Tories struggling in Lib Dem marginals

[Anarcho-Socialist]

New figures suggest Lib Dems will hold onto almost all of the seats the Tories need to win.

The headline figures from the latest opinion polls may be fascinating but they are a poor guide to the likely outcome of the election. For a better understanding, we need to look at what is happening in the key Lib Dem-Tory marginals.

Thankfully, PoliticalBetting's Mike Smithson has published a sub-set of data from the latest Angus Reid poll which goes some way to enabling this. The figures show that in the 62 seats currently held by Nick Clegg's party, the Lib Dems are on 44 per cent, the Tories on 23 per cent and Labour on 19 per cent.

A lead of this size suggests, as Smithson writes, that the Lib Dems will keep almost all of the seats they won in 2005. This finding correlates with one from last week's Crosby/Textor poll for the Telegraph (carried out before Cleggmania) which found that that the Conservatives would fail to win any of the 20 key Lib Dem-Tory marginals.

It's all bad news for David Cameron. Of the 117 seats his party needs to gain for a majority of one, 23 are currently held by the Lib Dems.

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2010/04/lib-dems-tories-seats-figures

This is very encouraging.

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. Very good news for round me

The MP in my former constituency (before boundary changes) is the most vulnerable of all - majority over the Tories of 125 in 2005, and the changes may have increased that to a massive 140 or so). And Chris Huhne, next door in Eastleigh, is also vulnerable (just a 0.9% majority; though that's with Eastleigh council being overwhelmingly Lib Dem - 37, to 5 Tories, in mostly the same area (apart from the Chandler's Ford bit where I live, which is 50-50 Lib Dem/Tory).

[TheBigotBasher]

2. I wonder how Lib Dems are doing in

Labour and Conservative held marginals where they polled second. That is over 190 seats that this bounce could potentially give them in possibilities not even dreamed of before the start of this election.

Clegg needs to manage expectations better though. At the moment he is almost expected to walk in to the next debate and beat Brown and Cameron around with a big club (would make for interesting tv). All Cameron and Brown need to do to secure a "win" from this next debate is just say their name properly.

[T_i_B]

3. It's worth remembering...

...how many of those seats are very safe for Labour and Conservatives. Looking at Sheffield for instance you've got one safe Lib Dem seat, one Labour / Lib Dem marginal and three safe Labour seats where a donkey wearing a red rosette could get in. The Lib Dems are not going to win Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough off Blunkett for instance as they are just too far behind Labour round there.

And of course in other places a donkey wearing a blue rosette would win and you would have a similar situation with the Tories and Lib Dems.

[BolivarianHero]

4. Either way...

If you're dumb enough to vote for either the party that fellated Dumbya or the party of Thatcher, you deserve your shit sandwich.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. There's a list of Lib Dem target seats here

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/guide/liberal-democrat-target-seats

As T_i_B says, many are too solidly Labour or Tory to be realistic. Going down to the one Sheffield seat that might be in contention - Sheffield Central - that needs a swing from Labour of 8%, ir Labour lose 8% and Lib Dems gain 8% from last time - so the notional 2005 result of Lab 46.6%, LD 30.6% becomes LD 38.6%, Lab 38.6%. That swing is roughly where the polls are now - Labour down from a national 35% to 27%, Lib Dems up from 22% to 30%.

But the swing against the Tories isn't so much - they're currently around 32% nationally, about the same as they got in 2005. So the Tory-Lib Dem swing is only about 4%.

From the target list, that would mean the Lib Dems gaining about 16 Tory seats, and 28 Labour seats. So that looks like 100-110 Lib Dem seats in total, when added to what they've already got.

Every week, PoliticsHome aggregates the week's YouGov polls to have enough to break it down by region. Here's the one from Monday, using data from April 11th-18th - ie mainly before the debate, but including a couple from after it: http://www.politicshome.com/uk/article/8065/the_view_from_the_regions_19_april_10.html

It shows there is regional variation - the Tories were at 50% in the South East, 5% better than in 2005, compared to the Lib Dems being on 25% - exactly the same as 2005. However, that was compared to 52% and 19% from the week before, so the debate, even with only a third or so of the survey after it, seems to have had a significant effect. A lot of the Lib Dem target seats are in the South East, or other areas where the Tories are strong, so it will be interesting to see next week's regional breakdown, which will be post-1st debate (with a little post-2nd).

[T_i_B]

6. The other thing to remember about Sheffield Central

is that due to redistricting some solid Labour areas like Burngreave have been moved out and some Lib Dem areas like my old stomping ground of Broomhill have been moved into the constituency by the boundary comission. Therefore it's a lot more marginal then it was in 2005.

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. Yeah, that 16% margin is after the boundary changes

The majority in 2005 for the old constituency was 23.6%: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/vote2005/html/511.stm

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. Bookmakers' odds for each seat, where they've quoted it

Whether they've used local knowledge, or just set the odds from national swings, we can't tell.

eg for the Sheffield Central seat - Labour still favourite, but the Lib Dems are close:

http://www.oddschecker.com/specials/politics-and-election/sheffield-central/winning-party

All seats available from the pulldown menu.