Northumberland Conservatives set for comfortable wins in General Elections, according to poll predictions

That’s the forecast of the YouGov MRP poll, published on November 27, which came closest to predicting the outcome of the 2017 General Election, calling 93% of seats correctly when Theresa May lost her majority, against the expectations and predictions of many.

Nationally, it suggests that if the election was held on November 28, the Tories would win 359 seats – 42 more than two years ago, which would be the party’s best performance since 1987.

Its model shows Labour losing 51 seats, from 262 to 211, which would represent its worst performance since 1983.

The Lib Dems would end up with 18 seats, the Greens one and the Brexit Party none, while the SNP would secure 43 seats in Scotland and Plaid Cymru four in Wales.

In Northumberland, it predicts that Conservatives Anne-Marie Trevelyan and Guy Opperman will regain their respective Berwick and Hexham seats comfortably, each taking more than half of the votes as they did in 2017.

The poll suggests that the Lib Dems would be back into second place in Berwick, as they were in 2015, before being forced into third by Labour in 2017.

But the picture is not quite so rosy for Labour in its traditional heartlands of south-east Northumberland, with Wansbeck being described as a ‘likely’ rather than ‘safe’ Labour seat and Blyth Valley as a ‘lean’ Labour seat.

In Wansbeck, while the Conservatives are forecast to secure around a third of the vote, as they did in 2017, it suggests that the share for the Labour Party’s chairman, Ian Lavery, will drop from 57% to around 44%, primarily due to the presence of a Brexit Party candidate.

In Blyth Valley, long-standing Labour MP Ronnie Campbell, who secured more than half of the vote in 2017, has stood down and his replacement, Susan Dungworth, the leader of the opposition group at Northumberland County Council, is predicted to secure a significantly lower 43% vote share, just ahead of the Conservatives with 37%.

The YouGov MRP methodology includes 100,319 interviews conducted over seven days up to and including November 26 and analysis of key demographics, past voting behaviour and the likely turnout among different demographic groups.

However, it adds: ‘As this is a national model, it does not always account for specific local factors that may shape the vote in some seats.’

Full list of those standing in the four Northumberland constituencies

Berwick-Upon-Tweed: Tom Hancock (Liberal Democrat); Thomas Stewart (Green); Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Conservative); Trish Williams (Labour).

Blyth Valley: Thom Chapman (Liberal Democrats); Susan Dungworth (Labour); Dawn Furness (Green); Ian Levy (Conservative); Mark Peart (Brexit Party).

Hexham: Penny Grennan (Labour); Stephen Howse (Liberal Democrat); Nick Morphet (Green); Guy Opperman (Conservative).

Wansbeck: Michael Flynn (Christian People’s Alliance); Jack Gebhard (Conservative); Ian Lavery (Labour); Steve Leyland (Green); Stephen Psallidas (Liberal Democrat); Eden Webley (Brexit Party).