Britain’s general election may only prolong the fierce ideological debate that has consumed the Conservative Party during their 14 years in power, even if they suffer the worst-case defeats forecast by some pollsters.
The Conservative Party that emerges from Thursday’s nationwide vote will likely retain a similar split between centrists and right-wingers as it had before, according to a Bloomberg analysis of public election forecast data. There were some indications that moderates could slightly increase their influence within the parliamentary party, although the debate over how to win back supporters of Nigel Farage’s Reform U.K. is expected to preoccupy any Tories who win seats.
The analysis relied on data from eight so-called MRP surveys by pollsters including Ipsos, Savanta and YouGov that show the left-leaning Labour Party on track for a historic majority in excess of 150 seats in the 650-seat House of Commons. Large sample-sizes in those polls, which use demographic data and statistical modeling to project results by constituency, show the Conservatives left with somewhere from 50 to 150 seats.