Final Lord Ashcroft Polls for Election 2015

Lord Ashcroft has released his final batch of polls for Election 2015. He has polled Conservative held Labour marginals, two notable seats in Scotland and a Liberal Democrat held Conservative marginal.

Conservative held Labour marginals

Such marginals are the place where this election is to be won or lost. Here is a brief summary of what Lord Ashcroft found:

Labour Target 26: Pudsey: 1.7% swing needed, 1.2% swing found, Conservative hold
Labour Target 47: Croydon Central: 2.9% swing needed, 0.9% swing found, Conservative hold
Labour Target 50: Wirral West: 3.1% swing needed, 4.6% swing found, Labour gain
Labour Target 68: Norwich North: 4.6% swing needed, 5.6% swing found, Labour gain
Labour Target 79: Peterborough: 5.4% swing needed, 6.4% swing found, Labour gain
Labour Target 81: Stourbridge: 5.5% swing needed, 4.5% swing found, Conservative hold
Labour Target 89: Battersea: 6.1% swing needed, 0.1% swing found, Conservative hold.

Labour need 68 net gains to win this election. Taking into account previous polling which has shown that Labour will easily lose seats to the SNP and easily gain seats from the Liberal Democrats, it is likely that Labour will need to hit up to around target seat 100 to win a majority. According to the battleground, Labour would therefore need a 6.5% swing across the country for an outright victory.

Notice that no seat polled has a swing that high. Both of the seats polled in London show relatively little change compared to 2010. I suspect this is because UKIP are doing worse in London to the benefit of the Conservatives.

These figures do appear to be consistent with national polling. It seems apparent that Labour are not getting the kind of result they need to win and the Conservatives are losing too many seats to be able to hold on even with the gains they are likely to make from the Liberal Democrats.

Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (2010)
Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale is the only Conservative held seat in Scotland. Previous Lord Ashcroft polling has shown a close race between the Conservatives and the SNP. Two weeks ago Lord Ashcroft showed a 2% SNP lead over the Conservatives. Now Lord Ashcroft is showing that lead to have increased to 11%. If this seat is lost by the Conservatives it is unlikely that there will be any Conservative held seats in Scotland, although the currently Liberal Democrat held neighbouring seat of Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk may be won by the Conservatives.

Renfrewshire East (2010)
Renfrewshire East is currently held by the leader of the Scottish Labour Party Jim Murphy. Lord Ashcroft has previously shown the SNP with a 9% lead over Labour. Now he is showing this lead down to 3%. The SNP vote share has remained more or less the same, but it looks as though the Conservative vote has gone to Labour, possibly tactically to keep the SNP out.

Cornwall North (2010)
Cornwall North has historically been a Conservative-Liberal marginal and this election appears to be no different. Lord Ashcroft is showing a 2% Liberal Democrat lead over the Conservatives.