On Sun, 30 Oct 2005 23:28:39 +0000, Dave Arquati wrote:

Paul Scott wrote:
"Boltar" wrote in message
oups.com...

Public opinion it seems to me is generally in favour. Its more
a case of a load of standard issue Nimbies down the bottom end
whinging about it because it might make driving Jemima 500
yards to school a bit harder. For the people of Southall and
onwards to Uxbridge it would be a godsend given the
generally lousy public transport in that corridor.

B2003

Have a look at this from the Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...846599,00.html

'......Transport for London embarked on a massive consultation exercise,
produced 500 pages of data, interviewed 16,895 people and printed 440,000
brochures and questionnaires in 11 different languages.
The findings were as clear as a thumb's down from the emperor in the
Colosseum: 70 per cent of respondents did not support the idea.'

I always thought it was rather obvious that consultation responses are
heavily biased towards opponents of a scheme. You wouldn't ring up the
gas company to tell them they sent you a nice low bill, but you
certainly would if they tried to overcharge you.

The market research TfL did should be much more representative of public
opinion. The 2005 MORI market research says that 48% are in favour of
and 37% are opposed to the scheme, with higher support in Southall and
Uxbridge and lower support in Ealing.

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/trams/download...eportFINAL.pdf


First of all it needs be said that MORI are a very professional and objective
polling organisation. Polls for things like general elections are relatively
simple affairs (there really only being three main parties plus the 'don't
knows'). That being said all the pollsters (including MORI) got the prediction
for the 1992 general election badly wrong (in the sense of winning party not
majority!) So it's not an exact science.

Polling for a subject like WLT is far more complex than elections and that is
why there is always a full report given by the polling organisation. If you
are going to comment meaningfully, all of this should be read carefully in
detail. A one liner headline does not really do justice to the report which is
available publicly at the URL which you provided.

Some parts of the detail which can be extracted are as follows:

If you want to be 95% certain of the final result (note still not 100% certain
- that's never possible) you cannot just take the 48% pro and 37% against. The
figures are actually 48+/- 5 pro and 37+/-5 against (Top of page 8 of the
report). So although its is less likely than 48 to 37, it is still within the
95% probability that the result was 43% pro and 42% against. This of course is
a rather different picture.

Of probably much greater significance is the information contained on page 12
which states that only about 25% of respondents, by their own judgment,
considered that they had a good understanding of the scheme and 38% stated
that they only had a limited understanding. Note that the 'undecideds' were
only 15% so even if all of those were in the 'limited understanding' group,
there was still a significant percentage (23%) who definitely voted one way or
the other based on 'a limited understanding' of the scheme'. Note the comment
on page 13,

'Opponents of the WLT are more likely to have a 'good' understanding of the
scheme than those who are in favour of it (35% and 22% respectively).'
We can deduce therefore that many of those who voted in favour had by their
own admission actually a 'limited understanding' of what they were voting for.
If we assume that this group is only slightly more than half of the 23% (as
seems reasonable from the statement quoted from page 13), let's call it 13%
and that if they had had a 'good understanding' then they would have voted
against, then the end result would have been 35+/-5 % for and 50+/-5 % against
- a totally different result.

The results on the bottom of page 9 and the top of page 10 are also very
telling and I have quoted them in full below:
Among those residents who support the WLT scheme, the main reasons relate to
the perception that it will lead to less congestion, journeys will be quicker
and that trams are more environmentally friendly. In contrast, the most common
spontaneous reasons for opposing the scheme are the view that it will lead to
greater congestion in other areas as cars divert to side roads, that it will
not provide a solution to transport problems and that roads are not wide
enough to support the WLT. In addition, when prompted, 71% of residents agree
that the tram will cause too much disruption whilst building work takes place.
When presented with a number of potential benefits of the WLT scheme (e.g.
reduced pollution, more reliable than current bus services, lead to more jobs
in the area) the majority of residents say they would be more in favour of the
scheme if these scenarios transpired.

Similarly, when presented with a list of potential drawbacks of the scheme
(e.g. increased congestion, parts of the Uxbridge Road being closed to
traffic), the majority say they would be less in favour of it. Of note, seven
in ten would be less in favour of the scheme if it resulted in increased
congestion, including 57% of those who currently support the scheme. o On
balance, more residents disagree than agree that they would personally benefit
from the WLT scheme (47% and 38% respectively). Despite this, 59% say they
will actually use it. Of note, 28% of those who oppose the scheme say they are
likely to use the scheme.

In effect the respondents supporting the scheme are saying that they recognise
that there is a problem and that the tramway scheme has been stated to be a
way of solving that problem. They therefore feel that they should support it.
Note of course that no possible alternative options are presented in the poll.
So in effect the question is, 'This is a solution to the Uxbridge Road
congestion problem - do you support it?'

What is of great interest is the statistic at the end. Cynicism has led even
many of those supposed 'supporters' to believe that it really is not going to
work because they say that they will gain no personal benefit from it. Note
that 70% would be less in favour if they were convinced that the scheme was
not going to deliver its promoted benefits.

If 70% of those who were pro scheme for instance were to become agnostic
because of such conviction, then the overall result would be 15+/- 3% in
favour, still 37+/-5% against and nearly half not sure at all!

I would venture to suggest that if far more people understood the issues
better and were honestly informed that there were other (cheaper) options
available, this latter result might actually be far nearer to a true opinion.

The bottom line is that policy in regard to an issue as important and complex
as WLT should be based on all information (and that includes the full detail
of the MORI report). What appears to have been done is that one headline
statistic has been extracted for political expediency. To quote Andrew Lang,

"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts-for support rather than
illumination."

David Bradley