Who Cares Who's Third?

Um, Neil, where have the parties gone in the polls with all that under our belt?

Well, you're right to say obviously about the Burnham honeymoon.

I mean, it has definitely, we, we're still experiencing that honeymoon.

Um, a lot of the polling companies are all over the place though.

So when we last convened, YouGov had Labor still slightly behind Reform, 22 against 23 in a poll that came out the week when we were, we were last on.

But Ipsos, uh, had Labor at 28, Opinium 27, More in Common 27, uh, and a couple of other smaller firms.

And, and generally, um, things have started to move together.

Of course, we always think of YouGov as being, uh, the kind of the, the prestige one to look for.

Uh, and, and even through to the middle of August, they were still stubbornly sticking with 22% in a couple of polls.

Uh, but now as we, as we came into conference season, they started to go up 23%, 24%.

Um, and, uh, this week they've, they've really kind of solidified around the, the, the, the numbers that we were seeing from all the other pollsters.

Uh, we also had a couple of MRPs, uh, in the time.

We haven't had any MRPs for ages, actually.

I, I'm not gonna go into those in big detail now.

Maybe we'll talk about that in a future show, uh, because there's so much to get into today.

We, we-- it's been a, as usual, it's been a mental time, but more, more importantly is what's been happening in the betting markets.

So the most seats for the general election, uh, you might think that with Burnham having a honeymoon, um, and Reform, you know, they won the Clacton by-election.

We aren't gonna get a Count Binface government, even though we underestimated them, uh, the man, the great one.

Um, it, it, you know, it, it has been slightly funny.

Reform was stubbornly holding on to about two to one to get most seats the next election, and Burnham was drifting out to towards two to one, even as people like Opinium and Survation said that he was on 28% and the, and that Reform were down to 23 and 24 and even 21.

Um, the, uh, uh, the big punter, I, I mean, I-- we say the big punter is probably a completely different guy, but we don't see many people playing in four-figure sums on the most seats market.

You've got to tie up money for a long time, and, and every now and then somebody comes out of the woodwork, they wanna play in five-figure amounts.

And this person came out wanting to play five figures, and they wanted to lay Labor, and they were really trying to push them towards two to one.

It seemed a bit odd to me because with Labor being in the insurgency, uh, and, um, you know, with, with Burnham on his honeymoon, uh, I, I didn't think that w- I mean, uh, it's easy to say now, but I didn't think that seemed like a smart idea.

And, and actually, as they've crept up, he's back down to, the price is back down to more like 2.7, so j- a little under seven to four.