ComRes Brighton poll and latest Populus polling

The BBC have commissioned a very rare creature - a local government voting intention poll for a single council, in this case a ComRes poll of Brighton and Hove. The reason, naturally enough, is because of Brighton's status as being the only Green party council in the country. The poll does not bode well for it remaining that way - it shows the Green party down by about 10 points since the local elections in 2011, Labour up by about 7 points. The figures I have for the 2011 vote in Brighton & Hove are slightly different from those used by the BBC, probably due to dealing with multi-member seats differently, but either way it doesn't show the Greens doing well. Of course, just as Westminster polls are snapshots of the current position, not predictions of what will happen when the election does roll round, the same applies to local elections.

The poll did NOT ask how people in Brighton and Hove would vote at a general election, so we can't conclude from it whether or not Caroline Lucas is in trouble of losing her own seat.

Meanwhile the twice-weekly Populus poll is out today and has topline figures of CON 34%, LAB 37%, LDEM 14%, UKIP 8%. The three point lead is at the lower end of Populus's typical range, but perfectly explicable by the normal margin of error. Full tabs are here

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