Election 2015- Hume Brophy Daily Update 20 28 April 2015

Today’s campaigning sees Labour setting out their first 100 day plan for immigration, whilst the Conservatives will announce that Libor fines will go to pay for 50,000 apprenticeships. The SNP have claimed that was “bullied” by the Conservatives to rule out a formal SNP coalition, according to Scottish First Minister .

Of course all of this is rather a rehash of what has already been announced and with the campaign drawing to a close, all parties are not making much of an improvement in their poll results. With constant warning about a Labour/SNP alliance, UKIP and the Greens accusing the other parties of being too establishment, Labour accusing the Tories of being too cold and heartless and the Lib Dems trying to say they are the only sane ones in all this madness has not really made an headway in any polling numbers. With now only just over a week to ago it is now just a waiting game to see which party has a successful message, if at all.

Business Today  Polls  Trivia  On the campaign trail  For the diary

Business Today

 Prime Minister speaks in on apprenticeships (9:50am)  Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg speaks on Liberal Democrat coalition redlines on economic policy and education spending, then spends the afternoon campaigning in Somerset  Labour Party leader Ed Miliband speaks in the Vale of on immigration (11:00am)  Defence Secretary , shadow defence secretary Vernon Coaker, Nick Harvey, Angus Robertson and Rebecca Johnson take part in a BBC Daily Politics debate on defence policy (2:00pm)  Shadow energy secretary and Scottish Labour leader campaign in Glasgow (11:00am)  Margaret Ritchie attends an SDLP tourism discussion in County Down (8:00am)  UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage speaks in Hartlepool  leader Nicola Sturgeon campaigns in South Queensferry (1:00pm)  leader Leanne Wood and AM campaign in the Vale of Glamorgan. Leanne Wood is expected to outline her party's plans to improve the National Health Service  UK Independence Party deputy chairman Suzanne Evans holds a press briefing in London on taxation and the economy (8:30am)  Scottish Conservatives leader Ruth Davidson campaigns in Edinburgh (2:00pm)  Scottish Deputy First Minister John Swinney campaigns in Stirling

Polls

Lord Ashcroft released further polling last night, putting the Conservatives into a 6 point lead in front of Labour and ICM also places the Conservatives in the lead by 3 points ahead of Labour. Nonetheless, as with all polling, Populus has Labour on a 3 point lead over the Tories, once again throwing into doubt unpredictable results of polling. If all these were to be taken as an average, the two major parties would still be neck and neck.

Top line figures are: Lord Ashcroft- CON 36%, LAB 30%, LDEM 9%, UKIP 11%, GRN 7% ICM- CON 35%, LAB 32%, LDEM 9%, UKIP 13%, GRN 5% Populus- CON 33%, LAB 36%, LDEM 8%, UKIP 14%, GRN 5%

Once again, not much change over the overall polling the past few days, with the usual polling results;

 Labour 33% +0  Conservative 34% +1  UKIP 13% +0  Liberal Democrats 9% +0  Green 5% +0  Others 6% -1

*As of 27 April 2015, BBC poll of polls

Betfair Predicts

Likelihood of:  Hung parliament 89%  Conservative Majority 10%  Labour Majority 1%

Seats (with increases/decreases based on last parliament)  Labour 264 Seats (gain of 7)  Conservative 280 seats (a loss of 22 seats)  UKIP 3 seats (gain of 1)  Liberal Democrats 28 seats (loss of 28 seats)  SNP 52 seats (gain of 46 seats)  Others (24 seats)* (loss of 10 seats)

*http://www.betfairpredicts.com/ as of 28 April 2015

Trivia

Did you know?

1. Sir Robert Walpole, regarded as Britain’s first Prime Minister, took a gift of some land and housing for his service from King George II in 1732. Walpole wished the property, three houses in Downing Street, to be gifted to all First Lords of the Treasury and not to him personally. When converting the three houses into one large house, now Number 10, Walpole had to convince the original tenant, a Mr Chicken, to move into another house in Downing Street in order for him to carry out the works. Mr Chicken agreed his house became the infamous entrance to Number 10.

2. In the 1950 and 1951 general elections Margaret Thatcher was the Conservative candidate for the safe Labour seat of Dartford. The local party selected her as its candidate because, though not a dynamic public speaker, she was well-prepared and fearless in her answers; another prospective candidate recalled that "Once she opened her mouth, the rest of us began to look rather second-rate". She attracted media attention as the youngest and the only female candidate. She lost on both occasions to Norman Dodds, but reduced the Labour majority by 6,000, and then a further 1,000.

3. Harold Wilson, Labour Prime Minister in the 1960s and the latter 1970s, did not really smoke in private, but used his famous pipe as more of a prop. Lord Donoughue, former right hand man to Wilson, said that the Prime Minister often used the pipe in his hand as a prop to give him more time to think of an answer to a difficult question.

On the Campaign Trail

HRH- The Election Baby

@Telegraph

Ed Balls Day Today is Day, a celebration to remember Ed Balls’ now infamous tweet of 2011. To celebrate this occasion, many on twitter have created Ed Balls images of their own!

@EdBallsmp

@GeneralBoles

@HRH_Duke_of_URL

Facts and Figures Interesting statistics from the BBC

@BBCPolitics

For the diary David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband all appear on a special Question Time on BBCOne at 8pm.