More evidence of the public’s dislike of disunity

RT @leftfootfwd: The detrimental impact of disunity. How the attempted coup damaged Labour. http://bit.ly/6sAtpy

The last figures show that there is a way back for Labour…I am not a big fan of the voter view of disunity on this one but your right it is damaging for Labour….

Price of disunity: how attempted coup damaged Labour. http://bit.ly/6sAtpy from @leftfootfwd <- I always been a fan of disunity, myself.

Disunity is certainly damaging, with or without the latest numbers – witness the 18 years in opposition Labour suffered after Benn & co made out that they’d lost the 1979 election for not pursuing policies that were left-wing enough. But what eventually saved the party in the longer term was that the disunity became so extreme and so persistent that it gave birth to the SDP, which gave birth to a return to sanity via Kinnock, Smith and Blair – and revival as ‘New Labour’ (i.e. new name for SDP).

But Brown stopped using the words ‘New Labour’ more than five years ago, at the height of his briefings against Blair (see http://maxatkinson.blogspot.com/2008/09/wisdom-of-forethought.html) and must be one of the few people in the country who’s surprised that so many people hold such deep resentment against him for plotting so openly and flagrantly against the most successful winner of elections the party has ever had.

When he backed out of calling an immediate election in October 2007, I was baffled that he’d opted to become the next Callaghan – i.e. an unelected PM who held on too long and lost an election he might have won if he’d gone for it earlier.

It now looks as though the party’s best hope is that the defeat will be a narrow one that will be quickly followed by an heir to Blair who’ll be able to save the New Labour mission from sinking into another 18 years of opposition – and, for reasons outlined earlier today, I’d say that the best hope is for Andy Burnham to become leader when Brown has shuffled off his electoral coil – http://bit.ly/6PiP26

I am really sorry to be pedantic, but I am increasingly annoyed by phrases such as ‘x% of the public think/say’, when the poll in question has such limited scope. Just because 60% of those polled say so, it is not a logical necessity that this reflects the public at large.

Yes, I am being pedantic and I am sorry, but it does appear that much of the political/media arena talks of it as if it does.

A poll conducted by, say, The Sun or The Times for its readers, is not reflective of ‘the public’, but merely those readers who answered that particular poll. Hold the same poll in two different papers, you’ll get different answers.

This is by no means a stab at this article or the author, or a Left Foot Forward problem, nor a left problem; just a general one of politics/media. I simply just reached tipping point at this moment in time and needed an outlet to be a nuisance.

Am I being too pedantic? Probably. Maybe I just need a smoke.

[Left Foot Forward is a truly wonderful thing, by the way]

Shamik,

So a mere 73% of the population can’t stand Labour and would like the government removed.

Heady days indeed for wanna be progressives everywhere. As an evidence based blog, is it not time to think the unthinkable and wonder if tribal party politics is really the answer?

For what say it is an “evidence based” blog to allow a contributor to write “Further proof that the actions of Geoff Hoon and Patricia Hewitt have damaged the Government emerged today following the latest Populus poll for this morning’s Times, which shows the Conservatives on 42 per cent and Labour on 27 per cent”.

It might be “further evidence” but is obviously not proof. Lots of other things could have contributed includingthe margin of error.

It is just sloppy and leads to the suspicion that “evidence based” just means anything that we can use to justify an existing belief.

@Red

“Just because 60% of those polled say so, it is not a logical necessity that this reflects the public at large.”

Clearly not, but opinion pollsters do try very hard to get representative polls, and they do often weight their results to reflect the public at large.

“A poll conducted by, say, The Sun or The Times for its readers, is not reflective of ‘the public’, but merely those readers who answered that particular poll. Hold the same poll in two different papers, you’ll get different answers.”

Ah, here’s your mistake. This is not a poll by the Times of it’s readers. It is a poll commissioned by the Times and performed by the opinion polsters Populus. Populus, like all good opinion polling companies wil attempt to produced as unbiased a poll as possible, after all it’s in their interests to do so. They also publish their methodology.

http://www.populus.co.uk/polling.html

Yeah, fair enough, Alun.

This isn’t a major thing for me; I just felt a bit annoyed by how much these polls get thrown around when I’ve never come across one myself, nor know anybody who has. Not that I’m basing it merely on that. That would be silly. I guess capitalism/corporatisation/commercialism/imperialism/society-politics gots me jaded.

Thanks very much for your reply – gonna go have a look-see at the link.

Peace

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[...] on both holding out the best possible chance of a Labour victory. As Left Foot Forward reported last month, January’s Times/Populus poll revealed: “By 64%-26% voters believe Gordon [...]

[...] on both holding out the best possible chance of a Labour victory. As Left Foot Forward reported last month, January’s Times/Populus poll revealed: “By 64%-26% voters believe Gordon [...]