A worrying trend for Ed Miliband’s team: Labour’s 2010 Lib Dem crutch is getting shorter
Many ex-yellows are now going green
Over the last two years we’ve been keeping a close eye on the group of swing voters who could have a big impact on the May 7th outcome – those who voted Lib Dem in 2010 but have now switched to Labour. In my latest calculation, for January, the number has dropped to a low point.
This is not the sort of trend that you can easily discern from a single poll which is why I’ve gone for monthly averages.
The above chart is based on eighteen months of the twice-weekly Populus poll and shows the proportion of 2010 LD voters who are now telling the pollsters that they’ve switched. Populus has been chosen because the other regular one, YouGov, does not present its numbers in a way that you can easily extract the data.
What seems to be happening is that they are not going back to Clegg’s party but are now saying Green.
If the Ashcroft marginals polling is correct then we are likely to see less of an effect in key seats that the Tories are defending from LAB or trying to take from the LDs.
Professor John Curtice calls the yellow switchers “Labour’s crutch” – well it’s getting shorter.