Rogue election poll predicting ‘nightmare’ hung parliament sends Pound tumbling

A ROGUE Election forecast predicting a “nightmare” hung Parliament sent the Pound tumbling yesterday – despite widespread ridicule.

Using new ‘methodology, pollsters YouGov said the Conservatives were on course to lose 30 seats on June 8 – leaving Theresa May 16 seats short of a majority.

They even claimed Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson wasn’t safe in his Uxbridge constituency – where he has a 10,695 majority.

Tory campaign chief Jim Messina, the former 2012 Barack Obama campaign manager, said he had spent the day “laughing” at the “stupid poll”.

And he challenged a YouGov exec to a bet on the outcome.

Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner was so shocked she claimed the poll was a “shadowy Tory plot” to force their supporters to get and vote by scaring them.

But the poll sent the Pound down 1 per cent against the euro to euros 1.143 and by half a cent against the dollar to $1.277 – risking another bout of inflation for families and firms.

Neil Wilson at ETX Capital said: “A hung Parliament is the nightmare scenario for May.

“It would constitute a massive personal failure and undoubtedly make for great domestic political uncertainty at the worst possible moment for Britain.”

Pollsters were panned after the 2015 Election and again last year’s Referendum for calling the outcomes the wrong way.

And both Tory and Labour candidates said the YouGov poll defied belief given what they were seeing on the ground.

A Tory said canvas returns suggested he would benefit from a 7-to-8 per cent swing from Labour next week.

One Labour candidate defending a key battle ground seat dubbed YouGov’s projection as “absolute horses***”, from what they are hearing on the doorstep.

Another Labour source described the study as “b******s”.

But YouGov chief and co-founder Stephan Shakespeare stood by the findings yesterday and insisted the pollster was using new methodology which analysed responses on a constituency by constituency basis.

He said: “We know we run a risk publishing so much data in the heat of an election.

“But as data scientists we are committed to innovating to increase both accuracy and specificity.”

Speaking yesterday Theresa May insisted she had no regrets about calling a snap Election – as she was asked if she would RESIGN in the event of a hung Parliament.

She said: “The only poll that matters is the one that takes place on June 8 – and when June 8 comes the choice that people will have is actually the same as it was at the beginning of the campaign.”

Politics professor Matthew Goodwin said the same YouGov methodology predicted Hillary Clinton would win in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Iowa – and “she lost them all”.

Labour has cut the Tory lead from more than 20 points to as few as 5.

But a separate survey by Kantar-TNS yesterday put the Tories on 43 points – a ten point lead over Labour.

Polling guru John Curtice said an average 9 point lead would result in a majority of just 34 – “and this would be quite a failure given where the Conservatives started”.

He said the Tories were advancing in the North and the Midlands – which could be worth as much as 18 seats.

But he said: “The fact that we do not know if Theresa May is going to make it is the big thing that has changed from three weeks ago.”