The race becomes a tie – but Labour could snatch it

Thanks to Mike for alerting me to the fact that 23.4% of the UKIP support in the survation poll were people who did not vote in the 2010 General Election.

History has shown voters who did not vote in the last general election are the less likely to turnout in the next general election. One of the reasons ICM has been consistently the most accurate pollster is one of their adjustments is to discount the view of non voters by a 50%.

The one thing that may give comfort to Reckless/UKIP is that there was no UKIP candidate in 2010, so some of these 2010 non voters were probably Kippers who didn’t have a bona fide UKIP candidate to vote for and therefore stayed at home.

But given the resources and effort the Tories are expected to throw into this by-election, it should be a lot closer than the 9% lead than the headline figures suggested last night.

The most intriguing element is Labour being just six points behind, with a strong campaign they could win it. That might be David Cameron’s best result in this by election. He could point out this is a harbinger of the 2015 General Election, go to bed with Nigel Farage and wake up with Ed Miliband.

14/1 on Labour winning the by-election looks very tasty, in light of the above, but I think most of my money today will be going on a Tory hold.

TSE