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November 27, 2019 - 11:41pm
YouGov’s MRP poll has finally dropped, to much fanfare, and will have both cheered and unnerved Conservative high command. It shows the Tories winning 359 seats — a majority of 68.
It’s worth saying that recent polls have hinted at a squeeze on the Tory lead, as some Lib Dem votes seem to be moving back to Labour. Given that eight of the Tory gains in the YouGov model show a margin of less than 1%, and a further 20 have a margin of less than 5%, if that squeeze continues it can wipe a lot of those Tory gains out.
But, if this model is roughly right (and it correlates closely enough with the Focaldata model released earlier in the day to think that it should be), the Conservatives could lose all of these 28 seats and still end up with a majority. At 331 seats, albeit small, even this reduced result would still be a bigger majority than David Cameron won in 2015.
So at this point, it seems fair to say that a Conservative majority seems highly likely.
The map (below) that YouGov produced of seats changing hands shows in a single powerful image how the Conservatives seem to be managing this: winning seats across the midlands and in the North, without losing any to speak of across their southern heartlands. It’s the ‘and-and’ strategy, and, with two weeks to go, it seems to be working a treat.
Freddie Sayers is the Editor-in-Chief & CEO of UnHerd. He was previously Editor-in-Chief of YouGov, and founder of PoliticsHome.
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