Election Forecast 2015 - Opinion Polls Trending Towards Conservative Outright Win
ElectionOracle / UK General Election Mar 15, 2015 - 08:32 AM GMTHung Parliament is NOT a Certainty!
Opinion polls obsessed journalists are continuously number crunching each weeks polls into seats per party election forecasts that are then liberally regurgitated across the mainstream media. That latest such analysis is signaling that Labour has lost its most seats lead of only a week ago as now the Conservatives are being forecast to form the largest party in another hung parliament. However, in terms of extrapolating the polling trends into election day then the consensus view for another hung parliament can no longer be certain, as the polling trend implies that the Conservatives could win an outright election victory as my original analysis of over a year ago concluded (30th Dec 2013 - UK House Prices Forecast 2014 to 2018, Inflation, Trend Trajectory and General Election 2015).
The following is a list of the current state of seats forecasts by various popular mostly mainstream media funded election sites that are set against my own forecast of 28th Feb 2015.
Market Oracle | May2015 .com | Electoralcalculus .co.uk | ElectionForecast .co.uk | The Guardian | |
28th Feb |
12th Mar | 14th Mar | 11th Mar | 11th Mar | |
Conservative | 296 | 281 | 262 | 295 | 279 |
Labour | 262 | 263 | 301 | 267 | 266 |
SNP | 35 | 55 | 46 | 42 | 52 |
Lib Dem | 30 | 24 | 17 | 24 | 27 |
UKIP | 5 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
Others | 22 |
The following are individual forecaster trends with brief comments.
May2015.com (New Statesman)
MO 28th Feb |
12th Mar | 5th Mar | 26th Feb | 10th Feb | |
Conservative | 296 | 281 | 255 | 270 | 270 |
Labour | 262 | 263 | 283 | 271 | 272 |
SNP | 35 | 55 | 55 | 56 | 56 |
Lib Dem | 30 | 24 | 26 | 25 | |
UKIP | 5 | 4 | 4 | 4 | |
Others | 22 |
For several months had put Labour in the lead but have now are starting to put the Conservatives in the lead, though within a tight 9 seat swing.
Electoralcalculus.co.uk
MO 28th Feb |
14th Mar | 9th Mar | 27th Feb | 30th Jan | |
Conservative | 296 | 262 | 267 | 265 | 265 |
Labour | 262 | 301 | 298 | 301 | 297 |
SNP | 35 | 46 | 55 | 46 | 50 |
Lib Dem | 30 | 17 | 15 | 17 | |
UKIP | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |
Others | 22 |
Are exhibiting a consistent strong bias towards Labour
ElectionForecast.co.uk
MO 28th Feb |
11th Mar | 25th Feb | 13th Feb | |
Conservative | 296 | 295 | 284 | 280 |
Labour | 262 | 267 | 279 | 283 |
SNP | 35 | 42 | 39 | 37 |
Lib Dem | 30 | 24 | 25 | 27 |
UKIP | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
Others | 22 |
Their most recent update now most closely matches my forecast of 28th Feb 2015.
The Guardian
MO 28th Feb |
11th Mar | 27th Feb | 28th Jan | |
Conservative | 296 | 279 | 276 | 273 |
Labour | 262 | 266 | 271 | 273 |
SNP | 35 | 52 | 51 | 49 |
Lib Dem | 30 | 27 | 27 | 28 |
UKIP | 5 | 4 | 3 | 5 |
Others | 22 |
Again another mainstream forecaster that is starting to give the edge to the Conservatives, though here the swing between major parties is an even tighter more marginal 6 seats.
Analysis
The over-riding expectations are for the Conservatives to form the largest party in an hung parliament. Though as of writing no forecaster has matched or surpassed my expectations for the Tories to win at least 296 seats.
Another point of difference is that pollsters continue to grossly over estimate the number of seats the SNP will win i.e. typically 50-55, against my expectations of just 35.
Conclusion
If the current trend continues then it is possible that the Conservatives could win an outright majority on May 7th as per my long standing analysis of seats vs house prices trend trajectory that painted a picture for a likely probable Conservative general election victory.
16 Dec 2013 - UK General Election Forecast 2015, Who Will Win, Coalition, Conservative or Labour?
The updated election seats trend graph illustrates that the Conservatives are virtually ON TRACK to achieve the forecast outcome for an outright election victory on a majority of about 30 seats which NO ONE, and I mean no serious commentators / analysts has or is currently advocating.
UK General Election Forecast 2015
In terms of what I actually see as the most probable outcome for the general election, I refer to my in-depth analysis that concluded in the following detailed seats per party forecast:
- 28 Feb 2015 - UK General Election 2015 Seats Forecast - Who Will Win?
- 28 Feb 2015 - UK General Election 2015 - Forecasting Seats for SNP, LIb-Dems, UKIP and Others
UK General Election May 2015 Forecast Conclusion
My forecast conclusion is for the Conservatives to win 296 seats at the May 7th general election, Labour 2nd on 262 seats, with the full seats per political party breakdown as follows:
Therefore the most probable outcome is for a continuation of the ConDem Coalition government on 326 seats (296+30) where any shortfall would likely find support from the DUP's 8 seats.
The alternative is for a truly messy Lab-Lib SNP supported chaotic government on 327 seats (262+30+35) which in my opinion would be a truly disastrous outcome for Britain, nearly as bad as if Scotland had voted for independence last September.
Another possibility is that should the Conservatives do better than forecast i.e. secure over 300 seats but still fail to win an overall majority, then they may chose to go it alone with the plan to work towards winning a May 2016 general election.
The bottom line is that the opinion polls do not reflect how people will actually vote on May 7th when they are faced with a stark choice of steady as she goes ConDem government or take a huge gamble on Ed Milliband's Labour party. So in my opinion several millions of voters will chose to play it safe with ConDem which thus is the most probable outcome.
Also available a youtube video version of my forecast:
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Source and comments - http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article49839.html
By Nadeem Walayat
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Nadeem Walayat has over 25 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis focuses on UK inflation, economy, interest rates and housing market. He is the author of five ebook's in the The Inflation Mega-Trend and Stocks Stealth Bull Market series that can be downloaded for Free.
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