Ukip is expected to do well in a handful of seats, but where? Lord Ashcroft has polled four marginal seats where he’s previously found the people’s army doing well. Two of the seats are top targets for Ukip — Castle Point and Great Yarmouth — but the Tory peer has found that the party has failed to move into first place with under two weeks to go.
In Castle Point, where Ukip launched its election campaign earlier this year, Ashcroft has found the Tories are now ahead by five points. There has been a 17 per cent swing to Ukip but it’s not enough to put them into first place. Use the interactive chart above to see the latest polling numbers.
The same is true for Great Yarmouth, another seat Ukip hopes to do well in, but Ashcroft has the party in third place behind the Tories and Labour on 24 per cent. The other two seats have been on Ukip’s radar but are unlikely to be specific targets. Ashcroft has found that Ukip are in second place in Labour-held Great Grimsby on 25 per cent, but Labour are still set to hold onto the seat with a 17 point lead. While Cannock Chase is not high on the party’s target list, Ukip’s support has grown 18 points, putting them into third place.
The bigger problem for Ukip is that Ashcroft has found a high level of campaign activity in some of these seats — but it’s not enough to put them into the lead. In Castle Point for example, 63 per cent of residents said they’d had contact from Ukip, more than any other party, but just over half had heard from the Tories. In Great Grimsby, a similar level said they’d heard from Ukip but 72 per cent said they’d heard from Labour — which may explain their big lead.
Although it seems Nigel Farage is on track to win South Thanet, these surveys suggests that Ukip may struggle to win any seats aside from the main four — Clacton, Rochester & Strood, Thurrock as well as South Thanet — even if they do poll better than any election in the past.
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