BBS Exclusive Poll Analysis: Survation 14th - 21st of April 2026 Holyrood seats projection: SNP ~ 57 Reform ~ 21 Labour ~ 18 Conservative ~ 13 Green ~ 11 Lib Dem ~ 9 Independence: Yes ~ 51% No ~ 49%

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This is all based on a fundamental misreading of foundational political science by political strategists. Elite cues matter! Messaging matters! Opinion leadership is a thing!

I’d love to see gov’t officials try to define the British ‘middle class’ after the enormous struggle to come up with a usable definition for ‘working people’

Next Labour Deputy Leader is likely to be to the right of the party on economic issues. Based on our estimates with @chanret.bsky.social and @ukandeu.bsky.social You can play around with it on www.mpsleftright.co.uk

Radical right accommodation really does not work. New paper out with this exceptionally talented team @katharinalawall.bsky.social @robjohns75.bsky.social @drjennings.bsky.social @sarahobolt.bsky.social @zachdickson.bsky.social @danjdevine.bsky.social & @jack-bailey.co.uk doi.org/10.31235/osf...

Latest @thehousemag.bsky.social piece - on how to rank MPs, inc one of my fave academic studies, which put Diane Abbott to the right of Giles Radice. Also includes Rush reference.

NEW: Our latest poll of full- and part-time workers found only a third think their organisation is ready to take advantage of AI. However, this jumps to 58% of those in tech, media, or communications. @chrisrsurvation.bsky.social analyses the results below Read more: wp.me/p1cU9i-7jF 🧵 1/5

Labour will certainly be pleased to win this one, but that's a pretty close result; if you run these as uniform swings versus 2021, it only secures a total of 8 Labour constituency MSPs versus 51 for the SNP. As I've said before, this was must-win for Labour, but margin matters, and it's not huge!

Who would make the best prime minister by age groups? This and more from my colleague @chrisrsurvation.bsky.social below 👇

NEW: Westminster Voting Intention RFM 27 (-3) LAB 24 (-1) CON 20 (+2) LD 13 (-) GRN 8 (+1) OTH 7 (-) F/w 30th May - 2nd June 2025. Changes vs 5th May. 🧵1/7

I’ve never understood the irrational opposition to universal ID in this country so very happy to see this in my inbox today

This chart is from @britishelectionstudy.com @jamesdgriffiths.bsky.social, me and Ed Fieldhouse. You can see that 2024 Reform voters mainly came from the Conservatives or UKIP in 2015. This has been a story on the right for *ten years* now, unless something very different happened last week.

Some reflections on Runcorn

New Senedd polling shows Labour in the lead but with Reform and Plaid close behind. LAB 27% REF 24% PC 24% CON 15% LD 5% GRE 5% OTH 1% F/w 10th March - 3rd April. @jackpeacock1.bsky.social explores the findings here: www.survation.com/senedd-polli...

A big shift in mood among Labour members after the spring statement. Support for the leadership has dropped sharply, welfare reforms are seen as damaging, and next month's local elections are expected to go very badly. More below👇

I’m just a girl standing in front of a boy telling him it’s not true he has become more right-wing… it is me who has become more left-wing 🫠

I’ve long used FiveThirtyEight’s interactive “Hack Your Way To Scientific Glory” to illustrate the idea of p-hacking when I teach statistics. But ABC/Disney killed the site earlier this month :( So I made my own with #rstats and Observable and #QuartoPub ! stats.andrewheiss.com/hack-your-way/

We (@survation.bsky.social) have launched an exciting new partnership with @labourlist.bsky.social to provide regular polling of Labour Party members on their views of cabinet, leadership, policies and external threats. Findings from our first poll below 👇

Highest support we have ever recorded for Reform UK in a Scottish poll, while the SNP maintains an 11-point lead over Labour

A British election factoid I hadn't noticed until I was updating my lecture slides - in 2024 only 15% of constituencies were won by a majority of votes. That is less than half the previous low of 34% recorded in 2010.

We are hiring! Survation is looking for a Trainee Research Executive to join our team. If you are passionate about polling, data analysis, and public opinion research, apply now! Deadline: 24th March 2024 More details: www.survation.com/survation-is...

Are you an U/G in the social sciences looking for a Masters programme? Have you considered @rhulpir.bsky.social ? You can find a list of our programmes at www.royalholloway.ac.uk/research-and... <- MSc Elections, Campaigns and Democracy w/ Adv. Quant Methods taught by @caprosser.com wd be my pick

I have a new article in @electoralstudies.bsky.social 🎉 It uses conjoint experiment in the UK to test how important the culture war (statues, LGBT+ representation in pop culture, DEI, transwomen athletes, curriculum diversity, and university free speech) is to voters Link👇 & results 🧵

Fascinating insights fon where MPs stand rom @chanret.bsky.social and Vasil Lazarov ukandeu.ac.uk/placing-mps-...

Yields on 10-year US Treasuries & UK gilts reflect borrowing costs for those governments. Here's how UK and US government 10 yr borrowing costs have trended over the past 3 months. Without checking - which one is the world's strongest economy and which is the country apparently in a crisis?

Really cool work by @chanret.bsky.social and @vlazarov.bsky.social! Speaking of left-right positions of UK MPs, it turns out that their social media followership is also an extremely effective way of generating ideology estimates too 👇👀👇 doi.org/10.1017/S000...

How left- or right-wing is each MP? New data by @chanret.bsky.social and @vlazarov.bsky.social in partnership with Survation and @ukandeu.bsky.social reveals the (economic) left-right positions of individual MPs. www.survation.com/how-left-or-...

How (economically) left- or right-wing is your MP? A new dataset and interactive website can tell you... www.mpsleftright.co.uk (🧵, 1/12)

📣 NEW PAPER KLAXON 📣 "Who lacks voter identification? The electoral implications of the Elections Act 2022" With Ed Fieldhouse, @caprosser.bsky.social, @jack-bailey.co.uk, @jonmellon.bsky.social (@britishelectionstudy.com) Just published at Parliamentary Affairs: academic.oup.com/pa/advance-a...

Start pack of Royal Holloway Politics & International Relations academic staff and PhD students! go.bsky.app/EyuS68d

In what honestly feels like a huge victory for PhD student organising, after 3 years we finally just received an email saying that we'll be moving to an office with windows next month!!! 🌞😎☀️ being relentless pains in everyone's neck works!! 🪟🪟🪟🪟

The 12 types of Political Science paper. What's missing #polsci?

Out now open access at @ajpseditor.bsky.social. 194 potential exclusion-restriction violations for studies using weather as an instrumental variable onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Just to make sure that our new generation of researchers does not get less attention than more senior scholars, I have made a starter pack with PhD researchers in Political Science go.bsky.app/MYHYycU

📢Calling frontline migrant support services📢 Does your organisation work supporting migrants? Do you want more resources when you encounter gender and sexuality in that work? 👩👨🧑‍🦱🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️ We have 100 physical copies of the training workbook for you - get in touch for a copy 👓 1/

Now the dust has settled a little, I’d like to tell you about a new paper I have that: 1️⃣ Solves a long-standing problem in electoral studies 2️⃣ Links political metrics & information theory 3️⃣ Introduces a 2nd “root rule” of elections Let me walk you through it 👇

A good read from Nate Cohn on diverse sources of polling error, but I think a more useful contribution would be to say "If we under-estimate Trump, here's the likely reasons why" and "If we under-estimate Harris, here's the likely reasons why" www.nytimes.com/2024/10/22/u....

Thinking about doing a PhD in Politics and International Relations? Royal Holloway is part of SEDarc which offers studentships to cover tuition fees and a £21,237 per annum stipend for 3.5 years - apply by 7th Jan 5pm www.royalholloway.ac.uk/studying-her...

Labour’s First 100 Days: Our Qualitative Panel Has Their Say. Goodwill continues amongst Labour swing voters despite winter fuel payment and ongoing gift scandal. www.survation.com/labours-firs...

We use 30 year averages to show climatology (average weather conditions). During the 20th century the UK climatology followed a path around a confined box. With #globalwarming and #climatechange they have escaped out the box. This #dataviz shows UK rainfall and temperature.

Unfortunately I will not be able to attend after all. My apologies, my initial enthusiasm was caused by a misreading of 'webinar' as 'winebar', under the circumstances I hope you understand

New blog post: "How much do gender and ethnicity affect wannabe MPs’ chances of being selected?" chrishanretty.co.uk/posts/candid...

Join us at 6:15pm on the 14th October for @jennpiscopo.bsky.social's inaugural professorial lecture "The women's rights era: 50 years of gender equality advocacy and reform across the globe" The lecture is followed by a reception 🥂🎉 www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-womens...

Funding available for UK-based PGR or ECRs to attend this workshop on "Gender, Parties, and Parliaments" and receive feedback on your work from @jennpiscopo.bsky.social @drmalligaoch.bsky.social @sfranceschet.bsky.social among other fantastic scholars!

Very interesting patterns between party blocs on the left/right largely united in negative voting but also strong fragmentation between Con/Reform voters

For those who were waiting for Survation – we have finally joined Bluesky! Follow us for the latest insights into public opinion, voting intention, and research findings. We look forward to sharing our work and engaging with thoughtful discussion!