Conservatives gain support among key groups since last general election
Since 2005, the Conservative Party's share of voting intention among the public as a whole has increased by eight percentage points. However, while the Conservatives have made gains across the board, Ipsos's analysis shows that they have made some of their best inroads among groups where their support was relatively low in 2005. In particular, their support has grown among 25-44 year olds, DE social grades and in the North of England. Their support has also increased more among women than men, and in the South West and West Midlands.
In nearly all cases, this has primarily been at the expense of Labour, with the exception of the South West where support has been gained from the Liberal Democrats.
Ben Page, Chief Executive of Ipsos said: " The Conservatives have strengthened their support across the board, but in particular among younger, working class people (DEs) and voters in the North of England - they are again achieving support right across England and across society."
The charts below show the changes in detail.
Technical Details
For the Political Monitor, Ipsos interviewed a representative sample of c.1,000 adults aged 18+ across Great Britain every month. Between January and September 2009, 9,057 interviews were conducted by telephone. Data are weighted to match the profile of the population.
Voting intention figures exclude those who say they would not vote, are undecided or refuse to name a party and those who are not absolutely certain to vote. Where percentages do not sum to 100, this may be due to computer rounding, the exclusion of "don't know" categories, or multiple answers.
The 2005 data comes from the MORI Election Aggregate (weighted to final results) based on 15,948 interviews (conducted both by telephone and face-to-face) with GB adults aged 18+ between April and May 2005.
