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

Bozza had a whopping great majority of 80 seats. He could have just told the nutters to 'do one' and negotiated a reasonable Brexit. Instead he was " high on his own supply". Party on dude....

If Labour has a big win it is because people are dissatisfied with current conditions and not because of the quality of anyone in Labour party or their policies. They are totally lackluster now compared to Blair election.

We're in a very safe Tory seat, but DH said that night the electoral calculus has changed to LibDems winning. That would be a shock result. DD thinks a lot of the younger people in our immediate area will be voting LibDems, which even so that doesn't seem enough to make a difference.

We should remember that there is a variation of about 200 seats between the extremes of current polling so the uncertainty is acknowledged.

I don't fully understand the maths of MRPs and polling but the most important thing is the people choosing the assumptions the model will work under have a nose for political change, good understanding of psychology and knowledge of local factors.

Brexit was a big thing in the last two elections. It's not in this one.

The biggest issues for most people are probably the Economy in general, the Cost of Living in particular, and the NHS? Immigration in certain quarters.

The Tories are not strong on these policy areas.

Some people are tribal and would vote for a mongoose with a blue rosette.

But how many?

His problem was that he'd kicked so much of the moderate wing out already, before the 2019 GE. It's really the only example in recent British political history of an incumbent government having done that to itself in advance. Quite the Faustian pact, as it turned out.

I've just checked out two constituencies I know to have always been Tory safe seats, in different parts of the country and both showing a shift to Lib Dem.

John Curtice is usually pretty bang on so I’ll wait to see what he has to say at 10.05 tomorrow.

EC has ours going red despite being a safe Tory seat (over 60% of the vote) for decades and historically one or maybe two lib Dems many years ago. A few other poll sites did have it as staying blue by a few points. I find it highly unlikely it will go to Labour. We've had a small boundary change, but nothing significant. However we did lose a fairly high profile MP and they've parachuted in a new guy from the other end of the country, which may have an impact.

Unfortunately, our Labour candidate was on the local council and isn't considered particularly effective, so this works against them. It will be interesting to see the results come in (quite late, usually so not one to stay up for) but I'm not at all confident. I'm hoping I managed to sway DH on his postal vote the other day as he was quite undecided to the last minute, but I was stressing how close it could be and the importance of tactical voting!

All 46 of them!

well if mumsnet is to be believed, the tories might only retain 1 seat and labour will get the 528648364784 other seats. :) - i can tell you tho, no one i know is voting labour... but you know. Majority, landslide, hooray KS etc etc.

Interestingly, almost everyone I know is voting Labour. I'd be really surprised if the polls were wrong about this particular former Tory 'blue wall' stronghold turning red.

I have it on good authority that after mis-measuring the likelihood of a Brexit vote, the major polling companies have changed their methods and are much more accurate. They are measuring many factors, including intention to vote on the day, how someone has voted historically. where they voted previously, what their voting intentions are this time, detailed demographic information on age, sex, educational background, profession, income, property ownership... I am inclined to trust that they are as accurate as it is possible to be. But they are still polls. Only the real votes actually count.

Even the Tories are conceding defeat today.

https://apple.news/A4zi9hmORSdmxktO0RMmRDg

Ours has been a strong Tory seat all the years I've lived here but is now showing Labour wipe out, which will be interesting.

The polls are usually around right. Certainly have been for the last couple of elections. Why would they suddenly be wrong?

I think that preference falsification has had the biggest effect in this election, more than any other in British history.
I think it will be a lot closer than a lot of the polling is predicting.
Labour will have a majority, but vulnerable to the Left in the party.
The Tories will fall apart for a few years.

I think the Conservative voters on here are as lacking in understanding as the government.

They don’t seem to understand that the majority of the country hate them and want them gone. There seems to be no understanding of why people want this.

Absolutely - I don't remember the Tories ever being concerned about a democracy when they had a large majority.

Same here, lots of leaflets from all parties through the door but no actual canvassers

We’ve only had two leaflets from Labour. Not a whisper from anyone else. It’s a boundary change seat too, although polls have it safer Labour.

Long-standing, fairly popular Tory with solid majority in ours. For the first time this century there's a promising Labour candidate with real local credentials, and it looks like Reform will also take a chunk out of the incumbent's existing base. Lib Dem and Greens are both extremely inexperienced and unlikely to take more than token/protest votes. Most predictions are Labour win by a whisker, but it's going to be tight; I suspect it'll be a Tory hold. I've seen hardly any "Vote x" signs in houses but a couple of huge billboards in favour of the Tory. I imagine most of the other constituents can't afford the cardboard...

DS1's constituency currently blue, saw a couple of polls saying Labour were in with a chance, but DS's observation plus history of the area strongly suggest LibDem is the best tactical choice. That's what he and DIL and I think DIL's family will be going for.

This is fascinating. Looking at Clacton who will overwhelmingly vote for Farage, and then the education, employment and deprivation levels for voters...its not a surprise really is it.

Gosh, its almost like your circle of friends aren't the only ones responsible for the vote in a country of 66 Million people.....

There is a fair bit of variation in the polls.

This is because of a number of factors - how they handle the don't knows - some just leave them out, some ask follow up questions (if a gun was against your head who would you vote for etc etc)

However they're all showing a Labour victory. All of them,

They might all be wrong - stranger things have happened - but I personally wouldn't be betting on it.

We'll know soon anyway

An elderly relative has been a labour voter all her life. She lives in Skegness, Lincolnshire which has been a safe Tory seat for the past 9 years.

She'll be voting Tory tomorrow for the first time ever, doesn't want to but there's massive support for Reform and tactical voting may prevent them getting in.
Labour has no chance and it would be a wasted vote.