Alan Fisher
Bad, could be even worse
The Labour Party has had a bad election campaign. Never in front in the opinion polls, now trailing in third place. It’s hoping that its support stands up in the traditional areas, the inner cities of England, large parts of Scotland and the urban areas of Wales. Things seemed to take a turn for the worse in the last few days after what has unfortunately become known as ‘bigotgate’, an event from which no-one emerged happy. Yet there is a chance that even trailing behind the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats in the share of the vote, the party could still win the largest number of seats.
If they’re basing the final result on the opinion polls, Labour supporters and politicians could still be in for a very big shock. A quick analysis of the polls and the reality of the last four elections will make deeply uncomfortable reading. In the elections in 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2005, Labour has polled better than they performed.
Labour lost the 1992 election, even though many predicted a win for Neil Kinnock. He was facing an unpopular Conservative prime minister who had taken over from an adored long serving icon in Margaret Thatcher. The country was facing a financial crisis, had just emerged from a war in the Middle East and the ruling party was riven by divisions. The pre-vote polls put Labour within two points of the Conservatives. When the ballots were counted, they ended up eight points behind. John Major won an unlikely majority.
Labour took revenge by routing the Tories in 1997, unseating a number of prominent figures, winning a massive majority. But if voting had followed the polls, the Labour victory would have been much bigger. They suggested Labour would pick up 54% of the vote. The final figure was 43% with the Conservatives doing much better than expected.
In 2001, Tony Blair became one of the few Labour leaders to win re-election. He did it with 41% of the vote, even though the opinion polls suggested that he would be 10 points better off. Again the Conservatives did better than predicted.
And then there is the historic win for Blair just five years ago. He’d gone to war in Iraq – which was deeply unpopular, had indicated he might not serve a full five-year term, standing down for Gordon Brown, and was tied up in huge rows over civil liberties. Yet he won. And he did it by taking a smaller percentage of the vote than the Conservatives.
The pattern over the last four elections has been quite clear. The Labour vote is over-estimated; the Conservatives do much better than expected. And as for the Liberal Democrats, regarded by many as an irrelevance until this election? Well they always win more votes than the opinion polls suggest.
Every election is different, but even in 2005, when the eve of election polls were very accurate, the Labour vote flattered to deceive. If the pattern is repeated, what was already shaping up to be a bad night for Labour is going to be a whole lot worse than they feared.
Alan Fisher is an Al Jazeera correspondent
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The Library
Recent articles
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04.05.10
Issue no 246
Stitched up
Since ‘Bigotgate’, the
electronic media’s arrogant control of the election has
been complete
[click here]
How did he get
away with it?
Catherine Czerkawska
argues from personal experience that the scandal facing the Roman Catholic church is common to
other institutions
[click here]
Ash
Gerard Rochford
Our poem for May
reflects more deeply
on the
significance of
a current event
[click here]
Also today:
Bob and Rose
The last in the series
of election diaries
[click here]
for R D Kernohan
[click here]
for Rose Galt
Tedious and Brief
The election in 100
words a day
[click here]
Alan Fisher’s
World
Saving the euro
[click here]
Next edition: Wednesday
