Election 2015: Nick Robinson, one man who’d welcome a second election

Lib Dems on the road to ruin

Posted at 09.45, Fri 13 Feb 2015

The Lib Dems have slumped to six per cent, their worst showing in 25 years, putting them in fifth place behind the Greens on seven per cent, according to a new Ipsos-MORI poll for the Evening Standard.

According to a ‘nowcast’ (see definition below) by academics at the British Election Study, it could reduce the party to a single seat on 7 May.

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That’s probably unrealistic– it takes no account of public allegiance to individual MPs, for instance – but on these figures there is very little chance the Lib Dems will save more than half of their current 57 seats, if that.

Ian Jones at UKgeneralelection.com has a useful chart showing the swing the Tories, Labour, the SNP and even the Greens (in one case) would need in each Lib Dem seat. Jones says Clegg and Co's best chance of survival is to treat the general election as 57 separate by-elections.

Definition: A ‘nowcast’ - as opposed to a forecast - assumes an election right now. BES looks at polls based on standard voting intention rather than the “thinking of your own constituency” method preferred by Ashcroft and other pollsters.