A new poll just out by PoliticsHome with the fieldwork carried out by YouGov seeks to make a more accurate prediction of the next election by interviewing more than 34,000 people in more than 200 marginal constituencies.

These have been broken down in 17 separate categories of seat and the poll has sought to discover different trends. From the data a projected majority of 146 is forecast.

The project has been masterminded by Anthony Wells of UK Polling Report which has a good analysis.

One aspect tested was tactical voting, particularly in Lib Dem targets and marginals. This has produced good news for Nick Clegg’s party.

It has taken about seven weeks to process the data from fieldwork that was carried out in late July. The real question then is how up to date we can regard it

I’ll be doing a further piece when I have had chance to examine the data in detail.

Alas tonight we have a crisis involving a member of my family – my daughter has had her passport stolen in Corsica and is due to fly out tomorrow morning. The FCO say call the airline, Easyjet, but that seems impossible on a Saturday night.

Mike Smithson