Chris Curtis MP
@chriscurtis94
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No longer spending much time around here. You can find me on b**es*y, details in my pinned tweet.
Joined April 2009
After 15 years, it's time to move on. I no longer feel comfortable using this site, and it's become quite an unpleasant place to spend my time. Please do join me at the other place though, details below.
EXC: Labour MPs have begun quitting X in alarm over the platform, with one saying Elon Musk had turned it into “a megaphone for foreign adversaries and far-right fringe groups”.
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We have just had a nurse, back from a long shift, turned away from the polling station because they wouldn't accept her NHS ID badge. She has no other form of ID in the household. You have got to wonder why the government doesn't want our nurses voting.
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I don't know who needs to hear this, but anyone who thinks the Rwanda deal is unethical is already going to think that. If you really want to make it unpopular, point out that it is a waste of 1.4 billion quid by a government that wont help people with their energy bills.
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Today's everyday hero is my landlord, who is "willing" to allow me to stay in the flat for a 29% rent increase.
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I assume this doesn't need saying, but just on the of chance it does, cutting public services to give more money to rich people is about as politically toxic as it is possible to get. And rightly so.
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Yes, Boris Johnson won a massive majority in 2019, but I also used to have a 30-inch waist. Things change, and if you don't adapt you end up with trousers you can't fit in.
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In the excitement, it's also worth remembering @PippaCrerar heroic reporting that originally brought the story to light.
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When are we allowed to start talking about the upcoming Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election?.
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Very few things make me more irate than hearing people from working-class backgrounds being told what they are and aren't allowed to like.
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Shout out to the staffer who read the focus group report which said people were upset with "The Prime Minister smirking about it" and decided he should now do interviews in a face mask.
'Have you lied to the public and parliament?'. Boris Johnson: "No.". The prime minister repeats his apologies for "misjudgements" made in Downing Street, and says he believed he was attending a "work event". Latest: 📺 Sky 501, Freeview 233 and YouTube
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More than anything else, I am sick to death of seeing private school kids imply that my mum wasn't aspirational for me because she couldn't afford to send me to a private school.
🏫 Labour's war on private schools shows a fundamental misreading of middle class aspiration. The party seems to have forgot that not every independent school is Eton and their plans risk putting more even pressure on the state. Latest @theipaper column
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Nan's nearly 92. She was born in Great Wollstone and has lived here all her life. Her postal vote has arrived and she has just voted Labour for the first time.
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A currency trader tells me that sterling is falling because of the increase in restaurants that sell "pies" that are just a bit of pastry on the top of the dish, rather than all the way around.
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A consistent picture across the snap polls tonight. Opinium - 64% want the PM to resign.YouGov - 63% want the PM to resign.Savanta - 69% want the PM to resign. And all pretty unchanged from last week's polls.
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"Polling says their is no enthusiasm for both of you". Starmer approval rating +2.Sunak approval rating -41. Honestly, the utter state of this.
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The laugh of a billionaire who has just been told that an Iceland worker is struggling to afford his mortgage.
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New polling for @SkyNews shows really low levels of trust in journalists among the public. - 72% don't trust newspapers on the issue of Coronavirus, just 17% do. - 64% don't trust TV journalists on the issue of Coronavirus, just 24% do.
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Just because this morning's papers are bordering on madness, a rough summary of these results would be:.> Labour rebuilt the so-called "Red Wall".> Labour made even further advances in parts of the south.> The Lib Dems won lots of disaffected Tory voters.
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Over one in every twenty rough sleepers fought for our country. A week out from Remembrance Day, rather than offering them support, our Home Secretary is threatening to ban the one lifeline that stops them from freezing on cold winter nights.
The British people are compassionate. We will always support those who are genuinely homeless. But we cannot allow our streets to be taken over by rows of tents occupied by people, many of them from abroad, living on the streets as a lifestyle choice. 1/4.
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Just a reminder that this unworkable, expensive, undemocratic policy was introduced after the dodgiest use of survey data I have EVER seen from a government body.
From 4 May, you’ll need photo ID to vote at polling stations in:. 🪪 Local elections in England.🪪 UK Parliamentary by-elections.🪪 Police and Crime Commissioner elections in England and Wales. Find out more ⬇️.
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I hear they are worried that paying nurses and junior doctors fairly might mean there is no money leftover for Michelle Mone and Matt Hancock's pub landlord.
🚨 NEW: Senior Tories have accused Keir Starmer of losing control of public sector pay by agreeing deals to end strikes . [@guardian].
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BREAKING: I have got information on a new plot to oust Rishi Sunak as Prime Minister as part of a wider plan to get Britain “back on track”. Full thread 👇 (1/7).
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Here is the under the bonnet number that matters. 13% of those who voted Tory at the last election say they will now vote Labour. This is *almost* 1997 levels of switching.
🚨LATEST @OpiniumResearch / . @ObserverUK poll 🚨. Our latest poll shows Labour's lead rising from to 8 points over the Conservatives, up from 3 points a fortnight ago. Con 31% (-3).Lab 39% (+2).Lib Dem 10% (-2).Green 7% (+1)
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Our Prime Minister described me as ignorant, arrogant, and ill raised because of my fantastic single mum. But sure, tell me again how it is just the ugly, intolerant, left who have a problem.
‘Britain’s divide isn’t North v South or red v blue. It’s between the ugly, intolerant Left and the rest of us’. My MoS column:
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Sweet mother of god this is awful. This is not a poll. These results are not representative of the adult population. A newspaper should NEVER be reporting these results in this way.
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One final point on the polls right now. It is also important to note that Labour's numbers are up on a lot of the underlying questions as much as the Tories are down. This isn't just a case of the Tories becoming less popular, but also Labour becoming more popular.
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New game: Make up your own gimmicky Tory policy. Badly thought through answers only.
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I'm not saying you can't believe a word Rishi Sunak says but. He came to Milton Keynes to campaign against new housing. Their manifesto includes a commitment to build more houses in the "20 largest cities". Milton Keynes is the 18th largest city.
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Delighted to be selected as Labour's candidate for Milton Keynes North. I would like to thank you all for the support during this campaign. I will continue to fight to turn Milton Keynes red, and for the Labour government this country urgently needs.
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I think Starmer's decision is the right one, and there is obviously now a big chance that this massively backfires on the Conservatives, however. .
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This Tory chaos is damaging Britain and damaging my city. We deserve a better future and I’m willing to fight for it. That’s why I’m standing to be Labour’s next MP for Milton Keynes North. Sign up to my campaign here -
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This isn't quite right. He has been airbrushed from TORY local election leaflets. He is still on the Labour ones.
NEW in tomorrow’s Daily Telegraph. Boris Johnson ‘airbrushed from local election leaflets like Jeremy Corbyn’ .
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For God's sake. Wordle 234 X/6. ⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩.
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Count Binface still struggling to reach 2%. His biggest problem is that, while his policies might be individually popular, Londoners just don't believe he can deliver on them.
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The BBCs Editorial Guidance on Vox Pop, flagrantly disregarded yet again.
Uxbridge residents stick by Boris Johnson despite Partygate report
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As I have been saying, the number to watch is the Tory to Labour switcher %. Last week it was 12%. This week it is 23%!!!!.
Voters abandon Tories as faith in economic competence dives
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If I were a Conservative MP, not sure I would stand in front of a giant neon sign saying "lick me" right now.
Great to visit Great Gelato on Stony Stratford High Street, with @iainastewart and try some of their delicious gelato 🍨 . Fantastic to see new businesses opening all over Milton Keynes 😁. #LoveMK
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They are not your voters, and they have the capacity to care about both.
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In a purely personal capacity, yesterday I tweeted about my time at YouGov, stating that YouGov banned us from publicising a 2017 poll which Jeremy Corbyn because it was too positive about Labour. 1 / 4.
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@RoryStewartUK I'm just guessing, but I think it might because Rishi Sunak keeps yelling rubbish over the top of him, and the moderator is allowing him to do it. 🤷♂️.
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Message from my brother. Thoughts with all our brave fire and rescue staff today, fighting to keep us safe in the most difficult circumstances.
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It's this that is going to kill the Tories - thinking they can approach the cost of living crisis with the same attitude as they approached the culture wars.
Conservative MP Lee Anderson says there isn't a massive need for food banks in the UK, it’s just that people “cannot cook properly, they can't cook a meal from scratch, they cannot budget.”
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If Shaun Bailey gets elected Mayor of London I will run around City Hall naked.
I can’t believe I’m writing this. But Tory sources say Shaun Bailey’s campaign now believe they can win the London mayoralty.
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The most likely path to the Tories losing the next election is the Conservative Party convincing themselves that Johnson is more invincible than he really is.
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It's clearly not the main point here, but this man is still supposed to be an MP, and he is still taking a £84k a year salary from the taxpayer. What on earth makes him think he can just fly to the Caribbean when he's supposed to be working?.
EXCLUSIVE:. I'm told that Boris Johnson is expected to stand in the Tory leadership contest. He's taking soundings but is said to believe it is a matter of national interest.
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A note to any commentator responding to that speech - Johnson isn't as popular as you think he is.
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I met a new mum during the campaign who was almost in tears as she talked about the meals she had skipped over winter so she could afford to keep the heating on for her newborn. I will never apologise for supporting a government that builds more solar farms, ends out reliance on.
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Eeah, these government approval numbers are rough. Approve 11% (-6).Disapprove 72% (+8). This is worse than it ever got under Johnson.
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Four in ten Unite members voted Conservative in the 2019 General Election. The idea that Kier Starmer is too right-wing for them is bonkers.
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Here are the most recent YouGov results on proroguing Parliament, including @anthonyjwells heroic effort at writing a balanced survey question on a complicated topic. Unfortunately, this never made it onto the front page of a newspaper.
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If Labour wins in Mid Beds today then Woburn will be the first Centre Parcs to be represented by a Labour MP since (I think) 2010.
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Sunak's ridiculous decision to cut HS2 and throw the West Midlands under the bus has put his leadership in jeopardy. Good.
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Alternative headline:. "Mayor of London needs three large cars of police protection, just to walk his dog, after repeated threats to his life".
Mail on Sunday find Sadiq Khan using three very large cars to travel 4.5 miles and back to take his dog for a walk, when he has a park just round the corner from his home.
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I just can't work out why they would do such a thing.
What's really shocking is that although the govt rightly *expanded* eligible photo-ID to include bus/train/travel passes for the elderly, they've *refused* to accept travel passes for the young.
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It's a tragedy that we haven't heard about Steps 5,6,7,8.
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There is something brilliantly hilarious about this whole saga. Why did no Tory stop and think about where this might end up?.
JRM not freelancing here. This implicit call for a truce, I’m told, is the line the chief whip is desperate for Tory MPs to take on Beergate. They’ve been warned that Starmer’s resignation would cause serious problems for the Tories in the country.
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This is obviously just awful and bleak. But it's also offensive that this think the kind of thing will help them win an election. They are so out of touch with the country they run they genuinely think we want homeless people to freeze.
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If I were the Conservatives I just wouldn't start arguments about where party funding comes from.
🥀 *The £125 million reason*. A new website to reveal why Labour MPs are so keen to back striking unions. A huge £125 million in union donations to the Labour Party, including £264,000 to one senior frontbencher. 🔍
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Agree or disagree, the way he eloquently and persuasively make this argument (paticularly up against @afneil) is masterful.
"You don't want an election because you fear the outcome, you want a second referendum because you didn't like the result of the first. What kind of a democrat are you?". @AfNeil challenges Tony Blair on backing referendum before election. #andrewneilshow
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Is the world flat? Here's both sides of the debate.
👀 hottest year in 125,000 years. Here's both sides of the debate, with @jameswoudhuysen and @ZoeatShine. #KayBurley PO
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If he doesn't know about your polling, perhaps it's because you aren't publishing the tables, despite being required to do so as a British Polling Council member?.
Owen is wrong (again). He does not know the polling. I'm polling voters every week. 65-70% think immigration is too high.60-70% think Britain has lost control of borders.80-90% think gvt handling migration badly.And more ppl back Rwanda than oppose it. Watching liberals & radical.
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Trying to avoid commenting on the Zahawi story, mainly because I don't want to receive any legal letters. But I will say that, as an ex-YouGov employee who started on a salary of £18,000 a year, I was always proud to be paying my taxes each month.
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🚨New @OpiniumResearch polling 🚨. Southgate is now more popular among Brits than Churchill. *Southgate*.Favourable 72%.Unfavourable 11%.NET: +61. *Churchill*.Favourable 65%.Unfavourable 22%.NET: +43
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I would suggest that anyone who thinks these issues are "dominating the public debate" as opposed to a massive deadly virus, vaccines, jobs, crimes etc. hasn't spoke to many voters recently.
A huge problem for Labour. It is dangerously out of step on a whole range of cultural issues that are now dominating the public debate . Ht @CommSenseUK JL Partners
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I feel like this is just codifying a long standing convention.
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Just on the off chance nobody has made this point yet, the PM would find it very difficult to hold his seat on this national swing.
🚨NEW Westminster Voting Intention🚨. 📈6pt Labour lead. On behalf of the Daily Mail. 🔴Lab 40 (+5).🔵Con 34 (-4).🟠LDM 10 (=).🟡SNP 5 (=).🟢Grn 5 (+1).⚪️Other 7 (-2). 2,019 UK adults, 11-12 Nov. (Changes from 5-7 Nov)
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Beyond the headline number, that's an 8 point lead for *Labour* on the economy.
🗳NEW: Westminster Voting Intention. 🌹LAB: 43% (+3).🌳CON: 32% (-2).🔶LDM: 9% (-1). via, @DeltapollUK • Changes w/08-11/03
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After the 1997 General election it was 1233 days before there was a poll showing the two parties neck and neck. It has been 261 days since the 2019 election.
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Just to be clear, the problem with the 45p rate cut was not that it was unpopular in the "red wall". It was unpopular everywhere. Not everything is about the red wall.
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Don't want to brag, but I've just seen the fridge.
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The government are doing this because they know they can get a 2 day debate on the ethics of the policy off the back of it. If you oppose the policy, don't fall into their trap.
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The latest polling out of New Zealand is almost unbelievable. If it holds, Ardern's 36 point lead would make Blair's 1997 landslide look pathetic.
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What's amazing is how pretty much all pollsters have been saying this *on loop* for the last year. and still so many in Westminster don't seem to get it.
What was striking is how flat 'culture war' issues were, how removed so much of the SW1 conversation which dominates politics and a fair bit of the media really is, despite fact it's often done in name of 'real people'. Any clip where a candidate talked about those issues tanked.
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77% of voters support the ban on fox hunting and it played a not insignificant part in damaging the Tories in the 2017 election campaign.
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I hate to be one of those people, but it really is very silly to do something like this.
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Keir Starmer should 100000000000000% not do this.
Pressure on Keir Starmer to tear up his usual caution and order his MPs to unite with Tory rebels and vote against vaccine passports to try to topple No10. Labour MP tells me: "We've a duty to oppose No10 - we should try to defeat the PM and then call a no confidence vote".
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Britain:.I can't get a GP appointment and food is getting really expensive. The Conservative Party:
Breaking:. Boris Johnson accuses Rishi Sunak of ‘talking rubbish’ over claims he asked him to over-rule Holac. ‘Rishi Sunak is talking rubbish. To honour these peerages it was not necessary to overrule Holac - but simply to ask them to renew their vetting, a mere formality.'.
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Imagine going to such great lengths just because you don't want to pay nurses a decent wage.
EXCLUSIVE:. Rishi Sunak is poised to announce minimum strike legislation as soon as tomorrow. It will enable employers to sue unions and sack employees if they refuse to accept. Hearing six sectors covered - NHS, schools, rail, borders, fire, nuclear.
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The question of whether Labour is "doing enough" is settled. IF these results were replicated in a General Election, Johnson would be out. Starmer would be in, albeit without his own majority. This shouldn't be a surprise, it's also what national polls are showing!.
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Just 37% of those who voted Conservative at the last election say they would do so again. 37%!.
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Labour could win a three-figure majority at the next General Election, and half of the political commentators in the UK will write up that it's actually a disaster for the party. Some of the commentary today is completely crackers.
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We now have a Labour majority on Milton Keynes council for the first time this century. There are more concrete cows in Milton Keynes than Conservative councilors.
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The last time polling conclusively showed the Labour leader was more popular than the Conservative leader was October 2007.
NEW: Poll by @OpiniumResearch finds that Keir Starmer has overtaken Boris Johnson in the leadership stakes. 37% say Starmer would make a better PM than Boris Johnson. 35% say the reverse. But in terms of party preferences, the Conservatives lead Labour by 4 points.
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Yesterday I handed back my laptop and ended nearly a decade of work as a pollster. It has been a varied ten years, from the fun polling on which Hogwarts house senior politicians would be in, to the critical insight work we ran for the government during the pandemic. There
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I have been too busy to dig into it. but I can't remember the last time when we say a results like this.
And more surprisingly, Reeves and Stamer (32%) now lead over Johnson and Sunak (31%) on who the public most trust to handle the economy. This is changed from a 14 point Johnson / Sunak lead this time last year.
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Imagine having the confidence to just miss three calls in a row from the Prime Minister.
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We surveyed over 10,000 people for this model, and worked with the brilliant @jblumenau from UCL, who I have worked with on MRP modelling for years.
Westminster MRP Seat projection:. LAB: 411 (+209).CON: 137 (-228).LDM: 39 (+27).SNP: 37 (-11).
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Lab (+4).
🚨 NEW: Rishi Sunak will now be on the road three days a week to “connect with voters” . [@thetimes].
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Guys, I'm starting to think this might not be the wedge issue the Tories think it is.
Sanvanta ComRes:. - Majority (58%) say that the rail strikes this week are justified; a third (34%) say they are not. - Two thirds (66%) say the government has not done enough to prevent the strikes from happening.
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Committing or stopping?.
🚨New three-word slogan klaxon . Boris Johnson told Cabinet: "Crime crime crime is what we want to focus on.".
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