EU Referendum


EU Referendum: a poll reversal?


06/09/2015



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Survation
is claiming that its latest poll on EU referendum voting intentions that it has recorded 43 percent in favour of leaving the EU, with 40 percent wanting to remain and 17 percent undecided. Discarding the undecideds, that puts the split at 51 percent for leaving and 49 percent wanting to remain.

This compares with the last poll from this company, which put the crude split at 45 percent "yes" and 37 percent "no" in response to whether to remain in the EU, leaving 18 percent undecided.

The current poll is the first to use the new question format, turning an eight percent lead in favour of remaining to a three percent lead to the leavers – a movement of 11 percent.

Says the Mail on Sunday, this lends weight to the claims that the new phrasing boosts the leavers, the old question giving a boost of eight-nine percent to the remainers. The difference is scarcely, if at all, statistically significant.

This is especially the case when the poll with "normal weighting" records 40.2 percent in favour of remaining in the EU, against 39.7 percent in favour of leaving, with 20 percent undecided. That puts the two sides neck-and-neck.

Nevertheless, there will be some who will wish to aver that the result is also influenced by the migrant crisis, although with one poll and the confounding effect of the change in the question wording makes it unwise to be dogmatic as to the reasons for the shift, assuming it is not an outlier.

Those who are relying on migration (or immigration) to push sentiment in the direction of leaving may, however, be disappointed. In the last 24 hours, in response to the photographs of the drowned Syrian child, public sentiment seems to have shifted significantly in favour of the migrants, reflected in some media accounts.

If both public opinion and the media are fickle on this issue, any gain attributable to migration and related issues may be short-lived and even subject to a reverse. As it stands, however, the Survation indicates that there is very little public support for accepting large numbers of Syrians, even as we see in the Sunday Times a report that the UK is to take in 15,000.

Moreover, Survation does ask a follow-on question as to the voting intentions of those who opted to remain, if the migration crisis "continues to get worse". Some 68 percent stay firm, but 22 percent suggested they might consider leaving while 11 percent recorded "don't know".

On that basis, everything is to play for – although nothing can be taken for granted. The polls were largely inaccurate in their predictions for the general election and if – as we believe likely – the referendum will not be held for more than two years, anything could happen in the interim.