General Election 2001 - Or Might You Change Your Mind?

A brief observation from the data in our latest poll, published in the Sunday Telegraph at the weekend and based on telephone interviews conducted on 31 May-2 June (Thursday-Saturday).

Notice how much more markedly the Liberal Democrat vote, especially, but also the Conservative vote has hardened than has the Labour vote over the period of the election campaign. In our first campaign poll, conducted for The Times on 8 May, more than half of those saying they would support the Liberal Democrats thought that they might change their mind; and slightly more Conservative supporters than Labour supporters said so.

Now the position has reversed. Not only are there considerably more Lib Dem supporters than at the start of May, but two-thirds of them say they have definitely made up their minds. The Tories have cut their proportion of waverers by a third, while for Labour there has been no statistically significant difference in swing.

There have been past general elections in Britain in which the result has been determined by last minute swing. 1992 springs to mind, as does 1970 (the last time Labour was unwise enough to risk going to the polls shortly after an important England football match). This election won't be, of course; the gap is far too large for that. But if there is a late swing, it is the government's opponents who look better placed to benefit from it than is the government itself.