These must be the likliest Tory seats in Scotland in my view:

Dumfries and Galloway (rising SNP vote plus decent increase in Tory vote must make this very likely for Peter Duncan to snatch from Russell Brown)

Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (good result in 2005 followed by gain at Holyrood in 2007 – while the Tories may not be overwhelming favourites they will be looking to take it)

After that it gets more tricky. The Perthshire and Angus seats look vulnerable on the basis of being marginal but with a very good SNP showing this may take them out of realistic range for the moment, though Perthshire at least should remain marginal.

East Renfrewshire and Edinburgh South West could be realistic propositions, the latter due to Darling + Pentlands being Tory, the former as a middle class seat, plus recording a good Tory performance in May 2007, should be more vulnerable than most to the Conservatives. Stirling may be another but the Conservatives fell back there in May.

My judgement is that the Conservatives should hope to get three, be pleased with five and delighted with anything over that. It also depends upon whether the YouGov showing of 22% is accurate or, being a subsample, worthless.

There is an incredibly safe New Labour seat in the North East of England that you have missed in your analysis of marginal swings – (Simply because it has never been thought of as marginal) – That of Houghton and Washington.

Always gone to Labour – Always will?

In the Washington constituencies aligned with Houghton-Le-Spring, one by one the Council seats are being won by the Tories.

And in Houghton-Le-Spring, the old quarry that sits above the Town centre itself, is now a land fill/toxic dumping ground, thanks to New Labour councillors.

R.A.T.S. – (Residents against toxic site) the independent group, fighting to close this poisonous monstrosity, are picking off council seats one by one.

http://www.houghton-rats.org.uk/index.html

If in the next general election Councillor Colin Wakefield (R.A.T.S.) – and a natural Tory, (for this fact see “blog” on R.A.T.S. website) stood as an Independent candidate, (as he is threatening to do) he could well pick this once incredibly safe New Labour seat off.

Mike, that is the part that this site isn’t the right place for. We should all be discussing what we think will happen, not what should happen.

If any one can find a link it would be interesting (can’t find the report or even a summary on JRRT’s web site). Finally, if JRRT got off its high horse for a second, it would realise that it has the capacity to influence the situation since it give about £2 million each year to the Lib Dems!

The Tories will not need to seperate Labour from Liberal in any attack – the voters know that the Liberals were only a tactical party to keep the Tories out of power – as i have said before on here – the Liberals are fighting for their own lives at the moment – the fight will this time be a fair one (without the Liberals using tactical votes) between the Tories and Labour – in 2010 it will be like watching a game of “Risk” as the constituencies and well known names fall from both parties.

The Tory increase will come from the Liberals and the large amount of voters who voted Tory in the 80’s & early 90’s who just stopped voting all together in the last 11 years.

I cannot understand why you think i have a “congenital dislike” of Labour – they have a right to exist and give their point of view and act on it as the chosen party of government elected by a MASSIVE majority of 36% of voters as you and i both do & the Liberals , Tories , BNP , SNP etc – they have had 11 years to do what the 36% thought they would do and have failed – all i am saying is that the British deserve better now & the POLLS and the media are reflecting that now.

I do not dislike or like any political party in the UK , they all have bits that appeal to me , but some of them keep to their word and care about ALL the citizens including the working class – “TOTALLY NON PARTISAN” – Just a realist that sees what the other 74% of people being POLLED are seeing and saying that they will not vote Labour back in , in 2010.

I would be very happy to explain any of comments on this site that i may have made that you feel should have me gagged.

With apologies for the typogaphical slip, what I mean by ‘balanced speculation’ is that I prefer an ‘if’ or ‘but’ approach to comment. I don’t think the oracle’s comments are particularly tongue in cheek, I think he is a congenital dislike of Labour whatever they do. Now, I’m a Labour supporter and Chair of Fabian Group but I’m quite prepared to admit that some of things the Thatcher governments did were necessary and beneficial for the country whilst some of the things Labour has done over the past 10 years could have been done differently and in the case of the 10p tax row should never been done in this way in the first place. I’m just more interested, therefore, in speculating about things such as what might happen to the polls if GB hadn’t pulled things round by October and was forced out.