Working with leading pollster ComRes, Electoral Calculus has applied modern regression-based techniques to show an increased Labour lead over the Conservatives.
Regression techniques, also known as MRP, are growing in popularity in the market research industry as a way to make polling more accurate again. Classic polling techniques have had problems with accuracy in recent years as representative sampling becomes harder.
Working jointly with ComRes, we have applied the regression techniques to recent polls. Those polls showed Labour and the Conservatives about equally popular, when they were analysed with conventional polling techniques. But under the new regression techniques, they show a Labour lead of 4pc over the Conservatives.
| General Election 2017 | Current Voting Intention | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Vote Share | Seats | Vote Share | Seats | Change |
| CON | 43.5% | 318 | 32.6% | 277 | −41 |
| LAB | 41.0% | 262 | 34.7% | 290 | 28 |
| LIB | 7.6% | 12 | 8.6% | 15 | 3 |
| UKIP | 1.9% | 0 | 5.9% | 0 | 0 |
| Green | 1.7% | 1 | 3.2% | 0 | -1 |
| TIG | 0.0% | 0 | 8.6% | 0 | 0 |
| SNP | 3.1% | 35 | 3.7% | 47 | 12 |
| PC | 0.5% | 4 | 0.7% | 3 | -1 |
An additional feature of regression techniques is that they give a seat-by-seat breakdown which each seat is individually predicted, rather than relying on uniform national swing assumptions.
This regression prediction by ComRes and Electoral Calculus was featured in the Daily Telegraph, "Tory Leavers most in danger of losing seats" on 20 April 2019.
Details of the regression method, and its successful testing with earlier pre-election polls can be found here.