LONDON – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is on track to lose his own seat and neither of the two main political parties is likely to gain an outright majority in the next general election, which won’t take place until 2024, according to a new poll.
This is the first detailed account of the public’s perception of how Johnson has handled the recently concluded Brexit talks and the COVID-19 pandemic after reversing plans to allow families to get together at Christmas in parts of southern England to stop the virus from spreading.
More than 22,000 people were polled in a closely-watched constituency-by-constituency poll over a four-week period in December conducted by the research data company Focaldata and published by the Sunday Times.
The so-called multilevel regression and post-stratification (MRP) poll found that the ruling Conservatives would lose 81 seats, eliminating the majority of 80 seats. This would leave the Conservatives with 284 seats, while the opposition Labor party would win 282 seats, the poll found.
The Scottish National Party, looking to break away from the rest of the UK, is expected to win 57 of Scotland’s 59 seats, meaning the party could potentially play a role as king in the formation of the next government.
The prime minister is at risk of losing his own seat in Uxbridge, west of London, according to the poll.
Johnson took a resounding election victory last year that allowed him to take Britain out of the European Union orbit on New Year’s Eve after nearly half a century of close ties.
But Johnson’s premiership may increasingly be determined by the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has already killed more than 74,000 people and crushed the economy.