Another poll has shown the Conservatives close to electoral oblivion in Wales, with the governing party at Westminster projected to win just two of the 40 existing seats.
The results of the poll undertaken by Beaufort Research are similar to those of a YouGov poll released on St David’s Day. Looking at voting intentions if there were a General Election tomorrow, Beaufort’s poll shows Labour getting 52% of the vote in Wales, the Conservatives 19%, Plaid Cymru 15%, the Green Party 5%, Reform UK and the Liberal Democrats both on 4% and other parties on 1%.
Based on the polling figures and assuming a uniform swing - with no allowances for local variations - the results for a Westminster election on present boundaries with 40 seats in Wales would see Labour winning 34, the Conservatives two (Brecon & Radnorshire and Montgomeryshire) and Plaid Cymru the four it held at the last election (Arfon, Dwyfor Meirionnydd, Ceredigion and Carmarthen East & Dinefwr). At the last Westminster election in 2019, Labour won 22 seats and the Conservatives 14. If the next election is fought as is planned on a new political map of Wales with just 32 seats, the Tories may face an even bigger problem.
In terms of votes, Labour won 41% in 2019 with the Conservatives just five points behind on 36%, Plaid Cymru 10%, the Liberal Democrats 6%, the Brexit Party 5%, the Green Party 1% and Others 1%.
The Beaufort poll suggests Labour would win 12 seats from the Conservatives: Aberconwy, Bridgend, Carmarthen West & South Pembrokeshire, Clwyd South, Clwyd West, Delyn, Monmouth, Preseli Pembrokeshire, Vale of Clwyd, Vale of Glamorgan, Wrexham and Ynys Mon.
Four former Tory Secretaries of State for Wales - Simon Hart, David Jones, Stephen Crabb and Alun Cairns - would be defeated, and the current Secretary of State David Davies would lose the Monmouth seat he’s held since 2005. There would be variations in support for the parties depending on where voters live, their social class, their gender, their age and whether they can speak Welsh.
Based on voting intention, Labour’s highest level of support would be in Cardiff and South East Wales, where it would secure as much as 56% of the vote, with the Conservatives on 16% and Plaid Cymru 12%. In South West Wales and the Valleys, Labour would be on 52%, the Conservatives 20% and Plaid 16%. In North and Mid Wales, Labour would get 46% of the vote, the Conservatives 20% and Plaid Cymru 18%.
Among those in the more prosperous ABC1 social grades, Labour would lead with 47% with the Conservatives on 22% and Plaid Cymru 16%. By contrast, those in the less prosperous C2DE social grades would see Labour on 57%, the Conservatives on 15% and Plaid on 14%.
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Women (56%) are more likely to vote Labour than men (47%). Some 16% of women would vote Conservative against 22% of men. Support for Plaid was more evenly matched in gender terms, with 16% of men backing the party and 15% of women.
The younger people are, the more likely they are to vote Labour. Among those aged 16-34, Labour has the support of 60%, with Plaid Cymru on 21% and the Conservatives on just 7%. In the 35 to 54 age bracket, Labour was backed by 57%, with Plaid Cymru on 16% and the Conservatives on 12%.
Only among those aged 55 and over were the Conservatives in second place, with 28% support against 45% for Labour and 13% for Plaid. Welsh speakers split 47% for Labour, 28% for Plaid Cymru and 16% for the Conservatives, while non-Welsh speakers have 54% support for Labour, 20% for the Conservatives and 9% for Plaid Cymru.
Dr Jac Larner of Cardiff University’s Wales Governance Centre said: “Similar to the St David’s Day YouGov poll, the estimates for Brecon & Radnorshire and Arfon are incredibly tight and it’s basically a coin flip, the difference in this poll being that Plaid are projected to keep Arfon.
Dr Larner added: “While uniform swing is good at giving us a general sense of what an election might look like, it doesn’t account for specific constituency effects that might occur in a real election. In an election it’s unlikely for there to be the same swing everywhere, but it's also unlikely to see widespread differences across multiple constituencies in Wales.
“This poll, consistent with many others carried out in Wales in the past six months, adds to the weight of evidence that the Conservatives are on the brink of electoral wipe-out in Wales. So far, Rishi Sunak has been unable to undo any of the damage to vote intention that occurred under his predecessor Liz Truss.
“Labour’s vote intention figures in Wales are close to the highest we can observe in any polling dating back the last 20 years. “If this continues into an election, they will again be the largest party in Wales by a substantial margin, continuing over a century of electoral success in Wales.
“The significance of this should not be underestimated: there is no other state/nation/region in the world that has seen such a period of single-party dominance.”
New boundaries are due to be introduced later this year, with Wales’ quota of MPs reduced from 40 to 32.
- All respondents included in the voting intention figures taken from the Beaufort survey were aged 18+, must have given a party voting preference and must have said they were at least 9 or 10 out of 10 certain to vote. This group had an unweighted sample size of 544 out of a total sample size of 1,000. Because of the smaller base, the samples have been split into three regions rather than the usual five, to make the figures more robust. Fieldwork took place between January 16 and February 5
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