Actual Voting Intention in Wales!
The long awaited NOP poll on voting intention in the Welsh Assembly elections next month has support in the constituency vote at CON 23%(+3), LAB 36%(-4), LDEM 15%(+1), PC 20%(-1) and in the regional vote CON 24%(+5), LAB 35%(-2), LDEM 15%(+2), PC 20%(nc). Changes are from the shares of the vote at the last election in 2003.
Assuming the poll is correct - and there is no great track record of success in polls for the Welsh assembly - Plaid are not enjoying the same surge in support as the SNP in Scotland and Labour's decline is not so precipitous. The main beneficary of Labour's drop in support appears to be the Conservatives, who are now in a relatively clear second place in Wales.
ITV projects that, were the same shares of the vote to be reflected in the election next month, the Welsh Assembly would have 25 Labour AMs (-5), 14 Conservatives (+3), 12 Plaid Cymru (nc), 7 Liberal Democrats (+1) and 2 Independents (+1). Changes are from the number of AMs returned after the last election. This would probably leave Labour unable to continue as a minority administration without coming to an agreement with an opposition party.
UPDATE: Plaid have reacted by publishing some of their private polling, conducted by Beaufort Research. It's voting intentions amongst those certain to vote are CON 14%, LAB 37%, LDEM 14%, PC 30%. It's not clear which vote it refers to, but either way it shows a Plaid surge and a Conservative slump. We do not, of course, have any knowledge of how the poll is weighted or conducted (though Beaufort seem to specialise in face-to-face polling), or what the other polls that Beaufort have conducted and Plaid chose not to publish showed...
