EU REFERENDUM POLLING POST MORTEM. British Polling Council / NatCen 8th December 2016

Transcription

1 EU REFERENDUM POLLING POST MORTEM British Polling Council / NatCen 8th December 2016

2 FINAL POLLS Modal difference that hasn t been seen since online polls first started to show UKIP overtaking the Lib Dems in 2012/2013 Leave % minus Remain % Telephone Online Populus ComRes ORB Ipsos MORI Survation YouGov TNS Opinium 2

3 VOTING INTENTION JAN 2012 MAY % European Parliament elections Party propensity weighting 35% 25% 15% Con Lab UKIP Lib Dem 5% Trend line smoothed to 4-poll moving average 3

4 LEAVE STARTED WELL AHEAD Party propensity weighting Actual question text used 6 5 Leave Remain 4

5 THE TURNOUT PROBLEM Political Studies Association turnout predictions Stephen Bush: Broadly, a moderately % 61% 59% 63% 59% high turnout (say 60 per cent all the way up to 80 per cent) is good for 5 Remain, and anything below 45 is good for Leave. On a low turnout, the preferences of the elderly and the devout are exaggerated in this contest, both those groups aid Leave. PSA Mean Academics Pollsters Journalists Other Actual turnout 5

6 SOME FARED WORSE THAN OTHERS Adam Drummond (Opinium): Instinctively I d expect turnout between 45% and 55%, with Remain s chances of victory increasing in almost direct proportion. At risk of creating hostages to fortune I m almost tempted to go with a rule of thumb that turnout below 5 means Brexit, and above 5 means we stay in. Damian Lyons Lowe Survation Luke Taylor TNS Andrew Hawkins ComRes 6 Ben Page Ipsos MORI 65% Martin Boon ICM >6 Joe Twyman YouGov 59% 40-5 Closer to 6 than but, like I say, I m not unused to being horribly wrong Published April 11 th

7 GENERAL ELECTION TURNOUT MODELS Effects of retroactively applying GE turnout filters to EU Ref Polls % 53% 49% 51% Demographic weights with no GE adjustment + Party Propensity Demographic weights with GE adjustment + Party Propensity Remain Leave 7

8 NUDGING And if you were forced to choose, would you say you lean more towards the UK remaining part of the European Union or more towards the UK leaving the European Union? 1. Lean more towards the UK REMAINING in the EU 2. Undecided but more likely to vote REMAIN than LEAVE 3. Undecided but more likely to vote LEAVE than REMAIN 4. Lean more towards the UK LEAVING the EU 5. No opinion 5 45% 35% 25% 15% 5% Results of nudge question % of sample Lean REMAIN Lean LEAVE Still no view 8

9 NUDGING And if you were forced to choose, would you say you lean more towards the UK remaining part of the European Union or more towards the UK leaving the European Union? 25% Results of nudge question 1. Lean more towards the UK REMAINING in the EU 2. Undecided but more likely to vote REMAIN than LEAVE 3. Undecided but more likely to vote LEAVE than REMAIN 4. Lean more towards the UK LEAVING the EU 5. No opinion 15% 5% Lean REMAIN Lean LEAVE 9

10 SOCIAL ATTITUDES BES Face to face Phone Online Racial equality Not gone far 31.9% % enough About right 42.9% 39.5% 39.3% Gone too far 18.7% 15.3% 26.4% National identity More British 20.9% 27.2% 19.2% Equally British and 47.6% 42.7% 38.8% English More English 23.8% 24.4% 31.7% 10

11 HOW OUR NUMBERS COMPARED Online samples were more socially conservative but OUR online samples even more so Have efforts to counter racial discrimination 42.9% % 39.3% 36.5% 35.2% 31.9% 24.9% 26.4% 20.5% 18.7% 15.3% Not gone far enough About right Gone too far BES Face to face Populus Phone Populus Online Opinium (Online) 27th May 16 11

12 HOW OUR NUMBERS COMPARED Online samples were more socially conservative but OUR online samples even more so Would you say that you feel More British Equally British and English More English BES Face to face Populus Phone Populus Online Opinium (Online) 27th May 16 12

13 EFFECTS OF ATTITUDINAL WEIGHTING Introduction of attitudinal weighs Without attitudinal weights Leave Remain Leave Remain 13

14 EFFECT OF ATTITUDINAL WEIGHTING WITH attitudinal weights All who expressed a voting intention WITHOUT attitudinal weights % 51% 47% 53% Remain (with attitudinal weights) Leave (with attitudinal weights) - Remain (no additudinal weights) Leave (no attitudinal weights) 14

15 EFFECT OF ATTITUDINAL WEIGHTING 6 WITH attitudinal weights 52% 10 out of 10 likely to vote WITHOUT attitudinal weights 55% 5 48% 45% Remain (with attitudinal weights) Leave (with attitudinal weights) - Remain (no additudinal weights) Leave (no attitudinal weights) 15

16 CONCLUSIONS The EU referendum was a sui generis event almost specifically designed to trip up pollsters. There is a limit to the extent to which we can apply lessons to general election polling No adjustment we would have made pre-referendum would have pushed our final poll into the sort of clear Remain lead territory that telephone polls had Attitudinal weighting had a similar effect to the sort of turnout model we considered applying and which would have made our 2015 GE result much more accurate Open vs. closed is something we re going to have to take more account of and as time goes on as it transcends party loyalties, particularly as we move on from the referendum and past vote weighting becomes less and less applicable 16

17 OPEN VS. CLOSED The Leave vote is much more unified than the Remain vote EU Referendum vote by tribe 85% 8 74% 66% 62% 59% 47% 51% 39% 31% 32% 34% 26% 12% 11% 3% Democratic Socialists Community Progressives Swing Voters New Britain Free Liberals Common Sense Our Britain Remain Leave 17

18 THANK YOU FOR ANY QUERIES CONTACT: ADAM DRUMMOND SENIOR RESEARCH MANAGER +44 (0) A ST JOHN STREET LONDON EC1M 4AY