Is Labour being flattered by the non-voters?
How much of the red support is from the “can’t be arsed”?
One of the great things about the way Comres sets out the detailed data from its polls is that it includes a line on what those who didn’t vote at the last May say they plan to do next time.
And from the latest poll we find that a move that I’ve identified before is that a significant part comes from those who didn’t vote at the general election.
I’ve longed argued that declared non-voters from the previous general election should be treated differently by the pollsters – and, indeed, ICM now down-weights them by a half. For it’s known that the section of the electorate least likely to vote next time are those who didn’t do so last time.
In this latest poll we see that 9% of Labour’s support comes from non-voters which compares with 5% for both the Tories and the Lib Dems.
The data also shows that the Lib Dems, as we might expect, have lost between a quarter and a third of their general election support to Labour. But about one in six of the general election voters have not moved to another party – they simply say that at the moment they don’t know or refuse to give a voting intention.