I’m being spied on

[mosy]

I'm sure that however the Labour Party got information about (or guessed) your previous voting patterns, it won't have been by illegally tracing your ballot paper(s) through the unique number. If that sort of thing went on, we would have heard about it and it would constitute a major political scandal.

the windrush scandal has been going on for years so anything is possible. To be asked if I’d be voting Labour “again”was suspicious.

Did you ask 'how do you know who I voted for?' ??

I'm perfectly at ease with assuming conspiracy theories of all sorts simply because we know our data is a free for all (gleaned & assembled or hacked). As JGD said 22 Apr 2018, 20:37: "We do have to be careful". Isn't our only option is stay alert and refuse to be manipulated?

"Positive reinforcement" manipulation by canvassers also springs to mind, i.e. "Everybody else thinks... can we tick you as being with the 'In crowd'?" I.e. might not be based on actual prior voting, just the pressured implication that surely you're one of us.

JGD wrote 23 Apr 2018, 08:08 : "On acceptability (or wising up) - are those of us of an age more disturbed by the ease with which this manipulation can be executed ? Are our younger counterparts less concerned ?"

Speaking as my opinion of younger ones I know (e.g. mid twenties), the short answer is yes. I don't know if it's lack of understanding of data mining when their lives are posted (permanently) on e.g. Facebook or they truly believe everything is for "the greater good" or "lesser of two evils" which reduction by government of privacy is labelled as, which strangely people acquiesce to.

[dcjprior]

Here's how it works. There won't be any spying involved.

At some point in the past someone from the Labour Party will have knocked on your door and asked you - or anyone answering - if they could count on your vote in an upcoming election. They will have had a list of registered voters and they'd record, next to your name, whether you were 'L' for declared Labour, 'C' for declared Conservative', 'D' for declared Lib Dem, 'U' for declared UKIP, 'A' if you didn't want to say but were definitely against Labour, 'R' for refused etc.

Therefore, someone, in the past, will have told the Labour canvasser that you were likely to be voting Labour in that upcoming election, and this would have been recorded as an 'L'. Sometimes canvassers are lazy and record everyone in that address as having a certain political preference even if only one person declares this preference.

Political parties do not have the time, motivation or wherewithal to laboriously go through each and every ballot paper after an election, take the ballot paper number and try to compare it against people's polling card numbers. It's almost certainly the case that ballot paper numbers are only printed on the counterfoils, not the ballot papers themselves, so this comparison is likely impossible.

It is often easy to tell, by looking at someone's Facebook profile, depending on their privacy settings, whether they support Labour, the Conservatives or another party, or none at all, but individual political parties in Sydenham or elsewhere simply will not have the time to go trawling through thousands of FB profiles.

Source - I am a canvasser for a political party myself (absolutely not the Labour Party).

TL;DR - you're not being spied on.

[syd]

Here's how it works. There won't be any spying involved.

At some point in the past someone from the Labour Party will have knocked on your door and asked you - or anyone answering - if they could count on your vote in an upcoming election. They will have had a list of registered voters and they'd record, next to your name, whether you were 'L' for declared Labour, 'C' for declared Conservative', 'D' for declared Lib Dem, 'U' for declared UKIP, 'A' if you didn't want to say but were definitely against Labour, 'R' for refused etc.

Therefore, someone, in the past, will have told the Labour canvasser that you were likely to be voting Labour in that upcoming election, and this would have been recorded as an 'L'. Sometimes canvassers are lazy and record everyone in that address as having a certain political preference even if only one person declares this preference.

Political parties do not have the time, motivation or wherewithal to laboriously go through each and every ballot paper after an election, take the ballot paper number and try to compare it against people's polling card numbers. It's almost certainly the case that ballot paper numbers are only printed on the counterfoils, not the ballot papers themselves, so this comparison is likely impossible.

It is often easy to tell, by looking at someone's Facebook profile, depending on their privacy settings, whether they support Labour, the Conservatives or another party, or none at all, but individual political parties in Sydenham or elsewhere simply will not have the time to go trawling through thousands of FB profiles.

Source - I am a canvasser for a political party myself (absolutely not the Labour Party).

TL;DR - you're not being spied on.

The problem with your theory is this is the first time I’ve been asked - I’ve never discussed my voting intentions to anyone who isn’t a friend. I posted here to see if anyone else had a knock at the door

[mosy]

...[clip]... It's almost certainly the case that ballot paper numbers are only printed on the counterfoils, not the ballot papers themselves, so this comparison is likely impossible..

I beg to differ as the unique number is clearly visible in small print on the ballot paper itself, which is issued against that number on the list when your name is ticked off at the polling station.

Syd, Dunno as we don't get political canvassers knocking.

[Tim Lund]

It is often easy to tell, by looking at someone's Facebook profile, depending on their privacy settings, whether they support Labour, the Conservatives or another party, or none at all, but individual political parties in Sydenham or elsewhere simply will not have the time to go trawling through thousands of FB profiles.

Source - I am a canvasser for a political party myself (absolutely not the Labour Party).

TL;DR - you're not being spied on.

TL;DR - you didn't read my follow up about the Labour Party - doubtless legitimately - paying Facebook for this sort of information, so maybe just saving themselves the trouble of 'trawling through thousands of FB profiles'

As I said in my first post, the Labour Party is by some way the most competently run political grouping in LB Lewisham

I am not a member of the Labour Party, or any other,

[RJM]

Someone I know wrote this: https://thatgarybrannanthing.wordpress. ... d-to-know/ a couple of years ago, including a bit about the count. It's very unlikely that anyone would be able to trace back your vote from what he describes about how it works, and he does actually do the counting.

Maybe your canvassers just used an unfortunate turn of phrase?

[mosy]

Someone I know wrote this: https://thatgarybrannanthing.wordpress. ... d-to-know/ a couple of years ago, including a bit about the count. It's very unlikely that anyone would be able to trace back your vote from what he describes about how it works, and he does actually do the counting.

Maybe your canvassers just used an unfortunate turn of phrase?

You seem to be referring to the voting and counting process which I don't think anyone doubts. It's the fact that our details and number are on a data base and it presumably has to be the case that a paper has to be attached to a valid number to show it's not a duplicate or counterfeit ballot paper. Therefore votes must be tied back to the number on one system or another. If that's not the case, then there'd be no point in having a number on the paper. The question is whether the data base is "used", not whether ballot paper tampering can exist, although it's good to know that every care is taken for the actual count.

[JGD]

Just an extra thought on post-results analysis - but still very much on point.

We have become accustomed to seeing demographic analysis of how the vote was distributed amongst the electorate.,

Age and gender are two of the elements (there are others) that are frequently reported on both for elections and referenda - and at constituency level.

Is this a significant and sophisticated exercise by pollsters from postulated data or is it an actual analysis of the recorded vote.

I do not know - can anyone speak from first hand knowledge or any evidence of how it is achieved ?

[Tim Lund]

Just an extra thought on post-results analysis - but still very much on point.

We have become accustomed to seeing demographic analysis of how the vote was distributed amongst the electorate.,

Age and gender are two of the elements (there are others) that are frequently reported on both for elections and referenda - and at constituency level.

Is this a significant and sophisticated exercise by pollsters from postulated data or is it an actual analysis of the recorded vote.

I do not know - can anyone speak from first hand knowledge or any evidence of how it is achieved ?

Pretty sure it's an exercise by pollsters, which includes a fair amount of guess work, so less sophisticated than you might expect

https://www.ipsos.com/ipsos-mori/en-uk/ ... 7-election

[JGD]

Fairly clear on ipsos MORI's part, Tim.

They firmly state it is an estimate then "calibrated" somehow.

[mosy]

Voting analyses I've seen have all been polled, e.g. YouGov, Electoral Commission, after voting day. The source should be quoted and will show sample size, questions asked etc.

As to how the sample is adjusted to extrapolate for total vote maps, there are a handful of things poll companies decide on that they think should make the sample result more representative in geographic and/ or demographic respects. "Herding" by pollsters is worrying though. It is thought to be a common one that's wholly subjective, which is when the results are adjusted to bring them closer to the expected result, hence most polls will report similar findings with no result being miles away from the "herd of polls". See: https://www.ncpolitics.uk/2015/06/is-th ... ding.html/

Any stats, economic or electoral, past or current from the ONS are factual analyses from statutory obligatory data required and collected by them. As far as I know, they only give publicly the basic number of registered voters for elections.

[JGD]

Hugely informative - thank you.

And they do this for the post-results analysis as well as the pre-ballot prediction polls ?

[mosy]

Hugely informative - thank you.

And they do this for the post-results analysis as well as the pre-ballot prediction polls ?

Yes indeed for "total" maps. They somehow have to make say, a hundred answers match the result of say 5,000 actual votes cast taking account of typical demographic and likely voting propensity and for which party, plus experience of how many might be telling fibs about how they voted etc, so still much guesswork in extrapolation terms for "total" maps. As said, any raw survey data published is usually available for those actually polled, but even that assumes people polled told the truth as no way of knowing.

[syd]

Morning,

So I received an email reminding me to vote...along with the canvasser and 2 leaflets. Wtf is going on? Is Lewisham council pooing it’s self for some reason? Are residents beginn8ng to do a Lambeth or Southwark and demanding labour Stop tak8ng the mick? Or does the mayor want a large turnout.

Either way I’m more concerned that planning docs for the monstrosity have been removed from thr Plann8ng website

[syd]

It seems I am right



https://libertystratcom.org/2018/04/30/ ... analytica/


Sensitive personal data of Labour voters was processed by a third party and shared with Arron Banks’s (link: http://Leave.EU) Leave.EU, Cambridge Analytica, and others in February 2016.

[JGD]

BH and I have completed our postal ballots.

Each of the two sets of papers had our unique roll number plus another longer unique number, which had our roll number embedded in it.

Any form of scanning, manual or digital, would quickly reveal our identity and how we voted.

[syenhamboy]

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ ... l-10572355

[syd]

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/ ... l-10572355

Yep.

If British citizens can be deported for no reason I guess looking at ballots is no biggie.