Will Cameron or Miliband be the next prime minister? The pollsters polled
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Version 0 of 1. Two weeks ago we asked Britain’s leading pollsters who they thought was winning the election. They all thought the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, had edged ahead. A month before that most said Miliband had a slight advantage, though not all agreed. With the election now round the corner, we asked them: Based on the polls, who, between Ed Miliband and David Cameron, do you think will be the next prime minister? Opinion between the pollsters is once again divided. Ben Page, chief executive of Ipsos Mori: ‘Toss a coin’ This is now simply too close to call. Polls all have a 3-4% margin of error and the gap separating Miliband and Cameron is smaller than that. But if I have to bet I would say the SNP surge is slightly overstated, and therefore gap in seats between Labour and Conservatives will be small, but with incumbency helping the Conservatives get to be the largest party. Who gets to form a workable minority government? Toss a coin. Martin Boon, director, ICM: ‘I’d challenge anyone who says they know how this will end up’ A quick-fire clustering of a few more sizable Conservative leads implies some sort of momentum for them, but in truth our own poll only moved a fraction and the others might just be a function of fairly normal volatility. But at least it’s something for the prime minister to chew on with a sense of hope. I think the final polls will be in the same territory, so it’s over to the seat-projection artists to make of it what they will, and then the parties’ backroom deal teams to redefine how the democratic will manifests itself in parliament. As for directly answering the question, I’ve still got little idea and I’d challenge anyone who says they know how this will end up. Damian Lyons Lowe, founder & chief executive of Survation: ‘Ed Miliband’ Our new ballot paper-prompted voting question, which we believe will produce results closer to the actual results tomorrow, currently shows: CON 31.0% LAB 32.3% LD 10.1% UKIP 15.2% GRE 5.4% SNP 3.9% Others 1.8%. This would indicate a seat picture of: CON 270-280 LAB 270-275 SNP 45 LD 30 UKIP 6 GRE 1 RES 1. Ed Miliband would then, on this basis be our most likely next prime minister, and LAB could be closer to the Conservatives in both votes and seats than is the current expectation – lending some “legitimacy” to the formation of a Labour minority government. Joe Twyman, head of political and social research at YouGov: ‘A score draw so public opinion will dictate the outcome’ In the early hours of Sunday morning Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao were left standing at the end of what had been a long and, at times brutal, contest. Neither fighter was able to land the knockout blow and so the result was decided on points. Now, with only a few days remaining, Ed Miliband and David Cameron are still squaring up against one another and although a knockout blow now looks virtually impossible, there are still points to be won and the result remains very uncertain. Miliband has adopted an aggressive, confrontational stance by ruling out any kind of coalition or deal or agreement or whatever with the SNP. This will, one imagines, result in him being left well short of a majority and having to go all Michael Corleone – offering the SNP nothing, but hoping they blink first and fall in line as their opposition to the alternative is too great. However, David Cameron may keep fighting and refuse to give in. Crucially, he will need to, as I expect, win slightly more votes and a few more seats than Labour, but also convince the remaining Lib Dems to enter into a formal coalition agreement. No easy task, but by no means impossible. If he succeeds, we could be left with both Con/LibDem and Lab/SNP blocs close in terms of seats although still short of the 326 (or even 323) needed for a majority, but with the Conservatives able to claim a points victory by virtue of being the single party having more votes and seats. Crucially they will also have a formal agreement binding them – something Lab/SNP would lack, if Miliband is to be believed. What happens next could once again depend on public opinion. Cameron may claim to be acting in the national interest by defending the union and upholding the defence of the realm. More useful to his cause is the fact that he is the public’s preferred choice for prime minister (38% to Miliband’s 24%) and also 47% believe the single party that has the most seats in parliament has the best claim to form a government, even if other parties working together have more seats – compared with just 26% who think the opposite. Public opinion may come around further and strengthen his position and as the incumbent he gets first bite at the cherry, but it may go in the opposite direction, and if the Lib Dems waver or side with Labour instead he may well be beaten. Ultimately whoever is left standing will be the winner. Adam Drummond, Opinium: ‘Ed Miliband’ Based on the polls – and barring a late swing – I expect the Conservatives to have a small lead on both vote-share and seats but far short of a majority and still short even with Liberal Democrat support. In this scenario Ed Miliband becomes prime minister with SNP support (whether he welcomes that or not) and that of other smaller parties like Plaid Cymru or the SDLP. I’m putting a lot of stock in two things. One is that the Lib Dems have said they won’t be part of a coalition reliant on either SNP or Ukip support, which limits David Cameron’s options more than Ed Miliband’s. The other is that the same MPs who might vote down a Conservative Queen’s speech would also support a Labour one because predictions that Cameron-out equals Miliband-in assume that a vote against the former translates into a vote for the latter. The reliability of that assumption is something that will be tested in the months to come. However, the polls and seat forecasts they inform are so close that many things could throw all this off. I’d still say Ed Miliband is likely to be the next prime minister but, to use a polling cliche, the margin of error on this is pretty substantial. What’s been most interesting to me is that both Labour and Conservatives now seem to have set out what their angle is going to be in that scenario with the Tories apparently planning to declare victory if they are the largest party while Labour pursue the same sort of “squatter in Downing Street” line that the Tories took after the 2010 election. We have done some polling on what the public think would be legitimate here and it tends to support the largest party over a coalition of other parties and the party with the most votes rather than the most seats. I would expect that to change once we know the result and can put names and faces to those hypotheticals, but there’s certainly a risk of any new government facing a crisis of legitimacy if it doesn’t include the largest party. Andrew Hawkins, chairman of ComRes: ‘Ed Miliband’ The Tories look set to lose enough seats to Labour, and gain too few from the Lib Dems, for David Cameron to cling to power. Even if the SNP take most of Labour’s Scottish seats, as looks likely, then because the Tories cannot work with them it removes upwards of 40 critical seats from their potential use. So for those reasons, on the current polling, Prime Minister Miliband is the most plausible outcome. The only scenario where Cameron would remain in place would be if Labour have an awful night, combining a bloodbath of losses to the SNP with a failure to take large numbers of seats from the Lib Dems and Tories. That is eminently possible too, but less likely as far as the polling goes. Michelle Harrison, global head of public affairs at TNS: ‘Stalemate; Miliband has the numbers, but public opinion will decide’ The final stretch and we find ourselves pretty much where we started at the beginning of the campaign – in stalemate. This election represents what happens when a country is unconfident about its economic future, unsure of its place in the world, and fed up with the state of its politics. With Conservatives and Labour cancelling each other out, and the fragmentation of the traditional party system, only one thing is certain – the politics of Scotland are transforming the politics of Britain. Once the votes are counted, the Conservatives are set to be the largest party. Labour theoretically should still have the greatest chance of forming a government. However, we cannot underestimate the power of incumbency. The fear of change might just tip those key marginals in the Conservatives’ favour, while also strengthening Cameron’s negotiating hand as the clock ticks on the formation of a new government. The real drama will start on Friday. The sway of public opinion in such a scenario will be critical to our new definitions of legitimacy. Laurence Stellings, an associate director at Populus: ‘Cameron - whatever the constitution and parliamentary arithmetic, the public will likely view the second place party and leader as defeated’ The Conservatives have gained ground on Labour, and I’d expect them to make further progress in the final days. They’ll enter election day with a lead in the polls and win both the popular vote and largest share of seats (but not a majority). What happens next will be decided by the leaders, their inner circles and negotiations between the parties – not something a pollster can poll on. But with the benefit of incumbency, the largest share of the vote, and the largest number of seats, I can see the public viewing David Cameron as having legitimacy - and in turn forming a government and daring the left-leaning bloc to vote against him and his right-leaning bloc. Whatever the constitution and parliamentary arithmetic, the public will likely view the second place party and leader as defeated. The election is much too close for Ed Miliband becoming PM to be a surprise outcome, but I’d predict Cameron to continue being prime minister. |