Support For Tories Is ‘At Its Lowest Ever In British Polling History,’ Elections Guru Says

Public support for the Conservatives have fallen to a historic low in polling history, John Curtice said today.

The famous pollster told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg: “Standing at just 20%, Conservative support is now at its lowest ever in British polling history.

“Mr Sunak, whose own personal ratings have clearly fallen, must be beginning to doubt his decision to call the election early.”

He added that a eight-point lead over Reform last week has fallen to just a four-point.

But Curtice also noticed that Labour are “being challenged by the Greens and the Lib Dems”, and support has fallen by two points – to 41%, on average.

His remarks came after another wave of polls predicted a pretty bleak result for the Conservatives when the public go to the ballot box.

A Savanta survey of 2,045 adults for The Sunday Telegraph found the party were at the lowest point since the final days of Theresa May’s time in office in early 2019, having dropped down four points to just 21%.

The same poll, conducted between 12-14 June and released on Saturday, showed Reform UK had climbed up three points to 13%.

Political research director at Savanta, Chris Hopkins, said it showed “nothing short of electoral extinction for the Conservative Party”.

“The hopes of Conservative candidates are being shot to pieces by poll after poll showing the Conservative Party in increasingly dire straits – and we’re only halfway through the campaign,” he said.

“There’s a real sense that things could still get worse for the Conservatives, and with postal votes about to drop through millions of letterboxes, time is already close to running out for Rishi Sunak.”

It comes after a separate Survation poll for Best for Britain, published in The Sunday Times, suggested the Conservatives would secure only 72 seats in the next parliament.

It predicted Labour would win 456, meaning the party would win a stomping 262 majority, the Liberal Democrats 56 seats, Reform seven and the Greens one.

Survation – which had polled 22,000 adults between 31 May and 13 June – showed the vote share would have halved from 44% in 2 019 to 24%.

Meanwhile, YouGov poll released last Thursday caused a huge stir within Westminster as it put Reform ahead of the Conservatives for the first time.

Nigel Farage’s populist party was on 19% of the vote while the Tories were on 18%, prompting his party to position themselves as the “opposition to Labour”.

Rishi Sunak downplayed this poll on Friday.

Speaking to journalists from the G7 summit in Italy, he said: “We are only halfway through this election, so I’m still fighting very hard for every vote.”

He also pledged to stay in parliament as an MP even if the Conservatives lose the election.

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Lee Anderson Used To Think That MPs Who Defect Should Face Being Kicked Out Of Parliament

Lee Anderson used to believe that MPs who defect to other parties should face being kicked out of parliament, it has emerged.

The former Tory deputy chairman announced this morning that he was switching to Reform UK.

Asked whether he would now call a by-election in his Ashfield seat, both Anderson and Reform UK leader Richard Tice said there was no need because the general election will take place soon.

But in 2020, Anderson backed a private members’ bill calling for MPs who change parties to face a recall petition so their constituents could decide whether they should be forced to trigger a by-election.

The Recall of MPs (Change of Party Affiliation) Bill was debated by the Commons on September 2 that year.

Its proposer, Anthony Mangnall, said changing parties “is clearly a breach of the spirit of the contract between ourselves and our constituents”.

He added: “Parties are often more visible than the candidate, from their leaders to their cabinets and their manifestos. They act as a magnet to either attract or repel voters to or from to their cause.

“So when a candidate who has campaigned using those logos, promoting that manifesto and supporting that leader switches sides, they are doing so against everything they told the thousands of voters they connected with during the election. This is not promoting democracy; it is degrading it.”

Anderson was one of 55 MPs who voted for the bill, which has not made it to the statute book.

But despite his previous stance, Anderson – who lost the Tory whip last month over comments he made about Sadiq Khan – today said he was switching sides because “I want my country back”.

He has already been removed from all Tory MP WhatsApp groups, and faced criticism from some of his former colleagues in the party.

However, Conservative backbencher Mark Pritchard told Sky News that “the door will always be left open” for Anderson is he wants to return.

He said: “Lee will always be welcome in the Conservative Party if he decides to come back.”

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