Into unknown territory with Ukip – just how much will Farage’s party impact on next week’s outcomes?

Into unknown territory with Ukip – just how much will Farage’s party impact on next week’s outcomes?

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Today I’ve been at the annual briefing organised by the Political Studies Association on the May local elections. On the panel were Professor John Curtice from Strathclyde and Professors Rallings and Thrasher from the University of Plymouth.

Their overall prediction for council seats won/lost, based on their local by-elections model is CON – 310, LAB +350, LD – 130, UKIP +40.

    For me one statistic stood out and that is in the picture above : In local by-elections in seats where Ukip stood before the purples are seeing an average increase in their vote share of 12.2%

    If they do anything like that a week tomorrow then the Tories could be in trouble.

A key factor is that most of the seats up and intra-coalition fights where the last time both CON and LD occupied the top two slots.

So some of the seepage from the yellows might be more than made up by the purples siphoning off the blue votes.

The LDs, of course, will get smashed where they are defending against LAB.

The big message from an absorbing session is that all bets are off as we enter the world of four party politics.

Mike Smithson

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