Poll: 6pc of Tory voters have switched to UKIP
How serious is the threat to the blues?
New data from Angus Reid shows that 6% of those who told the pollster in a post election survey in May 2010 that the voted Tory now saying they would support UKIP in an immediate general election.
What’s significant about this is that the past vote data is not based on what they now say they did at the last election but on what they told the pollster in a survey carried out over the weekend after the election.
Thus the potential for false recall is much reduced.
The same poll shows that 4% of Lib Dem voters last May and 2% of Labour ones have also switched to the anti-EU party.
The problem with this sort of data is that we are dealing with small sub-samples which does add to the potential for error. However the AR figures are broadly in line with YouGov which on Friday showed that 5% of general election Tory and LD voters were now saying they were supporting UKIP.
NOTE: The sub-sample sizes were 603 Tory general elections voter with Angus Reid and 796 with YouGov.