The Lib Dems will have an inflated local popularity - Elwyn seems well-known in the area and they may have a lot of voters too outraged by Phil Woolas' actions to hop ship to Labour.

Two polls out today show Labour are on track for a very comfortable win. ICM has Labour on 44% with the Lib Dems on 27% and the Tories on 18%. Populus (which had a bigger sample size) puts Labour on 46% with the Lib Dems on 29% and the Tories on 15%.

 

Nowhere near as disastrous for the Lib Dems as might've been expected... if these polls are reliable, they're only down 3-5% from the election. Surprisingly (and at odds with national opinion polls), most of Labour's increased support in Oldham since May seems to be coming from the Tories, whose vote in these polls is down more than 10% - although it should be noted that it's widely thought the Tories are holding back money from their candidate in a deliberate attempt to boost the Lib Dem candidate's chances. Still, it's worth pointing out that, in the Populus poll, Labour even manage to outpoll the combined Coalition vote! I think Ed Miliband will be very pleased with anything like this scale of victory next week.

That's the net effect. If this is how it goes on Thursday I suspect it will be a result of a lot of Lib Dem voters switching to Labour but largely being replaced by Tory voters switching to the Lib Dems.

 

I'm surprised no credible independent candidate is standing. Given the circumstances of the byelection they might have had a chance of winning.

There's a third poll by a company called Survation - no, I've never heard of them either. They are awaiting approval as members of the trade body and their figures are very different from the other polls so should perhaps be taken with more than a pinch of salt. Their result is Lab 31%, Lib Dem 30%, Con 6% with the rest going for other candidates or don't knows.

 

Survation are publishing more details at midnight with details of the other polls on Monday.

I've posted this before, but I think it's relevent, given it talks about opinion polls:

 

I've posted this before, but I think it's relevent, given it talks about opinion polls:

I don't need to see it again to remember it very well. That's one reason why it will be interesting to see more details. It is possible - although I suspect it would be against the pollsters' code of conduct - that Survation asked something along the lines off "If the Conservatives had no chance of winning, how will you vote?". The company are not bound by the code of conduct at the moment but they would be pretty stupid to go against it if they wanted to be part of the trade body.

There is now some more information from Survation - http://survation.com/2011/01/oldham-east-s...survey-results/

 

There is no obvious bias in the questioning. However, they did ask about other people in the household and how they might vote. It is not clear what they did with the answers to that question.

If like Tyron says the LibDem candidate is quite popular locally then it could be a close race. A good reputation locally can withstand a parties poor national reputation

If like Tyron says the LibDem candidate is quite popular locally then it could be a close race. A good reputation locally can withstand a parties poor national reputation

The dodgy looking poll (putting the Lib Dems just 1% behind) appears to have named the candidates. If the other two did not that could be one reason for the big difference from the other polls.

Not only is Survation untested, it also used a smaller sample size than the other two polls. I'd be inclined to discard it. I predict the final result will resemble the ICM/Populus numbers, although I think it's possible the Lib Dems will 'squeeze' the Tory vote a bit more as Lib Dem campaigners appeal to Tories in the final days to vote for them to keep out Labour.

Looks like the Lib Dems might be about to redefine "falling on one's sword". The Cabinet Secretary is investigating whether a Lib Dem minister breached the ministerial code by announcing a policy for the first time at a campaign event in the constituency:

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/20...es-deficit-cuts

 

Meanwhile, a Lib Dem election leaflet is claiming the Labour candidate is lying when she says she has lived in the constituency for 25 years. If it turns out the Lib Dems are lying, then, even if by some miracle they manage to win the by-election, the result could be open to judicial review in exactly the same way as the Woolas result was.

Looks like the Lib Dems might be about to redefine "falling on one's sword". The Cabinet Secretary is investigating whether a Lib Dem minister breached the ministerial code by announcing a policy for the first time at a campaign event in the constituency:

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/20...es-deficit-cuts

 

Meanwhile, a Lib Dem election leaflet is claiming the Labour candidate is lying when she says she has lived in the constituency for 25 years. If it turns out the Lib Dems are lying, then, even if by some miracle they manage to win the by-election, the result could be open to judicial review in exactly the same way as the Woolas result was.

The constituency boundaries have changed so much over the last 25 years that both sides could potentially claim to be telling the truth.

A byelection is likely in Barnsley Central after the Labour MP has pleaded guilty to fiddling his expenses. If he gets a prison sentence of at least a year (a former MP got 18 months last week for fiddling a larger amount) he will be disqualified from office. Of course, he may choose to resign anyway. There is currently a mass Labour majority with the Lib Dems just six votes ahead of the Tories. In seats like this I'm inclined to think of them as joint third rather than joint second. However, if the Lib Dems were not part of the coalition, they would probably have a fighting chance of winning it.

The Labour leadership has rightly disowned that Illsley guy, so he's definitely going to get kicked out even if he isn't jailed for more than a year. Obviously Ed Miliband will have MAJOR problems if he can't hold such a rock-solid safe seat.

Eric Illsley has had the good sense to announce that he will be resigning as an MP. Unless a credible Martin Bell-type independent comes along, Labour should win easily although it is obviously an embarrassing byelection for them.

I doubt an independent would be able to make any inroads against a new candidate untainted by the expenses scandal...

The result for the election will be called at around 2 am. I'm predicting an incredibly narrow win for the Lib Dems, but in truth it could go to one of three.

Labour seem pretty much a shoo-in to win (judging from the messages coming out of each party's camps), but it seems it was closer than predicted, due to a low turnout fuelled by poor weather. The Tory candidate has pretty mch conceded.

Lib Dem President Tim Farron has conceded.

Former Lib Dem MP Evan Harris is suggesting that Labour will win but not by the 17% margin predicted at the weekend. If that is the case Labour will celebrate a win although opposition parties ought to win byelections. The Lib Dems may be able to point to their vote holding up even though that may be a case of defectors to Labour being replaced by Tory switchers. The Tories will say they never expected to win even though they had an excellent candidate.

I'm going to hazard a guess of a majority of 3,000 for Labour. Not spectacular but enough.