Monday, March 7, 2011

TNS-BMRB : Labour list vote lead trimmed

Evidently while I was busy noticing that I'd been very slow on the uptake about the last Angus Reid poll, I was being equally slow on the uptake about today's full-scale Holyrood poll in the Herald -

Constituency vote :

Labour 44% (-5)
SNP 29% (-4)
Conservatives 12% (+3)
Liberal Democrats 11% (+4)

Regional list vote :

Labour 39% (-8)
SNP 29% (-4)
Conservatives 11% (+2)
Liberal Democrats 10% (+3)
Greens 6% (+3)
Others 5% (+3)


UPDATE : The ever-delightful Labour wind-up merchant "Braveheart" (ahem) popped along earlier to helpfully point out that I had the SNP's percentage share of the list vote wrong - it should have been 29%, not 33%. I've updated the figures above, and changed the headline to reflect the rather smaller cut of the Labour lead than the one I thought we were dealing with. However, I haven't updated the following text, so it should be read with the changed figure in mind...

It goes without saying that the constituency figures make for sobering reading, but a dramatic reduction of the Labour lead on the list vote (which in theory ought to be the more important of the two) offers some grounds for encouragement at this stage, with the proper campaign period - during which the SNP will have the considerable advantage of the most popular party leader - still to come.

As I've suggested before, the most important figure in this election could well turn out to be the combined support for the SNP and Tories - because even though those two parties are highly unlikely to enter into coalition with each other, they are also both unlikely to enter into a deal with Labour. Anything close to a combined SNP/Tory majority would therefore call into question the viability of a minority government led by Iain "the Snarl" Gray. On the constituency vote in this poll, SNP + Tory support comes to 41%, and on the list vote it comes to 44%.

Overall, these figures at least seem somewhat more plausible than the completely unrealistic Labour ratings that TNS-BMRB reported last time round - you don't need to be an expert in polling methodology to know that Labour were never going to receive 47% of the vote on the list. Indeed, even 39% still seems rather improbable given that Donald Dewar only managed 35%.

Last but not least, if James MacKenzie is telling us the truth when he says that the Greens are merely prudently keeping their options open about a coalition with Labour, he might want to urgently have a word with the Herald about it. They seem to see things in a rather different light -

"Despite likely Green support for a coalition..."

The way things are going, the "vote Green, get Gray" meme could soon be picking up a head of steam.

9 comments:

  1. Not such a consolation: it has Labour on 59 seats (up 13 and the same as an Ipsos/Mori poll two weeks ago) and the SNP on 39 (-8).

    The SNP complained that the Ipsos/Mori poll had used adjusted figures to show Labour's lead.

    The TNS-BMRB poll uses "unadjusted", raw figures. But it still produces the same broad result.......

    "...the most important figure in this election could well turn out to be the combined support for the SNP and Tories - because even though those two parties are highly unlikely to enter into coalition with each other, they are also both unlikely to enter into a deal with Labour. Anything close to a combined SNP/Tory majority would therefore call into question the viability of a minority government led by Iain "the Snarl" Gray. ..."

    Funny how the SNP pretends to be a left wing party but always wants the Tories to succeed.

    ...The coalaition that dare not speak its name...

    Tartan Tories it's true....

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  2. The Regional List adds up to 104%?

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  3. The SNP complained that the Ipsos/Mori poll had used adjusted figures to show Labour's lead.

    The TNS-BMRB poll uses "unadjusted", raw figures. But it still produces the same broad result.......


    Nope, all pollsters weight their figures. On this occasion, both Labour and the SNP have been weighted up from the unadjusted results, with Labour benefitting more from this.

    It wasn't Ipsos-MORI the SNP complained about, but YouGov, which turned a significant unweighted SNP lead into a significant Labour lead. They've less to object to this time, as the raw figures have Labour ahead also.

    The SNP should be 29%

    Um, they are?

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  4. Thanks for the correction Colin. You're right.

    Indeed the SNP are at 29% on the regional vote. But the post has them at 33%, hence Stuart's observation that the regional list added up to 104%...

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  5. I sincerely apologise for getting the regional list figures wrong - I was sent them by email this morning, and although I should have double-checked them, it wouldn't have made much difference if I had because the Herald article in its wisdom didn't bother giving us the full figures. Here is the explanation of what happened from UK Polling Report -

    "Note that the Herald report doesn’t specifically mention the 29% regional figures for the SNP in the text, it just says they have the same figure. I’m interpreting that as meaning they are on 29% in both, though other people have interpreted it as meaning the SNP are on the same figure as last time, which would put them at 33% on the regional vote."

    So you see, Braveheart? No conspiracy. You're obviously just a Labour troll with an 'ironic' name here to have a bit of a rant, but even so it would be splendid if you could harmonise your witterings with what I actually said. On the subject of an SNP/Tory alliance, I said this -

    "those two parties are highly unlikely to enter into coalition with each other"

    Indeed, in case it's slipped your notice, the SNP have a specific constitutional bar on coalitions with the Tories at Holyrood level. Scottish Labour don't. I wonder why?

    As you know perfectly well, what I was talking about was the likelihood that both the SNP and Tories would be - for their own separate reasons - in opposition to a Labour minority government, just as Labour and the SNP are both bitterly opposed to the government at Westminster, without that in some way being a "Labour-SNP alliance". Ironically, though, the SNP wanted precisely such an alliance (along with the Lib Dems and Plaid Cymru) to keep the Tories out. Now I wonder, Braveheart, do you remember which party was somewhat less keen on that idea, resulting in Cameron needlessly becoming PM? Hint - you might want to look through the archives of Tom Harris' blog.

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  6. Sorry James, I never thought there was a conspiracy. It was Stuart that raised it .... I just looked at the Herald and spotted the mistake and helpfully replied to Stuart.

    And when Colin pointed out that I had misread the figures, I thanked him for the correction.

    As for the "no formal coalition with Tories..." you don't need one when you have a nod and a wink, and so much political philosophy in common, do you?

    It's just that, for a so-called left wing party, so many SNP policies, e.g. freezing council tax, cutting business rates, are Tory policies anyway....

    Not that it's a surprise to me.

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  7. Braveheart, I appreciate this is an embarrassment for you and it's little wonder you feel the need to spin furiously to cover it up, but the fact is that by any objective measure the SNP is currently a more left-wing party than Labour. The gulf isn't huge, but it's there all right, which means by definition that Labour are also somewhat closer to the Tories on many issues. Witness the grotesque 'hang em, flog em' mentality of the Labour frontbench in relation to criminal justice, for instance. No, it's tribalism - not 'political philosophy' - that is likely to prevent the Tories backing a Labour administration, and in all honesty I can't say I'm sorry about that, because as you've probably gathered I think an Iain Gray premiership will be a disaster for Scotland. We need social democracy in this country, not five years of conservative 'Snarlism'.

    Now, should I be charitable and overlook your own blatant factual inaccuracies earlier in this thread, such as the claim that the seat projections from the last Ipsos-Mori poll had Labour on 59 seats, when in fact they showed the SNP ahead?

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  8. James,
    you can ignore any factal inaccuracies you come across anywhere....

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