Saturday, April 25, 2015

Rise in numbers who think Miliband and Labour will win


So, YouGov have produced figures apparently demonstrating that the Tories no longer have a clear lead in voter expectations of which party is going to gain the most seats in the current British General Election.

Little nerd-explain. First, no polling firm is 100% objective. There are too many variations for a polling firm to weight its sample.

Secondly, one of the developing themes of this campaign is the whole Nicola Sturgeon is a winner, Ed Miliband has become cool thing.

Before the campaign began, we hardly knew Sturgeon, and the general view of Miliband was that he couldn't govern a bacon butty, let alone a developed nation.

Fast forward a few weeks. Sturgeon is the campaign's star. Solid, capable, a credible threat. Miliband has seen his approval ratings rise out of the basement, as a boring campaign has found release in his nerd-cool.

But most important, whereas before we all believed the Tories would head a minority government, all of the talking heads have finally explained that the rules actually mean that the result in our head (which in terms of seats has not changed) would lead to a Labour-SNP government.

Which, in the past six days, has led to two things becoming demonstrably clear:

1) People now take Sturgeon and Miliband seriously. Even YouGov's own polling still shows that folk think Miliband would be a useless Prime Minister. But they now believe he could be Prime Minister. They finally get the rules. Which even YouGov is quick to point out is not the same as voting intention. I may vote this way, but even so, I see something else as the perceived outcome. And, especially since the minnows' debate last Thursday, the public has come truly to believe that a Labour-SNP government is possible. As a consequence of which ...

2) Voting intention polling (including that of YouGov, for the first time in twelve days) is now showing a drift towards the Tories. Folks are getting scared. Which was always the primary objective of the Tory election campaign.