Snap election could produce Labour-led government, poll reveals

LABOUR leader Jeremy Corbyn and the Scottish National Party’s Nicola Sturgeon could form a Government if the Conservative Party implodes over Brexit, a major polling study has found.

A poll of polls of 13,000 voters conducted by Electoral Calculus predicts that the Tories will emerge as the largest party after a snap election with 286 MPs, three more than Labour’s 283 MPs. The SNP would have 43 MPs and Liberal Democrats 16. That result would leave the Tories struggling to form alliances with enough like-minded parties to remain in government.

This would allow Labour to form a Left-leaning coalition alliance with the SNP, with a combined 326 MPs and a slim two-seat majority in the 650-strong Commons.

The findings will alarm Conservative MPs who readily concede that an elec- tion triggered by the collapse of Theresa May’s Government is a possible outcome after next week’s vote on her Brexit deal.

Tory MPs who would find their seats vulnerable in the event of a general election include Amber Rudd, the Work and Pensions Secretary (Hastings and Rye), Zac Goldsmith (Richmond Park) and the former Cabinet minister Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet).

Even if new constituency bounda- ries – yet to be signed off by Parliament – are taken into account the Tories would still be 22 short of an overall majority although Labour and the SNP would not be able to form a government.

Martin Baxter, the founder and chief executive of Electoral Calculus, said that, after a snap election: “Parliament would be badly hung and would not be able to do very much with those figures.”