ICM show 14 point Tory lead

ICM have released their first poll since the local elections and it shows not just an increased Tory lead, but as with YouGov the largest Tory lead from the company for many years. The topline voting intention figures, with changes from ICM's last poll, are CON 41%(+2), LAB 27%(-2), LDEM 22%(+2). The poll was conducted between the 16th and 18th of May.

It is obviously the lowest score Labour have received from ICM in recent years, but it's also an advance for the Liberal Democrats. ICM normally find a higher level of Lib Dem support than other pollsters anyway, but even by their standards it's the highest level of Lib Dem support for over a year (compare this with YouGov's poll yesterday - as usual they showed a much lower level of Lib Dem support than ICM do, but just like ICM it was the highest level of Lib Dem support for over a year).

The ICM poll adopts the methodological changes we saw in their Crewe and Nantwich poll, explained here. The effect this month was to increase the Tory lead by 1 point compared to what it would have been on the old methodology.

Given the collapse of Labour's support and the big difference ICM's reallocation of former Labour voters saying "don't know" has made in their Crewe and Nantwich polls it will be interesting to see how much of the difference between YouGov's 20 point lead and ICM's 14 point lead is due to that reallocation.

UPDATE: Not very much of it actually! The re-allocation of don't knows only decreased the Tory lead by one point.