Marginals poll shows big Tory lead
But details are scarce and the pollster isn’t registered
The first news of this poll of the 30 most marginal seats has come on ConservativeHome and details are very scarce.
Firstly although the pollster has carried out at least one political poll in the UK before it is not listed as a member of the British Polling Council which makes me, for one, feel a touch uncomfortable.
Secondly the report that we’ve got does not tell is when the fieldwork was done and how the questioning took place. Was it online or by phone? Hopefully that will become clear.
The figures, if they can be supported, are sensational and do suggest that the marginals might be performing differently. Clearly these have seen a lot more campaigning than standard seats.
Going for the top 30 marginal seats, in a sense, is not that informative. I like the YouGov/C4 approach of looking at the seats that the Tories must take if they are to get a majority.
The ConHome report does note that there was a similar poll a year ago when the figures were CON 41: LAB 17: LD 18.
UPDATE: The Sunday Telegraph tells us that the survey, conducted for FlyingMatters, an aviation and tourism lobbying group, was of 1,004 voters were interviewed between 1 July and 11 July. That’s a very long fieldwork period which raised further questions.