Executive support falls while TUV ‘surge’ continues: New poll…

Only the UUP has escaped the Executive curse, with the DUP down 7% since the restoration, Sinn Féin 5% and Alliance 2%.

If this trend continues there will be political consequences.

The other big headline is the steady advance of the TUV, up another point at the expense of the DUP.

This puts it only four points behind the DUP. A further two-point swing would put them on an equal footing. (For a brief explanation of swing see the bottom of this article.)

If repeated in the next election it would cut swathes through the DUP’s Assembly ranks.

The next chart shows the level of vulnerability of the weakest DUP seat in each constituency. Where the exact point at which a seat is lost can depend on a number of factors, such as how well a party balances multiple candidates. This uncertainty is reflected in the colour coding. This poll’s figures represent an average swing from the DUP to the TUV of between 4.4% and 5.4%. (The spread is due to poll figures not being given in decimals.) These two boundaries are shown as grey vertical lines on the chart.

Sharp-eyed readers may spot that an error on the May chart which then showed FST as more vulnerable has been corrected.

How will DUP MLA’s react to that sea of red between the grey lines? If DUP prospects do not change as the election grows closer expect discontents within the party to break surface. Will Reform UK spot opportunities?

In addition to seats that the DUP won in 2022, last year’s Westminster election brought three further seats into focus:

        North Down, where the Independent Alex Easton gifted his Assembly seat to the DUP following his election as MP. To calculate the tipping point I have allocated Easton’s first preference votes among the other parties according to his transfers.

        West Belfast, where the 2024 Westminster election results confirmed that boundary changes mean the constituency now contains sufficient unionist electors to win an Assembly seat.

        North Antrim, where the departure of Robin Swann to become MP for South Antrim releases his extraordinary personal vote. In 2022 nearly half (46%) of Swann’s 9,530 first preferences came from voters who failed to transfer to his UUP running mate. If Swann had not been on the ballot the DUP would have received the biggest boost, up to 1570 additional first preferences. Only two hundred fewer would have been added to the TUV, with Alliance picking up nearly 900. As a result, the DUP would have taken a second seat, with the UUP reduced to runner-up about a thousand votes behind.

In each of these three constituencies the DUP would be expected to gain a seat relative to the last election provided they maintained their general 2022 levels of popularity, giving them 28 seats in total, compared to the 27 currently held by Sinn Féin. It is essential therefore to be aware of the potential impact of a DUP to TUV swing on these prospects and they are therefore included on the chart.

It should be remembered that the swing is an average across all constituencies. Some will be higher and some lower, as occured in 2022.

As you can see, in some constituencies there are large variations from the overall average of 5.9% (shown in red). There tended to be more extreme variations in constituencies which the TUV had not contested in 2017 (which are shown in green).

So some MLA’s would unexpectedly survive, whilst others who hoped themselves safe might not.

The UUP has not profited from the DUP’s travails, dropping the point it gained last time.

Meanwhile on the nationalist side there has been no change.

This leaves Sinn Féin the largest party, now 9% ahead of the DUP. But this is entirely due to DUP weakness, with Sinn Féin’s drop from the 31% ratings it was achieving in the year after the Local Government elections seemingly well behind them.

Although there has been no further improvement, the SDLP will be pleased to have retained their 11% ratings, keeping their hopes of a modest improvement at the next election alive. Perhaps being outside the Executive is working for them.

Aontú has retained the 1% improvement that it made in the last poll.

This leaves the swing from Sinn Féin to the SDLP where it was last time, between 2.0% and 3.0%, as shown by the grey vertical lines. It can clearly be seen that Sinn Féin seats are on the whole far less vulnerable to adverse swings than the DUP’s. Nevertheless two seats are clearly under the microscope.

The record of swing from the SDLP to Sinn Féin in 2022 showed similar volatility to that between the DUP and TUV. It is a feature of all countries where elections are decided by the voters rather than pre-determined by the government. As such it can also be expected in any swing between the two parties at the next election.

As well as the swing between two parties, the outcome can be affected by four other factors. We have already seen the potential impact of personal votes in the case of North Antrim, although that was a very extreme example. Also relevant are changes in the balance of votes between different candidates of the same party, changes to the votes for other parties and changes to the pattern of transfers. All three potentially complicate the picture in West Belfast.

The base case is that a DUP gain here would come at the expense of People Before Profit, even though estimates agree that following the boundary changes the constituency has lost more Sinn Féin than PBP voters.

But the base case also assumes that, apart from the effect of the boundary change, every other vote and transfer remains the same as in 2022. But that is unlikely. Even a relatively small swing from Sinn Féin to either PBP or the SDLP would change that calculation.

So would a change in the balance between SF candidates. In 2022 Sinn Féin gave us a masterclass in balancing their four candidates, two of whom were new to the ballot paper. This enabled them to pick up more than 2,000 transfers across 10 counts for the loss of just over 300 of their own. By the final stage their lowest placed candidate was less than a 100 votes short of a quota, whilst two others were over quota with over 500 of undistributed surplus between them. There is no realistic room for improvement. Even a small deterioration would reduce SF chances of retaining four seats.

A good example of how a change in votes for another party could affect SF is PBP. While it is obvious that a sufficient increase in their vote could put them ahead of the fourth SF, a smaller decrease could also be damaging. Last time PBP knocked out the SDLP, from which PBP gained almost 1,550 votes and Sinn Féin nearly 1,000. Although evidence of PBP transferring is limited, what there is shows little appetite for SF. If PBP were to fall behind the SDLP this could cost SF up to 600 net transfers, while gifting around 1,400 to the SDLP.

However, the poll suggests that the PBP vote would go up. A rise for PBP and SDLP at the same time would be the worst scenario for Sinn Féin in this seat.

This is the first time that Alliance have hit a low of 12% since their surge in 2019. Members will be waiting anxiously for November to see if this is just a blip, or is the ‘responsibility without power’ of being in the Executive taking the same toll on them as it appears to be taking on the DUP and Sinn Féin?

Completing the round of good news for non-Executive parties is the Greens, which have also held on to their 1% improvement from last time.

Finally, for the record, the Independents and Others.

LucidTalk normally break these down into unionist, nationalist and neutral in their tables published about a week after the publication in the BT but did not do so for their May results. The total balance between the Designations is an important component of any poll analysis for Assembly elections since the majority of voters transfer within their designation. It is to be hoped that LucidTalk return to their normal practice.

AN EXPLANATION OF SWING

Swing is not the increase or decrease in one party’s vote, it is a measure of the relative change in support between two parties. Three examples. 

1.      If Party A gains 3% while Party B drops 3%, they have moved 6% points apart. The effect is the same as if 3% of voters had moved directly from Party B to Party A. The swing is 3%.
2.      Party F gains 4% while Party G drops 2%. They have also moved 6% points apart. The swing is 3%.
3.      Party X gains 8% while Party Y also gains 2%. Although they have both gained, they have still moved 6% points apart. So once again the swing is 3%.