Here’s the current party holders of the 6 seats the South West has:

6 seats, 2 elected as Ukip, 2 Conservative, 1 Labour, 1 Green

What we’ve done is to take the total number of votes from the 2014 election, compared the South West voting percentages against the national picture (as say LibDems & Greens do better in SW elections than they do nationally) and modify accordingly against a current national poll. For the parties with incumbents, we’ve added a small boost too. That gives you the following vote totals:

Brexit 345,730

Cons 315,879

LibDems 217,481

Labour 211,647

Change UK 120,254

UKIP 109,351

Green 105,720

The EU elections work on the basis of the D’Hondt system, which is a form of proportional representation that favours bigger parties. Basically the party with the most votes gets the first MEP, then you divide their votes by 2 and then see who’s got the most. Whoever has gets the second MEP and also gets their total divided by 2 and so on until all the seats are allocated. There’s are more detailed explainer here. So applying the D’Hondt system to the above numbers you get:

Brexit 2

Cons 2

LibDems 1

Labour 1

Using the current list of candidates for the South West (from here) that gives the following people seats:

Brexit Party Ann Widdecombe James Glancy Conservatives Ashley Fox James Mustoe Labour Clare Moody Liberal Democrats Caroline Voaden

What does this show? Well it is, in terms of the 2014, vote similar-ish with the Brexit Party replacing UKIP on the right and Labour replacing Greens on the left. Shame we don’t get to see a progressive and/or pro-EU vote surge manifested in the number of seats. In this model, this is down to Change UK taking votes from other progressive parties who stood in 2014.

Thoughts? Bad that we may lose Molly Scott-Cato that would be a huge loss as she’s been a good MEP. On plus side we’ll see no UKIP MEPs in the SW, including no Carl of Swindon. On basis of this, if votes in the SW want to send a message of support for the EU we’d be better off picking two (not three, four if Labour wake-the-fuck-up) pro-EU parties than over a number and then the vote could return 3 seats knocking out one of the right votes (probably the 2nd Tory seat)

Disclaimer! This model is based on the same turnout as 2014, and we don’t think it will be the same. EU elections have motivated anti-EU people more than pro-EU voters in the past but who knows in 2019? For example the 2017 General Election saw younger people turn out in much larger numbers for Labour, confounding the polls. Plus Brexit cuts across party lines in complex ways, so it is hard to know if say disenfranchised Tory voters will defect to another party or stay at home?