🔍📊Westminster elections are largely won and lost in England, a place that votes Tory or votes for a party that panders to Tory voters (Telegraph Poll)

30 comments

1. They’re not quite taking population density or the actual numbers into account here. I mean obviously they’re biased but also they’re probably misrepresenting a lot

2. You say largely won or lost in England, but the Labour vote collapse in Scotland is one of the biggest factors in Tory UK rule.

3. It’s a rather nonsense question, no? It’s kind of the same thing as with a lot of campaigns (Brexit among them) – if you compare something very concrete to something more abstract, then people will naturally turn that abstract thing into whatever appeals to them, especially with a rather nebulous phrase as “followed core conservative values”. The Telegraph article about this poll mentions things like “a new, tax-cutting Tory leader with a tougher approach to legal and illegal migration”, but it’s not that clear what the actual question was (it appears this is part of an MRP project that YouGov were commissioned to do with several other questions, but I couldn’t find this specific question yet).

   The Telegraph in general are pushing more for Sunak to go at the moment, so it’s no real surprise they would feature this more heavily. There’s also the standard caveats that looking at a map can be misleading because land doesn’t vote, constituencies do – but Ross Colquhoun would never miss an opportunity to spin more than Alastair Campbell in a washing machine.

4. And yet wasn’t there a poll that other day that about 10% of people under 50 were going to vote Tory?

   Basically, I don’t think even rural England, which is what we see here, is going to be reliably Tory in the future.

   Likewise, a lot of people on your map are swing voters (and I would argue choosing “Starmer who hasn’t yet released a manifesto vs your own hypothetical conservative leader” – which could be anything from far-right to extremely soft centre-right – is always going to result in strange polling), as the other map showing current voting from the same polled population of 14,000 people shows.

5. It’s a nonsensical question done by an overwhelmingly pro Tory outlet. This is just propaganda

6. Telegraph Tory leaning rubbish

7. Shitty leading poll question by a biased source. I wouldn’t read too much into it.

8. Dear lord, this is laughable. Who would you prefer: a real person; or some nebulous ideal of a politician whose ‘core conservative values’ just happen to align perfectly with whatever your values are?

   I remember when the Telegraph used to be a semi-serious news outlet. Absolute joke of a rag these days.

9. Others have already said all that needs to be said on the matter, but I still need to chime in with a big fuck the Torygraph

10. If the Tories really thought they’d win this big just by getting rid of Sunak then he’d be gone before the poll even hit the press.

11. You’re telling me that elections are largely won and lost in a part of the country that has 84% of the population?

    Say it ain’t so!

12. Also misleading as hell map. I hate when tories do this too.

    Omg look how blue the country is we’re so amazing. When if you expand those red dots for population you’d remember they’re all equal roughly populace groups. London should be huge to show all the groups.

13. I, for one, am shocked that the Telegraph (a Tory-supporting newspaper) readership (Tories) would vote for the Tories.

14. Not largely won completely won it’s never mattered since 1954 what government Scotland voted for we have always got who England voted for

15. You are showing an example from a conservative backed publication.

16. So comparing a real person to an imaginary perfect leader. Yes this is useful data.

17. Elections are exclusively won and lost in England. It’s part of the problem

18. With that result, I’m sure snp supporters will be hoping for a new Tory leader.

19. I think most of us know this already.

20. Now ask all of those people what they think “core Conservative values” are. I suspect you’d get a lot of different answers and very few would be “running the country into the ground, embezzling billions for them and their mates and sending vulnerable people to Rwanda”.

21. Westminster has never stopped being England’s parliament, simply due to its size. A few hangers on from the colonies don’t change this.

    I would not advocate for a US style sokutiin with a disproportionate senate, as this is unfair to English voters who reasonably expect a UK government to reflect their preferences andbnot ours.

    The only fair and democratic solution is for the countries who want a different government from England to leave the UK, or perhaps to replace it with a union in the style of the EU.

22. It’s a pointless question. Also it was commissioned by the Torygraph, who are clearly clutching at straws.

23. What are the constituencies in red? Is there a list?

24. Okay now remember land doesn’t vote, could you show a comparison of parliamentary seats and % of voters

25. Do you get paid to post this nonsense? I hope so. It would be really sad if you did this in your free time.

26. Who would you prefer: Keir Starmer of the platonic ideal of a Tory leader who has miraculously solved all of life’s problems while lowering your taxes and giving you a cheeky wank?

27. We’re fucked either way so

28. You can smell the desperation.

29. The Torygraph just casually scrubbing Plaid Cymru and the Lib Dem’s from the map for some reason.

30. As well being a stupid question the headline basically says “Country with the biggest population has biggest number of votes”.