With a bit of luck British politics might just settle down for a while. It’s been a crazy few months with three different Prime Ministers and Labour with a polling lead of over 30%. With Rishi Sunak now in Downing Street, let’s look at the latest political betting odds, some of which do border on the insane.
It’s unlikely anyone has placed a bet on there being three UK Prime Ministers in a year. Could there be four though? There have been many calls for a General Election to be held but almost exclusively by opposition parties.
Liz Truss was a disastrous Prime Minister but even she knew calling a General Election would be an insane move. Opposition parties can shout all they like but they wouldn’t be thinking twice about going to the polls in the current situation.
The odds of a General Election being held this year are 25/1 at BetVictor. For that to be the case, the election would have to be called soon after mid-November. That’s just not going to happen. A General Election next year is 3/1 at Paddy Power but again that looks unlikely.
Late 2024 is the most likely date and that’s 2/9 at Betfair.. However, Sunak (or whoever is the Prime Minister) could hang on until late December and the General Election wouldn’t then take place until January 2025. You can get 2/5 at Unibet that the next election is held in 2024 or later.
Will Rishi Sunak still be in charge when the next General Election is held? SBK gives odds of 17/10 that he doesn’t exit his role as Prime Minister until 2024 and also offers 11/8 on him leaving in 2025 or later.
SBK also offers rather generous odds on who will be the next Conservative Party leader. Boris Johnson, Penny Mordaunt and Kemi Badenoch are all available at odds of 7/1.
The new Prime Minister has a massive job on his hands to win the next General Election. It’s unlikely that Labour will have anything like a lead of over 30% in the polls but it’s going to be hard to peg back that kind of lead if it actually exists.
Labour are 4/7 at BetVictor to win the most seats at the next General Election with the Tories offered at 6/4 by Betfair. They do have a healthy majority and if the Red Wall seats could be held onto, they still have an outside chance of winning most seats. The first past the post electoral system might help too.
Could we see a coalition government? It’s 66/1 at Paddy Power that the Tories and Labour share power. Now that really is political madness but not as insane as the 150/1 at Betfair on the Green Party winning the most seats at the next General Election. That’d be a slight improvement on the one seat they currently hold. Politics has been insane of late but it’s not that crazy.
