23:29

The result of YouGov’s constituency by constituency model makes seductive reading for the Conservatives and grim reading for Labour.



Can you believe it?

What YouGov has in its favour was its success last time: Nine days before the last election, the firm predicted Theresa May’s Conservatives would lose their majority and end up with just 310 seats.

In fact, the party got 317 but it came at a time when few other pollsters were predicting anything other than a May win.

What YouGov has against it is that it has been polling people over the past week, when regular polling firms would aim for the last couple of days. And, during an election campaign, every day matters.

A week ago, neither party manifesto was out, the leaders debate hadn’t happened and the antisemitism row hadn’t surfaced. More importantly, while the Conservative squeeze of the Brexit party has come early in this campaign, the Labour squeeze of the Lib Dems is perhaps not yet complete.

There are some things in the forecast that look curious. Labour is not forecast to gain any seats at all, which will surprise party workers in some targets where it has dozens on the ground, such as Southampton Itchen (Con maj 31), Hastings and Rye (Con maj 346) and Chingford and Woodford Green (Con maj 2438).

But it will hit home in the critical “red wall” band that runs very roughly from north Wales to the Humber, where Labour insiders are already deeply concerned, with some party workers reporting a sharp fall in those willing to say they will back the party.

The modelling suggests the Conservatives will gain seat after seat in Britain’s smaller cities and large towns: Wrexham (Lab maj 1,832), Derby North (Lab maj 2,015), Great Grimsby (2,565), despite the residual presence of the Brexit party.

Even West Bromwich East, previously held for Labour by Tom Watson with a majority of 7,713, is projected to change hands, and interestingly most of the seats projected to switch are straight Conservative versus Labour battles. In only a handful, such as Kensington in London, does a Lib Dem revival split the anti-Tory vote.