Principalfish Nowcast

[elinorhelyn]

principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/?map=prediction

I always find the principalfish Nowcast fascinating, they currently have Labour winning seats like Aylesbury and Banbury and this is in a hung parliament their saying. How does their methodology work?

[The Bishop]

On that evidence, not terribly well?

[iain]

Not very well by the looks of things.

[elinorhelyn]

Tbf to principalfish I can see Southern towns outside London like Aylesbury and Banbury trend towards Labour as the Londonification takes place there and other places like it in the future but certainly not that quickly within one electoral cycle

[The Bishop]

And equally, Aylesbury has arguably for some time been somewhere Labour "should" do better than it actually does.

Their progress has been hindered by the fact the LibDems are very well dug in there, in local elections at least.

[elinorhelyn]

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

[jamie]

Jan 29, 2021 12:34:41 GMT elinorhelyn said:

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

They seem to be assuming a car crash performance by Labour in Wales with the Tories comfortably ahead. The most obvious ‘only in a model’ prediction I can find is Brecon and Radnorshire which has Labour going from 10% to 2% despite the Lib Dem’s also losing votes. 

[mondialito]

Jan 29, 2021 12:34:41 GMT elinorhelyn said:

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

Tories gaining Battersea is a hardy perennial. Not inconceivable of course, but it would require them to abandon their anti-London culture war first.

[bjornhattan]

Jan 29, 2021 12:27:17 GMT The Bishop said:

And equally, Aylesbury has arguably for some time been somewhere Labour "should" do better than it actually does.

Their progress has been hindered by the fact the LibDems are very well dug in there, in local elections at least.

Aylesbury town is certainly winnable for Labour, but about a third of the constituency's voters live in extremely Conservative rural areas. It's difficult to see Labour getting many votes out of Wendover or any of the villages up in the Chilterns! Boundary changes will help since any new Aylesbury constituency will be more tightly drawn around the town, but it's still a tall order.

The prospect of Labour gaining Banbury is interesting, but they seem to predict that based purely on regional swing, which may not apply there. Banbury is very much out on a limb in the South East "region", and the town itself looks just as much to the Midlands as it does southwards - so I'd expect its swing to be somewhere between the West Midlands figure (6%) and the South East figure (16%).

[jamie]

South Norfolk has a 3% Conservative majority...

[bjornhattan]

Jan 29, 2021 12:34:41 GMT elinorhelyn said:

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

They have the Conservatives coming third in Hitchin and Harpenden.

[gwynthegriff]

Have they really got Rees-Mogg losing to Labour ?

[elinorhelyn]

Jan 29, 2021 12:49:06 GMT gwynthegriff said:

Have they really got Rees-Mogg losing to Labour ?

Tbf their is a large LD vote to eat into in that constituency, maybe not enough to win the seat, but certainly enough to make it more marginal than it is now

[elinorhelyn]

Jan 29, 2021 12:42:41 GMT mondialito said:

Jan 29, 2021 12:34:41 GMT elinorhelyn said:

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

Tories gaining Battersea is a hardy perennial. Not inconceivable of course, but it would require them to abandon their anti-London culture war first.

I think you misread Battersea, it actually has it being having a 5 figure majority for Labour now.

[rivers10]

I havent looked in depth but have they fell into the old trap of treating Wales and Scotland specific polls (often from a while ago) as gospel and then imposing the results onto more recent GB wide polls resulting in Labour being well down in both Scotland and Wales but surging ahead in England in order to attain the GB wide tied figure that the national polls indicate?

From my brief glance thats what seems to be happening here and it results in some herculean swings to Labour in many English seats at the same time their losing seats in Wales

[European Lefty]

Jan 29, 2021 12:34:41 GMT elinorhelyn said:

Any of you spot any other freak seat projections you'd like to comment on?

Rochford & Southend East, Orkney & Shetland, Edinburgh South, Gower, Llanelli, Rushcliffe, the two Bournemouth seats......

Also Labour gaining Scunthorpe but not Grimsby seems unlikely

[European Lefty]

And a Labour majority of 32% in Bedford!

[Andrew_S]

Jan 29, 2021 12:11:08 GMT elinorhelyn said:

principalfish.co.uk/electionmaps/?map=prediction

I always find the principalfish Nowcast fascinating, they currently have Labour winning seats like Aylesbury and Banbury and this is in a hung parliament their saying. How does their methodology work?

If Labour won 400 seats Aylesbury and Banbury would probably not be among them. They also have a 4,000 Tory majority in Finchley. Im fascinated to know how they can be so bad at forecasting.

[pragmaticidealist]

They have a disproportionate thing going on where (for example) they are assuming that the Lib Dem vote would decline to 1% or less in various places where it was over 5% in 2019, and that the Labour would surge in the likes of Guildford. Not likely to happen.

Also, is there a way of seeing the raw vote totals in each constituency? It seems to show the majorities in each, and the national popular vote.

[andrewp]

What have they done there?! A bigger Conservative majority in Newport West than Central Devon, Labour getting within 1800 of the Conservatives in Central Devon