Researching The Public: Post-War Policy, Politics And Polling

Lorna Lawrence

Conservative Party – Margaret Thatcher

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.75 1989 May

To mark the 10th anniversary of Margaret Thatcher’s election as Prime Minister, NOP was commissioned by the Daily Mail to conduct a comprehensive study among “Thatcher’s Children” – young people aged 16-25 who have become adults since 1979. The survey covered a wide range of subjects, such as work, marriage, politics and ambition and was carried out with 808 adults aged 16-25 between 3rd-12th March 1989 throughout Britain.
The Tories hold a 12% lead over Labour among those aqed 16-25 (43% vs 31%) compared to a lead of 9% in NOP’s national poll of all adults carried out at the same time. Some way behind in joint third come the SLD and the Green Party each on 7%. The Green figure indicates perhaps the most marked difference between young people and the population as a whole – the Greens have never scored above 2% in a national NOP poll.
It is interesting to note that whereas in all –adult polls the Tories usually have a far greater lead in the South than in the Midlands, the reverse is true among those aged 16-25, where the Conservatives lead by a full 27% in the Midlands and by 18% in the South. The Tory lead is also greater amongst those who claimed to be ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ interested in politics than among those with little or no interest (14% to 10%).
Only 4% of Thatcher’s children thought it very likely that Labour will win the next General Election, and even among Labour voters only 11% were fairly convinced that Labour would win; the same number that thought this was not at all likely. Over half (55%) thought a Labour victory either not very or not at all likely.

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.80 1990 March

Dissatisfaction with Margaret Thatcher’s leadership appeared as potent a force nationally as in Mid-Staffordshire, according to the poll carried out for the independent on Sunday on 24th March 1990. NOP conducted a total of1081 interviews face-to-face in 54 constituencies across the country, 2days after the Tory defeat in the Mid-Staffordshire by-election.61% of voters, including 37% of Tories, said Margaret Thatcher should resign before the next general election; 32% felt she should lead the Conservatives into it.
Michael Heseltine was the overwhelming favourite to take over from Mrs Thatcher, with 42% of respondents choosing him. His nearest rival was Sir Geoffrey Howe (6%), followed closely by Norman Tebbit with 5% (8% among Tories) and John Major with 4%. However, 32% of the 1081 voters were undecided.

Scottish National Party

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.73 1988 December

Despite a claim for growing support for the idea of an independent Scotland, in 1988 NOP found overall, only 16% support independence for Scotland – 5% fewer than those preferring the status quo, though support is somewhat higher amongst those aged 18-34 (24%).
Only 26% of the SNP’s own supporters want complete independence compared to 34% at the General Election. The majority (58%) prefer to stay in UK but greater independence from London. Support greatest in the 35-54 age group (64%).

WAPOR 52nd Conference (Paris, France), September 1999. Conference papers

Scots were rarely polled on the issue of independence before the seventies, but the SNP’s electoral fortunes may serve as a shorthand to trace its popularity. The SNP was founded in 1928 and its first general election in 1929, it fielded only 2 candidates and attracted just 3,313 votes, 0.2% of the total in Scotland. By 1935, 3 of its 8 candidates managed to save their deposits (securing one-eighth of the votes in their constituencies), but still its support was politically insignificant. An early Gallup poll (across England and Wales as well as Scotland, in February 1938) suggests how little the issue had penetrated the national consciousness: asked if “Scotland should have self-government”, 3 in 10 were in favour and 3 in 10 opposed, but the largest number had no opinion.
By the 1970s, the SNP was in a stronger position. In 1967, two by-elections indicated that they were at last a force to be reckoned with. At Glasgow Pollok, they secured a respectable 28% of the vote even in the face of the knowledge that SNP votes would be wasted in deciding the result of a key Conservative-Labour marginal; then later in the year they at last picked up another parliamentary seat in a by-election in Labour’s industrial heartland, this time at Hamilton.
The breakthrough, however, came 4 years later. In the February 1974 election, when Edward Heath appealed for and was denied a mandate for his Conservative government to confront the striking coal miners, the SNP doubled its share of the vote to 22% and won 7 parliamentary seats. Harold Wilson, the Labour leader, formed a minority government in the hung parliament that resulted and called a new election in October the same year, hoping to secure himself a working majority in the Commons. At this election the SNP share rose to 30%, with eleven members of parliament, and Labour’s overall majority was just 3 seats. The pressure was kept up through the 1974-1979 parliament by a series of impressive SNP gains in local government by-elections.
Although the rise of the SNP was indicative of increasing support for full Scottish independence, in fact this was never the solution preferred by the majority. When MORI surveyed public opinion on this issue in December 1976, more than half of Scots said they would prefer a Scottish Assembly; only 22% wanted an independent Scotland and 20% no change. Moreover, a majority of both Labour (58%) and Conservative (51%) supporters wanted a devolved assembly, and even among the SNP almost half (46%) preferred devolution, though 50% supported their party’s call for full independence.
But even more strongly, there was support for a referendum on setting up a Scottish Assembly – 4 in 5 Scots were in favour. These were the circumstances in which the Labour government promised referendums in Scotland and Wales and began to pilot the necessary legislation through Parliament.
Labour’s campaigners avoided using the word ‘devolution’ because they had discovered from MORI’s private polls for the party that many Scots simply didn’t understand it. In 1974, as many as 65% said they didn’t know what “devolution” meant, and only one in 5 gave any sort of accurate definition. Even by 1978, when the campaign was in full flow, MORI found that if we asked about attitudes to “devolution” a quarter said ‘don’t know’; but if we asked about support or opposition to a “Separate Scottish Assembly”, don’t knows fell to just 12%, and most of those who were undecided before swung to approval. From that day, Labour politicians spoke enthusiastically of a “separate Scottish Assembly”, and the word “devolution” was banished.
But opponents forced an amendment to the bill, which required not only that a majority of those voting should vote in favour, but also that 40% of the entire electorate should do so. This perhaps innocuous-seeming requirement proved in fact a stiff test: in the referendum on 1 March 1979, 52% of those who voted -and with the turnout being under two-thirds, less than a third of the whole Scottish electorate -supported the Assembly. Nevertheless, though failure in the referendum meant that any immediate move to devolution was blocked, polls found only a third thought the issue should be dropped altogether; but with the collapse of Prime Minister Callaghan’s government a month later (the SNP voting with the rest of the opposition against him on a confidence motion), and subsequent election of Mrs Thatcher’s Conservatives to whom any proposal weakening the Union was anathema, there followed a hiatus of nearly 2 decades before another opportunity arose for Scotland to seize a degree of self-government.
At the 1979 election the SNP vote fell back to 17% and just two seats, while Mrs Thatcher’s Conservatives swept England to secure a parliamentary majority but also secured a respectable 31% of the vote in Scotland (though Labour’s 42% made it the largest party with twice as many Scottish MPs as the Conservatives). As conservative support waned through the eighties, the SNP derived little benefit, taking just 12% of the vote in 1983 and 14% in 1987. In MORI’s regular opinion polls, SNP support never topped 20% between 1979 and the autumn of 1988.
The Thatcher premiership, while offering no opportunity for Scotland to loosen its ties with England, nevertheless did a lot to foster Scottish resentment and ensure that eventual change would come. For one thing, the privatisation programme which was a centrepiece of Thatcherite policy implied a weakening of local government and increasing centralisation of governmental functions and decision-making power. By the mid-eighties the Conservatives – the majority party in Scotland as recently as 1955 – were clearly seen by most Scots as an essentially alien force. (In 1991, an ICM poll for the Scotsman found 3 in 4 Scots agreeing that the Conservatives were “an English party”.) Opposition to the government would naturally flow into nationalistic channels: resentment of Conservative rule could most easily be rationalised by viewing Scotland as a distinct political entity that had voted against a Conservative government and yet had it imposed – so separate rule for Scotland, whether through devolution or full independence, could therefore be seen as a directly party-political issue.
Perhaps the most resented policy was the Community Charge or “poll tax”, introduced in Scotland a year before it came into force in England. It was widely seen as an English government using Scotland to experiment upon; in September 1989, 74% of Scots disapproved of the policy. Conversely, water privatisation was not introduced in Scotland when it had been imposed throughout the rest of the country, but the possibility that it might follow again became a powerful political issue. Even when Mrs Thatcher was ousted and the “poll tax” dropped, John Major’s administration found few friends in Scotland; in December 1992, a MORI poll for the Sunday Times Scotland found that 73% of Scots agreed that “the government doesn’t care about Scotland”. It is arguable that the resurgence in support for devolution was primarily motivated by party-political distaste for the government in London rather than the abstract idea of union with England.
By the time of the 1992 election, the Conservatives took their unpopularity in Scotland for granted, but still out-polled the SNP, who took (only) 21.5% of the votes and 3 seats. But discontent with the constitutional status quo was higher than this would suggest, with MORI’s polls finding support for full independence (either within or outside the European Community) running at 34% through most of the campaign, but dropping to 28% in the final week, while support for devolution rose a little, from 42% to 45%.
One factor which has clearly worked against support for devolution or independence is the anticipated cost. In February 1992, MORI found that 62% of Scots said they thought that if Scotland became an independent state taxes would go up, whereas only 10% expected them to come down; and almost half (49%) said “I would not be willing to pay more in taxes for any amount of self-government for Scotland”, though 26% said they would pay more for complete independence and 17% even for limited devolution.
Following Labour’s victory in the 1997 general election, the new government quickly kept its promise to hold a new referendum on setting up a Scottish Parliament. With just over 3 in 5 electors turning out, 74.3% voted for a Scottish Parliament and 63.5% for it to have taxvarying powers.
The elections for the first Scottish Parliament for almost 300 years took place on 6 May 1999.

Polls: voting intentions and related issues of public interest 2013

Q: There will be a referendum on Scottish Independence on the 18th of September 2014. How do you intend to vote in response to the question: Should Scotland be an independent country? (Scottish respondents – All)

• Yes: 25%
• No: 43% (53% of SNP voters)
• Don’t know: 32%

Q: Following devolution in 1999, the Scottish parliament was given control over some areas of government, whilst others were retained by the Westminster parliament. Which of the following statements would you say most applies to you?

‘I have a very good idea of which areas of government are the responsibility of the Scottish Parliament, and which are the responsibility of Westminster’: All
• Very good idea: 14%
• Some idea: 44%
• No idea: 40%
• Don’t know: 2%

Plaid Cymru

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.73 1988 December

In recent years, Welsh nationalism has once again become a major issue within Wales, and part of the reason for this has been the actions of certain extremists groups – the fire-bombings of English holiday homes within Wales and (more recently) of English estate agents as well. However, no research had been carried out within the traditional Welsh community to establish what support (if any) there is for the extremists – no doubt due to the extremely sensitive nature of the subject. However, such difficulties are not insurmountable and a survey carried out amongst this group would also afford a valuable opportunity to discover attitudes to a wide range of other cultural and political issues.
With this in mind, NOP was commissioned by HTV Wales to measure opinions in this area and interview a representative quota sample of adults aged 18+ in a stratified selection of wards containing over 50% of Welsh speakers (such Wards being concentrated in North and Mid-Wales) between 27th August – 30th September1988. The survey was not designed to represent the entire population of Wales, but it did cover both Welsh and English speakers in the Welsh “heartland”.
Voting Intention as might be expected, given that interviewing took place in the most “Welsh” areas of Wales, Plaid Cymru ran Labour a close second (31% to 30%) in terms of voting intention, with the Tories not far behind on 25%. The Democrats attract the support of around one in ten, with the Greens and SOP each on 2%.Traditional class, tenure and urban/rural biases affect support for the Tories and Labour, with Labour holding a lead of 17% over the Tories among the C2DE group, of 37% among Council tenants and of 12% in built-up areas. By contrast, the Conservatives lead by 20% among ABCls by 6% among owner-occupiers and by 1%in rural areas. Support for Plaid Cymru, however, seems largely independent of such familiar biases. Plaid’s support varies hardly at all by age, social class, region or tenure, but is instead heavily dependent on cultural factors such as fluency in Welsh and country of birth. Plaid is supported by 43% of fluent Welsh speakers but only by 9% of others, whilst three times as many Welsh-born respondents supported Plaid than did those born in England (36% to 12%). Such figures tend to point to Plaid’s support being almost entirely based on one issue -nationalism – and divorced from the usual left/right divide. Given that Plaid’s parliamentary representation is made up of those with views from all parts of the political spectrum, this may not be an unreasonable assumption.
Q. If a general election was held tomorrow, which of these parties would you vote for/be most likely to vote for? Base: All aged 18+ giving a party vote (All):

• Labour: 31%
• Plaid Cymru: 30%
• Conservative: 25%
• SLD: 10%
• Green: 2%
• SDP: 2%

Although 79% of those questioned spoke Welsh either fluently or a little, only one in eight of those born in England speak the language fluently, but 59% of those who were not fluent have tried to learn Welsh. The numbers of those speaking Welsh increases with age – from 55% among those aged 16-34 to 70% among the over 55s – and this is hardly surprising given the creeping anglicisation of even this part of Wales. Welsh speakers also become more frequent as one progresses down the social ladder, with 72% of DE’s claiming fluency compared to only 51% of AB’s. If Welshness is closely connected with fluency in the language, these findings may provide a reasonable profile of the “Welsh” Welsh themselves.
The latest target for the arsonists had been English estate agents which sell properties in Wales. Levels of support for this action are almost exactly the same as those for attacks on homes themselves at 6%. Again, Plaid Cymru supporters were the most likely to support the action (14%), but the vast majority disapproved of the attacks.
Throughout the arson campaign, the Police in some parts of Wales have claimed that some, normally law-abiding, communities are not helping with the investigations into the arson attacks – a belief perhaps supported by the earlier finding that one in eight would not come forward with evidence relating to an attack. When asked why they thought this was so, around one in four thought that such people supported the reasons for the attack (29%). A further 25% believed people simply didn’t want to get involved, and a worrying 24% thought potential witnesses would be scared of reprisals if they came forward. Only 5% thought that such people were either directly involved in the attacks or were protecting friends or relatives who were involved. However, a similar number (5%) thought that people did help the Police with their enquiries. Those unable to speak Welsh fluently, or who had spent most of their lives in England were much more likely to cite tacit support for the campaign than fluent Welsh speakers or those who had spent most of their lives in North/Mid-Wales. Those born in England were also the group most likely to think that those withholding evidence actually knew or were related to those involved (8% compared to only 2% among those born in Wales).Younger people and those in the ABCl group were also more likely to think that support for the attacks was the motive behind people’s reluctance to come forward (39% and 36% compared to 22% and 26% among those over 55 and C2DE’s), and women were more likely to mention threatened reprisals than men (27% to20%).

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.74 1989 March

In recent years relatively little research has been carried out in Wales on attitudes to issues such as devolution and the position of the Welsh language. However, by early 1989 the language issue had become “live” once again and devolution was a topic for discussion. NOP was commissioned by HTV Wales to measure opinions towards these and other matters and interviewed a representative quota sample of 1062 adults aged 18+ in52 sampling points throughout Wales between February 13th-19th.
Regarding voting intention, Labour, on 47%, held a clear lead of 21% over the Conservative in Wales as a whole. Plaid Cymru attracted the support of 14% with the SLD and SDP some way behind on 6% and 4% respectively. Plaid’s support in the survey is the highest ever recorded for the nationalists in a Wales-wide opinion poll.
Since the survey was introduced as being about various issues, the level of support for Plaid Cymru may have been slightly exaggerated as the main subject of the survey was the Welsh language, and those most likely to agree to be interviewed would have been those most interested in the issue. In turn, such people have an above average likelihood of being Plaid supporters. However, this factor is unlikely to have had any more than a minor influence on the results, and Plaid’s support has also been found to be around 10-14% by the Welsh sub-sample of NOP’s Random Omnibus Surveys between February and March. Hence this increase in Plaid’s support seems to be real.
In addition to the normal class variations in Party support, there is a clear regional difference in voting behaviour. Support for Labour is lower in the North (34%) where the lead is 5%; this is over Plaid Cymru. The reason for the level of Plaid support (at 29% over twice their national figure) is almost certainly the region’s high concentration of Welsh speakers. 57% of those in North Wales speak Welsh and Plaid is supported by many of this group. In the more Anglicised and industrial South, however, Labour’s lead is 32% over the Conservatives. Plaid’s support falls to only 8%, again showing the link between language and politics (only 17% of those in the South speak any Welsh at all). In rural Mid and West Wales the picture changes again, with Labour having a 1% lead over the Conservatives, while the SLO’s support is 12% (as would be expected given that it holds 3 seats in the area).

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.84 1991 March

NOP were commissioned by HTV to conduct a poll in the Neath constituency in the week before the by-election to measure political opinion in the run-up to polling. Fieldwork was conducted between 28th – 31st March 1991
Q: Are you in favour of establishing elected assembly for Wales?
• Yes: 56%
• No: 28%
• DK: 16%

Green Party

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.76 1989 July

A major political event of June/July was the meteoric rise of the Green Party which scored 14% (of the vote in the European elections and 10% in our July Poll (to lead the SLD by 3%).
Whilst only 11% of our sample claimed to be ‘certain’ to vote Green at the next election, at the opposite extreme only 2% claimed to be ‘certain not to. Indeed, 72% were at least ‘fairly likely’ to vote Green in 1991/1992.
The Greens and the present political system: 87% thought that none of the other party leaders were any good at dealing with environmental issues. Of those who expressed an opinion, one in five thought Neil Kinnock would cope best with Green issues and the same proportion (19%) opted for Paddy Ashdown. Only one in ten chose the Prime Minister and even amongst former Tories this proportion barely reached one in four. 14% felt unable to offer an opinion.
More generally, only 24% trusted the Government to take the right decisions about the environment. This proportion fell to 20% among current Greens, but rose slightly to 29% among potential Greens.
Despite Mrs Thatcher’s resistance to EEC intervention, the Common Market emerges as the most trustworthy body of all – only 43% remained sceptical of its commitment to Green principles.
Banning factory farming was the policy recognised as Green by over half of potential Greens (62%).
Current and ex-labour voters were the most informed group regarding what is and what is not a Green policy; Tory voters were the least informed.

British Public Opinion Issue 11.07 1989 September

The emerging image of the Green Party: The arrival of the Green Party as a force on the British political scene has significantly altered the conventional pattern of relative party images, according to a further Perceptual Mapping Computer Analysis derived from the MORI data. Perceptual maps which analyse the images of the conventional parties alone have mapped them out virtually in the form of an equilateral triangle CON vs LAB vs SLD/SDP, as shown on the front page. But the inclusion of the Greens results in a pushing together of the relative images of Labour, the Democrats and the SDP, as illustrated below. Although the Green Party’s image is still relatively faint (to nearly half of the electorate, it remains a largely unknown entity), its emerging attributes appear to include “having sensible policies” and “understanding the problems facing Britain”. Another important feature of the map is that the Labour and Conservative parties, who in our conventional analysis both share some of the affliction of the “extreme” co-ordinate, largely lose this to the Greens in the five-party analysis. Furthermore, while the Conservatives appear to lose some of their “professional in its approach” image to the Greens, Labour is having to share with the Green Party some of its traditional positive attributes such as “looks after the interests of people like us”, “represents all classes” and “concerned about people in real need”. The five-party analysis shown below on the right re-draws the equilateral triangle of the conventional analysis, but the three corners are virtually in the form of CON vs GRN vs LAB/DEM/SDP, with the Greens being seen essentially as the radical party of the left, and post-policy review, Labour as a social democratic party of the centre.

Liberal Party

NOP Bulletin 1967 September

It is clear that Mr. Jeremy Thorpe has not made much impact on the electorate since he replaced Mr. Grimond at the beginning of the year. Only 39% of the voters, and only 44% of Liberals, know that Mr. Thorpe is the leader of the Liberal Party. It should be emphasized, however, that the survey in question was carried out immediately before the Liberal Assembly. Awareness of Mr. Thorpe maybe greater now.

NOP Bulletin 1968 October

Shortly before the Liberal Assembly, 46% of the electorate said they were satisfied with Mr. Thorpe as Liberal Leader, while 17% were dissatisfied. Among Liberal voters, Mr. Thorpe’s rating was a satisfactory 76% suggesting that Mr. Thorpe is a good deal more popular among his rank-and-file than Mr. Heath, though slightly less popular than Mr Wilson.

NOP Political Bulletin 1972 December

At the end of the year, the gap between the parties was not much different to that at the beginning of the year – 10% in Labour’s favour. The Liberal share of the vote had increased to about 14%, while other parties accounted for a further 2% of the vote. About the same proportion of the electorate was dissatisfied either with the Government or with Mr. Heath as had been in January. And now Mr. Wilson was not as popular. Uxbridge, a Conservative marginal seat in 1970, was held by the Tories against the national swing, with a rather low level of turnout. Sutton and Cheam out-Orpingtoned Orpington.
Commentators suggested that the two party system was too inflexible to stand up to the political changes within the electorate, leading to a resurgence of the Liberals and mounting pressure within the major parties from the extreme wings. But in many respects this situation is akin to that in 1961-62. Then the Liberals enjoyed heights of popularity not enjoyed since before the Second World War. The issues were similar in name then as they are now, though their public face and the way they are judged probably differs. Thus in December 1962 the voting intention figures were: Conservative 37.7%, Labour 44.3%, Liberal 17.3%, Others 0.7%. Also in December 1962 as many people were for Britain joining the Common Market as were against (44% for 44% against) a position not dissimilar to now.
What then for 1973? It seems possible that the Liberal party could increase their share of the vote as they did a decade ago, though not to the same extent, provided that a sufficient number of major issues are unfavourable to the Conservative party, and provided that the Labour party continue as they are at present. However it seems likely also that as then, this situation will not last. As compared with six years ago the electorate seems more cynical about the likely pay-offs of political action (see November 1972 Bulletin), and in such an atmosphere any middle-off-the-road political alternative may seem like the present two. Furthermore as the electorate as a whole becomes more changeable in its voting habits so support for any political party may ebb and flow rather more quickly than we have so far seen.

NOP Political Bulletin 1973 May

For the first six months of the new Government’s life in 1970, party support seemed fairly evenly balanced. In early 1971 Labour gained a 10% lead over the Conservatives and since that time the Labour party has been favoured by the largest proportion of the ‘voters’. During most of the past 2.5 years, Labour support has fluctuated around the 48-52% level, with few discernible long-term movements up or down, while the Conservative vote has been gradually declining. In particular the period since Spring 1972 shows a marked downward trend in the number of people who say they would vote Conservative. In contrast, the Liberal vote, which had been rising very slowly indeed before the Spring of 1972 has been increasing in size rather more rapidly in the past 6-8 months. The rise of the Liberal vote occurring at the same time as a fall in Conservative support suggests that there has been a fairly sizeable switch in support from the Conservative to the Liberal party. Labour support remaining fairly stable. Further evidence of ex-Conservative supporters now favouring the Liberal party is discovered when the voting intentions of the different social classes are examined. In February 1972, 68% of AB class voters supported the Conservative party and 10% the Liberals; the situation now is that only 52% of AB class electors claim that they would vote Conservative, while 24% support the Liberal party. A similar situation is found among C1 voters, but patterns of support among C2 and DE voters seem to have changed little in the past 15 months.

NOP Political Bulletin 1973 July/August

Since the last NOP opinion poll in June which reported a Labour lead of 4.6% over the Conservative party, there has been a considerable change in the party support of the British electorate. Support for both the Labour and Conservative parties has fallen. The Liberal party seems to have benefited considerably from the decline in support for the two major parties. The latest NOP poll shows that 41.7% of the electorate would vote Labour if there were a general election tomorrow, while 28.9% would vote Conservative and 27.6% Liberal. This is the highest level of Liberal support that NOP has recorded since May 1962. In terms of electoral support, the Liberal and Conservative parties are now running neck and neck.
It would seem that the present Liberal revival is the result of widespread dissatisfaction with both the Conservative and Labour parties. Amongst those electors who said they would vote Liberal if there was a general election tomorrow, only 24% were satisfied with the government, 27% were satisfied with Mr. Heath and 23% were satisfied with Mr. Wilson.
The Liberals are neck and neck with the Tories in public popularity. An astonishing National Opinion Poll shows today that if a General Election were held now, the voting would be: Labour, 41.7 per cent. Conservative, 28.9 per cent. Liberal, 27.6 per cent.
Labour, though they would not have an overall majority over the other two parties, would probably form a government. But Mr Jeremy Thorpe and his Liberals could have more than 100 MPs who would decisively influence politics. NOP has never recorded such a slump in ratings for a Conservative Government as has occurred in the last two months. At the same time Liberal support has doubled and is now at its highest since the party’s famous Orpington by-election victory in 1962 when it hit 33.4 per cent. The Liberals are grabbing votes, mainly Tory ones, so fast that on the point of passing the Conservatives in popular appeal.

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.8 1976 October

Following the election of Mr. Steel as Leader of the Liberal Party, NOP asked electors whether they felt he would help or hinder his party. The questions were asked between July 13th – 18th, 1976. A quarter of the electorate (24%) felt his election was likely to increase support for the Liberals in the country and only 6% saw him as a potential vote loser. However, only 1% of electors said they themselves were now more likely to vote Liberal.
A much more serious problem is what has happened to all the Liberal voters of February and October 1974 who no longer claim that they would vote Liberal. In an attempt to answer this question, we asked respondents whether they have voted Liberal in either of the 1974 Elections or in the 1970 General Election. This type of questioning has methodological problems of recall and under-claiming. However, if one limits the objectives of the questioning to an analysis of the present voting intention of those who remember having voted Liberal at previous elections, these methodological problems are not so serious. The following table contains the results of this analysis.
As a generalisation three electors seemed to have “defected” from Liberal to Conservative for every two going to Labour. Only four out of every ten recent Liberal voters are still intending to support the party but amongst the bedrock support seven in ten (69%) of those who have voted Liberal in the last three elections are still intending to vote Liberal. Despite the clear loss of electoral support the survey analysis does indicate that 30% of those electors now intending to vote Liberal have not voted for the party at any of the last three elections.

Political Social Economic Review 1978 October

Voters say “Yes” to a Liberal Pact – or do they? An interesting example of the effect that question wording may have in political opinion polls arose early in September. Two polling organisations NOP, and its sister company, Market & Opinion Research International, were commissioned to undertake polls within a week of each other. Both questioned similar sized samples of the public on whether or not they would want the Liberals to form a pact with one of the two major parties if neither of the latter obtained an overall majority in a General Election. Yet the polls gave apparently contradictory answers: the NOP poll seemed to show that electors did want such a coalition; the MORI poll showed that they did not.
The NOP poll was undertaken for the Daily Mail, on the 6th and 7th of September. An inter-locking quota sample of 1,044 adults was interviewed in 54 Constituencies, and the poll found an overall lead for the Tories over Labour of 5%. After a number of questions on other topics, respondents were asked: “If the next General Election does not produce a clear majority for the Labour or Conservative parties, do you think the Liberals should form a coalition with one of them?” Answers were: Yes 56%, No 34%, Don’t know 10%. Those saying yes were further asked which party they would want the Liberals to form a coalition with: 27% of all respondents said Labour, 19% said Conservative, and 10% said they did not know. Thus the findings of this poll appeared to be that over half of all electors would want a coalition, although of these 18% have no clear idea as to who it should be with.

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.32 1981 August

The first thing which becomes clear from looking at the results to this question is that the Alliance is greater than the sum of its parts – more people say they would vote for the Alliance than originally said they would vote for the Liberals or the SDP. The obvious conclusion is that the idea of an Alliance has attractions. This is quite plausible given that polls over the years have shown a considerable degree of support for a “National Government”, and it would seem that the Alliance is seen as a step in this direction.
One of the most important questions about the SDP/Liberal Alliance is where its support is coming from. Comparison of the results from the two different voting questions show very clearly that the Alliance is taking support almost equally from Conservative and Labour.

Political, Social, Economic Review 1982 February

NOP Survey – When it was first introduced the second voting question was intended to tap support for a possible Alliance. As it became increasingly clear that the SDP and the Liberals will fight the next election as an Alliance. Except in a few possible cases, people will not get the chance to choose between Liberal and the SDP.

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.52 1985 February

A widely-held image of the student population of Great Britain is that of a group of radical, scruffy political agitators wasting their grants on anything but the purpose for which it was intended. In order to gauge the accuracy of these opinions, NOP conducted a quota survey of 614 students at 34 university sites on 14th December 1984, on behalf of the Mail on Sunday. A notable feature of the survey was how the voting intentions of the students interviewed showed significant differences from the figures for Great Britain as a whole. Within the student population, Labour is the most popular party by a substantial margin, with the SDP/Liberal Alliance attracting sufficient support to relegate the Conservatives to third place.

NOP Political, Social, Economic Review Issue no.66 1987 September

Whilst the Alliance is in a state of some turmoil, NOP have ceased to ask about satisfaction with the leader of the SDP, but the question on the Liberal leader is still asked. Mr Steel has clearly been harmed by the Alliance split, for his post-election rating, while constant over the three months, shows a major fall from the pre-election satisfaction level which was typically above 40%.
With the SDP/Liberal Alliance In a state of almost non-stop turmoil since the election there has been no shortage of media coverage. The transition of the SDP leadership from David Owen to Robert Maclennan was certainly well-covered, and yet a telephone poll of 1007 adults at the beginning of September showed that only 22% named Maclennan as the SDP leader – fewer than thought Dr Owen still was.
Even more disturbingly for Robert Maclennan, only one in three Alliance voters knew he was the SDP leader, with 23% naming David Owen and 40% admitting ignorance. This was again far below the recognition of the other party leaders among their non- supporters.

Lorna Lawrence

November 2025