The political cauldron has turned red hot as we wait for the details of the coalition’s October spending review.  But, first up – the Labour leadership contest.  The party’s new leader will be announced on Saturday at the start of its conference in Manchester.

Our system analysed around 6,000 mentions of the contest in real-time, in online and social media over the past couple of weeks.  Ed Balls had the strongest share of voice with 26.8%.  David Miliband took second spot with 25.2%.

Figure 1: Share of voice for Labour leadership contenders – 2/9 to 16/9

But, the sentiment analysis for the discussion showed Ed Miliband has had the highest proportion of positive mentions with 33.5%.

Ed Balls may have captured the conversation but he had the lowest proportion of positive mentions among all the contenders with 28.4%.  David Miliband and Ed Balls had the highest proportion of negative mentions at 6.3%.

Figure 2: Sentiment expressed towards Labour leadership contenders – 2/9 to 16/9

There’s been a a bit of a buzz around Ed Miliband with speculation he could win after second votes on discounted candidate ballot papers have been counted.  His older brother David has been firm favourite.

Mike Smithson on Political Betting (13/9) reported the results of last week’s Sunday Times YouGov poll of members and trade unionists, some of whom had already voted.   The results indicated that Ed Miliband has taken a small lead.

David Miliband was by far the most popular choice among Labour voters according to the results of a recent ComRes poll.  But, the leader will be elected by members and trade unions so the YouGov poll could be more accurate on the outcome.

Whoever wins, it could be a very close result.

Our next political analysis will be the coalition’s spending review.