Should voting intention polls be banned in final stages of GE campaigns: 30pc of MPs are in favour
In the days of Twitter a ban isn’t going to work
A new ComRes survey of 159 MPs reveals that 30% of MPs overall, including 35% of Labour MPs and one in four Tories (25%), would support a ban on the publication of opinion polls in the run-up to General Elections. The survey comes in the wake of the Indian Election Commission banning exit polls in the five states holding elections this month, plus a ban on any opinion polls in the final 48 hours of campaigning.
The ComRes survey also reveals which voting intention opinion poll methodology MPs trust and do not trust. The results are striking in that they show MPs trust most the methodology which pollsters themselves have almost entirely abandoned – face to face.
The problem with a ban is that it isn’t going to work. We see that whenever someone tries to put an embargo on what can be hot information.
Polls would still be commissioned and the parties would leak data it they thought it would benefit them.
Only trouble is that we’d get bit of selected data without the full transparency that exists at the moment through the British Polling Council disclosure code. That would be a very bad thing.
A bad idea – the 30% are wrong.
Mike Smithson
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