MORE important (and hence the decision to flip the order of the votes on the 2007 ballot paper – another decision which was criticised by Gould).

              • #26 by Doug Daniel on April 1, 2011 - 1:14 pm

                

                Of course, there wouldn’t even be a debate if the rules were nice and straight forward, i.e. party list = official party name.

                “Candidate” and “party” would certainly help clear things up. Here’s another one: how about just having the candidate’s name with no reference to their party? They’d really have to work at getting people’s votes then!

• #27 by Keith Roberts on March 31, 2011 - 3:16 pm

  

  Eastwood is looking very interesting indeed with the boundary changes removing the red tory vote of Borrheid and Neilston, especially with Ken not being on the regional list.

  Macintosh, if elected, may be one of the guys expected to pitch again for leadership in the event that Elmer falls on his own, or someone else’s sword, if he too is elected.

  If the SNP retain power then Gray surely cannot continue, in fact his coat peg his decidedly shoogly even before the election. So who will be the leader of the opposition, or of the Labour group in the Scottish parliament, in the absence of Gray and/or Macintosh? Will that decision be made before 5 May as London begins to realise just how desperate Labour have become, despite the best efforts of the MSM to talk them up and to ignore the bits they don’t want to see?

  Is it also time for some articles, in the written press and elsewhere, explaining how the list vote works in conjunction with constituency results in the region? What is clear is that the list seats are absolutely vital, and that many may not understand how they are arrived at. We have gone beyond ‘second vote Green’.

• #28 by Chris on March 31, 2011 - 3:47 pm

  

  I didn’t realise i was ranting, I thought I was being merely withering, something that may not be clear in print. So sorry if you felt aggresion.

  incumbency, shencumbency…

  • #29 by Jeff on March 31, 2011 - 5:23 pm

    

    Hi Chris. I didn’t take it as angry at all, thought you made some good points actually.

    I think I’ve made more than my fair share of toss-up calls in favour of Labour though (Ed East, Western Isles) so I don’t really agree with your overall point as far as my personal posts go.

    So, yeah, I don’t mind withering posts. Or even angry ones; the fun is in the disagreement. Ain’t that right Malc? 😉

    • #30 by Malc on March 31, 2011 - 5:31 pm

      

      Quite – and perhaps I was a bit quick to jump the gun on thinking it a rant, and thus apologies are perhaps due on my part for misrepresentation.

      Nevertheless, I want to make clear that its not that I dislike Labour. I’m just calling the seats as I see them. And I for one will be sad to see Ken Macintosh lose out, if Eastwood does indeed go blue. He’s a Labour MSP that I have a lot of time for, and a potential leader (as Keith mentions below).

• #31 by Danny1995 on March 31, 2011 - 5:34 pm

  

  C&M: Des McNulty(LAB)
  CN: Allan Wilson(LAB)
  CS: Irene Oldfather(LAB)
  Dumbarton: Jackie Baillie(LAB)
  Eastwood: Jackson Carlaw(CON)
  G&I: Duncan McNeill(LAB)
  Paisley: Evan Williams(LAB)
  Renfrewshire North & West: Stuart Clark(LAB)
  Renfrewshire South: Hugh Henry(LAB)
  Strathkelvin & Bearsden: David Whitton(LAB)
  1. Stewart Maxwell(SNP)
  2. Kenneth Gibson(SNP)
  3. Derek Mackay(SNP)
  4. Annabel Goldie(CON)
  5. Gil Paterson(SNP)
  6. Ross Finnie(LD)
  7. Fiona McLeod(SNP)

  Total
  9LAB, 5SNP, 2CON, 1LD

  Running(5 of 8 regions predicted)
  SNP – 30
  LAB – 29
  CON – 9
  LD – 7
  GRN – 1
  IND – 1

  • #32 by James on April 1, 2011 - 8:19 am

    

    I take it you don’t believe the Scotsman’s YouGov then 😉

• #33 by cynicalHighlander on March 31, 2011 - 5:39 pm

  

  This might be of use to you guys. Constituencies

• #34 by CassiusClaymore on March 31, 2011 - 6:09 pm

  

  Labour will rule in the West of Scotland generally until the ‘vote for monkey in red rosette’ tendency dies out.

  Bear in mind, also, that Labour voters will be able to understand the ballot paper this time. That was a disproportionate problem for Labour last time out given their voter demographic.

  CC

  • #35 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 8:24 am

    

    I agree – but that tendency isn’t limited to Labour. See also the SNP in Moray/ Banff & Buchan or Lib Dems in H&I (to a lesser extent – they tend to vote for the person more than the party, which happens to be Lib Dem more often than not)…

• #36 by Allan on March 31, 2011 - 11:22 pm

  

  Two points.

  1) the Paisley seat is actually a part merger of Wendy Alexander’s old Paisley North seat (with parts forming the Renfrewshire North & West seat) and Hugh Henry’s old Paisley South seat (with parts joining up with the new Renfrewshire South seat), so Ms Alexander technically only represented about half of the seat. It will be interesting to see what happens, especiallyas the Labour candidate Evan Williams is not well known around here.

  2) I’m not quite sure where you get the impresion the wee boy Derek MacKay is popular in Paisley. His administration have, by general concensus, been nothing short of a disaster – with controversial school closures and controversial cutbacks of school pupil transportation. Generally, they haven’t handled things particularaly well, and Labour did leave lots of kippers in the curtains when they left office.

  • #37 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 8:31 am

    

    1) True to an extent. According to the Denver notional report, its actually only 35% the former Wendy seat and 65% the old Hugh Henry one. I’ve probably over-stated the Wendy factor then – but it does show up the hassle that Wendy leaving it late to stand down caused Labour. There were, if I recall correctly, quite big fights over which seat each MSP would challenge for – and though Henry ended up with the safe as houses Renf South, if Wendy had stood down earlier, this would have been less internally dividing.

    2) Hmmm… if you are on the ground, you’ll know more than me for sure, but I have heard good things from various sources (including some partisan but non-SNP sources) that he’s the candidate to watch here. Perhaps my assumption is misplaced then, that he’s done well as council leader? In which case, you’ll see quite a comfortable Labour hold here then?

    • #38 by Allan on April 1, 2011 - 8:25 pm

      

      Firstly MacKay. His administration have not handled the constraints that he has had to work within very well. For example they closed a 26 year old school and split the pupil roll between two schools with older buildings (which at the time were still to be renovated). What will scupper his chances at this election is the same issue that mothers were queuing up to mention to Mags McLaren (the SNP’s candidate at last years General Election for Paisley & Renfrewshire North) at the hustings meeting I attended during last years Westminster Election campaign, which is the decision to raise the criteria fro free school transport from two miles to three miles. In the area MacKay is standing in, there’s a secondry school in Houston, one in Erskine as well as the schools in Renfrew & Johnstone that pupils from the likes of Bridge of Weir and Bishopton have to travel into. Clarke has clearly worked on the constituancy, and has got his name in the Paisley Daily Express on a number of occasions – particularily on knife crime. He is clearly the favourite.

      Regards my home constituancy, that might be one to watch. As I said, the Labour candidate was a leftfield pick, i wonder if not being a well kent face might work against him.

      • #39 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 9:21 pm

        

        Thanks for the info. I’ve gone with Labour in Renf N&W anyway, but I do think it will be a battle royal, especially with Annabel Goldie there as well. Could be a tight battle. Regards Paisley… I think it’d be a shocker if Labour didn’t win it – but it might be worth watching, especially with an unknown candidate in the mix.

• #40 by James Reekie on April 1, 2011 - 12:42 am

  

  Hi Jeff and Malc. I’ve just started reading your blog and it is excellent and your analysis seems spot on. Was going to say that I think Jackson will take Eastwood but I see you’ve updated. Also in the Mid Scotland and Fife Region- Alex Rowley might not take Dunfermline. You never know I might just win it ……

  • #41 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 8:40 am

    

    Thanks James. Glad you are enjoying. Eastwood was a slight oversight on my part – notionally Conservative by much more than I had thought – so yes, have changed. It’ll be amended properly in posts closer to the election. On Dunfermline – its notionally Lib Dem by just 77 from Labour, but their majority over you is nearly 7,500. I think you can see why we’ve gone with Alex Rowley! But best of luck on proving us wrong.

    PS – Its James’ blog too!

  • #42 by Jeff on April 1, 2011 - 11:26 am

    

    Thanks James, very kind of you.

    I also have Jackson Carlaw down to win Eastwood but wasn’t it this constituency in the UK Parliament that saw a closing of the ranks behind Jim Murphy, giving the Labour MP a record majority over the Conservative challenger? I seem to remember a confounding of expectations that the Tories might pull off a shock here. (Noting of course that strict FPTP at Westminster is different to the considerations of Holyrood voting)

    If it is the same voters, holding that same anti-Tory sentiment and ~7,000 SNP/Lib Dem tactical votes up for grabs, what’s to stop a similar result this time around?

    Perhaps this is one of those local factors that national swings do not show….

    • #43 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 11:33 am

      

      Jim Murphy didn’t have the same boundary changes which notionally handed the seat to his Conservative opponent though… So I suppose, its probably not quite the same voters.

• #44 by Top Tory Aide on April 1, 2011 - 6:24 pm

  

  I’d be quite surprised if Finnie gets back in – especially if the result on May 5th in any way resembles the recent opinion polls.

  • #45 by Malc on April 1, 2011 - 9:18 pm

    

    Depending how far the Lib Dem vote slides (or if the SNP lose Cunninghame North) he could be in trouble…

• #46 by Top Tory Aide on April 2, 2011 - 6:35 pm

  

  I’d be quite surprised if Gibson was to lose that seat. He’s worked his arse of in it, by all accounts.

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