YouGov regional figures

PoliticsHome have YouGov's regional figures for the past week here. These are the first properly weighted regional breaks from YouGov on data entirely after the first debate (the data release last week straddled it) and they seem to suggest that the Lib Dem boost is stronger in the North.

The swing from Labour to the Lib Dems in the North-East is 13%, in Yorkshire 11.5% and the North West 9.5. Compare this to the swing in the South East (5%) and London (7%). In Scotland there is very little sign of a Lib Dem advance, with the party on 25% compared to 23% at the last election (though this is still much better than the Liberals were polling in Scotland a few months back).

In the South West, the swing from Conservative to Liberal Democrat is 5.5% in this poll, suggesting around 9 Conservative losses to the Lib Dems, rather than the other way around.

On a uniform national swing, the data behind these figures would produce a seat distribution of CON 245, LAB 273, LD 100 - a hung Parliament with Labour the largest party. However, if we do regional swings based on this data, it produces a projection of CON 262, LAB 245, LD 111 - the Conservatives the largest party and an extra 11 Lib Dem seats. The difference is down to the Liberal Democrats gaining more Northern seats (most notably 6 extra in the North east, including all three Newcastle seats) and two extra in the South-West. The Conservatives would gain an extra 20 seats, partially offset by larger losses to the Lib Dems.

Of course, the normal caveats about sample size apply to the regional breaks - with 1000 or so respondents in each region the differences are not necessarily significant. There does seem to be a north-south divide in evidence though.