Poll List: 56% of likely Lib Dem voters may change their mind; most people still identify with Labour

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

UPDATE: ComRes tonight for ITV/The Independent shows:

Con 35% (nc), Lib Dems 27% (+1), Labour 25% (-1).

This poll, on a uniform swing, would deliver a hung parliament, but with the Tories as the largest party, 27 seats short of a working majority on 299 seats, with Labour on 236 seats and the Lib Dems on 84.

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A few new polls tonight again show the closeness of the election contest.

Ipsos-Mori shows, amongst those “absolutely certain to vote” the are Tories down three points on 32% andthe Lib Dems up eleven on last month on 32%, while Labour are down two points at 28%.

Translated to the election on a uniform swing, those numbers would deliver a hung parliament, with Labour as the biggest party and 58 seats short of a working majority on 268 seats in the new parliament, and the Tories on 233. the Lib Dems would have 118 seats, according to the UK Polling Report.

Interestingly, nearly half of respondents (49%) say they may change their mind about who to vote for, which is the highest level since Ipsos-Mori began asking the question in 1983 and shows the election is still wide open.

Equally importantly, Lib Dem voters are more likely to say they may change their mind (56%), compared to 40% of Conservative voters and 50% of Labour voters.

Labour is still the party which most people identify with: 31% say they identify best with Labour, 28% say the Conseravtives and 21% say the Liberal Democrats, which explains why the Lib Dem vote may still be open to change.

Also in the Ipsos-Mori poll, economic optimism remains positive, and has increased since March. The economic optimism index (those optimistic minus those pessimistic) stands at +15, compared with +7 last month.

And the poll finds 64% of people say they are certain to vote and 78% of all respondents say voting is personally important to them – which could indicate a high turnout is likely.

In the YouGov tracking poll tonight, the Tories are back in the lead, up two points on 33%. The Lib Dems are down 3% to 31%, while Labour have gained a point and risen to 27% since last night.

A ComRes poll is to follow at 10pm tonight.