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127-402: According to one 2011 poll , the program is popular and few Floridians favor cutting the funding for it. In 2020, the program received $ 100 million as part of HB 5001. This Florida protected area related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Opinion poll An opinion poll , often simply referred to as a survey or a poll (although strictly a poll

254-441: A margin of error – usually defined as the radius of a 95% confidence interval for a particular statistic. One example is the percent of people who prefer product A versus product B. When a single, global margin of error is reported for a survey, it refers to the maximum margin of error for all reported percentages using the full sample from the survey. If the statistic is a percentage, this maximum margin of error can be calculated as

381-689: A united Ireland as well as Scottish and Welsh independence , and has been critical of devolution . Historically, the party supported the continuance and maintenance of the British Empire . The party has taken various approaches towards the European Union (EU), with eurosceptic and, to a decreasing extent, pro-European factions within it. Historically, the party took a socially conservative approach. In defence policy, it supports an independent nuclear weapons programme and commitment to NATO membership. For much of modern British political history,

508-588: A coalition with the Liberal Democrats —the first postwar coalition government . Cameron's premiership was marked by the ongoing effects of the 2007–2008 financial crisis ; these involved a large deficit in government finances that his government sought to reduce through controversial austerity measures . In September 2014, the Unionist side, championed by Labour as well as by the Conservative Party and

635-460: A coalition government. Labour won the October 1974 election with an overall majority of three seats. Loss of power weakened Heath's control over the party and Margaret Thatcher deposed him in the 1975 leadership election . Thatcher led her party to victory at the 1979 general election with a manifesto which concentrated on the party's philosophy. As Prime Minister, Thatcher focused on rejecting

762-489: A fixed number of the most recent periods, for example the past five days. In this example, the next calculated results will use data for five days counting backwards from the next day, namely the same data as before, but with the data from the next day included, and without the data from the sixth day before that day. However, these polls are sometimes subject to dramatic fluctuations, and so political campaigns and candidates are cautious in analyzing their results. An example of

889-471: A huge role in the supplying of news: 62 percent of US adults get news on social media. This fact makes the issue of fake news on social media more pertinent. Other evidence shows that the most popular fake news stories were more widely shared on Facebook than the most popular mainstream news stories; many people who see fake news stories report that they believe them; and the most discussed fake news stories tended to favor Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton. As

1016-445: A larger sample, however if a pollster wishes to reduce the margin of error to 1% they would need a sample of around 10,000 people. In practice, pollsters need to balance the cost of a large sample against the reduction in sampling error and a sample size of around 500–1,000 is a typical compromise for political polls. (To get complete responses it may be necessary to include thousands of additional participators.) Another way to reduce

1143-464: A leadership challenge in 1995 by Redwood, but Redwood received 89 votes, further undermining Major's influence. The Conservative government was increasingly accused in the media of " sleaze ". Their support reached its lowest ebb in late 1994. Over the next two years the Conservatives gained some credit for the strong economic recovery and fall in unemployment. But an effective opposition campaign by

1270-428: A narrow victory at the 1951 general election , despite losing the popular vote, Churchill was back in power. Apart from rationing, which was ended in 1954, most of the welfare state enacted by Labour were accepted by the Conservatives and became part of the "post-war consensus" that was satirised as Butskellism and that lasted until the 1970s. The Conservatives were conciliatory towards unions, but they did privatise

1397-565: A national survey (partly as a circulation-raising exercise) and correctly predicted Woodrow Wilson 's election as president. Mailing out millions of postcards and simply counting the returns, The Literary Digest also correctly predicted the victories of Warren Harding in 1920, Calvin Coolidge in 1924, Herbert Hoover in 1928, and Franklin Roosevelt in 1932. Then, in 1936 , its survey of 2.3 million voters suggested that Alf Landon would win

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1524-507: A net gain of one seat for the Conservative Party and returned a mostly unscathed Labour Party back to government. This all occurred months after the fuel protests of September 2000 had seen the Conservatives briefly take a narrow lead over Labour in the opinion polls. In 2001, Iain Duncan Smith was elected leader of the party. Although Duncan Smith was a strong Eurosceptic , during his tenure, Europe ceased to be an issue of division in

1651-526: A person who is described by the surveyor as one of the "leading candidates". This description is "leading" as it indicates a subtle bias for that candidate, since it implies that the others in the race are not serious contenders. Additionally, leading questions often contain, or lack, certain facts that can sway a respondent's answer. Argumentative Questions can also impact the outcome of a survey. These types of questions, depending on their nature, either positive or negative, influence respondents' answers to reflect

1778-562: A political comeback that won them the 1951 general election . In 1947, the party published its Industrial Charter which marked its acceptance of the " post-war consensus " on the mixed economy and labour rights . David Maxwell Fyfe chaired a committee into Conservative Party organisation that resulted in the Maxwell Fyfe Report (1948–49). The report required the party to do more fundraising, by forbidding constituency associations from demanding large donations from candidates, with

1905-463: A question, with each version presented to half the respondents. The most effective controls, used by attitude researchers, are: These controls are not widely used in the polling industry. . However, as it is important that questions to test the product have a high quality, survey methodologists work on methods to test them. Empirical tests provide insight into the quality of the questionnaire, some may be more complex than others. For instance, testing

2032-407: A questionnaire can be done by: One of the criticisms of opinion polls is that societal assumptions that opinions between which there is no logical link are "correlated attitudes" can push people with one opinion into a group that forces them to pretend to have a supposedly linked but actually unrelated opinion. That, in turn, may cause people who have the first opinion to claim on polls that they have

2159-621: A result of these facts, some have concluded that if not for these stories, Donald Trump may not have won the election over Hillary Clinton. By providing information about voting intentions, opinion polls can sometimes influence the behavior of electors, and in his book The Broken Compass , Peter Hitchens asserts that opinion polls are actually a device for influencing public opinion. The various theories about how this happens can be split into two groups: bandwagon/underdog effects, and strategic ("tactical") voting. Conservative Party (UK) The Conservative and Unionist Party , commonly

2286-427: A sample is drawn from a large panel of volunteers, and the results are weighted to reflect the demographics of the population of interest. In contrast, popular web polls draw on whoever wishes to participate rather than a scientific sample of the population, and are therefore not generally considered professional. Statistical learning methods have been proposed in order to exploit social media content (such as posts on

2413-415: A significant problem if a poll is conducted too early for anyone to know about the potential candidate. A benchmark poll needs to be undertaken when voters are starting to learn more about the possible candidate running for office. A benchmark poll serves a number of purposes for a campaign. First, it gives the candidate a picture of where they stand with the electorate before any campaigning takes place. If

2540-429: A sizable discount. The new owners were more likely to vote Conservative, as Thatcher had hoped. Thatcher led the Conservatives to two further electoral victories in 1983 and 1987 . She was deeply unpopular in certain sections of society due to high unemployment and her response to the miners' strike . Unemployment had doubled between 1979 and 1982, largely due to Thatcher's monetarist battle against inflation. At

2667-598: A subsidiary in the United Kingdom that was almost alone in correctly predicting Labour's victory in the 1945 general election : virtually all other commentators had expected a victory for the Conservative Party , led by wartime leader Winston Churchill . The Allied occupation powers helped to create survey institutes in all of the Western occupation zones of Germany in 1947 and 1948 to better steer denazification . By

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2794-742: A tally of voter preferences reported by the Raleigh Star and North Carolina State Gazette and the Wilmington American Watchman and Delaware Advertiser prior to the 1824 presidential election , showing Andrew Jackson leading John Quincy Adams by 335 votes to 169 in the contest for the United States Presidency . Since Jackson won the popular vote in that state and the national popular vote, such straw votes gradually became more popular, but they remained local, usually citywide phenomena. In 1916, The Literary Digest embarked on

2921-470: A tracking poll that generated controversy over its accuracy, is one conducted during the 2000 U.S. presidential election, by the Gallup Organization . The results for one day showed Democratic candidate Al Gore with an eleven-point lead over Republican candidate George W. Bush . Then, a subsequent poll conducted just two days later showed Bush ahead of Gore by seven points. It was soon determined that

3048-497: Is a popular medium for the candidates to campaign and for gauging the public reaction to the campaigns. Social media can also be used as an indicator of the voter opinion regarding the poll. Some research studies have shown that predictions made using social media signals can match traditional opinion polls. Regarding the 2016 U.S. presidential election , a major concern has been that of the effect of false stories spread throughout social media . Evidence shows that social media plays

3175-401: Is an actual election), is a human research survey of public opinion from a particular sample . Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of questions and then extrapolating generalities in ratio or within confidence intervals . A person who conducts polls is referred to as a pollster . The first known example of an opinion poll was

3302-517: Is much more effective than traditional public opinion polling. Unlike traditional public polling, deliberative opinion polls measure what the public believes about issues after being offered information and the ability to discuss them with other voters. Since voters generally do not actively research various issues, they often base their opinions on these issues on what the media and candidates say about them. Scholars argued that these polls can truly reflect voters' feelings about an issue once they are given

3429-480: Is often referred to as the Bradley effect . If the results of surveys are widely publicized this effect may be magnified – a phenomenon commonly referred to as the spiral of silence . Use of the plurality voting system (select only one candidate) in a poll puts an unintentional bias into the poll, since people who favor more than one candidate cannot indicate this. The fact that they must choose only one candidate biases

3556-491: Is probability sampling and statistical theory that enable one to determine sampling error, confidence levels, and the like and to generalize from the results of the sample to the broader population from which it was selected. Other factors also come into play in making a survey scientific. One must select a sample of sufficient size. If the sampling error is too large or the level of confidence too low, it will be difficult to make reasonably precise statements about characteristics of

3683-401: Is subject to controversy. Deliberative Opinion Polls combine the aspects of a public opinion poll and a focus group. These polls bring a group of voters and provide information about specific issues. They are then allowed to discuss those issues with the other voters. Once they know more about the issues, they are polled afterward on their thoughts. Many scholars argue that this type of polling

3810-422: Is that an estimate of a trend is subject to a larger error than an estimate of a level. This is because if one estimates the change, the difference between two numbers X and Y, then one has to contend with errors in both X and Y . A rough guide is that if the change in measurement falls outside the margin of error it is worth attention. Since some people do not answer calls from strangers, or refuse to answer

3937-534: The Quarterly Review in 1830. The name immediately caught on and was formally adopted under the aegis of Robert Peel around 1834. Peel is acknowledged as the founder of the Conservative Party, which he created with the announcement of the Tamworth Manifesto . The term "Conservative Party" rather than Tory was the dominant usage by 1845. The widening of the electoral franchise in the 19th century forced

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4064-489: The 1993 general election predicted the governing National Party would increase its majority. However, the preliminary results on election night showed a hung parliament with National one seat short of a majority, leading to Prime Minister Jim Bolger exclaiming "bugger the pollsters" on live national television. The official count saw National gain Waitaki to hold a one-seat majority and retain government. Social media today

4191-432: The 2005 general election , the Conservative Party increased their total vote share and—more significantly—their number of parliamentary seats, reducing Labour's majority. The day following the election, Howard resigned. David Cameron won the 2005 leadership election . He then announced his intention to reform and realign the Conservatives. For most of 2006 and the first half of 2007, polls showed leads over Labour for

4318-571: The Community Charge (known by its opponents as the poll tax ) in 1989 is often cited as contributing to her political downfall. Internal party tensions led to a leadership challenge by the Conservative MP Michael Heseltine and she resigned on 28 November 1990. John Major won the party leadership election on 27 November 1990, and his appointment led to an almost immediate boost in Conservative Party fortunes. The election

4445-571: The Conservative Party and colloquially known as the Tories , is one of the two main political parties in the United Kingdom , along with the Labour Party . Following defeat by Labour in the 2024 general election , it is currently the second largest political party by the number of votes cast and number of seats in the House of Commons , followed by the Liberal Democrats . As the second largest party, it has

4572-853: The House of Commons on 3 September 2019. Later that same day, 21 Conservative MPs had the Conservative whip withdrawn after voting with the Opposition to grant the House of Commons control over its order paper. Johnson would later halt the Withdrawal Agreement Bill , calling for a general election. The 2019 general election resulted in the Conservatives winning a majority, the Party's largest since 1987 . The party won several constituencies, particularly in formerly traditional Labour seats . On 20 December 2019, MPs passed an agreement for withdrawing from

4699-583: The Liberals were mostly against the war until the invasion of Belgium, Conservative leaders were strongly in favour of aiding France and stopping Germany. The Liberal party was in full control of the government until its mismanagement of the war effort under the Shell Crisis badly hurt its reputation. An all-party coalition government was formed in May 1915. In late 1916 Liberal David Lloyd George became prime minister but

4826-547: The Nazi extermination of the Jews never happened?" The confusing wording of this question led to inaccurate results which indicated that 22 percent of respondents believed it seemed possible the Holocaust might not have ever happened. When the question was reworded, significantly fewer respondents (only 1 percent) expressed that same sentiment. Thus comparisons between polls often boil down to

4953-486: The United States was the prediction that Thomas Dewey would defeat Harry S. Truman in the 1948 US presidential election . Major polling organizations, including Gallup and Roper, had indicated that Dewey would defeat Truman in a landslide; Truman won a narrow victory. There were also substantial polling errors in the presidential elections of 1952, 1980, 1996, 2000, and 2016: while the first three correctly predicted

5080-454: The cost of living crisis , including price caps on energy bills and government help to pay them. Truss's mini-budget on 23 September faced severe criticism and markets reacted poorly; the pound fell to a record low of 1.03 against the dollar, and UK government gilt yields rose to 4.3 per cent, prompting the Bank of England to trigger an emergency bond-buying programme. After condemnation from

5207-413: The 1780s. They were known as "Independent Whigs", " Friends of Mr Pitt ", or "Pittites" and never used terms such as "Tory" or "Conservative". From about 1812, the name "Tory" was commonly used for a new party that, according to historian Robert Blake, "are the ancestors of Conservatism". Blake adds that Pitt's successors after 1812 "were not in any sense standard-bearers of 'true Toryism'". The term Tory

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5334-428: The 1950s and early 1960s. The Suez Crisis of 1956 was a humiliating defeat for Prime Minister Eden, but his successor, Macmillan, minimised the damage and focused attention on domestic issues and prosperity. Following controversy over the selections of Harold Macmillan and Alec Douglas-Home via a process of consultation known as the 'Magic Circle', a formal election process was created and the first leadership election

5461-470: The 1950s, various types of polling had spread to most democracies. Viewed from a long-term perspective, advertising had come under heavy pressure in the early 1930s. The Great Depression forced businesses to drastically cut back on their advertising spending. Layoffs and reductions were common at all agencies. The New Deal furthermore aggressively promoted consumerism, and minimized the value of (or need for) advertising. Historian Jackson Lears argues that "By

5588-456: The 2016 New York primary, where a news organization reports misleading primary results. Government officials argue that since many Americans believe in exit polls more, election results are likely to make voters not think they are impacted electorally and be more doubtful about the credibility of news organizations. Over time, a number of theories and mechanisms have been offered to explain erroneous polling results. Some of these reflect errors on

5715-534: The 2016 U.S. primaries, CNN reported that the Democratic primary in New York was too close to call, and they made this judgment based on exit polls. However, the vote count revealed that these exit polls were misleading, and Hillary Clinton was far ahead of Bernie Sanders in the popular vote, winning the state by 58% to 42% margin. The overreliance on exit polling leads to the second point of how it undermines public trust in

5842-562: The 20th century made it one of the most successful political parties in the Western world . The most recent period of Conservative government was marked by extraordinary political turmoil. Some writers trace the party's origins to the Tory Party , which it soon replaced. Other historians point to a faction, rooted in the 18th century Whig Party , that coalesced around William Pitt the Younger in

5969-468: The Conservative Party , including allegations against its policies, fringes, and structure, was often in the public eye. These include allegations against senior politicians such as Boris Johnson , Michael Gove , Theresa May , and Zac Goldsmith . During the period of the Cameron and Johnson governments, a number of Conservative MPs have been accused or convicted of sexual misconduct, with cases including

6096-580: The Conservative Party to popularise its approach under Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby and Benjamin Disraeli , who carried through their own expansion of the franchise with the Reform Act of 1867 . The party was initially opposed to further expansion of the electorate but eventually allowed passage of Gladstone's 1884 Reform Act . In 1886, the party formed an alliance with Spencer Cavendish and Joseph Chamberlain 's new Liberal Unionist Party and, under

6223-540: The Conservative whip at Westminster, essentially forming the Irish wing of the party until 1922. In Britain, the Conservative party was known as the Unionist Party because of its opposition to home rule. Under Bonar Law 's leadership in 1911–1914, the Party morale improved, the "radical right" wing was contained, and the party machinery strengthened. It made some progress toward developing constructive social policies. While

6350-400: The Conservatives neck and neck, when the actual result was a clear Conservative majority. On the other hand, in 2017 , the opposite appears to have occurred. Most polls predicted an increased Conservative majority, even though in reality the election resulted in a hung parliament with a Conservative plurality: some polls correctly predicted this outcome. In New Zealand, the polls leading up to

6477-787: The Conservatives. Polls became more volatile in summer 2007 with the accession of Gordon Brown as Prime Minister. The Conservatives gained control of the London mayoralty for the first time in 2008 after Boris Johnson defeated the Labour incumbent, Ken Livingstone . In May 2010 the Conservative Party came to government, first under a coalition with the Liberal Democrats and later as a series of majority and minority governments. During this period there were five Conservative Prime Ministers: David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Rishi Sunak. The initial period of this time, primarily under

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6604-539: The ERM, a day thereafter referred to as Black Wednesday . Soon after, approximately one million householders faced repossession of their homes during a recession that saw a sharp rise in unemployment, taking it close to 3 million people. The party subsequently lost much of its reputation for good financial stewardship. The end of the recession was declared in April 1993. From 1994 to 1997, Major privatised British Rail . The party

6731-474: The EU referendum vote, and through the premierships of May, Boris Johnson, and their successors, the party shifted right on the political spectrum. In July 2019 Boris Johnson became Leader of the party. He became Prime Minister the next day. Johnson had made withdrawal from the EU by 31 October "with no ifs, buts or maybes" a key pledge during his campaign for party leadership . Johnson lost his working majority in

6858-541: The EU. On 24 June 2016, Cameron announced his intention to resign as Prime Minister, after he failed to convince the British public to stay in the European Union . On 11 July 2016, Theresa May became the leader of the Conservative Party. May promised social reform and a more centrist political outlook for the Conservative Party and its government. May's early cabinet appointments were interpreted as an effort to reunite

6985-878: The EU; the United Kingdom formally left on 31 January 2020. Johnson presided over the UK's response to the COVID-19 pandemic . From late 2021 onwards, Johnson received huge public backlash for the Partygate scandal, in which staff and senior members of government were pictured holding gatherings during lockdown contrary to Government guidance. The Metropolitan Police eventually fined Johnson for breaking lockdown rules in April 2022. In July 2022, Johnson admitted to appointing Chris Pincher as deputy chief whip while being aware of allegations of sexual assault against him. This, along with Partygate and increasing criticisms on Johnson's handling of

7112-471: The Irish question, socialism, electoral reform, and the issue of intervention in the economy. The fresh emphasis on anti-Socialism was its response to the growing strength of the Labour Party. When electoral reform was an issue, it worked to protect their base in rural England. It aggressively sought female voters in the 1920s, often relying on patriotic themes. In 1922, Bonar Law and Stanley Baldwin led

7239-427: The Labour Party culminated in a landslide defeat for the Conservatives in 1997 , their worst defeat since the 1906 general election . The 1997 election left the Conservative Party as an England-only party, with all Scottish and Welsh seats having been lost, and not a single new seat having been gained anywhere. Major resigned as party leader and was succeeded by William Hague . The 2001 general election resulted in

7366-476: The Liberal Democrats, won in the Scottish Independence referendum by 55% No to 45% Yes on the question "Should Scotland be an independent country". At the 2015 general election , the Conservatives formed a majority government under Cameron. After speculation of a referendum on the UK's EU membership throughout his premiership, a vote was announced for June 2016 in which Cameron campaigned to remain in

7493-590: The Liberal Party and the Labour Party ( National Labour and National Liberals ). In May 1940 a more balanced coalition was formed —the National Government —which, under the leadership of Winston Churchill , saw the United Kingdom through the Second World War. However, the party lost the 1945 general election in a landslide to the resurgent Labour Party. The concept of the "property-owning democracy"

7620-469: The Liberals soon split and the Conservatives dominated the government, especially after their landslide in the 1918 election . The Liberal party never recovered, but Labour gained strength after 1920. Nigel Keohane finds that the Conservatives were bitterly divided before 1914 but the war pulled the party together, allowing it to emphasise patriotism as it found new leadership and worked out its positions on

7747-557: The Pew Research Center in the US, in 2007, concluded that "cell-only respondents are different from landline respondents in important ways, (but) they were neither numerous enough nor different enough on the questions we examined to produce a significant change in overall general population survey estimates when included with the landline samples and weighted according to US Census parameters on basic demographic characteristics." This issue

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7874-852: The Unionists worked hard at grassroots organizing. Two general elections were held in 1910, in January and in December . The two main parties were now almost dead equal in seats, but the Liberals kept control with a coalition with the Irish Parliamentary Party . In 1912, the Liberal Unionists merged with the Conservative Party. In Ireland, the Irish Unionist Alliance had been formed in 1891 which merged Unionists who were opposed to Irish Home Rule into one political movement. Its MPs took

8001-512: The United Kingdom exhibited a wide urban–rural political divide ; the Conservative Party's voting and financial support base has historically consisted primarily of homeowners , business owners , farmers , real estate developers and middle class voters, especially in rural and suburban areas of England . Since the EU referendum in 2016, the Conservatives targeted working class voters from traditional Labour strongholds. The Conservatives' domination of British politics throughout

8128-545: The United States (because the phone's owner may be charged for taking a call ), these individuals are typically excluded from polling samples. There is concern that, if the subset of the population without cell phones differs markedly from the rest of the population, these differences can skew the results of the poll. Polling organizations have developed many weighting techniques to help overcome these deficiencies, with varying degrees of success. Studies of mobile phone users by

8255-422: The actual sample is a biased version of the universe the pollster wants to analyze. In these cases, bias introduces new errors, one way or the other, that are in addition to errors caused by sample size. Error due to bias does not become smaller with larger sample sizes, because taking a larger sample size simply repeats the same mistake on a larger scale. If the people who refuse to answer, or are never reached, have

8382-449: The answers given by respondents do not reflect their true beliefs. This may be deliberately engineered by unscrupulous pollsters in order to generate a certain result or please their clients, but more often is a result of the detailed wording or ordering of questions (see below). Respondents may deliberately try to manipulate the outcome of a poll by e.g. advocating a more extreme position than they actually hold in order to boost their side of

8509-424: The argument or give rapid and ill-considered answers in order to hasten the end of their questioning. Respondents may also feel under social pressure not to give an unpopular answer. For example, respondents might be unwilling to admit to unpopular attitudes like racism or sexism , and thus polls might not reflect the true incidence of these attitudes in the population. In American political parlance, this phenomenon

8636-584: The assumption that opinion polls show actual links between opinions is considered important. Another source of error is the use of samples that are not representative of the population as a consequence of the methodology used, as was the experience of The Literary Digest in 1936. For example, telephone sampling has a built-in error because in many times and places, those with telephones have generally been richer than those without. In some places many people have only mobile telephones . Because pollsters cannot use automated dialing machines to call mobile phones in

8763-445: The breakdown of the US population by party identification has not changed since the previous presidential election, you may underestimate a victory or a defeat of a particular party candidate that saw a surge or decline in its party registration relative to the previous presidential election cycle. Sample Techniques are also used and recommended to reduce sample errors and errors of margin. In chapter four of author Herb Asher he says,"it

8890-437: The breakup of the coalition, and the Conservatives governed until 1923, when a minority Labour government led by Ramsay MacDonald came to power. The Conservatives regained power in 1924 but were defeated in 1929 as a minority Labour government took office. In 1931, following the collapse of the Labour minority government, it entered another coalition, which was dominated by the Conservatives with some support from factions of both

9017-425: The campaign know which voters are persuadable so they can spend their limited resources in the most effective manner. Second, it can give them an idea of what messages, ideas, or slogans are the strongest with the electorate. In a tracking poll responses are obtained in a number of consecutive periods, for instance daily, and then results are calculated using a moving average of the responses that were gathered over

9144-400: The consumption of pornography in parliament, rape, groping, and sexual harassment. In 2017, a list of 36 sitting Conservative MPs accused of inappropriate sexual behaviour was leaked. The list is believed to have been compiled by party staff. Following accusations of multiple cases of rape against an unnamed Tory MP in 2023 and allegations of a cover-up, Baroness Warsi , who has served as

9271-408: The cost-of-living crisis, provoked a government crisis following a loss in confidence and nearly 60 resignations from government officials, eventually leading to Johnson announcing his resignation on 7 July. Boris Johnson's successor as leader was confirmed as Liz Truss on 5 September, following a leadership election . In a strategy labelled Trussonomics she introduced policies in response to

9398-609: The country, allowing for a comparative analysis between specific regions. For example, in the United States, exit polls are beneficial in accurately determining how the state voters cast their ballot instead of relying on a national survey. Third, exit polls can give journalists and social scientists a greater understanding of why voters voted the way they did and what factors contributed to their vote. Exit polling has several disadvantages that can cause controversy depending on its use. First, these polls are not always accurate and can sometimes mislead election reporting. For instance, during

9525-404: The factors that impact the results of opinion polls are the wording and order of the questions being posed by the surveyor. Questions that intentionally affect a respondents answer are referred to as leading questions . Individuals and/or groups use these types of questions in surveys to elicit responses favorable to their interests. For instance, the public is more likely to indicate support for

9652-675: The field of public opinion since 1947 when he joined the Elmo Roper firm, then later became partner. In September 1938, Jean Stoetzel , after having met Gallup, created IFOP, the Institut Français d'Opinion Publique , as the first European survey institute in Paris. Stoetzel started political polls in summer 1939 with the question " Why die for Danzig? ", looking for popular support or dissent with this question asked by appeasement politician and future collaborationist Marcel Déat . Gallup launched

9779-406: The floor and formally joined the Liberal Party (he rejoined the Conservatives in 1925). In December, Balfour lost control of his party, as the defections multiplied. He was replaced by Liberal Prime Minister Henry Campbell-Bannerman who called an election in January 1906 , which produced a massive Liberal victory. Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith enacted a great deal of reform legislation, but

9906-583: The formal parliamentary role of the Official Opposition . The party sits on the right-wing to centre-right of the political spectrum. It encompasses various ideological factions including one-nation conservatives , Thatcherites , and traditionalist conservatives . There have been twenty Conservative prime ministers . The party traditionally holds the annual Conservative Party Conference during party conference season , at which senior Conservative figures promote party policy. The Conservative Party

10033-450: The intention of broadening the diversity of MPs. In practice, it may have had the effect of lending more power to constituency parties and making candidates more uniform. Winston Churchill , the party leader, brought in a Party chairman to modernise the party: Frederick Marquis, 1st Earl of Woolton rebuilt the local organisations with an emphasis on membership, money, and a unified national propaganda appeal on critical issues. With

10160-404: The last century. David Cameron sought to modernise the Conservatives after his election as leader in 2005, and the party governed from 2010 to 2024 under five prime ministers, latterly Rishi Sunak . The party has generally adopted liberal economic policies favouring free markets since the 1980s, although historically it advocated for protectionism . The party is British unionist , opposing

10287-413: The late 1930s, though, corporate advertisers had begun a successful counterattack against their critics." They rehabilitated the concept of consumer sovereignty by inventing scientific public opinion polls, and making it the centerpiece of their own market research, as well as the key to understanding politics. George Gallup, the vice president of Young and Rubicam, and numerous other advertising experts, led

10414-471: The late 1940s but was too great a challenge to the post-war consensus to win Conservative endorsement. Thatcher favoured the idea because it would lead to a "property-owning democracy", an important idea that had emerged in the 1920s. Some local Conservative-run councils enacted profitable local sales schemes during the late 1960s. By the 1970s, many working-class people could afford to buy homes, and eagerly adopted Thatcher's invitation to purchase their homes at

10541-409: The margin of error is to rely on poll averages . This makes the assumption that the procedure is similar enough between many different polls and uses the sample size of each poll to create a polling average. Another source of error stems from faulty demographic models by pollsters who weigh their samples by particular variables such as party identification in an election. For example, if you assume that

10668-425: The media and the electoral process. In the U.S., Congress and state governments have criticized the use of exit polling because Americans tend to believe more in the accuracy of exit polls. If an exit poll shows that American voters were leaning toward a particular candidate, most would assume that the candidate would win. However, as mentioned earlier, an exit poll can sometimes be inaccurate and lead to situations like

10795-467: The micro-blogging platform Twitter ) for modelling and predicting voting intention polls. A benchmark poll is generally the first poll taken in a campaign. It is often taken before a candidate announces their bid for office, but sometimes it happens immediately following that announcement after they have had some opportunity to raise funds. This is generally a short and simple survey of likely voters. Benchmark polling often relies on timing, which can be

10922-708: The mild liberalism of the post-war consensus that tolerated or encouraged nationalisation, strong labour unions, heavy regulation, and high taxes. She did not challenge the National Health Service , and supported the Cold War policies of the consensus, but otherwise tried to dismantle and delegitimise it. She built a right-wing political ideology that became known as Thatcherism , based on social and economic ideas from British and American intellectuals such as Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman . Thatcher believed that too much socially democratic-oriented government policy

11049-429: The necessary information to learn more about it. Despite this, there are two issues with deliberative opinion polls. First, they are expensive and challenging to perform since they require a representative sample of voters, and the information given on specific issues must be fair and balanced. Second, the results of deliberative opinion polls generally do not reflect the opinions of most voters since most voters do not take

11176-533: The part of the pollsters; many of them are statistical in nature. Some blame respondents for not providing genuine answers to pollsters, a phenomenon known as social desirability-bias (also referred to as the Bradley effect or the Shy Tory Factor ); these terms can be quite controversial. Polls based on samples of populations are subject to sampling error which reflects the effects of chance and uncertainty in

11303-474: The party as it united behind calls for a referendum on the proposed European Union Constitution . However, before he could lead the party into a general election, Duncan Smith lost the vote on a motion of no confidence by MPs. This was despite the Conservative support equalling that of Labour in the months leading up to his departure from the leadership. Michael Howard then stood for the leadership unopposed on 6 November 2003. Under Howard's leadership in

11430-586: The party in the wake of the UK's vote to leave the European Union . She began the process of withdrawing the UK from the European Union in March 2017. In April 2017, the Cabinet agreed to hold a general election on 8 June. In a shock result, the election resulted in a hung parliament , with the Conservative Party needing a confidence and supply arrangement with the DUP to support a minority government. May's Premiership

11557-427: The party's co-chairman under David Cameron, stated that the Conservative Party has had a problem handling complaints of sexual misconducts against members appropriately. The 2010 election resulted in a hung parliament with the Conservatives having the most seats but short of an overall majority. Following the resignation of Gordon Brown , Cameron was named Prime Minister, and the Conservatives entered government in

11684-644: The party. Heath had come to power in June 1970 and the last possible date for the next general election was not until mid-1975. However a general election was held in February 1974 in a bid to win public support during a national emergency caused by the miners' strike. Heath's attempt to win a second term at this "snap" election failed, as a deadlock result left no party with an overall majority . Heath resigned within days, after failing to gain Liberal Party support to form

11811-403: The poll is done prior to announcing for office the candidate may use the poll to decide whether or not they should even run for office. Secondly, it shows them where their weaknesses and strengths are in two main areas. The first is the electorate. A benchmark poll shows them what types of voters they are sure to win, those they are sure to lose, and everyone in-between these two extremes. This lets

11938-611: The poll, causing it to favor the candidate most different from the others while it disfavors candidates who are similar to other candidates. The plurality voting system also biases elections in the same way. Some people responding may not understand the words being used, but may wish to avoid the embarrassment of admitting this, or the poll mechanism may not allow clarification, so they may make an arbitrary choice. Some percentage of people also answer whimsically or out of annoyance at being polled. This results in perhaps 4% of Americans reporting they have personally been decapitated . Among

12065-434: The poll, poll samples may not be representative samples from a population due to a non-response bias . Response rates have been declining, and are down to about 10% in recent years. Various pollsters have attributed this to an increased skepticism and lack of interest in polling. Because of this selection bias , the characteristics of those who agree to be interviewed may be markedly different from those who decline. That is,

12192-504: The population of interest to the pollster. A scientific poll not only will have a sufficiently large sample, it will also be sensitive to response rates. Very low response rates will raise questions about how representative and accurate the results are. Are there systematic differences between those who participated in the survey and those who, for whatever reason, did not participate? Sampling methods, sample size, and response rates will all be discussed in this chapter" (Asher 2017). A caution

12319-454: The premiership of David Cameron, was marked by the ongoing effects of the 2007–2008 financial crisis and the implementation of austerity measures in response. From 2015 the predominant political event was the Brexit referendum and the process to implement the decision to leave the trade bloc. The Conservatives' time in office was marked by several controversies. The presence of Islamophobia in

12446-487: The presidential election, but Roosevelt was instead re-elected by a landslide. George Gallup 's research found that the error was mainly caused by participation bias ; those who favored Landon were more enthusiastic about returning their postcards. Furthermore, the postcards were sent to a target audience who were more affluent than the American population as a whole, and therefore more likely to have Republican sympathies. At

12573-444: The public, the Labour Party and her own party, Truss reversed some aspects of the mini-budget, including the abolition of the top rate of income tax. Following a government crisis Truss announced her resignation as prime minister on 20 October after 44 days in office, the shortest premiership in British history. Truss also oversaw the worst polling the Conservatives had ever received, with Labour polling as high as 36 per cent above

12700-557: The questions are then worded in a way that limit the possible answers, typically to yes or no. Another type of question that can produce inaccurate results are " Double-Negative Questions". These are more often the result of human error, rather than intentional manipulation. One such example is a survey done in 1992 by the Roper Organization , concerning the Holocaust . The question read "Does it seem possible or impossible to you that

12827-455: The radius of the confidence interval for a reported percentage of 50%. Others suggest that a poll with a random sample of 1,000 people has margin of sampling error of ±3% for the estimated percentage of the whole population. A 3% margin of error means that if the same procedure is used a large number of times, 95% of the time the true population average will be within the sample estimate plus or minus 3%. The margin of error can be reduced by using

12954-454: The recovering British economy, saw the Conservatives returning quickly to the top of the opinion polls and winning the 1983 general election with a landslide majority, due to a split opposition vote. By the time of the general election in June 1987, the economy was stronger, with lower inflation and falling unemployment and Thatcher secured her third successive electoral victory. The introduction of

13081-409: The right wing of the Conservative Party itself for its tolerance of socialist policies and reluctance to curb the legal powers of labour unions. The Conservatives were re-elected in 1955 and 1959 with larger majorities. Conservative Prime Ministers Churchill, Anthony Eden , Harold Macmillan and Alec Douglas-Home promoted relatively liberal trade regulations and less state involvement throughout

13208-416: The same characteristics as the people who do answer, then the final results should be unbiased. If the people who do not answer have different opinions then there is bias in the results. In terms of election polls, studies suggest that bias effects are small, but each polling firm has its own techniques for adjusting weights to minimize selection bias. Survey results may be affected by response bias , where

13335-402: The same time, Gallup, Archibald Crossley and Elmo Roper conducted surveys that were far smaller but more scientifically based, and all three managed to correctly predict the result. The Literary Digest soon went out of business, while polling started to take off. Roper went on to correctly predict the two subsequent reelections of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Louis Harris had been in

13462-408: The sampling process. Sampling polls rely on the law of large numbers to measure the opinions of the whole population based only on a subset, and for this purpose the absolute size of the sample is important, but the percentage of the whole population is not important (unless it happens to be close to the sample size). The possible difference between the sample and whole population is often expressed as

13589-776: The second opinion without having it, causing opinion polls to become part of self-fulfilling prophecy problems. It has been suggested that attempts to counteract unethical opinions by condemning supposedly linked opinions may favor the groups that promote the actually unethical opinions by forcing people with supposedly linked opinions into them by ostracism elsewhere in society making such efforts counterproductive, that not being sent between groups that assume ulterior motives from each other and not being allowed to express consistent critical thought anywhere may create psychological stress because humans are sapient, and that discussion spaces free from assumptions of ulterior motives behind specific opinions should be created. In this context, rejection of

13716-522: The statesmen Robert Gascoyne-Cecil and Arthur Balfour , held power for all but three of the following twenty years before suffering a heavy defeat in 1906 when it split over the issue of free trade . Young Winston Churchill denounced Chamberlain's attack on free trade, and helped organise the opposition inside the Unionist/Conservative Party. Nevertheless, Balfour, as party leader, introduced protectionist legislation. Churchill crossed

13843-443: The steel and road haulage industries in 1953. During the Conservatives' thirteen-year tenure in office, pensions went up by 49% in real terms, sickness and unemployment benefits by 76% in real terms, and supplementary benefits by 46% in real terms. However, family allowances fell by 15% in real terms. "Thirteen Wasted Years" was a popular slogan attacking the Conservative record, primarily from Labour. In addition, there were attacks by

13970-543: The time of the 1979 general election , inflation had been at 9% or under for the previous year, then increased to over 20% in the first two years of the Thatcher ministry, but it had fallen again to 5.8% by the start of 1983. The period of unpopularity of the Conservatives in the early 1980s coincided with a crisis in the Labour Party, which then formed the main opposition. Victory in the Falklands War in June 1982, along with

14097-466: The time to research issues the way an academic researches issues. Exit polls interview voters just as they are leaving polling places. Unlike general public opinion polls, these are polls of people who voted in the election. Exit polls provide a more accurate picture of which candidates the public prefers in an election because people participating in the poll did vote in the election. Second, these polls are conducted across multiple voting locations across

14224-445: The tone of the question(s) and generate a certain response or reaction, rather than gauge sentiment in an unbiased manner. In opinion polling, there are also " loaded questions ", otherwise known as " trick questions ". This type of leading question may concern an uncomfortable or controversial issue, and/or automatically assume the subject of the question is related to the respondent(s) or that they are knowledgeable about it. Likewise,

14351-525: The volatility of the results was at least in part due to an uneven distribution of Democratic and Republican affiliated voters in the samples. Though the Gallup Organization argued the volatility in the poll was a genuine representation of the electorate, other polling organizations took steps to reduce such wide variations in their results. One such step included manipulating the proportion of Democrats and Republicans in any given sample, but this method

14478-781: The way. Moving into the 1940s, the industry played a leading role in the ideological mobilization of the American people in fighting the Nazis and the Japanese in World War II. As part of that effort, they redefined the "American Way of Life" in terms of a commitment to free enterprise. "Advertisers", Lears concludes, "played a crucial hegemonic role in creating the consumer culture that dominated post-World War II American society." Opinion polls for many years were maintained through telecommunications or in person-to-person contact. Methods and techniques vary, though they are widely accepted in most areas. Over

14605-465: The winner (albeit not the extent of their winning margin), with the last two correctly predicting the winner of the popular vote (but not the Electoral College). In the United Kingdom, most polls failed to predict the Conservative election victories of 1970 and 1992 , and Labour's victory in February 1974 . In the 2015 election , virtually every poll predicted a hung parliament with Labour and

14732-440: The wording of the question. On some issues, question wording can result in quite pronounced differences between surveys. This can also, however, be a result of legitimately conflicted feelings or evolving attitudes, rather than a poorly constructed survey. A common technique to control for this bias is to rotate the order in which questions are asked. Many pollsters also split-sample. This involves having two different versions of

14859-461: The years, technological innovations have also influenced survey methods such as the availability of electronic clipboards and Internet based polling. Opinion polling developed into popular applications through popular thought, although response rates for some surveys declined. Also, the following has also led to differentiating results: Some polling organizations, such as Angus Reid Public Opinion , YouGov and Zogby use Internet surveys, where

14986-430: Was a clear tendency for polls which included mobile phones in their samples to show a much larger lead for Obama , than polls that did not. The potential sources of bias are: Some polling companies have attempted to get around that problem by including a "cellphone supplement". There are a number of problems with including cellphones in a telephone poll: A widely publicized failure of opinion polling to date in

15113-546: Was an insult that entered English politics during the Exclusion Bill crisis of 1678–1681, which derived from the Middle Irish word tóraidhe (modern Irish : tóraí ) meaning outlaw or robber , which in turn derived from the Irish word tóir , meaning pursuit , since outlaws were "pursued men". The term " Conservative " was suggested as a title for the party in an article by J. Wilson Croker published in

15240-417: Was coined by Noel Skelton in 1923 and became a core principle of the party. While serving in Opposition during the late 1940s, the Conservative Party exploited and incited growing public anger at food rationing , scarcity, controls, austerity , and government bureaucracy. It used the dissatisfaction with the socialist and egalitarian policies of the Labour Party to rally middle-class supporters and build

15367-462: Was dominated by Brexit as she carried out negotiations with the European Union, adhering to the Chequers Plan , which resulted in her draft Brexit withdrawal agreement . May survived two votes of no confidence in December 2018 and January 2019, but after versions of her draft withdrawal agreement were rejected by Parliament three times , May announced her resignation on 24 May 2019. Subsequent to

15494-573: Was first identified in 2004, but came to prominence only during the 2008 US presidential election . In previous elections, the proportion of the general population using cell phones was small, but as this proportion has increased, there is concern that polling only landlines is no longer representative of the general population. In 2003, only 2.9% of households were wireless (cellphones only), compared to 12.8% in 2006. This results in " coverage error ". Many polling organisations select their sample by dialling random telephone numbers; however, in 2008, there

15621-486: Was founded in 1834 from the Tory Party and was one of two dominant political parties in the 19th century, along with the Liberal Party . Under Benjamin Disraeli , it played a preeminent role in politics at the height of the British Empire . In 1912, the Liberal Unionist Party merged with the party to form the Conservative and Unionist Party. Rivalry with the Labour Party has shaped modern British politics for

15748-517: Was held in 1965, won by Edward Heath. Edward Heath 's 1970–74 government was known for taking the UK into the EEC , although the right-wing of the party objected to his failure to control the trade unions at a time when a declining British industry saw many strikes, as well as the 1973–75 recession . Since accession to the EEC, which developed into the EU, British membership has been a source of heated debate within

15875-528: Was held on 9 April 1992 and the Conservatives won a fourth successive electoral victory, contrary to predictions from opinion polls. The Conservatives became the first party to attract 14 million votes in a general election. On 16 September 1992, the Government suspended Britain's membership of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM), after the pound fell lower than its minimum level in

16002-475: Was leading to a long-term decline in the British economy. As a result, her government pursued a programme of economic liberalism , adopting a free-market approach to public services based on the sale of publicly owned industries and utilities, as well as a reduction in trade union power. One of Thatcher's largest and most successful policies assisted council house tenants in public housing to purchase their homes at favourable rates. The "Right to Buy" had emerged in

16129-506: Was plagued by internal division and infighting, mainly over the UK's role in the European Union . The party's Eurosceptic wing, represented by MPs such as John Redwood , opposed further EU integration, whilst the party's pro-European wing, represented by those such as Chancellor of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke , was broadly supportive. The issue of the creation of a single European currency also inflamed tensions. Major survived

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