Polling round-up: the 2019 general election, week 3

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The 2019 general election is now in full swing. Both major parties have released their manifestos, the debates have begun, and the minor parties are collapsing.

The Brexit Party, in particular, has almost completely collapsed; this is partly due to the pollsters adjusting their methodology to take account of the Brexit Party's decision not to stand in the 317 seats that were won by the Tories in 2017. Unsurprisingly, the Tories have gained the most from the Brexit Party's collapse, but with 2-and-a-half weeks to go the Tories are running out of Leave votes to gain and are doing worse than at this point in 2017.

Labour's policies, meanwhile, have been recieved very positively - and its Brexit policy is actually the most popular policy of all the parties. This election is still wide open, and either major party could win. So let's take a look at the polls.

What the polls looked like in Week 3 (18th-24th November)

In the week of 18th-24th November, the average of polls was (changes since the week of 11th-17th November): 

Tories 43% (+2), Labour 30% (+1), Lib Dems 15% (-), Brexit 4% (-2), SNP 4% (+1), Greens 3% (-)

According to my seat estimate, the seat result would be (changes since the week of 4th-10th November): 

Tories 360 (+3), Labour 206 (-2), SNP 41 (-), Lib Dems 20 (-1), Others 23 (-)

The Tories’ gains last week were again almost entirely at the expense of the Brexit Party, partly because pollsters made changes to their methodology to account for the fact that the Brexit Party is not standing in the 317 seats that were won by the Tories in 2017. Overall, both major parties gained votes over the past week, and largely stood still relative to one another.

Amongst Leave voters, voting intention in 11th-17th November was, on average, as follows (changes since 4th-10th November):

Tories 69% (+2), Labour 14% (-), Brexit 8% (-3), Lib Dems 3% (-1), SNP 2% (-), Grn 2% (+1)

Amongst Remain voters, voting intention was:

Labour 44% (-), Lib Dems 26% (-), Tories 18% (-1), SNP 5% (-), Green 4% (-1)

Whilst the Tories are increasing their vote at the expense of the Brexit Party, Labour also continues to increase its support. The party is now averaging 30% in polls; in the week before MPs voted for an election, the party was averaging 23%.

The Lib Dems have not had a good week. Their average vote share in polls remains 15%, their lowest vote share in a weekly average since 20th-27th May (when they averaged 13%), and their estimated seat total has fallen to just 20 seats – which would represent a net gain of just 8 seats compared to 2017. Labour is now estimated to win 208 seats to the Lib Dems' 20.

For Jo Swinson to fulfill her ambition of becoming Prime Minister, she would now need to increase the Lib Dems' support by over 10 million votes in less than three weeks. That simply isn't going to happen. Either Boris Johnson or Jeremy Corbyn will win this election. Nobody else can.

Labour's policies are popular

Last week, Labour released its 2019 manifesto - and just like in 2017, the party's policies were recieved favourably by the public. DeltaPollUK polled the public to ask what they thought of particular policies, and these were the results:

All of the Labour policies listed in the poll had the support of a plurality of voters, and all but two (free broadband and Labour's Brexit policy) had the support of a majority of voters. The party's pledge to increase health spending by 4.3% a year is the most popular policy, winning the support of 81% of voters. Notably, its policy of raising taxes for those earning over £80,000 a year (whilst freezing taxes for everyone else) is also overwhelmingly popular.

Labour's Brexit policy, which has often been dismissed by centrists as a fudge that pleases nobody, is in fact the most popular Brexit policy out of all three major parties - and is the only policy that has more supporters than opponents.

Surprisingly, Labour's Brexit policy is actually more popular amongst Remain voters than the Liberal Democrats' pledge to revoke Article 50.

How is Labour doing compared to this point in 2017?

MPs voted to hold the 2017 general election on 19th April 2017, so the period of time most comparable to Week 3 of the 2019 campaign was the week of 8th-14th May 2017.

At this point in 2017, Labour was averaging 30%. The Tories’ average poll lead was 17pts, and their estimated majority was 110 seats. By comparison, the Tories’ average poll lead this week was 13pts, and their estimated majority was 70 seats.

Over the following few weeks, Labour support rose steadily until the party was averaging 36-37%, as shown in the chart below. Labour then outperformed these polls and won 41% within Great Britain in the 2017 election.

Summary

In last week's article, I wrote that:

"This week will see the publication of the 2019 manifesto and the Leaders’ debates, and all we need this week to continue on the 2017 trajectory is a gain of 1pt – and if the manifesto doesn’t deliver at least a 1pt increase in Labour’s vote share, I will be amazed."

Even though the manifesto usually takes about a week to affect the polls, Labour's vote share did indeed increase by 1pt this week, meaning that the party has already gained 7pts in three weeks. The party is performing just as well as it did at this point in 2017, and it is winning back Remainers at the speed of light, whilst the Tories are doing worse than they were doing at this point in 2017.

With two-and-a-half weeks left, we are closer to the Tories in the polls than we were at this point in 2017. The Lib Dems are collapsing, Remainers are flocking to the Labour Party, and the Tories have maxed out their Leave vote whilst alienating Lib Dem-leaning Tory Remainers.