Interesting UtterlyPerfect. My mum is a lifelong Tory in a massive Tory stronghold. This time she's voting Green
DH was in Esther McVey's neck of the woods yesterday. By pure chance he bumped into a man with a yellow rosette. The local candidate. Then a woman came up and said to the man 'hi I'm a life long Tory. I'm glad I've bumped into you. This time I want to vote LD'.
Esther took over from George. And before George it was Martin Bell. And before Martin Bell it was Neil Hamilton. Its a constituency with an interesting history... Esther has a reputation as a rather poor constituency MP (George by contrast had a surprisingly good local rep there despite being a cabinet minister)
Also a thread from yesterday:
Paul Brand@paulbranditv
Have spent the day speaking to experienced candidates in Labour marginals - seats Tories need to win. Some interesting findings:
1. All Labour candidates say “it feels like 2017”. They don’t expect Labour to win majority but they aren’t expecting huge landslide to Tories either.
2. They are picking up major voter fatigue and disengagement. Many expect a low turnout with little enthusiasm for another election. Which is interesting, because Tories need voters to feel motivated to ‘give Parliament a kicking’ by getting out and voting Conservative.
3. For Labour candidates, Corbyn is raised as an issue more frequently than Brexit. Antisemitism and other issues have cut through with voters since 2017. Boris Johnson is also proving polarising on the doorstep, especially among women.
4. None of this is scientific, but I am making a conscious effort in this election not to be solely informed by polls and to remain connected to candidates on doorstep. I welcome any to drop me a line. The candidates I’ve spoken to admit that the battle varies from seat to seat.
This is the second thread from a journalist to say very similar.
What I've picked up this time compared with last time in my local area is more people saying they don't know who to vote for. Last time they were much more likely to be Labour. But widespread dissatisfaction and not knowing what to do. I do think women turnout will be particularly low.
DH has also been to a high leave area and was talking to someone who said because they speak in another language when drunk (Welsh - it's a border constituency) they no longer go to their local because of the English nationalists. That's new.
My impression is that Lib Dem support is up and motivated. As is nationalists. Which would tie with the euro result. How it plays out depends on what labour and con moderates do. But if that's the case we could either get some shock results... Or a massive tory landslide via the backdoor (or both).