Labour would bag 314-seat majority in the Commons with Tories down to just 69 if an election held tomorrow, poll finds

13 December 2022, 18:17

Labour would secure a devastating 314-seat majority in the House of Commons if an election was held tomorrow, a poll suggests.

Under a new seat forecast, Labour win 482 seats while the Conservatives would be decimated, down to just 69 MPs.

The model was released three years to the day that Boris Johnson celebrated the Tories securing an 80-seat majority at the 2019 general election.

The result would see Keir Starmer's party more than double their numbers in the chamber while the Tories would suffer a defeat more humiliating than Tony Blair's landslide victory in 1997.

The polling company's modelling suggests that in London and the South, east the Tories would face widespread losses, and be all but wiped out across northern England.

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Even Rishi Sunak would lose his contituency in Yorkshire, it showed, a Tory seat since 1910.

The findings are from market research firm Savanta, in their first forecast since the Labour party conference in September.

6,237 British adults were interviewed online by Savanta from December 2 -5 with the data compiled in a MRP model by Electoral Calculus.

But polling experts are more cautious, and have suggested that by the time of the general election, the actual result 'could look very different'.

However, there was some encouragement for Tory MPs fearful of losing their jobs in the form of a separate survey from Deltapoll, which showed the Labour lead had been cut to 13 percentage points.

According to the poll, which was published today, the Conservatives are up four points to 32 per cent, with Labour down three to 45 per cent, compared to last week's survey.

Deltapoll surveyed 1,088 British adults between December 9 to 12.

Former shadow chancellor Ed Balls warned the leadership not to become complacent.

'This is now Labour's election to lose, rather than a real challenge for Labour to win,' he said.

'That changes the whole dynamic for Keir Starmer and for Rachel Reeves and the team.'

For Savanta's multilevel regression with poststratification (MRP) model this month, which was conducted in conjunction with Electoral Calculus, just 28 per cent said they would votes for Tories at a general election, while 48 per cent said they would support Labour.

The SNP would bag an additional seven seats, according to the modelling, which would leave Nicola Sturgeon with 55 of Scotland's 59 Westminster constituencies.

The Liberal Democrats would also see a big boost in their MPs to 21, which would represent the highest level since 2010.

Chris Hopkins, political research director at Savanta, said the model reflected Tory support collapsing following the meltdown of the Liz Truss premiership.

He said: 'Last time we published an MRP model, I spoke of both the potential and precarious nature of the 56-seat majority and 12-point lead the poll it gave the Labour Party during their conference.

'Even the most optimistic Labour supporter would not have foreseen what was to come, such was the subsequent Conservative collapse, and therefore this latest MRP model reflects the position now, of two parties experiencing widely differing electoral fortunes.

'But we must still express caution. Many seats going to Labour in this model, including a few that could be deemed "Red Wall", still indicate a 40 per cent or higher chance of remaining Conservative.

'And while that would have little impact on the overall election result, it does show that if Rishi Sunak can keep narrowing that Labour lead, point-by-point, the actual results come 2024 could look very different to this nowcast model.'

Martin Baxter, Founder of Electoral Calculus, said: 'This is an interesting poll, because it is the first MRP we have done since the Conservatives slid so far behind Labour, and therefore we have very little to compare it with.

'MRP results are different to applying uniform national swing (UNS) to the 2019 general election baseline.

'The UNS prediction would give the Conservatives about 24 more seats than this model.

'Previous elections suggests that MRP is usually more accurate than UNS predictions, but we are in uncharted electoral waters and uncertainty is higher than usual.'