Polling: 2017 General Election, Council Elections and Independence

[O'Kelly Isley III]

Never having been contacted by a polling organisation in my life, I'm curious as to how it's conducted in 2019.  Are people still phoned for opinions ?  Emails ?  Texts ?  Social media ?  Face to face interviews ?  Or what ?

The point I'm making is with such a diverse range of options, and on the basis that the first option is probably still the easiest, just how sure can we be that we aren't being repeatedly fed a line which leads to a narrow demographic of landline-connected and telephone-listed folk over 50, just the sort of people who in the main traditionally vote Tory ? 

 

[welshbairn]

I signed up for YouGov a while back, with the promise of small amounts of money or the chance of a £500 prize iirc. The questions started off straightforwardly about political opinions, shopping choices etc, but rapidly got hugely personal and psychological which freaked me out a bit, so I stopped.

[dorlomin]

1 hour ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

Never having been contacted by a polling organisation in my life, I'm curious as to how it's conducted in 2019.  Are people still phoned for opinions ?  Emails ?  Texts ?  Social media ?  Face to face interviews ?  Or what ?

Some do random samples., Yougov use a panel of regular contributors. Most of their paid work is marketing for products, they use profiles of their panels to build national pictures. Political polling is more an advert for their skills than their main bread and butter, which makes so many of the dumb conspiracy theories about them funny. 

I was contacted by a Deltapolling poller back in September, but I did not let them into the flat as I had no Chianti and favs beans. 

 

 

[Adamski]

I went to a talk by John Curtice at Glasgow University this evening. A pretty bleak picture for anyone who doesn’t want to see a Tory majority tbh. Conservatives hoovering up the leave vote and pretty much maxed out in terms of where they could his percentage-wise, but Labour need to get closer to maxing out remain voters if they want to catch up, and not looking like they’re in shape to do it at present.

Also had a graph showing a steady lead of a few points against independence for 2016-18, but then a jump to about 50/50 (or Yes very slightly ahead if anything) about a year ago that has remained steady ever since, with those extra points pretty much all coming from remainers. He made a comment about how tricky it will be for a PM to prevent more remainers moving to Yes if Brexit happens.

A couple of other snippets about registration and turnout: the ‘surge’ in voter registrations didn’t really happen and should be taken with a pinch of salt - it’s mostly people who had already registered re-registering to make sure. Also (not sure if I understood correctly but) a new register was created in the past month, meaning that voter records should be more up to date than most elections. As a result it’s very likely that turnout will be up from last time as the register is less likely to include redundant records - people who have died, moved away, etc (worth bearing in mind for betting purposes).

[ICTJohnboy]

55 minutes ago, Adamski said:

I went to a talk by John Curtice at Glasgow University this evening. A pretty bleak picture for anyone who doesn’t want to see a Tory majority tbh. Conservatives hoovering up the leave vote and pretty much maxed out in terms of where they could his percentage-wise, but Labour need to get closer to maxing out remain voters if they want to catch up, and not looking like they’re in shape to do it at present.

 

 

Did Curtice correctly predict the result of the 2017 election?

[BudBairn]

 
Did Curtice correctly predict the result of the 2017 election?

Unfortunately yes

[ICTJohnboy]

8 minutes ago, BudBairn said:

 

Unfortunately yes

 

 

Ach, his luck with forecasting will run out one of these days.

December 12th would be a good time for that to happen.

[dorlomin]

10 hours ago, ICTJohnboy said:

 

Did Curtice correctly predict the result of the 2017 election?

Curtice runs exit polls. Asking people who have actually turned up how they voted then extrapolating a national figure is a lot easier than asking people how they think they will vote in a few weeks time then trying estimate how many will change their mind or not turn up, plus how many your sampling is missing. 

That said the polls all have the same basic trends, though with variance around expected final results, and most of the polling experts are saying broadly the same thing. 

Curtice is on the last about 7 minutes of this. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p07wpy0j

Back at the start of November I said I thought Labour would loose seats and it would be down to whether the SNP and LDs could pick up enough seats to compensate. I have though the LDs will outperform their seat predictions using uniform national swing as many of their targets are strongly remain, they have had some really good constituency based polling. But most seem to have them only adding about 2 seats. 

You lot will have a better feel for the ground war in Scotland but it seems like the Indref2 No vote may be coalescing around the Conservatives, this may limit the SNP gains.  

And the ~"dont knows" and how many under 35s actually turn up could be the difference between a hung parliament and a Tory majority of 100. 

[fatshaft]

10 minutes ago, dorlomin said:

 

Back at the start of November I said I thought Labour would loose seats and it would be down to whether the SNP and LDs could pick up enough seats to compensate. I have though the LDs will outperform their seat predictions using uniform national swing as many of their targets are strongly remain, they have had some really good constituency based polling. But most seem to have them only adding about 2 seats. 

You lot will have a better feel for the ground war in Scotland but it seems like the Indref2 No vote may be coalescing around the Conservatives, this may limit the SNP gains.  

And the ~"dont knows" and how many under 35s actually turn up could be the difference between a hung parliament and a Tory majority of 100. 

Lib-Dems issue is Swinson, she got a bounce as the guffs didn't know her, they don't like what they see and she's tanking.

And yes, in Scotland it's turning into a straight 2 horse race that would have seen the Tories booted except Labs & Lib-Dems are going to vote for them to keep the SNP out. 

 

[Bedford White]

Better news in London

YouGov poll of London, for the Mile End Institute (QMUL) and Evening Standard:

LAB: 47% (+8)
CON: 30% (+1)
LIB: 15% (-4)
GRN: 4% (-1)
BRX: 3% (-3)

Changes on their previous poll.

Read more: http://vote-2012.proboards.com/thread/1150/yougov?page=342#ixzz672tz2vUn

[ICTJohnboy]

10 minutes ago, Bedford White said:

Better news in London

YouGov poll of London, for the Mile End Institute (QMUL) and Evening Standard:

LAB: 47% (+8)
CON: 30% (+1)
LIB: 15% (-4)
GRN: 4% (-1)
BRX: 3% (-3)

Changes on their previous poll.

Read more: http://vote-2012.proboards.com/thread/1150/yougov?page=342#ixzz672tz2vUn

 

Wow!!!

Corbyn might not win outright but a hung parliament could still be very much on the cards which will make a very special little lady in Scotland very happy.

This news won't do anything for Scottish Labour, who have of course, been very effectively replaced over the years by the SNP.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

 
Wow!!!
Corbyn might not win outright but a hung parliament could still be very much on the cards which will make a very special little lady in Scotland very happy.
This news won't do anything for Scottish Labour, who have of course, been very effectively replaced over the years by the SNP.

No great benefit in Labour winning English cities if the Countryfile Loyal and Northern towns return Tories.

[John Lambies Doos]

No great benefit in Labour winning English cities if the Countryfile Loyal and Northern towns return Tories.

I'm actually surprised Lib Dems aren't doing better in London.
Edit... No I'm not as 'look at me' Swinson is in charge.

[ICTJohnboy]

6 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

1 hour ago, ICTJohnboy said:

 
Wow!!!
Corbyn might not win outright but a hung parliament could still be very much on the cards which will make a very special little lady in Scotland very happy.
This news won't do anything for Scottish Labour, who have of course, been very effectively replaced over the years by the SNP.

No great benefit in Labour winning English cities if the Countryfile Loyal and Northern towns return Tories.

 

Don't think that will happen on the scale that's been predicted.

Brexit are standing in several Northern towns and are likely to take more traditional labour voters that the Tories will.

I'm really getting quietly optimistic that the Tories won't get back with an increased majority (or any kind of a majority)

[dorlomin]

2 hours ago, ICTJohnboy said:

Wow!!!

Corbyn might not win outright but a hung parliament could still be very much on the cards which will make a very special little lady in Scotland very happy.

8% down on 2017. Would be around 6 seats lost on uniform swing. In the most pro remain part of the UK, were this the actual result on election night it would indicate a very large tory majority. 

 

[Colkitto]

5 hours ago, John Lambies Doos said:

I'm actually surprised Lib Dems aren't doing better in London.
Edit... No I'm not as 'look at me' Swinson is in charge.

Apparently Swinson seat is on a shoogley peg.  Good chance of an SNP gain

[Mark Connolly]

10 minutes ago, Colkitto said:

Apparently Swinson seat is on a shoogley peg.  Good chance of an SNP gain

One of her big selling points the last time was that she had previously been a good constituency MP, which was true.

Since the 2017 election, she's barely been seen in ED, and that isn't something that goes down well there.

[dorlomin]

22 minutes ago, Colkitto said:

Apparently Swinson seat is on a shoogley peg.  Good chance of an SNP gain

For the best. She has been a bit too much "Nicola Murray MP" in the top job with the inbetweeners. 

[welshbairn]

Polls aren't much different to 2017, 9 days before the election. Tories in blue, Labour in white.

2017

 

2019

 

 

Edited December 3, 2019 by welshbairn

[renton]

52 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Polls aren't much different to 2017, 9 days before the election. Tories in blue, Labour in white.

2017

 

2019

 

 

Not sure I'd agree, in 2017 the distribution includes several single digit leads including one at 3 points. The 2019 polls the lowest is 9 points. Without doing the quick maths there is clearly a lower median tory lead to years ago.