Latest Scottish seat predictions – alittleecon
Nicola Sturgeon – will she be the big winner in Scotland?
Alex Little’s Scottish seat predictions are interesting because he bases them on bets at the bookies’, rather than random surveys. Here’s his current view:
I last looked at this on 1st January, and since then, things have changed quite a lot – in a bad way for Labour and a good way for the SNP. Here then are my latest predictions based on the current odds, against what I predicted previously:
| Current seats | Jan 1st Predictions | Feb 27th Predictions | |
| SNP | 6 | 25 | 29 |
| Labour | 41 | 29 | 23 |
| Lib Dem | 11 | 4 | 6 |
| Tory | 1 | 1 | 1 |
The full article is on alittleecon.
Of course, Alex’s predictions vary greatly from the survey predictions that give the SNP something like 40 seats, and from the recent Survation offering that suggested nationalists would have only nine.
The best bet, it seems, is that nobody knows what will happen.
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This frightens me to death. Please someone assure me the bloody Tories will not remain in power. Come on Scotland, we all buy your whisky, just support us on this occasion and I promise to keep buying Scottish whisky – if you don’t, I’ll start buying Irish.
You all hate the tories, have some thought for those of us south of your border. please don’t give this shower another chance. You might have relatives down here – think of them.
You joke about this but I still don’t see why English people, the vast majority in the UK, harp on about needing the Scots to vote Labour. We have done that for decades, to no avail. What you need is to convince your own countrymen to vote Labour if they want to get rid of the Tories. The way the people of England think and vote is not our problem. There are 10 times more of you; plenty to oust the Tories if you really wanted to.
Why on earth would you think people in England and Wales aren’t devoting a large proportion of their time and energy to convincing their fellow English and Welsh citizens to vote Labour?
Nobody is suggesting that the way people in the other UK countries vote is your problem.
Your problem is the way people in Scotland are planning to vote – based on the disinformation that is being sold to them regularly by SNP apparatchiks.
You are right Mike, nobody knows what will happen, but I would hope that the high turnout for the referendum is built upon for the GE.
You can agree or disagree with Scottish politics but getting a high turnout in elections gives political parties something to think about and it is refreshing to see people engaged in politics for once.
Labour needs to work hard to find out why they apoear to have lost so much ground in Scotland, find out what people want and act upon it.
It seems to me that the only thing Labour supporters have to fear from an SNP victory is the likelihood that there own right wing will seek a deal with the Tories rather than make any concessions to the SNP. We already have the spectacle of one Scottish Labour Councillor calling for Labour voters to vote Tory or Lib Dem rather than let SNP or Scottish Green candidates take seats.
Oh dear, Steve, you’re not one of those crackpots who thought McNeill was tweeting Labour policy, are you?
If that was the case, he wouldn’t have had to quit, would he?
Please use your intelligence.
Ah, but you’re also suggesting that Labour might do a deal with the Conservative Party, in denial of 115 years’ enmity between those two parties.
It seems to me that the only thing that should worry Labour supporters is the silliness being passed off as information by people like yourself.
I didn’t suggest for a minute that McNeill was “tweeting Labour policy” – the possibility never crossed my mind as such behaviour is not, generally speaking, a policy matter. I said that McNeill, a leading member of the Scottish Labour Party DID tweet it – presumably in the expectation that his followers would take heed. To suggest that he is some sort of lone maverick, given his long standing position at the heart of Scottish Labour is somewhat dis-ingenuous. As for Labour in Scotland (or England) doing a deal with the Tories – I didn’t exactly say that either. I said that the Labour *right* might seek a deal with the Tories, rather than see any influence going to what some have already disturbingly called “The Insurgents”. You know at least as well as I do (and probably better) which individuals are that way inclined. I *know* you don’t like them any more than I do, but it is no good pretending they don’t exist. A very good friend of mine, a working class labour activist for whom I have great respect, firmly believes that, once in power, Ed Miliband will take a “good sharp axe” to the Blairites and rightists – I wish I could believe it.
You say you don’t think McNeill was tweeting Labour policy, but then say it is disingenuous to suggest that he is a “lone maverick”. Make up your mind, please.
Regarding the Labour *right* seeking a deal with the Tories: They can’t do it without taking the rest of Labour with them, so what is your point exactly?
I’ve edited out your link to McNeill’s offending tweet. Why on earth would I want to encourage anyone to read that? They might think I agreed with what you’re suggesting.
1. Oh, come off it Mike – you know perfectly well that in the Labour Party (and elsewhere) there is “Policy” and there is “Tactics” – the latter usually the subject of informal discussion and understandings. In my original comment I referred to this particular event as a “spectacle” as in “A regrettable public display, as of bad behaviour:” – and I suppose the implication is that a “public display” is the expression of a “private attitude” which may, or may not, be shared by others.
2. And you think they are not prepared to split the Party?
3. LOL. I would never accuse you of that ;)
1. Maybe that’s true of the SNP. It is wrong of you to suggest such conduct takes place in parties of which you have no personal experience. I know what you are suggesting does NOT happen in my own constituency Labour party.
2. Not if it means losing.
Well – I was going to let it go – but I do have to point out that my partner and I between us have many years experience of the Labour Party ;)
Are you currently a member? If not, then your years of experience won’t count for anything at all.
Oh dear – and you almost had me convinced :
http://labourlist.org/2015/03/labour-mp-says-party-shouldnt-rule-out-a-grand-coalition-with-the-tories/
You really need to read these articles before linking to them:
“Needless to say, this isn’t likely to be a popular suggestion among most Labour supporters or MPs…”
I read the article. And if you read my posts before dismissing them you will see that I have never said more that that the idea is out there amongst an element in the party that has clout and needs to be taken seriously. Exactly like McNeill’s exhortation to vote Tory in Scotland.
That is not true. You said it is disingenuous to suggest that McNeill was acting on his own – thereby implying that he was enacting a policy (or ‘tactic’, if you really must) of the Labour Party. You denied that you were trying to say two different things, but that is exactly what you have been doing and you’re still doing it now.
Any suggestion that Labour could ally itself with the Conservative Party is absolute nonsense. Please don’t make yourself look any more of a fool than you’ve already managed.
Maybe you would be better spending your effort telling those members that are advocating it that they are talking nonsense then Try setting off the fire alarm in the building rather than yelling out of the window. BTW – I haven’t been insulting towards you once in this or any other thread. Disappointed that you do not return that courtesy.
I’m also disappointed that you haven’t realised what you’ve been doing.
No Mike – I understand what you are saying in that respect, I simply disagree with you. But pax – we’ve both made our points.
I’m guessing that the Tories will lose their one seat, the Lib Dems will lose between six and ten seats depending on how unpopular they are, and the SNP will win between twenty and forty seats.
I hope you are right and I am wrong but I have an inkling that the Tories may double their seats in Scotland, to 2. My constituency is historically Tory, having only been keeping them at bay because Michael Moore, the LibDem, was so popular and does a lot of constituency work. It all depends if his involvement in the coalition is enough to oust him. The SNP will try but it is an unlikely win for them. Labour needn’t bother standing for all the votes they generally get. I can only hope that the Tory who is standing is seen for the prat he is, with his number one priority on his propaganda sheet being a promise to re-instate weekly bin collections!
Wow. Does his leaflet have ‘My Plan’ plastered all over it as though he wrote it himself?
I’m not sure what you’re saying there Mike. It was item 1 on the first official party leaflet that dropped on my mat.
It seems to be a theme of Tory leaflets this time around. They’re all labelled “My plan” to do whatever (in Mid Wales it’s “secure a better future” – fat chance!) and then the points seem to be taken from a generic list.
Ah! I can’t remember if it was headed that way. The leaflet followed Michael Moore’s into the bin. His was a mini-newspaper bragging about how he and his party had held the Tories in check. You couldn’t make these folk up.
If there is any justice in heaven or on earth that supercilious smirking little sh*t Danny Alexander will end up losing his seat to someone – anybody! – next May and not be seen again.