What a day! Five new GB-wide polls, a Scottish poll and a Northern Ireland panel forecast. First up we had TNS, which was polled over the bank holiday weekend and showed Labour 3 points ahead. The five previous TNS polls this year have either shown the Conservatives and Labour neck-and-neck, or Labour way out (at least 6 points) in front, so a three-point Labour lead is a bit of a novelty:
TNS: CON 30 (-3) LAB 33 (+1) LIB 8 (=) UKIP 19 (+3) GRN 4 (-1) Fieldwork 2nd-7th N=1,207 Tabs http://t.co/gHd8uw1Fw9
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
Panelbase, having shown the parties neck-and-neck in their first GB poll, showed a six-point Labour lead:
Panelbase: CON 31 (-2) LAB 37 (+4) LIB 8 (+1) UKIP 16 (-1) GRN 4 (-1) Fieldwork 7th-9th #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
And Survation, will fieldwork entirely after Labour's non-dom policy announcement, showed Labour gaining a couple of points and, interestingly, recorded higher net ratings for Ed Miliband than David Cameron:
Survation/Mirror: CON 31 (=) LAB 35 (+2) LIB 9 (=) UKIP 15 (-3) GRN 4 (+1) Fieldwork post-#nomdom Biggest Labour lead for 3 weeks #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
ComRes/Mail/ITV, the only phone poll (so far) this week, found a one-point Tory lead. That's quite a bit lower than the four-point lead in their previous poll, though it's not clear whether that was a bit of a blip (and if so, how much):
ComRes/Mail/ITV: CON 34 (-2) LAB 33 (+1) LIB 12 (+3) UKIP 12 (=) GRN 4 (-1) #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
And a few minutes later, YouGov/Sun also showed a 1-point Conservative lead, but the move was in the opposite direction:
YouGov/Sun: CON 35 (+1) LAB 34 (-1) LIB 8 (=) UKIP 12 (-1) GRN 4 (-1) Fieldwork 8th-9th #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
So taking all of the polls together, four of the five have moved in Labour's favour, one towards the Tories. But only two of today's five national polls had fieldwork entirely after Labour's non-dom policy announcement, and those two moved in opposite directions. I would suggest that the jury's still out on the impact of the non-dom row, even though the polling on the issue itself has been very solidly in favour of Labour’s policy.
YouGov also polled for the Times in Scotland, reporting their biggest ever SNP lead, following (and quite possibly related to) the first debate in which they found Nicola Sturgeon to be the clear winner:
YouGov/Times (Scotland): SNP 49 (+3) CON 18 (+2) LAB 25 (-4) LIB 4 (+1) Fieldwork 8th-9th Biggest ever YouGov lead for #SNP #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
In Northern Ireland, LucidTalk’s panel forecast for the Belfast Telegraph showed the same seat numbers as the previous edition, but with increased confidence in the DUP retaking Belfast East from the APNI. You can read Bill White’s full analysis here.
LucidTalk/Belfast Telegraph forecast (NI): DUP 9 SF 5 SDLP 3 IND 1 Main change is that they're much more confident re Belfast E. #GE2015
— NumbrCrunchrPolitics (@NCPoliticsUK) April 9, 2015
Tomorrow might not be quite as dramatic, but then again, it might! We expect Populus in the morning, YouGov for the Sun and/or The Times later, and possibly the Evening Standard poll from Ipsos MORI, at their pre-election event in London.
