The bookies say bets are pouring in on a Labour majority – but that doesn’t mean it’s a clever gamble

As the opinion polls show a surge in Labour support, there’s been a rush to put money on Jeremy Corbyn moving into Number 10

Do the punters know something we pundits and the bookmakers don’t?

Oddschecker produces a rather nice pie chart featuring the most popular bets on the markets it covers. Casually perusing the general election majority page for inspiration, I was caught by surprise.

The chart showed that a Labour majority is scooping up more than one in every five of the bets placed, this despite it being a best priced 25-1 (it probably won’t please the party’s spinners to learn that their slice was coloured lime green).

Only one bookie (Unibet) was still offering that price at the time of writing. But to put it in context, more commonly available 20-1 represents an implied probably of less than 5 per cent.

“Over the last 24 hours a Labour majority has been our most popular selection out of all the markets at 20/1,” said Paddy Power’s Lee Price when I raised the issue with him.

So is this the pitter patter of rainfall before the thunder rumbles and the lightning strikes at the misinformation machine known as factcheckUK, sorry, Conservative HQ? Could Johnson really be left contemplating a return to his career coughing up bile as a columnist after 12 December?

You can probably leave your brolly at home for now.

Paddy Power is holding the 20/1 and there’s a reason for that.

While there are a large number of bets for Labour in this market, the big money is elsewhere. It’s wagered on a Tory majority at 4/9.

It’s worth nothing that some of the bookmaker’s rivals are in to 16-1 on Labour springing the political shock of a century that has already seen an awful lot of them. One of them is William Hill. In an earlier column, I revealed that Hill has changed its election pricing methodology to take a greater account of the number of bets as opposed to the weight of money. It’s because the numbers beat the money in both the EU referendum (where the former came for Leave) and the US presidential election (the numbers backed Trump, the money was for Hillary Clinton).

But it’s hard to imagine the numbers ending up smiling after this one.

All 20-1 shots are not the same. A horse at that price in a 30 runner sprint handicap at Royal Ascot, from a big stable and with a name jockey, is moving into quietly fancied territory. It getting its nose in front wouldn’t come as a big surprise.

By contrast, a Labour majority looks like a no hoper. In the same race, it’d be the sort of horse that’s scraped in at the bottom of the handicap when it would be better off running on the all weather at Lingfield.

Labour’s best bet remains a hung parliament. The odds on that have been creeping in a bit, just as the polls have narrowed a bit.

But the Tories are still at the head of the field even after a dismal, dishonest and gaffe filled campaign in which fresh revelations about Johnson’s unpleasant character seem to emerge daily.

As Price says: “While they (Labour) have seen an increase in the polls, they would realistically need to leapfrog the Conservatives and add another 10 points to their poll rating. With just over a week to go it looks too big an ask.”

It’s hard to disagree with that assessment.

Still, anyone looking for a consolation prize or two might like to pay attention to the Esher & Walton market where the Liberal Democrats are running strong in foreign secretary Dominic Raab’s seat.

Monica Harding’s odds of becoming the first non-Tory to represent the constituency since 1906 were cut to 6/4 from 5/2 this morning with the aforementioned oddsmaker.

The problem with this election is that voters look set to reward Johnson’s terrible behaviour. That’s a very bad message to send to politicians.

If the punters are correct, however, the voters of Esher & Walton might be preparing to show that there is a price to pay for being awful. Raab’s conduct with respect to the grieving family of Harry Dunn, mown down by the wife of American woman given diplomatic immunity, has been that.