This is lengthy and boring, but a collection of thoughts about what the EU election highlights beyond rather shallow leave v remain tropes.
I've just done a bit of number crunching on what Ashcroft says.
He says that 2017 Con Voters who voted on Thursday break down into:
1,512,147 in total who actually voted Con
3,516517 who voted Brexit Party (out of 5,248,533 total votes for BP)
808,148 who voted LD (out of 3,367,284 total votes for LD)
So a total of 5,836,812 voters (out of 13,636,684 who voted Tory in 2017).
Of these 5.8 million he has
2,356,066 who went from the Con to Brexit Party who support No Deal
1,160,451 who went from the Con to Brexit Party who DON'T support No Deal (but he doesn't specify what they do support).
544,373 who stayed with the Con Party who support May's Deal
257,065 who stayed with the Con Party who support a Different Deal
211,700 who stayed with the Con Party who support No Deal
423,401 who stayed with the Party who support Remain
727,333 who went to the LDs who support Remain
80,815 who went to the LDs but don't support Remain (its not clear what they do support).
Thats a total of 2,567,766 out of the 5,836,812 the 2017 Tory voters who support no deal. Or roughly 44%.
He has 1,898,919 returning from the Brexit Party to the Tories for next GE
And 177,792 returning from the LD to the Tories for next GE
This would make a total of 3,588,858 currently who are semi-reliable voters planning to vote Tory.
If you assume the worst case, you have 2,110,619 no dealers who are willing to vote Tory based on that. Roughly 58.5%.
But you perhaps would logically think that more extreme no dealers are likely to stay with the brexit party and those who don't support no deal would be the returnees. The lowest level of no dealers possible is 950,168. Roughly 26.4%.
So of the core Loyal Tory Vote which is likely to turnout come rain or shine its probably less than 50% who support no deal. Perhaps you can take those votes for granted. Perhaps you can get more from supporting no deal at a GE... but... (I'll come back to this later)
Its worth noting here that according to Ashcroft's previous data, the Cons lost 1,133,423 voters to Lab between 2015 and 2017, they lost 566,711 to the LD between 2015 and 2017 and gained 2,212,226 voters from UKIP. That was a net gain of 512,092. But its also important to note that UKIP didn't stand in many places in 2017 for tactical financial reasons so this choice to vote Conservative isn't necessarily a first choice anyway.
Also worth pointing out that despite getting 4,376,635 votes at the 2014 EU elections, Farage could only manage 3,881,099 in 2015. Despite the turnout being much higher at the GE (66.2% in 2015 v 35.6 in 2014). Yes Farage got 5,248,533 but that was his 2014 hard core plus a section of the Tory hardcore vote.
You have to conclude that for the most part those who vote UKIP/Brexit Party are not terribly representative of the population as a whole, because they are a) more highly motivated b) much more interested in politics as a whole c) almost always vote.
For the Conservatives to make gains off the back of the ref, they have to be attracting voters who voted Leave in 2016 but don't generally vote. The ones that the ref was won from. Whilst being the incumbent government.
I also note that support for no deal in the general population seems to be somewhere between 25% and 33% no higher than that. And if thats split between the Brexit Party and the Conservatives thats a bit of a problem.
The whole thing about chasing a no deal policy, is chasing a hard core of the vote, which a) isn't necessarily representative of the population wanting no deal b) is going to be split with a Farage led Brexit Party in a way it wasn't in 2017 c) they are the incumbent government who are never going to pick up a lot of the protest leave votes from 2016, no matter what they do d) nor are they going to pick up protest votes at the handling of brexit e) most people are apathetic about Brexit.
My point being where are they going to hover all these extra votes from at GE?
When you look at the numbers above, they actually are pretty meaningless in many respects. The just go round and round in circles and are dead similar and point to a small voting hard core that isn't changing.
Focusing purely on Brexit, which pursing no deal actively forces you to do by default, is going to backfire. Sure you can wheel out Boris as a figure to attract voters but how far is that going to go, if the NHS is dying on its arse?
Whether its no deal or a deal not what anyone is really ultimately interested in. They just want their hospital appointment.
I do think that the Tory Party Election Leadership in this respect has lost all sight of anything and certainly has absoluetely no comprehension of anything else. Its extreme naval gazing.
What does the No Deal Tory Leader offer anyone but a tiny number of people? They probably don't even get past their own party hard core of voters, when you look closely at the numbers!
It will be interesting to see, who - if anyone - gets past Brexit in the contest.
Conversely the Labour Party possibly are not caught in quite the same trap. Their issues are wider than Brexit and are about wider policy and cultural differences between regions. And might dissolve as Brexit is fucked up by the next Tory leader.
Its also worth pointing out that the LDs have the same ceiling issue as the Brexit Party in some ways too. I find it quite something that they won 3,367,284 votes on Thursday on that low turnout compared to 2,371,910 in the 2017 GE and 2,415,916 in the 2015 GE. Again they are highly motivated voters. (Peak LD in 2010 was 6,836,824).
You have to ask the question, what else do all these parties have to offer voters who aren't remotely arsed about Brexit? Policy or personality or tribalism. What the majority of the public are interested in? The usual stuff about health, education etc. And none of that is in sight.
And that IS where the Greens have something. And that for me, is interesting and shows direction. And perhaps is THE most interesting thing out of it all.