Ashcroft Poll Forecasts Nick Clegg to Lose Sheffield Hallam, But Tories to Rescue Lib Dems
ElectionOracle / Sheffield Apr 02, 2015 - 03:36 AM GMTBy: Nadeem_Walayat
The Labour party finally came to life in the battle for Lib Dem Leader Nick Clegg's Sheffield Hallam Seat, with the start of door step campaigning for local votes and leaflets dropping through letter boxes that list Lib Dem 'broken promises' such as not to raise tuition fees, VAT, and the local issue not to grant Sheffield Forgemasters a £80 million loan. Whilst Labour promises to "cut the deficit every year and get the current budget into surplus". Which is set against Labours track record of an out of control £167 billion annual budget deficit for 2009-10.
Which the Coalition despite austerity have only reduced to £95 billion, resulting in additional debt of approx £550 billion.
The local Labour party have been further bolstered by Lord Ashcroft's latest constituency level polling which shows that Nick Clegg is trailing behind the Labour candidate Oliver Coppard by 2%.
Sheffield Hallam Lord Ashcroft Opinion Poll (22nd-28th March 2015).
Conservative 16%
Labour 36%
Liberal Democrat 34%
UKIP 7%
Green 6%
Other 1%
Meanwhile where campaigning is concerned the Conservatives are still nowhere in sight, which suggests that their strategy favours the Lib Dem leader retaining his Sheffield Hallam seat than attempting to draw potential Lib Dem voters away and thus give the seat to Labour.
SNP Catastrophe
Clearly it is in both Labour and the Conservative interests for the Liberal Democrats' to do much better on election day then the 20-22 seats blood bath that the opinion polls suggest. So expect a lot of tactical voting in the Lib Dems direction, i.e. Labour and Conservatives voting for the Lib Dem candidate, which I am sure the political pundits will write much about AFTER election day to explain why the Lib Dems did much better than the opinion polls suggested. For then either party will be able to do avoid doing a deal with the devil, which for Labour are the SNP and Plaid Cymru nationalists and for the Conservatives tunnel vision UKIP.
Were Labour to be the largest party then as the following video analysis illustrates that the outcome for Labour to only be able to form a majority with the SNP and other nationalists could be catastrophic for Britain, as it is the intention of nationalist parties to literally force a Labour government to go on a debt fuelled spending binge, that within a few short years would literally leave the United Kingdom as hollow bankrupt husk, following which the SNP controlled Scottish parliament unilaterally declares itself independence.
Alex Salmond warns "If you hold the balance then you hold the power", "it would be very good for Scotland"
Therefore it is in the interests of BOTH Conservatives and Labour for the Lib Dems not be wiped out to such an extent that either are not able to form a Coalition with post election day. This further reinforces my view since 25th Feb 2015 ( Liberal Democrat Election Blood Bath - Could Nick Clegg Lose Sheffield Hallam?) that Nick Clegg will probably retain his seat in Sheffield Hallam regardless of the Ashcroft polls, AND that the Liberal Democrats nationally will do much better by at least retaining 30 seats and probably awake on May 8th with a tally nearer to 35 seats. Which would be enough for either Labour or Conservative on 290-300 seats to then form a Coalition government with.
27 Mar 2015 - Sheffield Hallam Election Battle 2015 - Lib Dems Go to War Whilst Labour Sleeps
However the trend to date of an highly intelligent and well organised and financed local Lib Dem campaign reinforces my earlier expectations for Nick Clegg to retain his Sheffield Hallam seat. Which given the weak Labour response to date suggests that Labours own private polling has concluded that it is just not worth wasting resources on trying to win. This implies that Nick Clegg could do much better than winning by 2,000 votes as I had originally envisioned a month ago, but instead now looks set to achieve a far more substantial majority of around 5,000 votes, which is contrary to the opinion polls that put the Lib Dems 10% behind Labour in Sheffield Hallam (Survation - LAB 33%, LD 23%, CON 22%, GREEN 12%, UKIP 9%).
So the trend is in the Lib Dems favour as the electorate right across the United Kingdom are awaking to the realisation of the potential for catastrophe should the SNP gain power in Westminister via a weak minority Labour government and then proceed to bankrupt Britain before the Scottish Parliament declares Independence without another referendum.
Election Forecast 2015
This reinforces the conclusion of my analysis of 28th Feb that the Liberal Democrats nationally are going to do much better than the opinion polls continue to suggest i.e. achieve a minimum of 30 seats and probably awake on May 8th with a tally near 35 MP's, as resources are being intelligently concentrated on those 35-40 most winnable seats, whilst the rest are effectively being abandoned. Which is set against current mainstream press typical opinion polls based seats forecast range of 20-24 seats.
- 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:
Also see recent video facts check analysis of the Leadership debates with Jeremy Paxman -
David Cameron Leadership Debate
Ed Miliband Leadership Debate
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By Nadeem Walayat
Copyright © 2005-2015 Marketoracle.co.uk (Market Oracle Ltd). All rights reserved.
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.
Nadeem is the Editor of The Market Oracle, a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication that presents in-depth analysis from over 1000 experienced analysts on a range of views of the probable direction of the financial markets, thus enabling our readers to arrive at an informed opinion on future market direction. http://www.marketoracle.co.uk
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