Posted by Prof Neil Carter
Although the final tranche of polls show little change from other recent polls, there is a slight firming up of support for the Conservatives. The majority of the polls are within 1 point of CON 36%, LAB 28%, LDEM 27%. What does this mean in terms of seats? On a uniform swing those percentages would translate into a seat distribution of Conservatives 297, Labour 245 and Lib Dems 76. But that probably won’t happen because there is good evidence that the Conservatives are outperforming the national swing in the Labour-Conservative marginal seats. Conservative gains in those seats will be tempered by a strong Liberal Democrat performance in Conservative-Liberal Democrat marginal seats. The other big uncertainty is how far the strong swing to the Liberal Democrats in the North will eat into the Labour vote in seats where the Liberal Democrats cannot win, thereby allowing the Conservatives to secure previous Labour strongholds.
Here are a few people who have nailed their colours to the mast:
Anthony Wells (UK Polling Report): CON 300-310, LAB 220-230, LD 80-90
TNS pollsters: CON 292, LAB 204, LD 114.
Peter Kellner (YouGov): CON 300-310, LAB 230-240, LDEM 75-85.
Angus Reid (pollsters) CON 320-340, LAB 165-185, LDEM 105-120.
And what are the bookies saying? As I write this piece at 10.35am, the Sporting Index spreads are: CON 315-320, LAB 216-221, LD 78-82.
