:00:26. > :00:30.It's been an extraordinary year for British politics and helping us to
:00:31. > :00:36.get underneath the skin of that is our panel this morning. So in order
:00:37. > :00:40.of speaking, I'm delighted to introduce Dr Chris Crosser from th
:00:41. > :00:56.University of Manchester and the British election study who is look
:00:57. > :01:00.at voting atty Tuesday. -- voting atty Tuesday. Professor Henderson
:01:01. > :01:08.who will talk us through the view on Scotland an Professor Tim Bale from
:01:09. > :01:13.Queen university London. Without further ado, I'll hand over to Chris
:01:14. > :01:17.to kick us off. I want to talk about three things. I want to put the
:01:18. > :01:21.current election into long-term context looking at how voters have
:01:22. > :01:24.changed the way they behave over a long period and also comparing
:01:25. > :01:28.attitudes towards the parties and leaders to the last couple of
:01:29. > :01:32.elections. Anyone who asks the question is this the Brexit
:01:33. > :01:38.election, that is the big question on everyone's minds, then I want to
:01:39. > :01:42.touch on the role of leadership. I'm joined by the Internet panel which
:01:43. > :01:48.interviews 30,000 people per wave and we have been running the current
:01:49. > :01:53.one since 2013 but it's been going for much longer, the British
:01:54. > :01:57.election study has run since 1964. The most recent wave was in December
:01:58. > :02:02.of last year and ideally we would have had slightly more recent data
:02:03. > :02:04.but the Prime Minister didn't give us quite enough notice unfortunately
:02:05. > :02:09.to get that out in time. So one of the interesting things
:02:10. > :02:13.about this election is whether it marks a return to a two-party
:02:14. > :02:18.system. So Ukip look like they're collapsing, the Lib Dems are
:02:19. > :02:22.struggling to regain their previous levels of support and with the
:02:23. > :02:28.exception of Scotland, as I'm sure we'll be reminded later, it looks
:02:29. > :02:32.like a one-horse race and a maybe a one-and-a-half horse race in
:02:33. > :02:38.England. If the polls are right, this is what the shared two party
:02:39. > :02:43.vote is over the years. It's declined massively over a long
:02:44. > :02:48.period of time since the 50s when the Conservatives and Labour got
:02:49. > :02:52.more than 90% of the vote to the most recent election where they only
:02:53. > :02:57.got 70%. If it twos back up to the sort of level expected by the polls,
:02:58. > :03:02.it marks a return not quite to the levels of two-party competition that
:03:03. > :03:08.we saw in the 50s and 60s, but at least maybe to the 80s and 90s. I
:03:09. > :03:13.want to say that even if this is apparent return to the previous
:03:14. > :03:15.model of British politics, the sort of things underlying politics
:03:16. > :03:19.haven't changed in the same direction. So I don't think we are
:03:20. > :03:25.really going to see a long-term shift back to the way politics used
:03:26. > :03:28.to be. This graph shows the percentage of voters who switch
:03:29. > :03:34.parties between elections and we know this because we take interviews
:03:35. > :03:39.from people at one election and ask if they are ready and reinterview
:03:40. > :03:45.years later and ask who they voted for. This number's gone up seasonth
:03:46. > :03:51.substantially. We have this second election that we can choose from,
:03:52. > :03:54.for the first time, only 13% of respondents changed parties between
:03:55. > :04:00.electionses. So just over one in ten. Whereas in 2015 which marks the
:04:01. > :04:04.high watermark of switching, 43% of the electorate voted for someone
:04:05. > :04:10.different than who they voted for five years previously in 2010. The
:04:11. > :04:14.reasons for this are long and complicated and I don't have time to
:04:15. > :04:20.begin to to them, but basically -- time to go into them, but basically
:04:21. > :04:24.the breakdown of strong class hierarchies and Trade Unions and
:04:25. > :04:27.that sort of thing which pinned people into the two party system
:04:28. > :04:31.have eroded over a long period. This is unlikely to reverse. Even if if
:04:32. > :04:37.election looks like a return to the way things used to be, the things
:04:38. > :04:40.underpinning it that have led to the fragmentation of British politics
:04:41. > :04:47.are unlikely to go away. Now I want to look at how things have changed
:04:48. > :04:51.since 2010 and 2015. If you look at the polls, things have changed
:04:52. > :04:54.dramatically since 2010 and 2015, but if you ask people the slightly
:04:55. > :04:58.different question, not who they are going to vote for but how they feel
:04:59. > :05:03.about the parties, actually the changed are much more muted. So this
:05:04. > :05:07.is the average level of liking of parties at each election and you can
:05:08. > :05:10.see that OK the Conservatives are slightly more popular than they were
:05:11. > :05:16.last time but they're not really much popular than they were in 2010
:05:17. > :05:20.and OK Labour is slightly less popular than in 2015 but only by a
:05:21. > :05:25.tiny bit and actually they are much more popular than they were in 2010.
:05:26. > :05:28.If you compare this to the really big changes in British politics like
:05:29. > :05:33.the change in how people felt about the Lib Dems after 2010 or about the
:05:34. > :05:38.SNP in Scotland after the reference double, the shifts in feelings about
:05:39. > :05:43.the Conservative Labour are really quite small. But if you look at how
:05:44. > :05:49.people feel about the leaders of the parties, there's a little bit more
:05:50. > :05:51.change. You can see Theresa May is well-liked, more so than David
:05:52. > :05:57.Cameron was either before he came Prime Minister or in 2015. Jeremy
:05:58. > :06:01.Corbyn is slightly less well liked than Ed Miliband but the notable
:06:02. > :06:05.thing is that it's not that much different from how people felt about
:06:06. > :06:10.Ed Miliband. There's something I want to come back to later on, but
:06:11. > :06:13.the thing to remember about leadership, it's much more volatile
:06:14. > :06:17.than how people feel about the parties. The current election, the
:06:18. > :06:23.Tories are doing particularly well because Theresa May is so popular,
:06:24. > :06:29.but people's attitudes about leaders tend to change rapidly more so than
:06:30. > :06:33.parties, so if something went wrong with Brexit or if Labour managed to
:06:34. > :06:38.elect a more popular leader, we could see a quick reversal of
:06:39. > :06:41.fortunes in the polls. Now the big question is, is this the Brexit
:06:42. > :06:45.election. One question we asked people in the surveys is what is the
:06:46. > :06:50.most important issue facing the country. The easy way to visualise
:06:51. > :06:54.the responses is to do a word cloud which weights the size of words
:06:55. > :06:59.according to how frequently they are mentioned in people's responses.
:07:00. > :07:08.This is a free text to an open-ended response. People are worried about
:07:09. > :07:14.Brexit and other issues like the NHS, immigration. They are slightly
:07:15. > :07:18.misleading though because they reward pluralities and punish people
:07:19. > :07:22.who disagree, much like our electoral system, it's actually the
:07:23. > :07:26.majority of people didn't say Brexit, only 43% of the sample said
:07:27. > :07:31.Brexit was the most important issue. It's high for a question of this
:07:32. > :07:35.type. Brexit seems to be at the forefront of people's mind but the
:07:36. > :07:39.effect it's having on the way people cast their votes is very confused
:07:40. > :07:43.and noisy and it's not clear at all that we are going to get the same
:07:44. > :07:48.realignment that we have in Scotland after the Scottish independence
:07:49. > :07:58.referendum. So these graphs show the flow of the vote between 2015 and
:07:59. > :08:02.our last survey in 2016. So December 2016, so post-referendum. So the two
:08:03. > :08:07.things to note I think really are one how much movement there is in
:08:08. > :08:11.all directions, so yes, you know, there are people moving from Labour
:08:12. > :08:15.to the Lib Dems on the remain side, people moving from Labour to the
:08:16. > :08:19.Tories on the leave side. Actually, there are people moving all over the
:08:20. > :08:23.place and there's a lot of people who're unsure about who they're
:08:24. > :08:29.going to vote for. So it looks like, although some people are being
:08:30. > :08:34.shifted by Brexit, mostly it's causing volatility and uncertainty
:08:35. > :08:38.in the election rather than reforming the lines of party
:08:39. > :08:42.competition in a clear way. If it's not Brexit, what is it? The
:08:43. > :08:49.obvious answer is it's about leadership and competence. I showed
:08:50. > :08:54.you the like figures before I showed you that Jeremy Corbyn was less well
:08:55. > :08:58.liked than Theresa May. Probably more important is the final set of
:08:59. > :09:02.bars which asked people how competent they thought Corbyn and
:09:03. > :09:09.May were. So although Corbyn is always lagging behind May on whether
:09:10. > :09:12.they are liked or have integrity, it's this competence one that picks
:09:13. > :09:18.out the difference between them. Another way of visualising this is
:09:19. > :09:22.to think about how the returns on liking a leader translate into
:09:23. > :09:30.thinking that they will be the best Prime Minister. This graph plots
:09:31. > :09:34.responses from these questions. So along the bottom is how people felt
:09:35. > :09:38.about each leader, so how you felt about Corbyn and how you felt about
:09:39. > :09:42.May and then going up is the proportion of those people in each
:09:43. > :09:43.of the categories for each leader who thought that that person would
:09:44. > :09:53.be the best Prime Minister. You can see that even when people
:09:54. > :09:57.don't like May they think she would be a better Prime Minister than
:09:58. > :10:01.people who think the same way about Corbyn. Only about one in ten think
:10:02. > :10:05.that Corbyn would be the best Prime Minister but four in ten think May
:10:06. > :10:12.would be the best Prime Minister. When you go up to seven which is
:10:13. > :10:18.quite high, and remember the average is between 4-5, so someone that
:10:19. > :10:22.likes Corbyn a seven on this scale is twice as positive about Corbyn as
:10:23. > :10:29.the average voter in Britain. But even there: only four in ten of
:10:30. > :10:33.those people think he would be the best Prime Minister compared to 85%
:10:34. > :10:40.of the people who think that way about May. So I think that is why
:10:41. > :10:44.the election is going the way it is. Some people think Corbyn looks like
:10:45. > :10:49.a nice guy, might have nice valleys, they might agree with his policies,
:10:50. > :10:54.but they don't think he has what it takes to be Prime Minister. On a
:10:55. > :10:58.final note, I would caution against separating out Brexit and leadership
:10:59. > :11:04.entirely. Here I've broken down how people feel about May and Corbyn by
:11:05. > :11:11.their vote in 2015 and their vote in the EU referendums. You can see that
:11:12. > :11:15.for the Conservatives, May is definitely more popular but she's
:11:16. > :11:19.more popular amongst leavers than remainders. The really interesting
:11:20. > :11:31.one is labour. Corbyn is more popular amongst remainers and May is
:11:32. > :11:34.more well liked amongst leave voters than Corbyn is. These things are
:11:35. > :11:40.interacting in a way that is advantage in the Conservatives and
:11:41. > :11:45.the issues of leadership and Brexit are very much entangled in the
:11:46. > :11:52.election. Thank you. Can I handover to Jennifer. I'm going to talk about
:11:53. > :11:57.two different topics today. The first is around the selection of
:11:58. > :12:01.women in the 2017 campaign, and that is a bit about what voters 's
:12:02. > :12:10.emotional responses are towards the campaign and the party leaders.
:12:11. > :12:17.and the election so far around the and the election so far around the
:12:18. > :12:23.selection of women, and the great strides that have taken place not
:12:24. > :12:28.just in 2017 but since 1997. One argument we've made is the
:12:29. > :12:32.centralised election process, as a result of the snap election, gave
:12:33. > :12:37.the party leadership and opportunity to push and equality agenda if they
:12:38. > :12:43.chose to. What we've seen is the result is that with women to win on
:12:44. > :12:50.the conservative side, there has been a dramatic increase in the
:12:51. > :12:53.percentage of women selected to contest the election. This isn't
:12:54. > :13:00.just about that kind of effort. Lots of women candidates ask citing the
:13:01. > :13:05.Theresa May factor, there a bit more confidence about their ability to
:13:06. > :13:08.stand as candidates. There is also a shift in local selectors, that if a
:13:09. > :13:12.woman is good enough to be Prime Minister she should be good enough
:13:13. > :13:16.to be a candidate as well. Lots of noise around equality and that has
:13:17. > :13:22.resulted in a higher percentage of women selected. Overall for all
:13:23. > :13:32.candidates, we know that women constitute just under 30%, so 29%,
:13:33. > :13:38.and that is up 3% from 2015. In 2015 26% of candidates were women and in
:13:39. > :13:43.2017 is now 29%. When we break that down by parties, you can see that
:13:44. > :13:50.for Conservative, Labour and Lib Dems, their percentage of women
:13:51. > :13:53.candidates has gone up from 2015. 29% of candidates are women
:13:54. > :14:01.candidates for the Conservative Party, 41 for Labour and 29 for the
:14:02. > :14:05.Lib Dems. For Ukip, and SNP this has gone down slightly. In some cases,
:14:06. > :14:09.particularly for Ukip and the Greens, they aren't fielding as many
:14:10. > :14:14.candidates and I think the effort around selection for women for those
:14:15. > :14:20.parties has reduced. We've taken this information and Chris and
:14:21. > :14:26.colleagues at UEA have done one of their early forecasts in terms of
:14:27. > :14:30.what would the outcome look like in terms of total number of MPs, but
:14:31. > :14:34.also what would that do for the gender balance of the new
:14:35. > :14:39.Parliament. Our estimates for the forecast of all MPs would be 410 for
:14:40. > :14:44.the Conservatives, 150 acre labour, eight for Lib Dem and 74 for the
:14:45. > :14:50.other parties. When we look at that for the impact on what that will
:14:51. > :14:55.have, so how does that selection of women translate into representation
:14:56. > :15:03.in the Commons, we project 98 for the Conservatives, 73 for Labour,
:15:04. > :15:07.and just one for the Lib Dems. 22 for other parties. This presents an
:15:08. > :15:12.interesting change in the Commons and an interesting change around the
:15:13. > :15:17.dynamics of gender. When we moved to compare that to 2015, there are
:15:18. > :15:24.three points we can take away. First is that 2017 isn't going to be the
:15:25. > :15:30.step change in gender representation we saw in 2015. In 2015 we finished
:15:31. > :15:35.with 191 women MPs elected, and we aren't going to see that kind of
:15:36. > :15:41.percentage change increase. Our projection is will see a total of
:15:42. > :15:45.194 women MPs, which is obviously three better than 2015, but it's
:15:46. > :15:50.actually down on the number at dissolution. There were 196 at the
:15:51. > :15:55.time of dissolution. From where we were in early May and will actually
:15:56. > :15:59.be slightly lower than that. There are two other points that I think
:16:00. > :16:03.are interesting. The first is that the Conservatives will take over as
:16:04. > :16:08.the party who are leading an women MPs. They will have just short of
:16:09. > :16:14.100 women MPs, they will have more women MPs than any other party in
:16:15. > :16:19.Parliament. However, their percentage of women MPs is still
:16:20. > :16:25.significantly lower than Labour. It is still a man's party in terms of
:16:26. > :16:30.representation in the Commons. For the Conservatives, just 24% of MPs,
:16:31. > :16:35.and this is a projection, will be women. When we compare that to the
:16:36. > :16:41.Labour Party, almost 50% of the Labour Party MPs will be women. In
:16:42. > :16:44.terms of their Parliamentary party it's a significant difference in
:16:45. > :16:48.terms of what we see the balance of representation. In terms of that
:16:49. > :16:53.more subtle shift in terms of who owns and is leading the dialogue
:16:54. > :17:00.around women's representation, the efforts by Theresa May, by Baroness
:17:01. > :17:04.Jenkin, have really shifted the perception of the role of women
:17:05. > :17:09.within the Conservative Party. Switching gears, we wanted to have a
:17:10. > :17:14.think about the campaign. We've heard lots about strong and stable,
:17:15. > :17:19.but we've also heard a bit about it being dull. The reason we think this
:17:20. > :17:24.might matter is because the dollar the election, that may have an
:17:25. > :17:30.impact on turnout. If people aren't excited, will they get out to the
:17:31. > :17:35.polls. This is data from just last week and we asked the British
:17:36. > :17:41.public, can you tell us which of the following range of feelings you
:17:42. > :17:45.think about the campaign is happening? There were four options.
:17:46. > :17:49.These are situated where you've got some motivating and positive
:17:50. > :17:53.feelings which are the happy and excited, those other things we think
:17:54. > :17:57.would get people to turnout, with got some passive but positive
:17:58. > :18:01.feelings which we might call content and relaxed, then we've got some
:18:02. > :18:05.passive negative, bored and depressed, and activating negative
:18:06. > :18:10.emotions which are angry and emotions which are angry and
:18:11. > :18:19.disgusted. What you can see is that, let's take those who haven't decided
:18:20. > :18:23.how they are going to vote. The undecideds are the least emotive
:18:24. > :18:29.about this election of all the groups we are looking at. Looking at
:18:30. > :18:33.voting intention and how they say they are going to vote on June the
:18:34. > :18:38.8th. Those undecided are the least animated and the least invested.
:18:39. > :18:44.That makes us consider whether these are people who are going to shift
:18:45. > :18:47.and turnout. For what we might call a progressive rock, Liberal
:18:48. > :18:53.Democrat, SNP, Plaid Cymru and Labour, they are down around bored
:18:54. > :19:01.and depressed. We'll leave it at that. Coming to Chris's point about
:19:02. > :19:09.is this the Brexit election, we said, let's think about how people
:19:10. > :19:14.voted in the referendum. When we look for those people who voted
:19:15. > :19:18.Remain, they are more likely to say they are depressed and board but
:19:19. > :19:23.less likely to say they are angry or disgusted. This is really
:19:24. > :19:34.interesting because it goes to the argument and the data we've been
:19:35. > :19:38.seeing about the re-lever -- "re-leavers". Those who have
:19:39. > :19:42.accepted the Brexit decision and are on board. So even for those who said
:19:43. > :19:50.they wanted to remain, they don't seem particularly animated. But they
:19:51. > :19:54.are in this bottom quadrant here. There are some here who are actually
:19:55. > :20:01.saying they are quite angry and disgusted. Finally, we wanted to
:20:02. > :20:07.focus on people's feelings towards the party leaders. The positions
:20:08. > :20:10.around the parties hasn't changed very much but what we think is
:20:11. > :20:17.driving this is people's feelings and peoples evaluations of the party
:20:18. > :20:21.leaders. Whereas Chris showed you a nice story around competence and
:20:22. > :20:26.trust, we are looking at a more emotive valuation of how people are
:20:27. > :20:31.viewing the party leaders. It's that emotional evaluation that influences
:20:32. > :20:39.whether they go to the polls and how they cast their vote. There are two
:20:40. > :20:45.things. We've got Jeremy Corbyn and Theresa May. What these spider plots
:20:46. > :20:50.show us is that supporters like their party leaders but very few
:20:51. > :21:02.other ones don't. That's not necessarily the surprising takeaway.
:21:03. > :21:05.If you look at the... They are quite pleased and happy for the most part
:21:06. > :21:10.around Jeremy Corbyn. That's all so true for Theresa May. I think there
:21:11. > :21:15.are a couple of interesting things to think about. When people are
:21:16. > :21:21.describing Theresa May they say they feel hopeful and confident. But it's
:21:22. > :21:28.not happy and proud, it's not the act motivating emotion is. This is
:21:29. > :21:33.labour and Liberal Democrats and Ukip. Theresa May invites a more
:21:34. > :21:38.negative emotional response from non-supporters. Whereas Corbyn get
:21:39. > :21:43.some in the lead emotionally negative responses, it is and has
:21:44. > :21:47.intense as those who aren't going to vote for May. Feelings for May are
:21:48. > :21:51.more intense, she gets more support from supporters, but her
:21:52. > :21:59.non-supporters are more likely to say they are feeling angry and
:22:00. > :22:05.afraid. So how this plays out, we think will be largely around people
:22:06. > :22:08.are generally happy with Theresa May, she is viewed as competent, she
:22:09. > :22:13.is viewed as a leader and that's what is going to win this election.
:22:14. > :22:17.It's not going to be a massive shift, unless there is that pivotal
:22:18. > :22:25.thing in the campaign that happens, this is going to be a very stable
:22:26. > :22:37.and safe when for the Conservatives. Thank you. I'll talk today a bit
:22:38. > :22:40.about Scotland. I've got six questions I thought might be helpful
:22:41. > :22:45.so I'll deal with each quickly in turn and then we can talk about them
:22:46. > :22:49.in the question and answer afterwards. In terms of how the
:22:50. > :22:53.Scottish context has changed, there are a couple of things worth noting.
:22:54. > :22:57.Scots used about four different parties at different electoral
:22:58. > :23:00.levels. They would be more likely to vote for the SNP in a Holyrood
:23:01. > :23:06.election and in a Westminster election. But now that is no longer
:23:07. > :23:10.the case. Voters are voting consistently across Holyrood and
:23:11. > :23:19.Westminster elections. So over time this is data consistency. We can see
:23:20. > :23:22.in the most recent election this is the proportion of parties retaining
:23:23. > :23:27.their voters from having cast a ballot for them in a previous
:23:28. > :23:30.election at another electoral level. Party preferences are converging
:23:31. > :23:35.across electoral levels. The other thing that I think it's worth noting
:23:36. > :23:39.is that not only are they converging, but they are converging
:23:40. > :23:43.on Holyrood preferences rather than on Westminster preferences. To the
:23:44. > :23:46.extent voters were inconsistent before, they are now more
:23:47. > :23:50.consistently backing the party they were typically back in a Holyrood
:23:51. > :23:55.election. The other thing we know is that when they resolve that
:23:56. > :23:59.inconsistency the reason they are resolving it is because they are
:24:00. > :24:02.voting in the direction of their constitutional preferences. We can
:24:03. > :24:06.look over time at people who are broadly supportive of a no vote or
:24:07. > :24:11.remaining within the union and people broadly supportive of a yes
:24:12. > :24:15.vote or a yes party and independence for Scotland. One thing we can see
:24:16. > :24:20.is that consistency is increasing over time but the other thing is
:24:21. > :24:24.that unionist voters are more consistent in their preferences than
:24:25. > :24:28.our pro-independence supporters. When they are resolving that
:24:29. > :24:32.inconsistency it's another way of proving what I said before, when
:24:33. > :24:37.people resolve that they want to vote yes but they back a no
:24:38. > :24:44.supporting party or they like to vote no against independence but
:24:45. > :24:49.they support the SNP, when voters resolve that inconsistency they
:24:50. > :24:52.resolve it in the direction of their constitutional preferences. There's
:24:53. > :24:57.lots of ways of looking at how the 2014 referendum has had an impact on
:24:58. > :25:01.voter preferences. Our argument is that it stripped out some of the
:25:02. > :25:02.inconsistency and also affected how people cast ballots in Westminster
:25:03. > :25:10.elections. The Other thing we know about the
:25:11. > :25:13.Scottish context is we have seen an increase in parties campaigning on
:25:14. > :25:16.issues that have nothing to do with the electoral level they are
:25:17. > :25:19.campaigning for. We saw this most obviously in the local elections
:25:20. > :25:23.where we had Conservative candidates saying vote for me to sit on
:25:24. > :25:27.Edinburgh city council if you want to stop a second referendum council,
:25:28. > :25:30.Edinburgh City Council can't control that. We also saw people saying vote
:25:31. > :25:34.for me for Edinburgh City Council if you want to stop a high Brexit.
:25:35. > :25:38.Again Edinburgh City Council can't do much about that. We saw that in
:25:39. > :25:42.the local elections but also see it in this election where we see Alex
:25:43. > :25:46.Salmond appearing and being grilled on the SNP's record on education in
:25:47. > :25:53.the Scottish Parliament. There's a lot of research about the extent to
:25:54. > :25:56.which voters have different understandings of citizenship,
:25:57. > :26:00.different senses of trust and efficacy. They reward parties at
:26:01. > :26:03.different levels in a fairly sophisticated way. The only way that
:26:04. > :26:07.happens is if they have an understanding of what is reserved
:26:08. > :26:11.and what is devolved and if parties campaign for reserved elections on
:26:12. > :26:16.reserved issues and cam main in devolved elections and issues and so
:26:17. > :26:22.on. What we are seeing here is this multidimensional soup in Scotland.
:26:23. > :26:26.That isn't the case in Wales. That is how the context has changed
:26:27. > :26:32.running into the 2017 election. In terms of Scotland now, we are seeing
:26:33. > :26:36.a different campaign in Scotland, far fewer mentions of Brexit, far
:26:37. > :26:39.less attention to Brexit in the campaign literature coming across
:26:40. > :26:44.the doors, far less mentions of it in the press. What we are seeing is
:26:45. > :26:48.more attention to opposition to an independence referendum. Now that
:26:49. > :26:52.might change as the manifestos come out and people start to talk about
:26:53. > :26:58.policy issues, other than Brexit and independence, but what we are seeing
:26:59. > :27:04.is less on Brexit and Scotland, more on attitudes to independence. Now,
:27:05. > :27:07.where the party is targeting - well I'll focus predominantly on Labour
:27:08. > :27:12.and the Conservatives, the SNP obviously hoping to hold on to every
:27:13. > :27:15.single seat they've got. Labour hold one, they hold Edinburgh south and
:27:16. > :27:20.they are hoping to keep it. I have yet to see a single prediction that
:27:21. > :27:23.assumes he will keep it. However, I suppose there is good news in the
:27:24. > :27:26.fact that some predictions say it will go to the Conservatives and
:27:27. > :27:32.other predictions say it will go to the SNP. The other possible good
:27:33. > :27:36.news for Ian Murray is he has a very good reputation as a local MP. But
:27:37. > :27:41.the other thing about Edinburgh is that yes it was a city that voted no
:27:42. > :27:44.and so one might think that that would help the Conservatives, but it
:27:45. > :27:50.was far more a city that voted remain. It was 75% remain. So
:27:51. > :27:54.Edinburgh people are more annoyed about Brexit than they are about the
:27:55. > :28:01.prospect of independence and that might well allow him to retain his
:28:02. > :28:05.seat. Labour say they're targeting place where is they were ahead of
:28:06. > :28:09.the SNP or within one percentage point of the SNP in the most recent
:28:10. > :28:12.elections. How credible are the targets? We can look at different
:28:13. > :28:17.pieces of information and, to cut through everything, the red stuff is
:28:18. > :28:22.good news. So I've got what happened in 2015, what the lead was of the
:28:23. > :28:29.SNP over Labour in that election. If welike at the most recent national
:28:30. > :28:33.poll in Scotland, what can we understand about national swings,
:28:34. > :28:38.what might that do to the standing of the parties in that constituency.
:28:39. > :28:43.What do we know about trends and no-voting in 2014 or leave voting in
:28:44. > :28:51.2016? What happened in the 2016 election and what happened in the
:28:52. > :28:56.locals in terms of preferences. There is no good news here for
:28:57. > :29:00.Labour. If you look at just the national swing, it doesn't look like
:29:01. > :29:07.they are going to pick anything up. You might assume that the stroerning
:29:08. > :29:11.the support for leave, that might help Labour. But they're in a fight
:29:12. > :29:16.with the Conservatives in terms of support. In terms of places where
:29:17. > :29:21.Labour hold the Parliament, Scottish Parliament constituency, there is
:29:22. > :29:24.some good news in east Lothian. That's Ian Gray's Scottish
:29:25. > :29:28.Parliamentary seat. Some good news for them there. They had more first
:29:29. > :29:32.preferences in the local elections in east Lothian. Other than that,
:29:33. > :29:36.there's not a whole lot of good news for Labour both in terms of the seat
:29:37. > :29:40.they hold and in terms of their targets. We can talk later on what
:29:41. > :29:44.on earth is happening in Aberdeen City Council if you would like. In
:29:45. > :29:49.term to haves Conservatives, obviously they hold DCT -- in terms
:29:50. > :29:53.of the Conservatives, they hold DCT, less than 800. They have said they
:29:54. > :29:57.think they can win 15 seats which is leading some to question their
:29:58. > :30:02.expectation management. If we look at some of their targets, then again
:30:03. > :30:06.we can do the equivalent thing and look at how they fared in 2015, what
:30:07. > :30:12.the national swing would mean, so national swing, the SNP are down
:30:13. > :30:16.nine, the Conservatives are up 13 on their performance in the 2015
:30:17. > :30:20.election, so if you just subtract nine from how the SNP were doing and
:30:21. > :30:24.were doing, what does that suggest were doing, what does that suggest
:30:25. > :30:28.in terms of profiles? We should be cautious, assuming that national
:30:29. > :30:32.constituency contest. So we can look constituency contest. So we can look
:30:33. > :30:37.also at local dynamics and how people were voting in 2014, very
:30:38. > :30:42.high votes for leave, for example, might help a Conservative Party
:30:43. > :30:45.that's staking its position far out on the opposition to a second
:30:46. > :30:50.independence referendum. We might assume that greater support for
:30:51. > :30:53.leave, almost 50% and Murray might help the Conservatives. We can also
:30:54. > :30:54.look at what was happening in terms of the 2016 Scottish Parliament
:30:55. > :30:59.elections or in terms of first elections or in terms of first
:31:00. > :31:03.preferences in the locals. But the general news is, there's far more
:31:04. > :31:06.good news in terms of the Conservative targets in this
:31:07. > :31:11.election than there was for Labour in terms of their targets.
:31:12. > :31:14.I'll skip over the Lib Dems for now. What should we make of the
:31:15. > :31:19.predictions? These are a range of the predictions that we are seeing
:31:20. > :31:22.in terms of how the SNP and Conservatives, Lib Dem and Labour
:31:23. > :31:29.might fare. No-one is predicting Labour will hold a seat in this
:31:30. > :31:33.election. Conservative predictions bounce around from three to four.
:31:34. > :31:39.There's one kicking about from eight to 11. Should we trust them? Very
:31:40. > :31:43.briefly, we should be cautious. The predictions are usually based,
:31:44. > :31:46.either mathematically worked out or people are just assuming inferring
:31:47. > :31:52.that certain things will happen. But they are even using the data or
:31:53. > :31:57.making guesses based on the most recent elections run under STV or on
:31:58. > :32:04.polls. In terms of STV, I would urge caution. We know that although there
:32:05. > :32:08.is alignment on partisan preferences acrosshood and Westminster, we don't
:32:09. > :32:12.know the extent to which this is true on local level. People's
:32:13. > :32:15.preferences at local level have been significantly different from the two
:32:16. > :32:19.other electoral levels in part because it operates under a
:32:20. > :32:27.different third electoral system in Scotland. So it could even in 2007
:32:28. > :32:32.when the local elections and the Scottish Parliament elections were
:32:33. > :32:34.held on the same day, we saw voters casting ballots for completely
:32:35. > :32:38.different parties in different electoral arenas so I would urge
:32:39. > :32:41.caution there. In terms of the polls, the last national poll in
:32:42. > :32:46.Scotland was done at the end of April and every poll since then has
:32:47. > :32:51.been a GV poll that's had tiny samples for Scotland, some under
:32:52. > :32:56.100. It was YouGov that did the last poll towards the end of April. If
:32:57. > :33:00.you look at the equivalent YouGov poll for GB as a whole with a
:33:01. > :33:03.systemple of just over 100 in Scotland, there has 14-point
:33:04. > :33:07.difference across the performance of the four main parties. You have
:33:08. > :33:12.estimates for the Conservative Party as low as 10% on some of those polls
:33:13. > :33:16.where Scotland's a small sample so I would absolutely urge caution in
:33:17. > :33:22.terms of the use of the polls to understand what's happening in
:33:23. > :33:26.Scotland. The margins of error are so much larger, Scotland's sample
:33:27. > :33:32.sub sample is not independently weighted. So in the slides in your
:33:33. > :33:36.packs, I've just got tracking local performance, how good the local
:33:37. > :33:40.elections might be perceived to do in terms of predicting performance
:33:41. > :33:47.in the subsequent Westminster elections and how well the polls
:33:48. > :33:58.will do. I'll end on Labour. How bad is it? Well, it's pretty bad. I've
:33:59. > :34:03.skipped over a slide. This is what YouGov asked voters, they said they
:34:04. > :34:07.cast their ballots a certain way before 2015 and before 2015 they
:34:08. > :34:12.said how are you going to cast your ballot now. Labour retained half of
:34:13. > :34:20.the its supporters and it was losing 40% to the SNP and some others to
:34:21. > :34:25.Labour and the Lib Dems. Everyone else was in a world of hurt. The Lib
:34:26. > :34:29.Dems own supporters were more likely to vote for another party.
:34:30. > :34:34.Conservatives retaining just 60% of the previous supporters, the SNP
:34:35. > :34:44.doing well. This was the situation between 2010 and 2015. Labour losing
:34:45. > :34:48.half its supporters, 40% to the SNP. Labour only now retains half of the
:34:49. > :34:52.ones it kept and now losing a third to the other side, lose ago third to
:34:53. > :34:57.-- losing a third to the Conservative Party. They kept half
:34:58. > :35:01.in 2015 and lost to the left, lost to the SNP. Both for reasons of
:35:02. > :35:08.social policy and for constitutional preferences because we know that
:35:09. > :35:12.people are more consistent. But also lost is now, it's losing on the
:35:13. > :35:15.other side in part because of left-right issues but also in terms
:35:16. > :35:23.of constitutional preferences. I'll leave it there. Thank you very much.
:35:24. > :35:28.I would like to congratulate my colleagues for finding all sorts of
:35:29. > :35:33.genuinely interesting things about an election that so far anyway
:35:34. > :35:36.portrayed by the media and some citizens by being fairly dull.
:35:37. > :35:41.Having said that, what they seem to have done also is to confirm in some
:35:42. > :35:44.ways what we already know, that is that the Conservatives are likely to
:35:45. > :35:50.come out of this election with a pretty big win. So as a result, I
:35:51. > :35:57.thought I would take my cue from Vince Cable, the former minister in
:35:58. > :36:00.the coalition Government, who said to a journalist earlier this week,
:36:01. > :36:06.politics after the election may be more interesting than before it.
:36:07. > :36:09.Therefore have a look at what might happen to the parties on June 8th.
:36:10. > :36:16.I'll start with the Conservative Party because in some ways, that's
:36:17. > :36:19.the easiest party to start with. Supposedly, the Conservative Party
:36:20. > :36:24.from June 9th onwards will be sitting fairly pretty. What I would
:36:25. > :36:30.say however is that there is perhaps some trouble ahead. The reason I say
:36:31. > :36:34.that is because a large majority can sometimes be a mixed blessing.
:36:35. > :36:39.Harold Wilson the Labour Prime Minister in 196 Managed to improve a
:36:40. > :36:48.majority that you could count tonne fingers of one hand to a majority of
:36:49. > :36:53.nearly 100. -- 1966. He was practising his putting and a friend
:36:54. > :37:00.asked him, how is your handicap and he replied, "gone up from three to
:37:01. > :37:03.97", and that I guess gives you an idea that sometimes large majorities
:37:04. > :37:07.can be a problem. Now clearly a small majority is more of a headache
:37:08. > :37:13.for a Prime Minister, simply because it puts him or her at the mercy of
:37:14. > :37:17.what some people unkindly like to call the head bangers on their back
:37:18. > :37:27.benches. But a large majority can sometimes be a problem too because
:37:28. > :37:32.it gives licence to malcontented MPs to exercise their conscience in
:37:33. > :37:38.votes in Parliament without actually feeling they're in any danger of
:37:39. > :37:48.messing with their own Government's majority. That kind of rebellion
:37:49. > :37:51.which my colleague Phil Cowley has researched extensively over the
:37:52. > :37:55.years can be a problem for parties because it gives the impression to
:37:56. > :37:58.the electorate, an important impression, of division within the
:37:59. > :38:03.party. Of course in the Conservative's case it's not
:38:04. > :38:05.necessarily going to be a misleading impression I think and that's
:38:06. > :38:09.because there is attention, there's been a perennial attention, if you
:38:10. > :38:15.like, in the Conservative Party, between on the one hand if you like
:38:16. > :38:18.its nationalist strain and on the other hand, it support for the
:38:19. > :38:25.market between, if you like, the free economy and the strong state.
:38:26. > :38:29.Given Brexit, and given Mrs May's apparent willingness to intervene in
:38:30. > :38:34.the economy, rather more than some of her colleagues, even some of her
:38:35. > :38:37.close colleagues, as well as her backbenchers and potential
:38:38. > :38:47.backbenchers would like, it could be that we see a wedge driven in to
:38:48. > :38:50.that crack. Having said that, I would still much rather be in the
:38:51. > :38:56.position of the Conservatives than I would be of Ukip. We have seen the
:38:57. > :39:01.people's army become in effect the people's platoon after Theresa May
:39:02. > :39:09.gets into Downing Street. The future for Ukip does I think look pretty
:39:10. > :39:15.bleak. The cull minute makes of Mrs May, Brexit, the loss of Nigel
:39:16. > :39:20.Farage, means voters are peeling away -- culmination. Many are going
:39:21. > :39:24.to the Conservatives. The leader seems fairly or unfairly to be seen
:39:25. > :39:29.as a laughing stock and there seems to be no obvious successor to Mr
:39:30. > :39:32.Nuttall if he steps down. The party seems to be haemorrhaging members in
:39:33. > :39:38.as much as we can know anything about that and it's clearly running
:39:39. > :39:43.out of cash and indeed credit. By 2018-2019 I think it's a serious
:39:44. > :39:46.possibility that Ukip may not even be a going concern organisationally,
:39:47. > :40:01.let alone electorally. There probably is room in the
:40:02. > :40:08.political market for a xenophobic, is on the phobic English Nationalist
:40:09. > :40:16.party. It's just that that party may not be Ukip and if it is Ukip they
:40:17. > :40:23.will always be a small space on the fringes of British politics that
:40:24. > :40:27.kind of party. Whether Ukip becomes that or whether it's Blitz and
:40:28. > :40:38.something else emerges we are yet to see. The SNP is the respectable face
:40:39. > :40:41.of nationalism in the UK and the shine has come off the SNP a little
:40:42. > :40:48.because it's being judged on its record in government. And as we've
:40:49. > :40:55.seen the Scottish Conservative Party seems to be coming back from the
:40:56. > :40:58.dead. But I think it's clear from what we've already heard that the
:40:59. > :41:05.SNP is still in a powerful position in Scotland. It is likely to govern
:41:06. > :41:13.that country over the next decade or so. And in some ways a big
:41:14. > :41:19.Conservative majority down there in Westminster provides the ideal
:41:20. > :41:23.conditions for an SNP which wants to fight for a second independence
:41:24. > :41:32.referendum. However, as we have already seen in the briefing
:41:33. > :41:37.provided in Scotland, that big Tory majority may not be sufficient to
:41:38. > :41:40.help the SNP win that referendum in part because that referendum is
:41:41. > :41:47.going to be mixed up now with peoples feeling about rejoining the
:41:48. > :41:53.European Union. We have to remind ourselves, although people like to
:41:54. > :42:03.say Scotland is a remain country, rather a lot of voters did vote to
:42:04. > :42:08.leave. So one must ask if the SNP failed to win a majority for
:42:09. > :42:14.independence last time around, with that in the mix, can it win a
:42:15. > :42:21.referendum next time around? I think one of the safest predictions may be
:42:22. > :42:28.that whatever happens this may be Nicola Sturgeon's last UK election,
:42:29. > :42:36.but we will see. As for the Greens, they are unlikely to do as well in
:42:37. > :42:43.2017 as they did in 2015. But they will still of course have an MP in
:42:44. > :42:47.the Commons, their leader Caroline Lucas. She looks as if she's going
:42:48. > :42:53.to be a clear winner again. And of course the Greens anyway can
:42:54. > :42:58.continue to occupy a fairly comfortable niche in British
:42:59. > :43:06.politics as being the nation's conscience on environmental issues.
:43:07. > :43:12.What about the Lib Dems? The Lib Dems will probably improve their
:43:13. > :43:18.vote share. They couldn't not till after what happened in 2015. They
:43:19. > :43:23.will find it difficult to take back more than a handful of seats from
:43:24. > :43:28.the Conservatives. That of course might lead after the election to a
:43:29. > :43:35.leadership contest for the Lib Dems. One of the reasons for the Lib Dems
:43:36. > :43:39.failure to capitalise on the situation we face now has to deal
:43:40. > :43:49.with Tim Farren and that leadership contest could even feature Sir Vince
:43:50. > :43:54.Cable. Having said that, it's important to remember that the Lib
:43:55. > :43:58.Dems are more than capable of surviving in the wilderness for
:43:59. > :44:05.quite some time. They have a strong base in local government. They have
:44:06. > :44:09.financially very useful large membership. The only risk it seems
:44:10. > :44:17.to me to the Lib Dems is what happens to the last party I will
:44:18. > :44:21.consider, the Labour Party. For Labour this election is not about
:44:22. > :44:29.whether it loses, it's about by how much it loses. Reasonable estimates
:44:30. > :44:33.and we have already seen some provided would say that that the top
:44:34. > :44:42.end it's likely to get less than 200 seats but at the lower end may be
:44:43. > :44:48.around 150. That then presents us with two possible scenarios. The
:44:49. > :44:56.first is that Jeremy Corbyn stays on as leader. If that happens one can
:44:57. > :45:01.presume he is likely to face a challenge and probably this summer.
:45:02. > :45:08.Who will challenge him we don't know. The names include Yvette
:45:09. > :45:18.Cooper, Dan Jarvis and maybe other candidates. What I would say that is
:45:19. > :45:24.that Jeremy Corbyn is not absolutely guaranteed to win another leadership
:45:25. > :45:33.contest. A project on membership will be doing surveys on party
:45:34. > :45:40.members after the election but what we know after the result when Owen
:45:41. > :45:45.Smith challenged Jeremy Corbyn at the wrong time in some ways last
:45:46. > :45:51.year, we still know that large numbers of Labour members did not
:45:52. > :45:56.vote for Jeremy Corbyn. It won't take that many people to peel away
:45:57. > :46:03.for there to be a different result this time around. The other scenario
:46:04. > :46:10.is of course Jeremy Corbyn goes. If that happens it will come about as
:46:11. > :46:16.the result of MPs in the PLP managing to get another -- enough
:46:17. > :46:21.nominations for the candidate to get on the ballot for Lent -- then
:46:22. > :46:28.should contest. We have done some figures on that and I think it is
:46:29. > :46:39.possible that Jeremy Corbyn's supporters in parliament after the
:46:40. > :46:45.election could actually get to the magic 15% threshold and be able to
:46:46. > :46:52.get on the ballot, in which case Jeremy might be given permission by
:46:53. > :46:58.those around him to resign. If that isn't the case, again we need to be
:46:59. > :47:05.very careful before thinking the Labour membership will automatically
:47:06. > :47:13.elect a Jeremy Corbyn clone after June the 9th. The reason being is
:47:14. > :47:17.the election defeat is going to be psychologically devastating. Of
:47:18. > :47:24.course some Labour members will retreat into denial of paranoia and
:47:25. > :47:28.we will get stories about the reason Jeromy lost being the media and
:47:29. > :47:36.being stabbed in the back by his MPs. But some Labour members will be
:47:37. > :47:43.shaken by the result. We do have to remember that a large proportion of
:47:44. > :47:46.Labour grassroots members and not signallers, they do want to be in
:47:47. > :47:52.power and they don't want the Conservative Party to be in power.
:47:53. > :47:57.We also have to remember, although they are not as important as they
:47:58. > :48:04.were before, that some trade union leaders at least will begin to back
:48:05. > :48:08.off supporting the Jeremy Corbyn wing of the Labour Party. They
:48:09. > :48:17.cannot carry on forever throwing their members with money after bad.
:48:18. > :48:26.Having said that, if a left winger winds, be it Jeremy Corbyn or a
:48:27. > :48:32.successor, then I do think that we do have two at least consider there
:48:33. > :48:42.being a serious risk of historic and fatal split in the Labour Party. Why
:48:43. > :48:48.do I say that? It is true of course that Labour MPs will have been
:48:49. > :48:52.elected under the Labour banner. It is true of course that Labour MPs
:48:53. > :48:57.have in mind all the time the president of the SDP in the 1980s
:48:58. > :49:04.which is not a good precedent for a party splintering. It's true of
:49:05. > :49:09.course that MPs are very aware of the obstacles presented to any new
:49:10. > :49:12.party by a first past the post system and it is obvious that any
:49:13. > :49:18.new party would have to be led by someone who can connect with the
:49:19. > :49:29.electorate. It's all very well to talk about doing the same in France
:49:30. > :49:33.but there is nobody obvious like him in the Labour Party who can pull
:49:34. > :49:40.that off. On the other hand I think it is at least possible that large
:49:41. > :49:46.numbers of Labour MPs, despite the volatility in the electorate, will
:49:47. > :49:52.regard the prospect of five and probably another ten years out of
:49:53. > :49:56.power with a degree of horror and they will not necessarily want to go
:49:57. > :50:02.down with what many of them regard as a sinking ship. They also know I
:50:03. > :50:07.think and this is very important, that is a crucial difference between
:50:08. > :50:11.now and the STP scenario in the 1980s. If a critical mass of Labour
:50:12. > :50:19.MPs is achieved and we're talking probably three figures worth of
:50:20. > :50:24.Labour MPs, then the breakaway party that is formed could immediately
:50:25. > :50:30.become the official opposition in this country. To become the official
:50:31. > :50:36.opposition is it simply needs to be the largest party not in government
:50:37. > :50:42.in the Commons. It would be as long as a new party were registered, that
:50:43. > :50:46.party would become the opposition. That is very different than from
:50:47. > :50:51.what happened to the SDP in the 1980s. Labour MPs also know that
:50:52. > :50:57.there is probably financial backing up their for some new venture and it
:50:58. > :51:03.is much easier these days to get finance than it probably was back in
:51:04. > :51:07.the 1980s. They will know that there are large numbers of voters who may
:51:08. > :51:12.be disillusioned and looking for a home. They will know that some
:51:13. > :51:22.Labour members and we're talking tens of thousands, might be up for
:51:23. > :51:25.something new. And they know some of the staff of the Labour Party may be
:51:26. > :51:36.as well and for those some of the Lib Dems may be interested as well.
:51:37. > :51:41.There is a sweet spot in Britain's system and it is when the majority
:51:42. > :51:45.of British voters are, namely centrist and even slightly
:51:46. > :51:51.centre-left on the economy but rather traditional authoritarian and
:51:52. > :51:57.restrictive on issues like immigration and welfare benefits and
:51:58. > :52:03.crying. At the moment that sweet spot is occupied by Theresa May's
:52:04. > :52:10.Conservative Party. She has done a lot to ensure that is the case. Just
:52:11. > :52:16.as before it was occupied by Tony Blair's Labour Party. And until
:52:17. > :52:19.labour moves back to that sweet spot the Conservatives are going to
:52:20. > :52:24.continue to rule the country. If Labour proves unable to make that
:52:25. > :52:30.move in the next few months after the election it is in serious danger
:52:31. > :52:42.of being replaced, not by an existing party, but by a new
:52:43. > :52:45.entrant. I think that rather than the substantial victory that Theresa
:52:46. > :52:49.May is going to get in this election is why this summer like last summer
:52:50. > :52:58.could be a historic one for British politics. We have a lot of
:52:59. > :53:04.interesting times ahead.