General election  

Labour on track to win large majority but some seats 'too close to call'

Labour on track to win large majority but some seats 'too close to call'
It is projected the Tory's could only win 115 seats (Jeff Over/BBC/AFP via Getty Images)

Labour are on track to win a large majority come July 5 but 120 seats are still "too close to call", according to Ipsos.

The company published the findings of its first poll of the general election yesterday (June 18) which estimated that Labour could win 453 seats with the Conservatives only winning 115, creating a Labour majority of 256. 

Implied vote shares from the data are 43 per cent Labour, 25 per cent Conservative, Reform UK 12 per cent, Liberal Democrats 10 per cent, Greens 6 per cent, SNP 3 per cent , Plaid Cymru 1 per cent and Other 1 per cent.

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Ipsos said: “Some 117 seats have a winning margin of less than five points, and are considered too close to call. The Conservatives are second in 50 of these, Labour in 43, and the Liberal Democrats 13, demonstrating that small changes in the parties’ performance could still lead to big changes in the final outcome.”

Seat projections

The Ipsos data suggested that Nigel Farage would win Clacton while Jeremy Corbyn would lose in Islington North. 

High profile Conservatives who are at risk of losing their seats include Grant Shapps, Penny Mordaunt, Gillian Keegan, Johnny Mercer, and Jacob Rees-Mogg. 

While Jeremy Hunt faces a tight race, with James Cleverly and Kemi Badenoch holding on.

According to Ipsos, Labour's votes are increasing across the country particularly in Scotland and the North East, with more modest advances or even some drops in highly urban areas where they have been traditionally strong, like London, Liverpool, Manchester, and Birmingham. 

While the party is only picking up a few more votes in Wales, they could still gain eight or nine seats due to the decline in the Conservative vote, the data found.

Rishi Sunak and his party are losing votes across the country with severe drops in the East and South of England and across the Midlands.

Ipsos has said the data shows the Conservatives are losing vote share in the area they were strongest in the 2019 general election.

The Lib Dems look likely to hold on to their eight seats from 2019 as well as gain at least 20 seats from the Tories, mostly in the South East and South West of England, Ipsos has projected.

“In Scotland, the fate of the SNP is still very much up in the air, with the implied vote shares in Scotland sitting at Labour 36 per cent, SNP 33 per cent, Conservatives 13 per cent, Liberal Democrats 8 per cent, Reform UK 5 per cent, and Greens 3 per cent. 

“Our model shows the SNP expected to win around 15 seats. They are currently at risk of losing 29 of their 2019 notional seats to Labour and three to the Liberal Democrats, while eight are too close to call.  In total, 12 out of the 57 seats in Scotland are too close to call,” Ipsos explained.

From the data, Ipsos has said Reform UK are currently estimated to win “relatively comfortably” both Ashfield and Clacton, overturning a massive Tory majority.