In a new blow to Prime Minister Rishi sunak a poll released yesterday suggests labour are on course for a huge majority at the next general election, doubling their number of MPs.
The survey also suggests that the conservatives would be wiped out of the north with no seats beyond South Holland and the Deepings, held by the popular Conservative MP Sir John Hayes.
The poll, by Savanta and Electoral Calculus, suggests Labour is on track to win a huge 314-seat majority at the next general election, with Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party enjoying a 20-point lead (48 per cent) over their Tory rivals (28 per cent).
Under the model, Labour would more than double the number of MPs it currently has winning a a total of 482. While the Conservatives would be down to just 69 MPs.
The poll also predicts that the Conservative would be wiped out across the North of England, with the Prime Minister losing his own Richmond seat in Yorkshire as well as across London and part of the South West.
The SNP would make further gains winning an extra seven seats, while the Lib Dems would end up with 21 MPs, including swiping deputy PM Dominic Raab’s Esher and Walton seat.
Chris Hopkins, political research director at Savanta, urged caution over the results and said the actual 2024 general election could “look very different”.
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 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 percent 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.”
It comes after polling guru Professor Sir John Curtice last month warned it would be “extremely difficult” for the Tories to win the next general election, expected in late 2024.
He told the Express that: “History suggests that it’s going to be extremely difficult. No government that has presided over a financial crisis has ever survived at the ballot box. Voters don’t forget governments being forced to do a U-turn by financial markets.”
Sir John highlighted how there was an “incredible gap” between Mr Sunak’s personal ratings which are higher than the party’s.
He said: “His role as Chancellor as having saved the economy, or he saved the labour market is still with him. It does mean that personally he’s got a reputation.”
The polling expert added that any hope for the Conservatives at the next general election depends on if Mr Sunak can turn around the economy.
He said: “Maybe he can, but it won’t be easy. And the odds are against him. It’s pretty clear that, at the moment two years out, the Labour party are favourites to win the next election.”
The poll will unnerve conservative strategists and Number 10 who are struggling to get onto the front foot politically, following a series of rebellions by backbench MPs which forced the Prime Minister into several embarrassing U-turns on issues such as compulsory house building targets and onshore wind farms last week.
The bleak picture painted by Savanta and Electoral Calculus will also do little to steady the nerves of conservative MPs many of whom are angry at Mr Sunak and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt over the autumn statement which saw a series of punitive tax increases introduced, while the government has failed to get a grip of the chaotic asylum system.
Savanta and Electoral Calculus interviewed 6,237 British adults between 2nd – 5th December.
