Helensville

Yesterday I blogged about Colin Craig’s dodgy poll where he talks about 89% of people in Helensville wanting consultation. (Quite apart from the fact that the Conservative Party can’t spell Helensville.)

I contacted Research First to ask about the exact questioning and other pertinent details of Colin Craig’s commissioned poll.

I did this because of the history of their dodgy polls. Commendably their CEO Roger Larkins returned my call and pointed to the full poll results at the Conservative Party website. It appears they have learned a bit from the last foray into manipulating public opinion through dodgy polls and most questions are vastly improved.

However the report tells us something that Colin Craig failed to tell us. Lying by omission, if you will.

You see the polling was not done in just Helensville, rather it was done across two electorates, Helensville and Rodney. Further it was a survey of just 355 respondents…with a margin of error of 5.2%.

To make matters worse the report does not split the 355 respondents by electorate so we have no way of telling how many were in each electorate. Despite demographic breakdown of other details this was omitted. I suspect that is because the vast majotiy of the 355 respondents were actually in Rodney electorate.

If we assume a 50/50 split across electorate then that also makes a major impact on the margin of error, blowing it out to 7.5%.

Colin Craig was intellectually and statistically dishonest to suggest the poll result was just for Helensville electorate. I blame him and not the polling company for this, for even though Research First omitted the demographic split they still highlighted it in the title of the poll.

I am sure David Farrar will look at other questions and details in more detail but for now I want to focus on Question 8. This question is seriously dodgy.

The details are as follows:

By loading up the possible answers in such a manner they were actually forcing a positive outcome better than 66%. It was such a stupid question anyway because if you ask almost everyone if they want to be consulted on something they will almost always say yes. But to ask it and have two positive answers and one negative answer then the pollster, presumably under instruction from their client, have forced respondents to answer in the way the client wanted.

It is dishonest and makes the results for that question statistically irrelevant. The error is further compounded by the dishonest way that Colin Craig presented the results by saying that 89% of Helensville voters want to be consulted. That is actually a lie. The poll was conducted over Rodney and Helensville electorates and no split in results was given, in no way can he take the total figure and apply it just to Helensville.

Colin Craig continues to use dodgy polling results to support dodgy contentions. This is really amateur hour stuff politically and shows that Colin Craig hasn’t learned a thing from his bullshit polling in Rodney and Epsom prior to the last election. He may have a lot of money to burn being stupid but he is a real slow learner.

Colin Craig has gone back to using his dodgy polling company again…you know the one that said he’d win Epsom…then the one that said he would win Rodney in a landlside, Check out my previous posts on Research First and their seriously dodgy polling methodology.

Craig today defended using the quote, saying it was a reflection of what some voters thought.

”It is certainly the comment that got me thinking where John Key was on this issue and where the electorate was. People express themselves in different ways. I’ve heard lots of people express themselves on this debate in ways that I wouldn’t.”

Helensville was more conservative than other electorates, Craig conceded.

For the first time, Key was not voting in accordance with his electorate on a conscience issue, he said. ”That’s a change in the game.”

Key had voted against civil unions and has said changed his vote to vote against prostitution reform after feedback from his electorate.

The Conservatives hired Research First to poll Helensville voters on the issue of gay marriage and gay adoption.

About 89 per cent said their MP should consult their electorate over conscience votes and vote the way voters wanted them to, it found.

We know all about Colin Craig dodgy polling. Let’s see the questions…I bet they are as loaded as the previous ones.

Colin Craig says dumb things, does dumb things, and is showing that politically he is a muppet.

Colin Craig is really going for gold in insulting the Prime Minister, posting out 20,000 leaflets calling John Key too gay for Helensville:

Conservative Party leader Colin Craig thinks John Key is “too gay” for his Helensville seat and has said so in 20,000 letters to residents.

Pamphlets arrived in locals’ mailboxes this week, urging them not to back Labour MP Louisa Wall’s same-sex marriage bill. They were accompanied by a signed letter from Craig. It gave prominence to a comment from a disgruntled local: “Colin, you should stand here because John Key is too gay for Helensville.”

Craig says people have expressed disgust that their local MP was supporting the bill without asking their views.

“MPs have a duty to represent their electorate but John Key has chosen to ignore the views of the people of Helensville and carry on regardless.

“I was in the town a few weeks ago and was surprised at how many people were annoyed that he is not listening to them.

“There are people out there who simply don’t like to see their Prime Minister doing things like dancing on stage with transvestites, as he has done in the past,” he said.

Bizarre behaviour. John Key says about 3 people have contacted his office about the issue of Marriage equality…Hardly a groundswell.

in other matters Colin Craig’s Facebook page is incorrectly authorised. (29 Gillies Ave, yet he abandoned Epsom around 6 months ago), and the Conservative party office has been empty since.

His website STILL lacks an authorisation as well – which means a wilful kind of negligence given I raised this some time ago.

Following on from yesterday’s post I had a friendly call from Stephen McElrea who assures me that there is no way he is standing down from the electorate chair position and there is no skullduggery going on.

This will probably disappoint those who know Stephen’s exceptional track record in broadcasting, where he is one of the few competent right wingers who can help National implement their policies. It is far easier to find an electorate chair than it is to find a man of Stephen’s standing in broadcasting, which is dominated by left wingers.

The tipline has been running hot with people concerned about the petty party politics going on in John Key’s electorate.

Apparently Stephen McElrea, the electorate chair, is stepping down, and is attempting to pass the baton on to his and the buggers muddle’s choice without anyone else becoming involved.

Readers will remember that Stephen is the highly regarded media specialist who is on the board of New Zealand On Air, whose strong background in media hasn’t stopped him from being a hamfisted political operative in the past. This includes his most recent faux pas, where he ended up being called on to resign after he and senior member of the buggers muddle faction Alastair Bell (and sitting board member) complained about some left wing propaganda on TV just before the election.

I do not approve of skullduggery of any sort in the National Party, and especially not skullduggery that reflects badly on the party. If there is a contest for electorate chair in Helensville it should be open, transparent and honest. The party could do worse than appoint Tamaki Electorate Chair Andrew Hunt to oversee the process as he carried out the Tamaki selection last year without any hint of the dodgy dealings that went on in Rodney, Coromandel, North Shore and Epsom, where the buggers muddle tested ethical boundaries.

The corrupt Winston Raymond Peters, now a pensioner, it seems, of Helensville wants to try and win the seat off John Key.

Well colour me annoyed. This short-arsed, mendacious, thieving, lying, philandering, prick still hasn’t paid us back the last $158,000 he nicked from the taxpayers of New Zealand.

He should be black-listed by the media until he starts fronting with our cash.

Every time he gets on a podium the first question asked of Winston Raymond Peters, 65, pensioner of Helensville is “Where’s our Cash?”

John Key will kick his lying, corrupt arse. He should quickly change the law to make WRP, 65, POH’s registration fee for any public office $158,000.

I think the blog mobile will be spending a great deal of time following the thief around.

I don’t hate anyone but Winston comes close. He is the living reason why we should consider term limits for politicians, and the second reason is the other pensioner looking to hoodwink voters in Christchurch.