The biggest problem I have with AV is that it will exaggerate swings. The Thatcher landslides in the 80's and the Blair landslides in 1997, 2001 and his almost-landslide (in terms of seats) in 2005 would have been even bigger. Some research figures suggest that if AV were in operation in 1997 ...

The Conservatives plan to cut MP's by 10% is more than just making it look like they are "cutting the cost of politics", it would also mean a boundary review of all House of Commons seats, which the Tories would hope would reduce the bias to Labour in the system.

Another marginal seats poll has come out, this time from Ipsos MORI. It indicates a 7% Labour to Conservative swing due to a surge in Conservative support in those seats, which would just be enough for a wafer-thin Conservative majority. However, that is on the assumption that the Tories hold all ...

A little caution on the ICM and YouGov polls that came out tonight. They both had fieldwork conducted over the weekend, which usually negatively affects the Conservative share of the vote compared to the final result, something to with the demographics of Conservative supporters and their likelihood ...

Northern Ireland has 18 seats, which if all of the parties were to support the Conservatives would give them 329. However, it's worth noting that Sinn Fein don't take their seats so I don't think they could technically be counted on for "support"?

One of the consequences of Sinn Fein not taking ...

I dont appect most of this, I still do not believe the tory will win outright, also if Greens, BNP and Esther Rantzen start winning seats then it anyone guess what will happen. If labour supporters switch to the lib dems in south west then tories will start loosing seats, and there will found it ...

A few bits and pieces on analysing the polls...

1) Uniform national swing is useful to provide what the general indications of a result may look like, but in past elections they have tended to overstate Labour on seats and underestimate both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. The US ...