Narrowing the gap

[swanarcadian]

A very interesting article by Ben Walker exploring the possibility of the poll gap narrowing in the run up to the general election  (with the New Statesman you have to register to view three free articles a month).   There's a graph showing historical precedents; such as 1969-1970, after which the Tories got a 3 point lead in the popular vote, having been ahead by double digits in the polls for most of the preceding few years.   

www.newstatesman.com/politics/polling/2023/08/polling-data-conservatives-recovery

Thoughts?

[edgbaston]

The ability to narrow the gap so to speak, nearly always depends on how much your former supporters loath your opponent. What are the Tories saving to wheel out?

[mattbewilson]

I can see Tories getting low to mid thirties with labour on low forties

[graham]

Aug 12, 2023 13:03:26 GMT swanarcadian said:

A very interesting article by Ben Walker exploring the possibility of the poll gap narrowing in the run up to the general election  (with the New Statesman you have to register to view three free articles a month).   There's a graph showing historical precedents; such as 1969-1970, after which the Tories got a 3 point lead in the popular vote, having been ahead by double digits in the polls for most of the preceding few years.   

www.newstatesman.com/politics/polling/2023/08/polling-data-conservatives-recovery

Thoughts?

I have made a similar point myself in another forum - though I tend to expect an election on 17th October next year rather than 3rd October. In 1970 Polling Day was 18th June  and the equivalent date to today - using my date - was circa 12th April 1969. There were not as many polls at that time , but NOP conducted a survey 9th - 14th April which recorded a Tory lead of 21.9%. On a GB basis, the Tories won in 1970 by 2.4% - so the lead narrowed by 19.5%. Were that to be repeated over the next 14 months or so the parties would be neck and neck.

NOP had two further surveys in late April and mid May 1969 which actually showed the Tory lead increasing slightly to 22.6% and 23.1% respectively - so the Labour recovery actually occurred over a 13 month period - though Gallup showed a 23.5% Tory lead as late as early July 1969 barely 10 months before Wilson announced the election date.

[The Bishop]

Yes an interesting read, but even assuming that polls half a century ago were accurate there are a few obvious points:

1) Sunak is, manifestly obviously, not Wilson - even his biggest fans would surely blush at such a claim.

2) as we are endlessly told, Starmer is not as popular as Blair pre-1997 - he stands up pretty well to Heath as an opposition leader though.

3) some Tories (and even more so their media cheerleaders) seem to think that a major narrowing of the polls before a GE is some sort of inevitable natural process - this is not the case, save perhaps to a fairly limited degree. Wilson's big recovery was because the economy significantly improved and he appeared to have regained a grip of things more generally; similarly whilst it is often forgotten now the Brown government made quite a decent fist of actually governing from the autumn of 2009 onwards (having seemed to be in near-permanent crisis for the previous few years) Will this one be able to do the same?

4) pollsters already take more account of don't knows and the like (even those that have not become quasi-predictions, something totally unknown pre-1970 or even 1992)

5) last but not least, there are quite a few more polls now than there were then!

[Sg1]

I think the point is well summarised above. Precedent suggests a narrowing of the gap, but so far we lack any reasons to suggest this will happen. Starmer is, for the time being, in a comfortable position where he is neither particularly loved by his supporters, nor particularly loathed by Conservatives. In short, he's inoffensive to most voters.

Therefore, I feel that the stick of a Starmer Labour government is ineffective and the carrot of a more positive economic outlook that can only be secured by another term has not yet materialised.

[graham]

In contradiction of the graph given in the article, I am unaware of any Tory leads as high as 30% at any point during the 1966-70 Parliament.I recall the peak Tory lead as 28% in Spring 1968.

[swanarcadian]

Yes, the Tories were 28 points ahead (with Gallup) in May 1968, no more than that.  This was matched once since then, in September 2008.   The popular vote gap in the 2010 election, twenty months later, was 7 points.   So one could look to more recent examples than the days of Wilson and Heath.  If anything, Labour were overestimated back then, certainly in 1970 when they were actually in the lead in the opinion polls during the campaign.

[nodealbrexiteer]

On a votes seats basis i wonder about the 'awkward' scenario of Labour having the gap closed to a point or 2 but the electoral system bias leaving the Tories as the largest party

[johnloony]

Aug 12, 2023 17:34:12 GMT nodealbrexiteer said:

On a votes seats basis i wonder about the 'awkward' scenario of Labour having the gap closed to a point or 2 but the electoral system bias leaving the Tories as the largest party

It would be awkward but it wouldn’t be a problem as such. It has happened before. It wouldn’t matter much because it would probably be a hung parliament; even if the “wrong” party got a majority of seats, it would just happen normally like it did in 1951, and government would continue in the usual way.

[nodealbrexiteer]

Aug 12, 2023 17:47:54 GMT johnloony said:

Aug 12, 2023 17:34:12 GMT nodealbrexiteer said:

On a votes seats basis i wonder about the 'awkward' scenario of Labour having the gap closed to a point or 2 but the electoral system bias leaving the Tories as the largest party

It would be awkward but it wouldn’t be a problem as such. It has happened before. It wouldn’t matter much because it would probably be a hung parliament; even if the “wrong” party got a majority of seats, it would just happen normally like it did in 1951, and government would continue in the usual way.

I suppose what i was trying to say it might be commented on more nowadays. It was a scenario avoided when the electoral system was substantially tilted to Labour and could by 'luck' be avoided in the current reverse situation

[graham]

Aug 12, 2023 17:54:25 GMT nodealbrexiteer said:

Aug 12, 2023 17:47:54 GMT johnloony said:

It would be awkward but it wouldn’t be a problem as such. It has happened before. It wouldn’t matter much because it would probably be a hung parliament; even if the “wrong” party got a majority of seats, it would just happen normally like it did in 1951, and government would continue in the usual way.

I suppose what i was trying to say it might be commented on more nowadays. It was a scenario avoided when the electoral system was substantially tilted to Labour and could by 'luck' be avoided in the current reverse situation

In the 1950s the electoral system was tilted to the Tories - though by the 1990s it was very much in Labour's favour. Labour's loss of Scotland and further demographic shifts have have tilted the system against Labour again, though a Labour recovery in Scotland will to some extent rebalance it.

[batman]

At this particular juncture the Labour lead is actually widening slightly further in the polling average. The Tories have made no progress at all since the beginning of the year, or rather, they DID, but Labour has rolled it back again fully. That's not to say that they won't finally start to narrow the gap at some point, but I can't see it going below 8% at the lowest now. No scientific reasoning, of course, but that's my gut feeling. Rather similar to Matt's really.

[The Bishop]

Aug 12, 2023 16:51:38 GMT swanarcadian said:

Yes, the Tories were 28 points ahead (with Gallup) in May 1968, no more than that.  This was matched once since then, in September 2008.   The popular vote gap in the 2010 election, twenty months later, was 7 points.   So one could look to more recent examples than the days of Wilson and Heath.  If anything, Labour were overestimated back then, certainly in 1970 when they were actually in the lead in the opinion polls during the campaign.

2010 was the first election since 1983 where Labour support was not overstated at all by polling. And since then the same has happened in 2017.

[nodealbrexiteer]

Aug 13, 2023 17:59:19 GMT The Bishop said:

Aug 12, 2023 16:51:38 GMT swanarcadian said:

Yes, the Tories were 28 points ahead (with Gallup) in May 1968, no more than that.  This was matched once since then, in September 2008.   The popular vote gap in the 2010 election, twenty months later, was 7 points.   So one could look to more recent examples than the days of Wilson and Heath.  If anything, Labour were overestimated back then, certainly in 1970 when they were actually in the lead in the opinion polls during the campaign.

2010 was the first election since 1983 where Labour support was not overstated at all by polling. And since then the same has happened in 2017.

Before that Feb 74

[graham]

Aug 13, 2023 17:59:19 GMT The Bishop said:

Aug 12, 2023 16:51:38 GMT swanarcadian said:

Yes, the Tories were 28 points ahead (with Gallup) in May 1968, no more than that.  This was matched once since then, in September 2008.   The popular vote gap in the 2010 election, twenty months later, was 7 points.   So one could look to more recent examples than the days of Wilson and Heath.  If anything, Labour were overestimated back then, certainly in 1970 when they were actually in the lead in the opinion polls during the campaign.

2010 was the first election since 1983 where Labour support was not overstated at all by polling. And since then the same has happened in 2017.

NOP was pretty spot on in 2005.

[uthacalthing]

Aug 12, 2023 14:16:22 GMT mattbewilson said:

I can see Tories getting low to mid thirties with labour on low forties

That puts others on 20% plus.


Show your working. 

[mattbewilson]

Aug 13, 2023 20:34:54 GMT uthacalthing said:

Aug 12, 2023 14:16:22 GMT mattbewilson said:

I can see Tories getting low to mid thirties with labour on low forties

That puts others on 20% plus.


Show your working. 

Lib Dems low teens, SNP/plaid 4%, NI parties 2%, Greens+fringe candidates whatever left

[willpower3]

Aug 13, 2023 17:59:19 GMT The Bishop said:

Aug 12, 2023 16:51:38 GMT swanarcadian said:

Yes, the Tories were 28 points ahead (with Gallup) in May 1968, no more than that.  This was matched once since then, in September 2008.   The popular vote gap in the 2010 election, twenty months later, was 7 points.   So one could look to more recent examples than the days of Wilson and Heath.  If anything, Labour were overestimated back then, certainly in 1970 when they were actually in the lead in the opinion polls during the campaign.

2010 was the first election since 1983 where Labour support was not overstated at all by polling. And since then the same has happened in 2017.

I think Labour did benefit quite significantly from general fears about a Tory government in 2010. Obviously, it wasn't enough to win, but it probably prevented a Tory majority. Hasn't it also been suggested that Labour may have clung on (either being the largest party in a hung parliament or getting enough seats to have made a coalition with the Lib Dems more plausible) without the Cleggmania nonsense? It prevented the "don't let the Tories cut your public services" message from being properly aired. 

[batman]

Cleggmania or the Cleggasm as it was also known was a rather patchy phenomenon. My constituency was completely unaffected by it, being replaced by a Goldsmithasm.