At this stage, I expected three things to be happening in regards to the general election campaigns and polling. One, we would see UKIP’s polling numbers deflate and going to the Tories. Two, Labour’s campaign would be a gaffe prone nightmare, seeing their numbers dip into the early twenties and possibly the teens. Three, a Lib Dem bounce in the polls , small, but significant, probably getting them to around 15 or 16.
The first one is undeniably happening, as Conservative polling numbers continue to be in the high 40s while UKIP is stuck in single digits, even with polling companies that tend to show favourable UKIP results. The second one is only half occurring: yes, the Labour campaign has been as shambolic as I predicted, with the car crash interviews coming thick and fast, but instead of causing the poll numbers to slip even further for Labour, there has been an undeniable “bounce”. I put that in quotations because this is a very small uplift we’ve talking about here; they seem to be polling around 27/28 as opposed to 24/25. I think this is because, at least for now, there is a group of voters who have been activated who are so concerned that Labour faces oblivion they want to save the party for future use. This is the “I hate Corbyn but I don’t want Labour to go completely down the pan” vote, and it appears to be more robust than I have previously given it credit for.
The third one is not happening at all. The national poll numbers for the Lib Dems simply aren’t going anywhere for the moment. Which means that if the polls stay the way they are, my prediction of 15 to 20 seats for them is looking decidedly optimistic. But there is one card left to play.
If the Lib Dems over perform in the local elections on Thursday, that could create some momentum for the party. They would have to do really well for this to work, so a gain of over a hundred seats at least, but that’s not out of the question. With a general election coming shortly, the anti-Corbyn Labour crowd may feel even less inclined to support Labour at the locals meaning they lose even more seats than anticipated. And on top of that, I still think they could do worse in the Scottish local elections than many pundits think. So the Lib Dems could stand to gain from all that.
I figure we’ll know where things stand about two weeks after the locals, so around May 18th or so. If the Lib Dems are still polling around 8 or 9 percent at that stage, regardless of local election results, it could be time to recalibrate expectations.
Much as I hate to say this, the Lib Dems have a number of *bi*g problems ahead of GE17:
– they are still paying the price for the coalition, specifically tuition fees that alienated a lot of the youth vote (even though it was a compromise they had to make as part of power-sharing – doesn’t cut any ice with idealistic young people)
– young people in general (the ones who don’t have wealth behind them) are so despondent about the future they either won’t vote (majority), or will vote Labour – as Trump showed, you don’t need to convince people to vote for you, just dissuade people to vote for your opponent.
– Large parts of the electorate are fed up with politics generally and Brexit in particular and ‘just want it to happen’. They judge Theresa May as the fastest route there.
– Tim Farron himself just isn’t charismatic enough to anyone defecting from Labour or Tory – he’s even depressing the motivation of his own voters with all the sexuality / Eurosceptic focus (see point about dissuasion above)
– Lots of hard-core Remainers are not happy that the Lib Dems are not opposing Brexit as a point of principle (again, no switch)
– And that’s before you even *get* to the unfairness of FPTP!
So – all looking doom and gloom? Not a bit of it:
– Nothing can stop a massive Tory majority in June, so it’s the next GE that we need to be focused on
– Plenty of time for Lib Dems to vote for someone more charismatic in the aftermath of GE17
– Time to build grassroots involvement during the nightmare of Brexit negotiations
– Lib Dems then position themselves as the ‘Party to Rejoin’ the EU – and this also gives us time to see a) what damage has been done to our economy and reputation (lots) and b) how EU responds in the face of other possible successionist movements and changes (unclear)
All leading to a potential resurgence in about 4 years time.
@Mark T Would have to question some of your conclusions.Not sure a badly defeated LD Party would be in a position to build a grass roots movement.I’m also wondering who you had in mind for the new “charismatic” leader.However above all else it isn’t clear to me that post brexit there’d be any appetite for another EU/brexit based GE campaign amongst the wider electorate.I suspect they’ll be heartily sick of the whole thing and,if anything,led by our media,inclined to blame Brussels when brexit doesn’t match their expectations.
At the moment, holding all 9 seats would be a big achievement. Tory remainers are staying with the Tories because they fear Corbyn even more than a hard Brexit. Labour remainers will probably either stick with Labour b/c they remember the coalition years or stay at home. We’re betweem two stools. The the other stool is the lack of media coverage compared to previous elections. I don’t envy the peeps @ ldhq, there are no easy answers atm…
I don’t understand why anyone would have expected Lib Dem poll ratings to rise into the mid teens. In a way it’s remarkable how static the Lib Dem poll ratings have been since about 6 months into the coalition. They haven’t been in the mid teens since 2010.
The only new ingredient is the anti-Brexit strategy. I’ve always been sceptical about that making much of a difference. It hasn’t done so in the months since it was articulated, and it hasn’t done so in the fortnight since the snap election was announced. If anything the Lib Dems have gone backwards, probably because of Farron’s gay sex cock-up.
Maybe they still need to project publicly the idea that there’s going to be a national resurgence, but when there’s any targeting of resources, they really need to be ruthlessly directed to the seats they currently hold (probably with the exception of Richmond Park) and half a dozen or so realistic targets held by Labour and the SNP.
Could backfire: the better the Lib Dems do in the local elections, the more plausible the ‘coalition of chaos’ line looks. If it looks like the Lib Dems might actually gain seats that will motivate voters who don’t want Corbyn as PM to get to the polls and vote Conservative, whereas if they don’t perceive the Lib Dems as any kind of a threat they might just stay at home.
Funny to see that YouGov asked people which political slogans they remembered – unprompted. The winner was “Strong and stable”, but only 15% remembered it, despite all the fuss among political fans. No other slogan was remembered by more than 2%. They asked about Tory and Labour slogans only. It might have been interesting to see if more than 2% remembered Farron having said something about gay sex – and if so what they thought he’d said …