2019 UK Election Forecast

Are Dominic Raab and Boris Johnson at risk of losing their seats?

Today, the UK is heading to the polls in what’s been called its ‘most divisive election in decades’, so with that in mind what result should we expect? I’ve created a statistical model to answer that question; using polling data and ‘fundamentals’ (i.e. the state of the economy) I’ve forecasted the likely result of Thursday’s vote.

The ‘fundamentals’

The model looks at five ‘fundamentals’, which are as follows:

• The economy (measured by GDP and unemployment)
• The length of time the current Government has been in power
• The PM’s approval rating, vs. the leader of the opposition’s
• The number of members in the different parties
• The ‘firmness’ of each party’s support (how likely/unlikely supporters of different parties are to change their minds)

These fundamentals have painted a similar picture throughout the election — the Conservatives are on course for (approximately) a 6 point victory over Labour. Why? Well, the economy is doing relatively well by standard measures, Conservative support is ‘firmer’ than Labour’s (according to YouGov polling) and, the PM has a significant advantage over Corbyn in terms of approval ratings. For these reasons, the ‘fundamentals’ point to the Conservatives being odds-on favourites to win the most votes, however, the ‘fundamentals’ also point to a smaller margin-of-victory for the party of Government than most polls. The reasons for this are that; the Conservatives have been in power over 9 years, increasing the chances that people want ‘change’, moreover, the Labour party has a significantly greater number of members than the Conservatives; meaning Labour have more potential activists and a strong core base of supporters. Additionally, economic growth has slowed down in recent quarters, meaning that while the state of the economy still points to a Conservative victory, it points to a significantly smaller one than what the polls are predicting.

What about the Lib Dems? The ‘fundamentals’ correctly predicted the fall in support that the Lib Dems have experienced throughout the election campaign. Even at their polling peak of 20% at the start of the campaign, the lack of firm support for the Lib Dems was suggesting — at the time — that the Lib Dems were instead on course for around 13–14% of the vote (a figure close to their current polling levels. From then to now, the polling figures and the ‘fundamentals’ have mostly converged and point to the Lib Dems getting around 12% of the vote.

Methodology

The model combines the five fundamentals, which have a combined weighting of 0.25, with polling averages, which have a combined weighting of 0.75, to create a national popular vote prediction and then this is broken down region by region to create a forecast of how many seats each party will win. The regional figures are inputted into Electoral Calculus’s ‘regional prediction’ tool to calculate the final figures for each seat.

Headline Figures

The model currently predicts a modest Conservative majority (though, a hung parliament is a serious possibility), with the Conservatives on course to win 343 seats (Likely range (LR): 290–404), Labour expected to win 223 seats (LR: 170–268), the Liberal Democrats; 17 (LR: 9–26 ) and the SNP; 44 (LR: 39–50 ). These figures show that anything; from a Conservative landslide to a Labour minority government are possible. Meanwhile the popular vote predictions are as follows:

• Conservatives: 42.8% (LR: 38.8% — 46.8%)
• Labour: 34.0% (LR: 30.0% — 38.0%)
• Lib Dems: 11.7% (7.7% — 15.7%)
• Brexit: 3.6% (1.6% — 5.6%)

Seat changes:

In the following seats there is a greater than 50% chance the incumbent party loses.

Graphics generated by Electoral Calculus

While these are the only seats where a new party is most likely to win, there are other seats not mentioned here where high profile MPs are at real risk of losing, including the Prime Minister himself. [See below graphic]

Conclusion

Ultimately, there are a wide range of possible outcomes in this election — including a hung parliament. However, the most likely result is a comfortable Conservative majority and a Conservative popular vote lead of 6–10 points. Nevertheless, the election sees Labour and the Liberal Democrats with the opportunities to take down big names in the Conservative party including, Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab, if supporters of the respective parties vote tactically against the governing party.

Nb: Electoral Calculus — a website that allows users to create election predictions — was used for parts of the calculations in this model.