Why the Tories Won

kabayiri

I suspect the Tory majority would be even more if UKIP had not existed.

It makes the current election result still seem impressive.

Obviously, the Tories have credible economic plans. Labour are dubious, and SNP have a bad case of fiscal incontinence.

antrobus

antrobus wrote: »

....Early on, there was a difference between telephone polling (showing Con leads) and online polling (showing Lab leads) but that difference seems to have largely gone by the time the final polls were issued.

Online polling is (of course) characterised by the fact that people sign up for the specific purpose of making a few quid. I know that the likes of YouGov are perfectly aware of the fact that this means that their actual user base is somewhat 'unrepresentative', and take account of this in terms of constructing a survey panel.

However it has occured to me that if (as is likely) an employed professional on £45k a year gets more survey invitations and so makes more money, than (say) an unemployed factory worker on benefits, then there is a financial incentive for the former to pretend that they are in fact the latter.

Since the internet is a compartively 'new thing', it might well take time for people to discover that this is the case, so you might start off in a situation where online polling appears to be accurate, but gradually bias seeps in over time, as your survey base corrupts itself.

But that can't be true, because the telephone polls were just as wrong. Unless those pollsters were panicked into conforming with the herd.

More on this.:)

I have been alerted by a thread on DT to the fact that Survation conducted a telephone poll on the 6th May that came out with the correct result of Con 37% Lab 31%.

http://survation.com/snatching-defeat-from-the-jaws-of-victory/

However, as Survation explain "the results seemed so “out of line” with all the polling conducted by ourselves and our peers – what poll commentators would term an “outlier” – that I “chickened out” of publishing the figures".

Which I think would be an example of a pollster being "panicked into conforming with the herd".:)

As a result Survation have concluded that telephone polling will be their "'Gold Standard' for voting intention going forward". So it looks like at least one polling company has concluded that online voting intention polls are subject to bias.

Sapphire

thor wrote: »

Hardly! The English crapped themselves believing the tory spin that the SNP would hold Labour to ransom if they got together in a coalition even though Milliband had ruled it out. I rate that as the biggest factor in Labour not making any progress south of the border.

Nonsense. If anything it was sturgeon and her appalling hostile anti-English rhetoric, and the thought that the SNP would unite with labour, with awful consequences for the United Kingdom, that put voters off both labour and the SNP. Well, that and millipede and his monumental follies, and labour's proposed policies.

bigheadxx

cells wrote: »

The right only have the tories to vote for

The left have labour SNP Green and the lib dems and imo even UKIP take more traditional left working class votes than they take from right. That splits their votes and ironically means even if there are more left leaning voters the right can win

Also my guess is that of the people who don't vote its probably more left than right by naybe two to one

They only have the Tories to speak for them more like. Labour is the party of benefit claimants and unionised public sector workers, it has no idea about ordinary people but conjects on what it believes they want.

IveSeenTheLight

antrobus wrote: »

An update from the Department of Quite Interesting Facts;

Labour won the 2005 election, when 8,638,282 million people voted Labour in England and Wales

Labour lost the 2015 election, when 8,640,179 million people voted Labour in England and Wales

That's right folks, the same number of people voted Labour in both elections. The difference in the outcome would be the 2.5m extra people that voted Conservative in 2015.

Labour did not lose the election, the Tories won it.

Your figures don't add up

Conservative increased their vote share by 0.8%, whilst Labour increased their vote share by 1.5%

So Conservatives only gained 630,866 votes as opposed to your 2.5 Million claim

Labour gained 740,809 votes.

Labour lost the election as they did not provide focus on the marginals whilst the Conservatives did.

michaels

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Your figures don't add up

Conservative increased their vote share by 0.8%, whilst Labour increased their vote share by 1.5%

So Conservatives only gained 630,866 votes as opposed to your 2.5 Million claim

Labour gained 740,809 votes.

Labour lost the election as they did not provide focus on the marginals whilst the Conservatives did.

You did see that Antrobus was comparing 2005 and 2015 with no mention of 2010, didn't you?

IveSeenTheLight

michaels wrote: »

You did see that Antrobus was comparing 2005 and 2015 with no mention of 2010, didn't you?

Ah, must admit I didn't.

Why go back to 2005?
Surely the comparison is from the last election

his figures for Labour votes in 2005 is still wrong they got 9,552,436 in 2005, hence their vote is still down since then, but up since 2010

michaels

antrobus wrote: »

More on this.:)

I have been alerted by a thread on DT to the fact that Survation conducted a telephone poll on the 6th May that came out with the correct result of Con 37% Lab 31%.

http://survation.com/snatching-defeat-from-the-jaws-of-victory/

However, as Survation explain "the results seemed so “out of line” with all the polling conducted by ourselves and our peers – what poll commentators would term an “outlier” – that I “chickened out” of publishing the figures".

Which I think would be an example of a pollster being "panicked into conforming with the herd".:)

As a result Survation have concluded that telephone polling will be their "'Gold Standard' for voting intention going forward". So it looks like at least one polling company has concluded that online voting intention polls are subject to bias.

I saw this, it would also appear that the final polls from different companies were much closer than MOE (margin of error, randon variations resulting from smaple size) would predict again sufggsting that he pollsters were all playing it safe by teaking their adjustment factors to give results similar to their competitors - given this you can see how a late swing would not be picked up.

Conrad

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Labour lost the election as they did not provide focus on the marginals whilst the Conservatives did.

Labour lost almost all it's target seats, those that every commentator said Labour had thrown the kitchen sink at.


Your focus on an increased vote number seems ill at ease with all the Labour big wigs saying it was an unmitigated disaster, where they never thought they'd see a return to 1983.

IveSeenTheLight

Conrad wrote: »

Labour lost almost all it's target seats, those that every commentator said Labour had thrown the kitchen sink at.


Your focus on an increased vote number seems ill at ease with all the Labour big wigs saying it was an unmitigated disaster, where they never thought they'd see a return to 1983.

Truth hurts I guess