Worst, Graph, Ever
Posted: Tuesday 22 December 2009 by Chris Hyland in Labels: euros, graphs, toriesI'm usually hardest on the Lib Dems for putting out misleading graphs on election literature, with good reason. However I have been alerted to what is possibly the most ridiculous election graph I have ever seen from Manchester Conservatives, displayed prominently on their homepage, highlighting the change in votes in the European elections in Manchester:
(The top number is the total votes each party got in Manchester, the lower number is the change from the 2004 election)
I think it's the only graph I've seen where the heights of the bars are in the wrong order, it's obvious to anyone looking that not only did the Greens place higher than the Tories in Manchester we also increased our vote by over three times as much. In fact if you plot the heights as a percentage change (eg Greens 8350 -> 12225 46.41%) it looks like this:
(I had to reduce the font size on the blue bar because it was so small)
For completeness here's the graph where the height of the arrows represents the number of votes changed:
I can see why they might have wanted to go with the one they did. Makes their achievement seem slightly less insignificant.
It's also worth pointing out that the value the Tories give for their own vote was wrong, they actually got 11,896 votes in Manchester.
Hat Tip to Marc Hudson of Manchester Climate Fortnightly.
Incredible - Labour with the highest vote are shown are the party in fourth place - worse still even in terms of the graph the Greens should be ahead of the Tories, more votes, better increase.
Hilarious. Thank you so much for this.