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Nigel Marriott's Blog

An independent statistician using data to understand our world and to predict the future

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Voice Referendum #2 – My Forecast Reviewed

November 5, 2023 By Nigel

Australians rejected the proposed constitutional amendment known as The Voice in a referendum on 14th October 2023.  NO won the national vote by 20.1 percentage points and the state count 6-0 but the more important question is was my forecast right?

[Read more…] about Voice Referendum #2 – My Forecast Reviewed

Filed Under: Elections, Forecasting Tagged With: Australia, Brexit, Election forecasting, Forecasting model, Parliament, Politics, Referendum, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation, Voice

Voice Referendum #1 – My Forecast Explained

October 13, 2023 By Nigel

Australians will reject the proposed constitutional amendment known as The Voice in a referendum on 14th October 2023.  My forecast is for NO to win the national vote by 17 percentage points and win the state count 6-0.

This article was first published on 11th October 2023.  My forecast then was for NO to win 16 points and the state count 6-0.

[Read more…] about Voice Referendum #1 – My Forecast Explained

Filed Under: Elections, Forecasting, Polling Tagged With: Australia, Brexit, Election forecasting, Forecasting model, Parliament, Politics, Referendum, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation, Voice

Pay Gap Trends #6 – Are we there yet?

May 10, 2023 By Nigel

Has 6 years of mandatory gender pay gap reporting (GPGR) made a dent in the UK’s gender pay gap?  According to a recent BBC article, not one bit at all.  Unfortunately, too many people on social media have been taken in by this misleading article and I will be submitting a formal complaint to the BBC soon to get it amended.  I rebutted this at the time with this LinkedIn post and I will now expand on that here to show what the true trend is and whether or not mandatory pay gap reporting has had an impact.

[Read more…] about Pay Gap Trends #6 – Are we there yet?

Filed Under: Diversity, Forecasting Tagged With: Gender Pay Gap, Median, ONS, pay gap trends, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation

UK Economy Tracker #10 – 2022 Q3

November 16, 2022 By Nigel

UK Inflation has risen sharply since the start of 2022 and dominates the media and politics today.  It is now having knock on effects, most notably on wage rises which are lagging behind inflation.  The aftermath of the COVID19 induced recession continues to be considerable economic uncertainty.

[Read more…] about UK Economy Tracker #10 – 2022 Q3

Filed Under: Forecasting, Misc Tagged With: Economy Tracker, Presenting data, Trackers, UK Economy

Pay Gap Trends #4 – Did the UK gender pay gap narrow in 2020?

September 5, 2021 By Nigel

This article was last updated using data submitted as of 4th September 2021.

In February 2021, the EHRC confirmed that all employers with a headcount of 250 employees or more would have to submit their gender pay gaps based on the 2020 snapshot date.  Due to the lateness of this confirmation, they also stated that no enforcement action would be taken prior to the end of September 2021.  As result, fewer employers than expected have reported 2020 data so far so I have used two methods of imputation to estimate that the median gender pay gap among these employers narrowed by 0.2 to 0.3 pence in the pound in 2020.

[Read more…] about Pay Gap Trends #4 – Did the UK gender pay gap narrow in 2020?

Filed Under: Diversity, Forecasting Tagged With: data quality, Gender Pay Gap, imputation, missing data, trend analysis, year on year

UK Local Elections #1 – My West England Metro Mayor 2021 Election Forecast

May 2, 2021 By Nigel

It will be close but I am predicting that the Conservatives will hold onto the West England Combined Authority Metropolitan Mayoralty on 6th May 2021.  By rights, they should not be winning but the 3 parties opposing them do not seem to understand the subtleties of the Supplementary Vote (SV) that is used in this election and they will end up splitting their votes to their detriment.

[Read more…] about UK Local Elections #1 – My West England Metro Mayor 2021 Election Forecast

Filed Under: Elections, Forecasting Tagged With: B&NES, Bath, Bristol, Conservative, EU Referendum, Greens, Labour, Lib Dems, local election, Majority, Metro Mayor, South Gloucs, Supplementary Vote, WECA, West England

UK General Elections #6 – Keir Starmer’s train to Downing Street

March 21, 2021 By Nigel

Keir Starmer has to match what Clement Attlee did in 1945 and beat what Tony Blair did in 1997 if he wants to form a Labour government at the next election.  To arrive at Downing Street by the end of 2024, Starmer must get his party to board an InterCity 125 train and spend the next 3 years following the tracks I lay out in this article.  As I will show, whichever track they take has to go through 125 English Conservative seats, most of which are in between cities.  Hence InterCity 125 becomes the easy to remember name of Labour’s list of target seats.

[Read more…] about UK General Elections #6 – Keir Starmer’s train to Downing Street

Filed Under: Elections, Forecasting Tagged With: Boundary review, Brexit, Conservative, elections, EU Referendum, General Election 2024, Labour, Lib Dems, Majority, Parliament, Politics, SNP, Swing, Tories

COVID19 Cases #1 – Latest Data and Trends for England

September 27, 2020 By Nigel

Last updated on 27th September 2020 but downloadable spreadsheet in section 3a was updated on 19th October 2020.  I will update the post when I get the time!

The latest data for COVID19 (Coronavirus) cases in England as of Saturday 26th September 2020 shows the number of people testing positive for COVID19 is up 60% from a week ago but this masks extreme regional disparities that make the national trend meaningless.  The North is in the grip of a second wave unlike the South which is not.  Unless recent trends in the North abate, the scenario of 50k positive tests per day by the end of October recently postulated by the Chief Scientific Officer remains feasible.

[Read more…] about COVID19 Cases #1 – Latest Data and Trends for England

Filed Under: Forecasting Tagged With: Coronavirus, Covid19, DHSC, England, NHS, ONS, Pandemic, PHE, Presenting data, SARS-COV-2, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation

COVID19 Deaths #2 – Are Public Health England’s Figures Misleading?

July 25, 2020 By Nigel

During the first wave of the COVID19 epidemic, the daily number of deaths published by Public Health England (PHE) has been the main headline in the news.  On 17th July, Matt Hancock, Secretary of State for Health, called for a review of this time series after a blog published by Yoon Loke & Carl Heneghan of Oxford University questioned whether definition used by this time series was appropriate.  I myself had noticed a change in the PHEr time series in my tracker of COVID19 deaths in England but I hadn’t understood why this might have been the case.  After looking at the data again in more detail, I have concluded that this time series is overestimating the number of deaths by 42 +/- 13 per day since the 23rd May and it needs to be revised otherwise it will create confusion should a second wave come.

[Read more…] about COVID19 Deaths #2 – Are Public Health England’s Figures Misleading?

Filed Under: Forecasting Tagged With: Coronavirus, Covid19, CQC, England, NHS, ONS, Pandemic, PHE, Presenting data, SARS-COV-2, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation

COVID19 Deaths #1 – Latest Data and Trends for England

July 25, 2020 By Nigel

Last updated on 25th July 2020 – future updates will be infrequent.

The latest data for deaths due to COVID19 (Coronavirus) in England as of Friday 24th July 2020 show that the first wave of the pandemic is now over when one looks as excess deaths.  People will still be dying of COVID19 for weeks yet but the overall number of excess deaths is now negative.

[Read more…] about COVID19 Deaths #1 – Latest Data and Trends for England

Filed Under: Forecasting Tagged With: Coronavirus, Covid19, CQC, England, NHS, ONS, Pandemic, PHE, Presenting data, SARS-COV-2, trend analysis, Trend extrapolation

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More blogs

Voice Referendum #2 – My Forecast Reviewed

Australians rejected the proposed constitutional amendment known as The Voice in a referendum on … [Read More...] about Voice Referendum #2 – My Forecast Reviewed

UK Weather Tracker #81 – October 2023

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Australians will reject the proposed constitutional amendment known as The Voice in a referendum on … [Read More...] about Voice Referendum #1 – My Forecast Explained

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September 2023 was the joint warmest on record in the UK, matching September 2006.  It was also the … [Read More...] about UK Weather Tracker #80 – September 2023

Pay Gap Data #6 – Where can I find gender pay gap data for 2022?

This post was updated on 4th October 2023 with the latest data. The government requires all … [Read More...] about Pay Gap Data #6 – Where can I find gender pay gap data for 2022?

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