If the trend in today’s London poll was replicated in Manchester Gorton then LAB might struggle
Today’s main polling news has been a London poll by YouGov for Queen Mary University where Professor Phil Cowley is one of the leading politics dons. He created the above charts. The main figures with changes on April last year were:-
CON 34+4
LAB 37-9
LD 14+7
UKIP 9-4
GRN 5+1
As we all know London has a very different demographic profile from most of the country and there are very few places indeed which come close to matching it. One I’d suggest is Manchester Gorton where Labour is defending a Westminster by-election on May 4th.
Gorton is an inner city seat with a huge number of students and a large BME population which has a much younger profile to the rest of the UK
Based on the betting odds the big battle is between Labour and the LDs who secured a third of the vote at GE2010 and where the yellows are fighting hard.
If the Gorton Labour vote is falling in the manner portrayed in the London poll with the strongly anti-BREXIT LDs the main beneficiary from these numbers should could be the yellows. Like London Manchester Gorton was strongly for REMAIN last June 23rd.
There has been no published Gorton polling though I’m given to understand from my links in the city that voters there say they have been polled. I can only assume that was a private poll for one of the parties.
There’s the added complication for LAB in the by-election of the LEAVE campaigner George Galloway running as an independent. I’m sure both the yellows and reds will not be slow in reminding voters that the former RESPECT MP announced his Gorton plans on the website of Arron Banks.
When Galloway made his intentions clear the week before last I laid Labour at 1.13 on Betfair. That’s now shifted to above 1.2 and I’ve taken the profits by betting on Labour.