Election catch-up: The most exciting campaign in which almost nothing happened

I don’t think this election has been notably negative or dirty – it’s a shame it’s almost over

1. A slew of final polls coming today, with at least one, from Ipsos MORI, to be published tomorrow morning. So far in the campaign there has been barely any movement in opinion (above, since the dissolution of Parliament on 30 March). The late swing to the Conservatives that many people expect has not yet materialised. ComRes’s penultimate poll for the Daily Mail and ITV News last night gave the Tories a three-point lead. All that means is that the May2015.com five-day weighted average now shows a Tory lead of 0.4 points.

To repeat, Cameron needs a four- or five-point lead in vote share to have a chance of staying on; Labour needs a four-point lead to have a chance of forming a government without needing the support of the SNP.

2. Anthony Wells, of UK Polling Report, has an excellent summary of the electoral battlefields for tomorrow.

3. David Hayes has another of his thoughtful overviews of British politics for the Australian Inside Story. He coins narcisstivist for the likes of Russell Brand, which could also be applied to Trenton Oldfield and Twiggy Garcia. And he says:

“For two years now, I have been haunted by a report published at a time when the Tories were 10 per cent and more behind Labour in many polls. In it, Simon Carswell, the Irish Times’s excellent US correspondent, quotes a piece of advice given to him on how to cover Washington: ‘Try to explain American politics in a way that your readers will not be completely shocked if a Republican wins.’ Now seems a good time to recycle it.”

4. I thought YouGov’s report of a 12-point lead for voting to stay in the EU in a referendum underlined my assessment that UKIP is finished on Friday. Stephen Tall is not so sure.

5. If Ed Miliband becomes prime minister, at the age of 45, he would be older on taking office than Cameron, Blair, Liverpool, Sidmouth, Pitt, Portland, North, Grafton, Devonshire and Walpole.

6. And finally, thanks to Scott Hoad for this, via Moose Allain:

“I have two mallards named Homer and Hesiod, I'm not sure what religion they are but I think they’re Greek author ducks.”