General Election Polling - completely off

[Rusty101]

Just been looking at the polling for mine and 2 neighbouring seats and I really do think it is way off the mark. I know the demographic pretty well and the prediction of Labour wiping out these conservative seats doesn’t really seem likely. It’s the shy Tory syndrome where people don’t want to admit that they will be voting for them. Anyone else feel the same when looking at the polling in their area?

www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/newseatlookup.html

Most of the political coverage I've seen around polls has pointed out that ones that look at individual seat swings - have different outcomes -though all with Labour majority- and it's because many seats are too close to call really.

There's also an issue with polls when share of votes dip below 30% mark it make it harder to predict and Tory have done that this time. Most of the commentary been about how many undecided voters there are and how firm many are even when pushed that they are still undecided.

There was senior retried Labour politician speaking in Wales yesterday they thought there won't be such a huge % of the vote as predicated but that they'll still take large proportion of the seats.

Absolutely agree.

Or as my late DF confessed later, “I didn’t want to leave the EU but I hated Cameron and wanted to reduce his majority for Remain so I voted Leave” 😵‍💫🙄

Can you tell us what the constituencies are, so we can check later to see what happened?

Absolutely. But equally, it's quite clear that Tory HQ has had quite a presence on here during the campaign.

That’s what a majority means, more than all the other parties put together. Boris had a majority of 80 because the conservatives won 365 seats and all the other parties together won 285. This was considered a ‘large majority’. The conservatives could have done whatever they liked with it but chose to collapse into culture wars and infighting instead.

Labour are predicted to win more than that.

That 'Labour will start charging people for grammar schools' thread comes to mind.

The only difference I can see is that the smaller majority Labour get the more power factions in the party might have to withhold their votes on legislation.

Like the ERG have done for decades in the Tories.

If Labour have a nice big majority then their version of the ERG Tories won't be so powerful.

The best thing for strong and stable government is to end the "tail wagging the dog" chaos we've had with the ERG faction of the Tories and give Keir Starmer a good sized working majority.

It's the same situation here. Lib Dem are very visible and the candidate is local and very well known! The Labour candidate is neither.

Weirdly, this poll predicts Labour as second, but the reality is Lib Dems are strong here and have replaced a Tory councillor on the council. (Small steps!). We're not an area Labour bothering to campaign in.

John Major had an overall majority of 20 something and managed to do an awful lot of damage , including the privatisation of Rail. Cameron had no overall majority. But his Austerity paved the way for a Brexit protest vote and left the door open for grifters and unhinged fanatics.

It's not all about size - it's what you do with it . 😉

Very true @Abhannmor

Governments with small or non existent majorities are also more likely to be held hostage to the extremist wing of the party.

Which constituency are you in?

You’d think so

the posters who keep referring to tory bots all the time remind me of the whole ‘reds under the bed’ thing of mccarthyism 😀

Personally ill be pleased when the tory AND labour bots disappear

I've just googled looking to see if there was a decent Independent candidate to vote for, apparently (not that I've had any door knocks or leaflets) there is a Rejoin candidate. At least I can do an anti Brexit vote, and not be stuck with spoiling my vote.

I don’t doubt there are shit stirrers on mumsnet at the moment but i think you would be very silly just to think its only the one political party

It's definitely not just the one, not at all. I've seen posts that had strong Russian troll farm energy in the past too. The Tory ones are just more obvious at the moment, that's all.

It always amazes me how many people are completely unaware of the way in which political parties and movements utilise online spaces like this.

Thanks, we do indeed. He hasn't covered himself in glory desperately trying to cling on!

In this part of the constituency he is campaigning on one issue pretty much (and how Labour will undo his work)

It being safe Labour is a big change here, as a constituency made up of mill towns, national park and rural voters we seem to change sides every time!

I don’t think it will be the big Labour majority that is being predicted.

We are a border change constituency so will be interesting what we end up with come Friday. All local constituency’s were conservative and we were Labour but I think the Labour majority came from the town that we were with which is now its own constituency. Also the recent bi-election turned 1 blue seat red and the other blue seats have had a bit of controversy lately. In my area I’ve only seen Labour placards in gardens but lots of reform followers on social media.

We’ve also had Kier, Angela Raynor, Nigel Farage visiting our area and some q&a’s from all the parties as local events so they clearly think they all have a chance

Reform have been all over it as soon as the starting pistol went. Their online presence is incredibly strong.

I didn't see that one. I'd vote for a party that got rid of state faith schools though.

I live in an area that has been traditionally been very Tory. But the demographic has been changing a bit, and there's a very small chance it could go Libdem.

I'd like to see my MP go as he's useless, and supported Liz Truss. But there are lots of people around here who think Boris is a lovely "young" man and will vote for anything in a blue rosette.

Absolutely

i do not have a bot radar though…im rubbish at spotting them

And what noble said

I expect both main parties have been 'working' on here recently.

It’s certainly interesting. I think KS had alienated a lot of the female vote and his comments in the last few days are perhaps a realisation that it’s not quite in the bag yet.