Back in early April I invited readers to guess at the Labour majority at the general election (my own lack of foresight was evident in my firm prediction that Rishi Sunak wouldn’t call it before the autumn).
I’ve just looked back at your predictions and some of them were astonishingly close. The eventual majority was 174. I include all those that came within six either way.
Within six: Tim Read and Stuart Pemble predicted 180. On the other side of that spread was Jean Gaffin on 168.
Within five: Nick Bailey and Ian Clark on 179.
Within four: Robin Stafford on 178, John Michael White on 170.
Within three: EPM on 177.
Within two: Philip Longstaff with 176.
Within one: Mark Easton on 175.
WAIT FOR IT…
Honourable mentions to Kevin Knowle who had a seat spread of Labour 423, Con 126, Libdem 56, to Richard Carrow for putting a figure to Reform seats (predicted 14, actual 5) and Meher Oliaj who reckoned a Labour seat total of 410 (actual 412)
BUT THE WINNER IS…
Leftwich who smacked the 174 bang on the nose. Leftwich, if you make yourself known to the organisers (me), they (I) owe you a prize.
Those key seats
I did pretty well here. I should have stuck by my original prediction that Jeremy Corbyn would hold on in Islington North. I was derailed by a poll and changed my mind.
Galloway, Mordaunt, Truss, Rees Mogg and Thangam Debbonaire ( a shame this one) all lost as I thought they would. Farage, Tice, Duncan Smith and Wes Streeting all won - though Streeting not by the comfortable margin that I expected and Reform won three more seats than I anticipated. I am glad I bottled any forecast for Scottish seats because I would have got them wrong - the SNP’s collapse was the second story of the night.
Big essay on defining the “far right” coming up and I apologise for the delay. If you want to receive notice of it and all other posts on here then the button is below:
One last thing: it’s time to stop listening to the political pundits and to start paying heed to the policy experts. If I had a penny for “no enthusiasm for Labour” commentaries and excited bits of coverage of the latest doings of our Nigel, I would be able to pay back the national debt myself. It is perfectly reasonable for polcorrs to go nap on the forthcoming Tory leadership battle (watch out for the egregious Robert Jenrick, who I posted about on here a year ago), but the new government is now in the business of governing, making hard choices and (hopefully) avoiding pitting the short against the long term.
Meanwhile your thoughts on the above gratefully received!
I was miles off, low turn out and maybe misreading of how much people wanted to punish the Tories. Less than 100 seats I now see was a real long shot.
For the Tories if I was them I’d commission a really big poll to not to understand the result but what they need to do to make them electable again. All the candidates will have ideas but they will be purely guesswork. It would be much more sensible to start with some real data.
As for Labour, you have to admire the efficiency of the result. Starmer has a group of very talented people in Labour HQ that know how to win elections.
As for governing and policy the appointees to ministers look impressive. They have so much to do. Will be interesting times to see priorities and as you say the policies.
Yes, your keys seat predictions were spot on 👏👏👏 (though as you say Wes’s was horribly close…) Re Corbyn, I took great comfort from the fact that you thought he was going to lose (I saw those polls too), and am deeply aggrieved that he is still my MP 😡😡😡
Anyway, apart from that, the whole thing is pretty bloody marvellous and i feel almost embarrassed by the levels of schadenfreude i have been feeling re certain people…
Looking forward to the piece on the far right!