While polling in the United Kingdom suggests a landslide for the Conservatives in next month’s election, the recent history of voter polls there has provided more than enough suspense on the result. Given how UK pollsters treat undecided voters, they’ve never had the predictive power they claim.
Michael Ashcroft – former Conservative peer and present political analyst – went a little deeper into the undecided vote by putting some undecided Labour voters from the West Midlands into a focus group. Given the swath of marginal seats (i.e., swing seats) in that region, and that in most polls Labour 2015 voters make up the largest group of “Don’t Knows”, it was an apt decision. Here’s what he found (Conservative Home).
For all this, switching from Labour would be a head-over-heart decision for many of these voters, and not an easy one, even if the Tories “seem to be mellowing a bit”. “I just feel worried. I don’t know if I would a hundred per cent want to vote for the Conservatives, because still emotionally I’m attached to Labour. But at the same time, because I’m fearful about what is going to happen once we Brexit, I almost feel if I don’t vote for them and someone else gets in and it gets interrupted, we might end up in a worse position. Because of the fear, I’m sort of stuck.”
Another thing that mattered to these voters was that Prime Minister Theresa May was moving forward on Leaving the UK despite her stance for Remain in the referendum.
For many of these voters, however they voted in the referendum, it was important that the Conservatives, and the Prime Minister in particular, seemed to be taking the will of the people seriously – something they were not used to seeing in politics. “Nobody believes politicians full stop, really. But at the end of the day, we’ve seen something we voted for happen… They can say ‘we’ll look after the NHS’, but they never do, you know they’re not going to. But with this, it’s happened.”
“You look at Theresa May, and she voted remain, but she’s accepted the vote like a lot of people haven’t accepted the vote to leave, and she’s saying ‘I’m going to do it because that’s what the majority voted for’. So that’s good to see. The Lib Dems are trying to overturn it, and with Labour you’re not too sure what they’re going to do.” “That is one overarching thing about the Tories, I think – they have demonstrated, those that wanted to stay have accepted the vote. One of the things that is really annoying me is that a lot of the other parties, and particularly the SNP, seem to be saying ‘you didn’t know what you were voting for’, which I find personally offensive, and ‘we’re going to keep voting until you vote right’. And whatever else, the Tories seem to be clear about that.”
This is one of the reasons – actually, I would say it’s the reason – the Conservatives could scoop up swaths of Labour votes and Labour seats in the West Midlands, the north of England (where Tees Valley shocked even themselves by going blue in their mayoral election last week), and Wales (although I’m still having trouble believing the Tories will do this well in Wales). Labour Leave voters especially now have a strong reason to flip – especially as UKIP falters (there are reports that UKIP is pulling out of a lot of constituencies this year, but I’m waiting to see actual figures and names first).
If these voters go with their tribal history, Labour could stem losses and keep May’s majority modest (about the 70-odd level that I’m projecting right now, or perhaps even lower). But if they follow their “heads” and vote Conservative, a 100+ landslide majority is far more likely. We’ll know in less than four weeks.