Lord Ashcroft Polls

By Lord Ashcroft

UKIP lead the Conservatives by 44% to 32% in the Rochester & Strood by-election, according to my poll of the constituency completed yesterday. Labour are a distant third with 17%, with the Liberal Democrats on 2%.

The previous three polls of the campaign have all found the Conservatives on between 30% and 33%. While UKIP appear to have consolidated their position over the course of the campaign, Labour have declined from the mid-twenties to the mid-teens.

In my poll just over half (54%) of 2010 Conservative voters naming a party said they would stay with the Tories in the by-election, while 44% would switch to UKIP. (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

The Conservatives hold onto their one-point lead over Labour in this week’s Ashcroft National Poll, conducted over the past weekend. Vote shares for the four biggest parties remain unchanged since last week, with the Tories on 30%, Labour on 29%, UKIP on 16% and the Liberal Democrats holding on to their 10%, a result which party president Tim Farron joked was causing champagne corks to pop at Lib Dem HQ last week. The Greens are up one point at 7% and the SNP down one at 4%. (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

In my previous round of battleground polling, published last month, I looked at eleven constituencies where the Conservatives have majorities of up to 4.8% over Labour. I found that nine of them would change hands on the basis of my snapshots, with swings to Labour ranging from 2% to 8%, averaging 5% in the seats as a whole.

This time I have looked further down the Conservative defence list, at twelve seats with majorities of between 1,936 or 4.8% (Northampton North) and 3,744 or 7.1% (Loughborough).

Taking the seats together, on the basis of the total sample of 12,008, Labour led the Conservatives by 36% to 33%, a swing of 4.5% since the 2010 election. However, if the findings in individual constituencies were repeated at the election, three of the twelve would stay blue (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

The Conservatives have taken a one-point lead in this week’s Ashcroft National Poll, conducted over the past weekend. All changes since last week’s tie are small, with the Tories dropping a point to 30% and Labour down two points on 29%. UKIP are down two at 16%, and the Liberal Democrats up three to 10%, the first time they have broken into double figures in the ANP since July: we will see over the coming weeks whether this heralds the start of a sustained recovery. The Greens are up one point at 6% and the SNP have 5%. (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

Labour and the Conservatives are level in this week’s Ashcroft National Poll, conducted over the past weekend. The Tories are up three points on last week to 31%, with Labour, the Liberal Democrats and UKIP unchanged on 31%, 7% and 18% respectively. After the last week’s surge to 8% and fourth place the Greens are back below the Lib Dems at their longer term average of 5%. The SNP scored 4%.

In other questions David Cameron and George Osborne led Ed Miliband and Ed Balls by 19 points (45% to 26%) on the question of who was most trusted to manage the economy in the best interests of Britain (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

Labour lead by three points in this week’s Ashcroft National Poll, conducted over the past weekend. There is little movement in the main parties shares: the Conservatives are unchanged on 28%, with Labour (31%), the Liberal Democrats (7%) and UKIP (18%) each down a point since last week. The Greens are up three points at 8%, their highest level yet in the ANP. (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

In my latest battleground polling I have looked at Conservative-held seats with Labour in second place which on paper are safer than those in my previous research. This round includes eleven constituencies with majorities of between 1,328 or 3.1% (Brighton Kemptown) and 2,420 or 4.8% (Gloucester).

The overall swing from Conservative to Labour in this group of seats was 5%, but as in previous rounds there was some variation between constituencies (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

This essay appears in The Politicos Guide To The 2015 General Election

Let’s start with a quiz. Shortly after the last election, which clown wrote this?

“Even if the stars had aligned in such a way as to make a minority Conservative government a real possibility, the choice David Cameron made to enter a coalition would still have been the right one, both for the country and for the Conservative Party.”

(more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

Labour are up two points to 32% in this week’s Ashcroft National Poll, taking them into a four-point lead over the Tories, who are down four at 28%. After several days in the headlines UKIP are up two points to 19%, equalling their highest share yet in the ANP. The Liberal Democrats are up one point at 8% and the Greens down two at 5%. (more…)

By Lord Ashcroft

Once  again Ukip has seized the political agenda and left the older parties flailing for a response. Douglas Carswell’s spectacular victory in Clacton was at least expected — but Ukip’s quiet insurgency in Heywood and Middleton has shocked the political establishment. If it can come close to snatching a safe seat from under Labour’s nose, where else could it strike?

My own regular national poll — as well as the daily YouGov polls published in The Sun — put the Tories tantalisingly ahead last week. But when it comes to the fundamentals, how much has really changed over the conference season? (more…)