Labour claims polling not for them
August 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am by David FarrarKeeping Stock blogs, quoting the Dom Post:
“Prime Minister Helen Clark denied yesterday that Labour was polling voters on her response to the furore – a move which could signal she had not ruled out a firmer line against Mr Peters.
It is understood that polling company UMR was asking several questions, including whether Miss Clark had been decisive enough, but she said the poll was nothing to do with Labour.
“It would be news to me, because neither I, nor my staff, nor the Labour Party have authorised any such polling.”"
Okay, well we know UMR has Labour as a client. So what are the possibilities:
- UMR are polling for another political party on whether Helen is tough enough on Winston and do people think John Key is slippery. Of course you are not allowed to work for two competing clients, so that theory is impossible.
- UMR on their own initiative decided to pay for a poll on how slippery is John Key and is Helen tough enough on WInston? And when they get the results of this poll, they will throw them in the bin, and not show them to anyone.
- Helen is not being upfront on this issue – which is rather hypocritical considering how much she went out of her way to claim she had no secrets about the who does polling for her,
There is I guess, another possibility. That the Spencer Trust commissioned the poll from UMR!!!
Related posts:
- Labour polling on what to do re Winston
- PM will not rule out push polling
- More Labour polling
- HoS on Tired Labour
August 6th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Miss Gollum is lying. Again.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:01 am
Quelle Surprise!
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:04 am
Helen Clark lies to us again? You could have knocked me down with a bulldozer.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:09 am
“have authorised any such polling”: someone else authorised the poll at Helen’s strong suggestion ? Perhaps the Progressives ?
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:12 am
Now now, chaps and chapesses. Helen Clark is an honourable member and we must take her at her word. Now, who’s having cream or yoghurt on their poll-driven fruitcake?
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:20 am
You go nuts on that honourable thing Craig.
I wouldn’t trust her to run a chook raffle without skimming the take.
We’ve all seen this bullshit spin cycle on high speed too many times.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:26 am
As I was the one polled (to whom the Dom Post is referring), do any of you know whether I have any rights to know who the poll was on behalf of, if I were to make a request to Rebecca, of UMR (who polled me), or her Auckland supervisor, whose name she provided me with?
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:33 am
No, polling companies generally will not, and in fact can not, disclose who their clients are for a specific poll – unless authorised to do so by the client.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:38 am
Gee, (thought as much) but that does leave us with the rather unsatisfactory situation of me being polled for 15 minutes on nothing but political issues, UMR not being able to accept rival political work – as it works exclusively for Labour – and Labour claiming it has nothing whatsoever to do with this poll.
How very curious. But I can’t concern myself with such piffling issues. My gladwrap and sellotape wings are nearly ready for my maiden flight off the Sky Tower. I’ll correspond with you all again when I return unscathed.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:40 am
Oh, before I go, maybe it was AUTHORISED by the EPMU, now that they’re a bona fide third party and all. Talk about transparency!!
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Helen said she did not authorise it – that would be true because she’s not an authoriser, she’s a dictator.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:55 am
Cheers for that DPF – it just struck me as a bit strange that UMR would be asking questions like that when “neither I, nor my staff, nor the Labour Party have authorised any such polling”. Perhaps the call that your e-mail informant got the other night actually got a call from an Exclusive Brethren PRETENDING to be from UMR!!!
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 9:59 am
Labour just don’t get it do they. A decade ago the PM would have released a press release saying “we did not do that” and it would be printed the next day. Highly motivated people would have scribbled letters to the editor and posted them the same day. Less motivated people would have posted them over the next day or two. The MSM would collect the letters, read them and about a 3-5 days later perhaps print a few of them.
By that time the issue would be dead and people would have moved on. The chances of any one letter writer getting enough information quick enough to do what DPF has done here and slam dunk the ‘economic with the truth’ press release would be low.
Now… we share the issue, various points of view are rapidly assessed and people interact on the issue.
It’s no wonder blogs get banned in some countries – how can the govt run a successful propaganda program when people are free to discuss the BS in the propaganda before it can even make it to the MSM.
Keep up Labour – the world has changed and you are a dinosaur dishonest party who has failed to realise that the truth is out there before you get a chance to change it via spin and BS.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 10:15 am
neither I, nor my staff, nor the Labour Party
Hmmmmmmmm
That leaves a LOT of gaps doesn’t it? There’s a hell of a lot of people working for Labour in the Beehive that could have done it as a hand down. e.g. H1 says to Cunning Cullen ‘be good to know what the sheeple think of the Whinnie thing eh? Cunning’s staff here the discussion (of course) and get on the blower post haste. “Neither I, nor my staff, nor the Labour Party” have done anything!
The words of our leaders now have to be evaluated as if they were the comments of a very well prepared witness in a high-profile case in the USA. Let’s face it, Hilary’s husband did not ‘have sex’ with that intern, at least not by his lawyer’s definition of ‘having sex’, which involved penetration of one specific orifice only!
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 10:23 am
The UMR poll will be an omnibus poll.
So Labour will pay for the “which Party are you voting for” questions. The additional questions maybe on Winston (if DPF’s correspondent is correct) will by paid for by someone else. The PSA recently engaged UMR to get polling information on tax cuts – this would have been done as part of UMR’s omnibus poll. Labour (but not the PSA) would have got the tax cut information broken down by the Party id.
The PSA therefore helps Labour indirectly and privately but without being openly politically partisan. It gets information to wage a campaign against reducing taxes.
“Omnibus” in the UMR context means a range of questions perhaps some unrelated for a range of clients.
Clark is probably technically correct she nor her office did not order up and therefore are not paying for the donorgate questions. Some other organisation will by paying for those – probably an organisation sympathetic to Labour. Someone in the Labour Party somewhere may have co-ordinated a number of other organisations to share the costs of the UMR omnibus polls upto the election. If they are Registered Third Parties then this information helps them tailor their public campaigns.
That is not to say that Clark will not receive the information from the questions paid for from non Parliamentary Labour Party sources all prepared with the Party ID crosstabs.
It’s a way of another organisation assisting Labour’s campaign without directly donating to Labour and having that disclosed widely in their own organisation and on Labour’s return. I would argue that it is still a “donation” under the EFA – it doesn’t cease to be a donation because it’s a donation of a thing that isn’t itself an electoral expense. The problem would be issues of evidence and proof.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 10:28 am
It’s 3 am
Vote:The phone goes
Helen answers
A voice says there is a nuclear warhead heading for Auckland
Helen makes a decision
She phones UMR
August 6th, 2008 at 10:35 am
DPF “No, polling companies generally will not, and in fact can not, disclose who their clients are for a specific poll – unless authorised to do so by the client.”
If Wycroft lodged a request under the Privacy Act requesting UMR to:
a) revel what information they have on file about him and his “interview” and
b) if it has been forwarded on to any third parties who those parties are
Surely they would have a legal obligation to revel this information?
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 11:16 am
What Bryan said.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 11:25 am
Chris, I think you’re right about it being a UMR Omnibus poll, or at least Omnibus style, but I suspect you’re also right on the money about organisations sympathetic or actually tangibly related to Labour being the others sponsoring the poll. The evidence for this – as Colin James revealed in a recent column – is that seldom does any of the information garnered in the Omnibus poll ever see the light of day now. Labour keeps it secret. The only recent snippet of information that was made public was when the PSA asked the deliciously loaded question: Do you feel there is enough waste in the public sector for an additional ten billion dollars worth of tax cuts on top of what Labour has already announced?
The reason all the other information doesn’t hit the airwaves is because where the Omnibus poll used to ask questions on behalf of private sector interests, including the NBR, which published the results of questions it posed, along with the political polling results, UMR is now so busy doing work for Labour that as far as I’m aware there is little or no private sector involvement in its Omnibus poll.
A question: doesn’t having related third party organisations (such as the PSA) play trojan horse on your behalf – asking questions as defined as “has Helen Clark been decisive in her handling of the Winston Peters donations affair? – as was asked of me on Monday night, sound like something the evil empire of National and Crosby/Textor would do?
Labour, you’re a pack of filthy HYPOCRITES!
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 11:42 am
Wycroft, just as important,
doesn’t having related third party organisations (such as the PSA) play trojan horse on your behalf – asking questions as defined as “has Helen Clark been decisive in her handling of the Winston Peters donations affair? – as was asked of me on Monday night, sound like something the cost of which and identity of the payor need to be divulged under the wonderful Electoral Finance Act?
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 11:50 am
My goodness Adolf, I think you may have a very good point. I’m sure those with more knowledge of the rules than me will be able to advise on whether I have grounds to seek some clarification of this with relevant parties, such as the Electoral Commission.
Even more to the point, I’d have thought such obviously loaded questions (that might reasonably be deduced as being designed to make me support one party or another) as “do you think John Key is a bit slippery?”, might require the same sort of identifcation of payor/authorising party under the Electoral Finance Act.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 11:59 am
Perhaps we need a poll reporting blog… where people can publish who called them, what was asked etc
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
Wycroft
I think it only needs authorisation if it’s not part of the labour-led govt. The Labour-led govt wrote the law and they know what they wanted it to say so if the ref makes a bad call it will be validated – move on.
Or: Go for it – lay a complaint and see how far it gets…. Might be interesting to catch the teflon-maggot out … again.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
For the record, I strongly support political parties polling.
I actually think the question outlined by Wycroft is ok if this was the question posed by UMR. UMR are good pollsters. The purpose of the question is to gauge what the sample thinks and probably to break that down by party support, which in all likelihood finds its way to Clark. If the fallout from Winston is confined to him then obviously there is little need to move on him which would in all likelihood require the search for a new parliamentary majority or early election.
Strangely, I hope on this issue its good news for Clark. I would hate for the Government to go early because of Winston First. If an early election were attributed to Peters, that on its own might secure his 5%; his voters like him being the centre of attention. Clark does the Country a long term favour by not over-reacting to Winston First. She also has options with the Greens and Maori Party should she be required to move i.e. perhaps if the SFO decides to investigate.
Winston First is best dealt with by withering on the vine – he is best in a flare up.
Regarding the URM omnibus poll cost sharing, it would depend on the total cost of the poll, and what proportion of the cost the various commissioning clients are. One would then have to assess the reasonable market value of the information donated, and to whom it’s actually donated. Subtle stuff.
The other issue is that Parliamentary Service might now be a bit more picky about what scripts they will agree too and therefore pay on behalf of the Parliamentary parties. I assume the Labour Leaders budget is paying for the poll. Questions that PS won’t approve could be paid for by others. Parliamentary Service approval also risks privacy – people talk in the building.
Vote:August 6th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Chris, I have no real problem with the poll. I have a little bit of a problem that certain politicians can’t tell the difference between principle and polls at times – but I note that my list of certain politicians appears to include both Helen and John on this one. To some extent it is a feature of our electoral system.
What I do have a problem with is Helen’s denial of it. It doesn’t really stack up, so it is lying by omission so far as I can tell. The question someone needs to ask is whether the Labour party has received access to the results of these questions from UMR. If so, then what were the results, and will Helen be acting on them?
I also agree that giving Winston oxygen is badness. But if it wasn’t this issue giving him oxygen then he would have manufactured another. This one at least has the potential to put a wooden stake in his heart. We don’t need to feel too bad for him, I’m sure one of his many benefactors will give him a job so he can see out his days. And I suspect that his super wouldn’t be too shabby by now either.
Vote:August 7th, 2008 at 5:05 am
Hels has no integrity on this issue.
Vote:August 7th, 2008 at 5:07 am
Hels has no integrity, full stop!
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