Poll suggests conservatives face Berkshire wipeout

The Conservatives face a potential wipeout in Berkshire according to a new poll predicting the result of the general election next month.

They currently hold six out of the eight MP seats in the county, with Berkshire now having nine parliamentary seats after the political map of England was redrawn.

In the latest election projection from YouGov, this number is likely to go down to two, with Labour taking five of the nine seats and the Liberal Democrats taking two as well.

The projection would see Labour winning the contests for Reading Central, Reading West and Mid Berkshire, Earley and Woodley, Slough and Bracknell.

If that result bears out, James Sunderland, the incumbent Conservative MP for Bracknell would lose his seat to Labour’s Peter Swallow.

Meanwhile, Labour’s Matt Rodda maintaining his place in Parliament as the new MP for Reading Central, beating off a challenge against councillor Raj Singh (Conservative, Kentwood).

Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi, Labour MP for Slough since 2017, is predicted to be elected for a third time under the shifted constituency boundaries, defeating Conservative candidate Moni Nanda.

Yuan Yang, the Labour candidate for the new Earley and Woodley constituency is projected to win the battle in the Reading suburbs against Tory Pauline Jorgensen (Conservative, Hillside).

Standing down

The election will see a host of new faces representing areas of Berkshire in Parliament as several sitting MPs are standing down.

They include political veterans Sir Alok Sharma and Sir John Redwood, the Conservative MPs for Reading West and Wokingham respectively.

Their Conservative successors are both set to lose.

In Reading West and Mid Berkshire, Labour’s Olivia Bailey is projected to beat Ross Mackinnon, who became the Conservative candidate this February after Sir Alok announced he would be stepping down in September 2023.

Meanwhile, Sir John only recently announced that he would stand down as an MP on May 24, two days after the election was called.

His hopeful Conservative successor Lucy Demery is projected to lose against cllr Clive Jones (Liberal Democrats, Hawkedon) who has been the Lib Dem candidate since February 2022.

Further west, Lee Dillon, the Liberal Democrat candidate and former leader of West Berkshire Council is slated to beat incumbent Conservative Laura Farris, who has been the MP since 2019.

It’s in East Berkshire where Conservatives are most likely to cling on.

Former Prime Minister Theresa May has stepped down as Conservative MP for Maidenhead, passing the torch to candidate Dr Tania Mathias, who is projected to fend off a challenge from cllr Julian Tisi (Liberal Democrats, Eton and Castle) the Lib Dem candidate.

Over in Windsor, incumbent Adam Afriyie said he would not run again in July 2022, with Conservative candidate Jack Rankin being selected last September.

The YouGov projection sees Mr Rankin beat Labour contender cllr Pavitar Kaur Mann (Labour, Britwell), the leader of the opposition on Slough Borough Council.

Estimate

The projection for Berkshire’s nine seats is part of YouGov’s new multi-level regression and post-stratification (MRP) model, which uses polling data.

The MRP is not a ‘prediction’ of the July 4 election, according to the firm, but an estimate of the results if an election was held today.

Nationally, the result would be as follows:

Labour – 422

Conservatives – 140

Liberal Democrats – 48

SNP – 17

Green – 2

Plaid Cymru – 2

Reform – 0

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