Monday lived up to its "pollercoaster" repuation with the usual three GB-wide polls, after an ICM/Guardian Scottish poll. I'll post an update on Scotland shortly, but in the meantime here’s John Curtice’s analysis, and Tom Clark’s Guardian writeup. Essentially there’s very little change at all from ICM’s last Scottish poll in December:
ICM/Gdn (Scot WM) SNP 43 (=) CON 14 (+1) LAB 27 (+1) LIB 6 (=) UKIP 7 (=) GRN 3 (-1) D 13-19 N=1002 Writeup http://t.co/FFDFtX7miN #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
Populus showed very little change from Friday, confirming the lack of anything but the most ephemeral budget bounce:
Populus: CON 31 (=) LAB 33 (-1) LIB 9 (=) UKIP 16 (-1) GRN 5 (=) Fieldwork 20th-22nd N=2,035 Tabs http://t.co/9mg4yiDRaK #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
The Ashcroft National Poll looks a lot like the big two squeezing the smaller parties, with their combined share jumping six points. Although that matches what we’ve been seeing recently, underlying trend is likely to be a bit more gradual.
Ashcroft National: CON 33 (+2) LAB 33 (+4) LIB 8 (=) UKIP 12 (-3) GRN 5 (-3) Dates 20th-22nd N=1,003 Tabs http://t.co/wMii9hdAQZ #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
Lord Ashcroft’s focus group report makes fascinating reading as always, and backs up idea that a huge number of voters remain undecided. This is how some of those undecided voters visualise the leaders as bands and musicians:
ANP (ldrs as bands): DC Take That/Coldplay/Bieber/Keith Urban EM Wham/Daniel O’Donnell NC Lighthouse Family/Simply Red/Cliff NF Sex Pistols
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
And finally YouGov’s daily poll for tomorrow’s Sun showed a tie. We remain pretty much all square, as the “short campaign” draws near:
YouGov/Sun: CON 34 (+1) LAB 34 (-1) LIB 8 (=) UKIP 12 (-2) GRN 6 (+1) Fieldwork 20th-21st #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
And as if four polls weren’t enough, Monday seemed to deliver some great reading/listening material too. Yesterday I mentioned house effects – right on cue, Anthony Wells over at UKPR has posted a must-read piece about different pollsters’ methodologies. Meanwhile in Cardiff, Roger Scully and Richard Wyn Jones gave a presentation on the electoral outlook in Wales:
And what are the betting markets saying about #GE2015? Leighton Williams from Nottingham Business School spoke to BBC Westminster Hour about the difference between tradable markets and polls. And on that score, it’s worth noting that betting markets were barely moved on David Cameron’s comments regarding his future – as always we’ll have to wait a little longer to see if the polls react.
And finally:
Whether @adamboultonSKY is right or not, at least this comment is highly entertaining… #GE2015 pic.twitter.com/JhFWyjrLhe
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) March 23, 2015
Tomorrow we’ll get another YouGov for the Sun, with Survation for the Mirror and the now-weekly ComRes/Mail phone poll both expected in the next couple of days.
