Jeremy Corbyn supporters were over the moon on Tuesday after bookmakers released odds of him becoming prime minister.
The Twitter account ‘Jeremy Corbyn for PM’ which describes itself as the “team behind #JezWeCan” and has a huge following of 122,000, enthusiastically declared Corbyn “favourite to take over from Theresa May”.
But when you actually examine what the odds mean...
Then Ladbrokes stepped in...
Ouch.
Undeterred Corbyn supporters continued to suggest it was a favourable position to be in compared to this time last year.
Then things got even worse...
The Mirror’s Mikey Smith then asked for some context.
This basically means Ed Miliband had a greater than 50% chance of becoming PM in 2012 and we all know how that ended.
Many were quick to jump on the misplaced enthusiasm.
Outside of the world of bookmakers, Corbyn’s chances of becoming PM are even worse according to analysis from the Electoral Calculus.
Research released yesterday concluded Labour has a 0% chance of winning a snap general election, leaving Theresa May to storm home with a majority of 90 seats.
The shock report prompted Labour MP Graham Jones to encourage party members to “sit up and take note” in a post on Twitter.
The study found that Labour would lose 50 MPs as a result of both new constituency boundaries and current voting intention if a snap poll was called.
While the new boundaries have not been confirmed or voted on, the Electoral Calculus projected its own based on previous proposals and updated voter geography.
Their findings would leave Her Majesty’s Opposition with a 0% statistical chance of forming the next majority government and only a 2% possibility of governing in coalition with the SNP and Plaid Cymru.
Leadership contender Owen Smith revealed recently that if he won the Labour contest there would be “no backroom deal” with Nicola Sturgeon’s party to keep May out of office.
There is only a 1% chance of Labour returning to power bolstered by the two nationalist parties and the Liberal Democrats.