Yesterday the Manchester Evening News splashed on the results of a leaked opinion poll claiming to show that local residents in Manchester would vote in favour of the congestion charge. I’m sure I’m not the only one smelling a large rat at the moment, for a whole host of reasons:
- How full is the data leaked to the MEN? David Ottewell who wrote the story has admitted that he did not at the time of writing have the full dataset. Most political hacks will be familiar with the Yes Minister opinion poll sketch, and I’d want to see the full data before drawing any conclusions on the results. If the “yes/no” question was preceded by a barrage of questions and information about the TIF bid then it is entirely worthless.
- Why has this data been leaked to a newspaper? This is a taxpayer-funded survey, which to the layman observer has been selectively leaked in order to obtain positive press coverage. Given the information available it would be very difficult for David Ottewell and his colleagues to sit on it - but that doesn’t mean that his “source” wasn’t playing games.
- Local polls are notoriously unreliable. The national opinion polls we see in the newspapers are the product of years of refining. Sampling of regional and local areas is a much less refined art - have a look at some by-election polls to see how far out they can be. Pollsters had Labour retaining Glasgow East comfortably and they severely underestimated the scale of the Conservative victory in Crewe & Nantwich.
- The local sampling of Ipsos/MORI is even worse. They had predicted that Ken Livingstone would comfortably retain the London Mayoralty.
- Where is the turnout filter? In a local referendum, only votes in the ballot box count. Do these figures take account of propensity to vote? I suspect not. All we can extract from the figures provided is that people are more likely to be strongly against than strongly for - which suggests that “no” voters are more likely to turn out in a poll.
Perhaps the most interesting question though is “why is this poll happening at all?”. We are having a full poll of all local residents before Christmas. Professional opinion polling is an expensive business, so why is taxpayers’ money being spent on an opinion poll - as distinct from consultation - when we are going to have a proper poll anyway…?
My constanst argument with this whole process is that information is not being put out in a fair and balanced manner. Consultation on this and many other issues just isnt fit for purpose. If we are ever going to move on from reciprocating the same problems and working to break social apathy we need to start listening.
The referendum is a step forward in this direction but still the cynic in me, fueled by reporting like what you have higlighted seems to think the powers that be want to steer people to what they wanted to impose and make it seem like it was a decision made of their own free will.
Martin,
So in other words: if people vote for the congestion charge they’ve been steered by the ‘powers that be’ to vote that way, and if they vote against they’ve made the decision of their own free will?? You can’t have it both ways!
The ‘powers that be’ in this debate also include Peel Holdings who are putting a lot of money into publicity to stop the congestion charge happening. Two personally observed examples:
- At the Dragon Boat Racing (a family event) at Salford Quays last Sunday, several girls in mini skirts and a person in a Shark suit going round with a petition against congestion charging.
- Adverts on the big screen in the Orient Food Court at the Trafford Centre pushing the ‘vote against the congestion charge’ message.
I’m sure there are many more.
Given the Liberal’s long standing commitment to improving the environment, why aren’t you showing leadership by arguing for the congestion charge to take more cars off the road and improve public transport?
Tom.
Tom, the money spent by Peel Holdings is dwarfed by the money spent by AGMA on TIF propaganda. Of course Peel are spending their own money on their advertising whereas AGMA are spending somebody else’s - yes that’s the hard-working taxpayers of Greater Manchester.
I’m consistently amused by Salford Labour’s sheer hypocrisy when it comes to Peel Holdings. Your election literature is chock-full of developments being paid for by Peel Holdings (start at MediaCity:UK and work downwards) but as soon as they spend some money opposing you all the toys come out of the pram.
Iain (name spelt correctly!),
You and I both know that once elected, politicians - of any party colour - can spend money on efforts to persuade the public of the merits of a particular proposal. I agree that tax payers money should never be wasted, but if AGMA took a democratic decision on how this money ought to be spent then it is legitimate to do so. You are of course entitled to criticise the amount of spending on this issue.
With regards to Peel Holdings - true enough they are helping to fund other projects. My point was that the ‘propaganda’ battle in congestion charge debate is far from the one-sided ‘vote for this or else’ campaign that it is characterised to be.
Do you have any comparable figures for the amounts spent ‘for’ and ‘against’ the congestion charge/TIF bid thus far? (This is a genuine question, as I am unaware of how much AGMA/Peel have spent).
Tom.
The AGMA propaganda has cost £3 million including over £800k on advertising and nearly £700k on spurious opinion polling.
I don’t know what Peel Holdings have spent but what I do know is that other than the odd letter from GMMG and some press coverage I’ve not seen any evidence that they’ve spent anything much at all. One would hope that the cost of hiring a man in a shark costume and erecting an advert on their own land would come in somewhere short of £3m…
Iain,
Can we include telephone canvassing/opinion polling in the local elections in Irlam in that total for Peel also? Though I concede that wouldn’t quite take the figure to £3m…
Tom.
You can if you want, but the cost of that will be negligible in comparison to the Ipsos/MORI polling. I’m surprised to see that the Labour Party is still pursuing that angle, they’ve been happy to take plenty of money from property developers and the spending was well before the regulated period.
Personally, I think the councils should have their propaganda spending capped to whatever the opposing camp are spending. If GMMG spend £50,000 for example, the councils should be restricted to the same value or provide the difference to GMMG to balance the argument.
I am pretty sure someone spending their own cash on this issue means a whole lot more than council officers spending other peoples. In fact, it is an absolute disgrace that £3 MILLION of taxpayers’ money is being thrown at a massive propaganda effort to sell the voting public a completely new and unjust form of taxation.
To be honest, I am disgusted at the way AGMA and the GMPTA have handled this issue and would recommend a vote against the proposals just on the underhand and cynical way it has been managed by self interested parties and non elected stooges.
This whole affair is democracy at its lowest ebb and undermines the whole ethos the UK was built upon.
Shame on the lot of them.
Tom
I have always said that if the people want congestion charging then i will work 100% to make sure the process is on time, on budget and delivers the most benefits to the people of Salford. When I met with GMPTE I said I dont want them with no other options if the bid falls down. I want great public transport which people will opt for, but I dont want to go down a route which forces people onto public transport.
I would be more at ease if the whole process had been handled better from the start.
I was told at a debate by Cllr Leese that a the congestion issue was to complex for a referendum yet now he supports it, closely followed by Cllr Merry.(I know what you will argue John but you didnt really promote it)
Then the Tif bid, hidden from the worlds on the grounds of competition, in effectively a one horse race.
Then come the signs on buses, ‘What Would You Say’ promising the world and if you look closely you can see the small print ‘partly funded by a peak time congestion charge’. A leading way to put a question?
Then we have the glossy information booklets, I would love to test a member on the public on what was in it and see what they got from it.
Then the T.V adverts, more poor loan add than informative advert, it should have had Carol Vorderman on it rather than Chris Bisson.
Then we have the press, the Advertiser is packed with Mr Berstein, Cllr/Lord Smith, funny how they will appear in the Salford Advertiser but wont talk to a Salford Councillor, apparently if he talked to me he would have to talk to all 700 councillors, if he had that many requests I would concede the argument.
Oh and lets not forget the pro Tif bid Squirrel, the ‘leaked polls’, the M.E.N editorials. Need I go on.
Oh and the Tif pods doing the rounds, very pleasant till you start asking about the congestion charge,then they couldnt get me out of the door fast enough.
With regards Liberals taking the lead on environmental issues, this charge needs cars on the roads to pay for the loan from the government. I am more concerned about civil liberties and the fact that I will be tracked going about my work, tracked in work and tracked on the way home. The prospect that those who need to drive and cant afford to pay the charge will create a new problem.
Have you examined what Salford will get from this bid, jobs? transport improvements that arent already funded and tagged with the bid? or do you think as I that Manchester will reap the rewards and yet again we will finish a poor second. I have not heard an argument that if the bid goes through and so many jobs are saved/created then if they are put into the same places via higher offices then we will be having these debates about congestion all over again, only this time it will be about them just putting the charge up.
Lets see how long we can keep this post going, ball’s in your court
Just a few questions to our Salford representatives:
What are YOU doing to promote your argument against the TIF Bid?
Where are your leaflets explaining your arguments?
Where are your petitions against the bid?
Where are your letters to the Advertiser?
Where are your press releases to the local media arguing your points?
Martin you say “I have always said that if the people want congestion charging then I will work 100% to make sure the process is on time…” but where is your evidence to suggest that the majority of people do not? Have you asked the people of Swinton South what they think?
There IS going to be a referendum and the people ARE going to get the vote.
Martin,
Well the last thread must be some sort of record for this blog, and is still being added to!
I don’t agree with you on the civil liberties argument and am broadly in favour of the congestion charge/TIF bid proposals. However I will say that it could have perhaps been introduced in a gradual way, starting with the city centre first and working outwards over time - and not necessarily as far as the M60 either.
Also, whilst not being against AGMA/GMPTE promoting the congestion charge with leading questions and the rest of it, I can see that £3m on publicity could have been spent better in other areas. I am inclined to agree, to a certain extent, with what Peter says regarding a pre-agreed cap on advertising funding for both sides of the argument. It’s too late for that now of course.
I am glad to read that if the referendum delivers a ‘yes’ vote you will support the proposals wholeheartedly.
Tom.
Iain,
Can I assume you’ve seen details of the full polling data (and my comments) on my blog?
There was also a second story in the paper.
I would stick in a couple of hyperlinks but I’m ridiculously busy for a Saturday.
All the best,
David
I have indeed David. I’d be interested to read the full IPSOS-MORI datasheet including the order in which the questions were asked. It doesn’t seem to be up on their website yet though…