Could polls be pointing to a win for Corbyn?
Can Jeremy Corbyn win the unwinnable election? After a series of promising polls, this question is now being seriously asked in the UK.
Pollsters and political pundits are divided on the answer – between ‘‘no’’ and ‘‘probably not’’.
Most, such as the University of Kent’s Matthew Goodwin, are completely dismissive – he will ‘‘happily eat my new Brexit book’’ if Labour poll 38 per cent, let alone beat the Conservatives which would require a much higher figure, he said.
But some, including pollster YouGov political research head Joe Twyman, add a note of caution.
The numbers, and the trend, point to a scenario where, just maybe, if the stars aligned (and the long-promised youth vote materialises), Labour leader Corbyn could pull the biggest electoral upset since… the last one.
When Prime Minister Theresa May called a snap general election in April, the Conservative advantage over Labour was above 20 points.
But one poll published on the weekend showed the gap at just 6 points – and all five weekend polls confirmed a trend of Labour’s steady rise.
YouGov’s Twyman says he is ‘‘relatively confident’’ this is a real shift in the electorate, not just a statistical blip. Labour is performing better in its heartlands than in 2015, and winning over voters from the Liberal Democrats, whose ‘‘fightback from 2015 is just not happening’’, Twyman said.
But the main division among voters is age.
If Jeremy Corbyn is to hold real hope, he must mobilise young voters (voting in the UK is not compulsory).
Labour has two thirds of the 18-24s, though the Conservatives have two thirds of the over 65s, who are much more likely to turn out on June 8.
The polls that have Labour in with the best chance take young people at their word as to whether they’ll vote, while the ones still predicting a handsome Tory majority go for historical models of demographic turnout.
The polls right now are too varied to give anyone confidence – last weekend’s figures could give the Conservatives a wafer-thin majority or a landslide.
Some put the variation down to pollsters tinkering with their pre- diction models after they predicted the wrong result in 2015.
In all but the vanishingly unlikely scenarios on the current numbers the Conservatives either win, or are replaced with a Labour-SNP coalition or a minority Labour government.
Labour’s biggest problem is still its leader. Twyman said when voters were polled on the best prime minister, about half said Theresa May and only one fifth Jeremy Corbyn. Though voters were generally impressed with Labour’s manifesto, they still have reservations about whether Corbyn could deliver it (as one comedian put it, ‘‘it’s like Darth Vader offered you a trifle’’).
No UK election has been won by a party that polls put behind its rival on both management of the economy and best prime minister.
However ‘‘what has been interesting in this campaign has been both candidates’ ability to be pretty damn mediocre,’’ Twyman said.
The momentum swung to Labour after their well-received manifesto launch, followed by the Conservatives astonishing decision to put social care cuts for the elderly in their own manifesto (a move quickly dubbed the ‘‘dementia tax’’).
But Twyman said the Manchester terror attack put the focus back on a Tory strength, security, and allowed Mrs May to look strong. She polls 25 per cent ahead of her rival on who voters believe will keep them safe from terrorism.
‘‘The momentum is with the Conservatives again – at the moment,’’ Twyman said. ‘‘But my suspicion is there is a lot more to come. We have seen their support is fragile. Neither candidate inspires excitement.’’
This weeks’ TV leadership debates might prove crucial, he said.
Dr Simon Usherwood, of the politics department at the University of Surrey, said polls were closing, but ‘‘still not so much as to put a Tory victory in doubt’’. May ‘‘has confused the weakness of the opposition with support for her agenda’’, he said. ‘‘This tightening of the polls is - in my view - about the disquiet with her and the procession to power that she seems to embody.
‘‘No one likes a politician who takes it all for granted - even if she has tried hard to say that if isn’t done and dusted - so while she will get a mandate on 8 June, I’m doubtful she’ll be able to do nearly as much with it as she thinks.’’
- Fairfax