Forgot to mention this earlier – a article I wrote for Total Politics last month giving tips on the best way to get the most of opinion polls http://www.totalpolitics.com/magazine_detail.php?id=1127
 | 7 May | 49 | 33 | 6 | 0 | Con +16 |
| 6 May | 50 | 31 | 7 | 0 | Con +19 |
 | 6 May | 50 | 30 | 7 | 3 | Con +20 |
| 1 May | 51 | 33 | 6 | 0 | Con +18 |
 | 28 Apr | 48 | 31 | 8 | 1 | Con +17 |
| 26 Apr | 50 | 33 | 7 | 0 | Con +17 |
| 23 Apr | 50 | 33 | 7 | 0 | Con +17 |
 | 20 Apr | 54 | 28 | 9 | 1 | Con +26 |
| 17 Apr | 53 | 32 | 5 | 1 | Con +21 |
| 17 Apr | 51 | 32 | 6 | 0 | Con +19 |
| 17 Apr | 52 | 31 | 8 | 0 | Con +21 |
 | 9 Apr | 46 | 29 | 10 | 2 | Con +17 |
| 9 Apr | 55 | 29 | 5 | 0 | Con +26 |
| 3 Apr | 53 | 30 | 7 | 0 | Con +23 |
| 2 Apr | 52 | 28 | 8 | 1 | Con +24 |
| 2 Apr | 49 | 29 | 8 | 0 | Con +20 |
| 27 Mar | 54 | 28 | 6 | 0 | Con +26 |
 | 26 Mar | 54 | 28 | 7 | 2 | Con +26 |
| 23 Mar | 47 | 29 | 8 | 0 | Con +18 |
| 20 Mar | 51 | 31 | 7 | 0 | Con +20 |
 | 16 Mar | 52 | 30 | 9 | 0 | Con +22 |
| 13 Mar | 49 | 32 | 6 | 0 | Con +17 |
| 9 Mar | 50 | 29 | 11 | 1 | Con +21 |
| 6 Mar | 45 | 28 | 11 | 3 | Con +17 |
| 2 Mar | 49 | 30 | 8 | 2 | Con +19 |
Good points AW, especially about taking into account all the polling on a given subject (different question wordings etc).
Btw, the sentence beginning “In contrast, anti-hunting campaigners would normally….”, it looks like it has acquired a glitch.
Yes, the title of the piece ended up in the middle of the sentence. Luckily the sense emerged anyway,
A good piece mine host. I’ll just crawl away now..
I printed off the article to pin above my desk at work. I understand the key point about using the Scottish or Welsh figures in UK polls as the numbers are small but isn’t there some reliance that can be put on a cumulative base using a number of sequential polls? Is there a formula or anything?