Conservative position weaker in 'red wall' seats says Curtice

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Sir John Curtice revealed that the Conservatives still retain the backing of three Red Wall seats even if the general support has dramatically declined, not least among Brexit voters. The Red Wall has tradionally inclined towards the Labour Party and the British political scientist admitted that the Conservative Party’s position is less solid than before following the numerous lockdown parties that came to light. A recent poll suggesed that 42 of the 45 Red Wall seats would return in Labour’s hands if an election was to take place today.

He estimated the only Red Wall seats that would remain blue if the polling was replicated at an election are Great Grimsby, Bassetlaw and Dudley North.

Sir John stated that the Tories can still rely on the support of Remain voters as opposed to the Leave voters who have emotionally detached themselves from the party in the wake of the allegations about Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s frequent festivities during lockdown, which Sue Gray and the police are probing at the minute.

In an interview with GB News, Sir Curtice categorically dismissed suggestions that Mr Johnson’s Tory party is keeping hold of the majority of voters as nationwide support is meagre.

He said: “It isn’t true however that the Conservatives are proving particularly successful at retaining many voters.

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“Actually support for the Conservative and national part has been falling more amongst leave voters than it has been amongst remain voters.

“And that has been true for quite some considerable time.”

Sir John stated that the “swings” in the national polls are just a reflection of the Conservatives’ decreasing popularity in the Red Wall seats.

He said: “But the second proof of their pleading is, we do actually have had a couple of opinion polls recently, what both of them show was more or less exactly the same swing in these Red Wall seats as there was in the national polls in the point in time.”

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The Conservatives have been greatly helped at the last general election by Red Wall seats and the outcome of the partygate probe could prove decisive but Sir John was adamant that not all of them are “going to go”.

He said: “In the Red Wall seats, the Conservative position now is not as strong as it was in the back end of September before the party began to hit in actual trouble.

“So on the polling evidence at least there isn’t any reason to believe that these Red Wall seats are going to swing differently from the rest of the country and that sure they aren’t all going to go.

“Some of them have incredibly large majorities: Dudley North, Bassetlaw, Great Grimsby.

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“Probably the Tories even if there is an election tomorrow they would hang onto that but there are plenty others inevitably, most of them are marginal, and therefore giving the current position of the party nationally they’d be very, very difficult to retain.”

According to reports, Mr Johnson is confident that his position is safe as Ms Gray is understood to be set to release her highly-anticipated report on Monday after probing up to 18 parties.

Should the Prime Minister’s predictions are coming true, he will have a shot at redemption as Tory MPs are unlikely to trigger a leadership contest if he is found not guilty of flouting the law.

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