A Most Interesting Opinion Poll

Love 'em or loathe 'em ?
How come no-one ever launches an opinion poll
asking about the worth of opinion polls !

by johnofgwent

Two days ago a poster on "ukdebate" suggested a "soon to be released" opinion poll had lumped every one of the parties other than Lab, Lib and Con together as "other" so as to hide the swing to one of the minority parties. I wonder which (!!) but at the time I commented that this was foolish in the extreme as to count only those three individually would lump Plaid and the Scottish Nationalists who have their hands on the tiller and are contributing directly to the mess we are in with those who offer an alternative to the shambles we have now.

But this morning I saw a comment from "harbi" in a previous blog entry. I think it deserves a post of it's own. On this page the London Daily News declares the result of an opinion poll of 4,433 voters (about the same as yougov considers significant) and this is what they had to say:-

The far-right British National Party is projected in a London Daily News poll to gain around 30 per cent of the vote in London which would result in up to 2-3 MEPs in the capital, and 7-8 MEPs nationally.

Conservative activists who have been canvassing aggressively the last weeks have been reporting a "stark increase" in BNP support on the doorsteps alarming many Tory grandees that the right wing of politics is being hijacked by the far right BNP.

The scandal over MPs expenses has eclipsed any concerns over immigration in the capital according to canvassers from the main political parties, and a "political meltdown" for the main political groups could take place on June 4, if voters do not turn out.

The London Daily News poll of 4433 votes shows the following:

Labour : 7.76% (345)
Conservative : 41.79% (1857)
Liberal Democrat : 13.46% (598)
Green : 1.91% (85)
BNP : 29.91% (1329)
UKIP : 2.72% (121)
Other : 2.45% (109)

If the BNP was to win the projected 7 seats nationally according to reports, it would lead a "European nationalists" block in the European Parliament led by BNP leader Nick Griffiths, with the group being entitled to £5 million in political funding from the EU.

The following days will see a concerted campaign by the main political parties to undermine the efforts of the BNP with an attempt to dissuade voters to "waste their vote" by voting for the BNP. Labour has already started a "Stop the BNP" leaflet which is being distributed to local parties nationally.

The Daily Telegraph ran a story that most of the BNPs new support is from disgruntled Labour voters:

"The Labour Party used to stand for what we believe in. Now, no way. It's not just immigration that has changed; it's our way of life. We're becoming a Third World country in Europe with no influence, no power and the people not knowing anything about their own history."

Sources within the Conservative hierarchy are "so concerned" by the BNP that publicly they do not even refer to it, and just refer to the BNP as "that evil party".

A pity they could not get the name of our party leader right. What if I were to call the leader of the Tories "Diddy" David Hamilton and the leader of the Lib Dems Mr Foggy or Mr Compo?

But the message is interesting, is it not