Comments on: West Lancashire

By: Lancs Observer

Lancs Observer — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 16:32:07 +0000

Thatcher’s Chief Whip in the Lords, Lord Hesketh has defected to UKIP.

By: Merseymike

Merseymike — Sun, 08 May 2011 22:32:51 +0000

You ‘do’ need to remember that this area can be deceiving because whilst Labour do respectably in Ormskirk the Tories hardly register in Skem. So Labour can win most votes but not most seats

By: Galloglass

Galloglass — Sun, 08 May 2011 20:51:05 +0000

If its any consolation Barnaby Labour did far better in Knowsley ward that I expected.

Also if the outgoing Labour leader had defended his seat in Bickerstaffe I’m certain you would have held that too.

By: Barnaby Marder

Barnaby Marder — Sat, 07 May 2011 21:16:52 +0000

I didn’t make many predictions. This was one I got wrong. The rather poor Labour result is in contrast with almost all surrounding areas, eg Labour gaining a majority of the seats contested in Sefton, which is very rare, and Labour making gains in most other neighbouring authorities. Interesting.

By: Shaun Bennett

Shaun Bennett — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 13:46:03 +0000

I can’t disagree with your logic Barnaby…I just don’t rate very highly the national percentage/local performace corrolation. I remember when the Tories in opposition were winning huge numbers of seats in some areas that were not expected, doing very very poorly (far worse than the national swing would indicate) in a lot of others and all on a relatively small lead over Labour of 7 or 8%.

I can imagine Labour doing better than a 5% lead nationally; I can imagine them winning scores of seats locally that look a lot like the picture of 2010′s results. But I can also imagine a situation where national swing is a nonsense (as it has increasingly become in local elections).

Time will tell of course. The Labour gains will be significant. But wouldn’t expect too many gains in wards that they failed to take last year-even if technically there would have been a swing nationally between 2010 and 2011. I’m not sure that local election results work like that any more.

Your overall council predictions though I have had no cause to disagree with Barnaby. I think we’ll end up with our predictions in the same place in terms of councils even if not precise necessarily wards.

By: Barnaby Marder

Barnaby Marder — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 13:01:43 +0000

Well let’s assume that Labour has a lead of only 2% over the Tories – that’s still a swing of 5.5% or so since last year. That would clearly net a lot of seats not won last year, even if one allows for the possibility of a certain degree of ticket-splitting (such ticket-splitting of course would have hurt Labour in the local elections in some areas, e.g. Birmingham Edgbaston where I think I’m right in saying that the Tories were winning a plurality of the local election vote even as Gisela Stuart held the parliamentary seat). Of course the swing could be uneven, but one has to suspect that Labour would tend to do better this year in West Lancashire than in Dover for example. I don’t have great local knowledge it’s true, but endless people claimed I didn’t know a constituency in the general election last year then found afterwards I had been more accurate in my predictions than they had (and you Shaun, since your predictions tended to be very similar to my own). This particularly applies to certain LD supporters although Galloglass is generally exempt from this. I think that a ward won by the Tories over Labour last year with a majority of 201 on a large turnout is bound to be a Labour target this year, although some such wards will clearly be harder targets than others.

By: Shaun Bennett

Shaun Bennett — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 12:52:30 +0000

Yes thats true. Although I do notice that Labour actually won more local council seats than the Tories did last year.

Of course, these seats were mostly last up in 2007, so we will see a lot of gains from then, but if we compare this years results to last years in the wards where that is possible, we probably won’t see anything like the same sort of difference.

Labour will be leading in votes and seats. But in terms of votes it will probably only be a 5% difference or so, and in terms of seats it will not be too different from last year (of course with a lot more councils in England actually up).

By: Barnaby Marder

Barnaby Marder — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 12:14:08 +0000

Yes obviously there will be a difference in turnout, but it would be extremely surprising if Labour failed to gain a plurality of the vote in this year’s elections in the country as a whole, and that would necessarily mean the party winning quite numerous wards which voted against Labour last year. The Tories will have problems getting their own vote out too, since in some areas Labour voters will be more motivated to go out than their Tory & LD counterparts.

By: Shaun Bennett

Shaun Bennett — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:07:25 +0000

But Barnaby, that was with the general election on the same day! Labour have the advantage of oppositon now but will not be pulling out their voters to a general election turnout.

Labour will make big big gains this year, but if they failed to win wards last year, they probably won’t turn them around this year in most cases.

By: Barnaby Marder

Barnaby Marder — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 07:30:57 +0000

The 2 wards you mention Galloglass were lost only narrowly by Labour last year. You may be right but I think I could be forgiven for thinking that given the substantial swing to Labour that has occurred since then we might at least have a chance.