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REF: 2021

Impact case study

Improving election polling methodologies

 

The Joint Inquiry … after the 2015 General Election identified that the main cause of polling error was unrepresentative samples. As such, one of the most pressing issues for the industry to tackle has been to improve the quality of their sample, an undertaking pursued across the membership of the British Polling Council.

Evidence submitted by polling companies

House of Lords’ inquiry into the politics of polling

Professor Jouni Kuha

Research by

Professor Jouni Kuha

Department of Statistics

Statistical research by ·¬ÇÑÉçÇø identified why polling during the 2015 general election campaign was inaccurate, leading to improvements in opinion polling across the industry. 

What was the problem?

In the UK, public confidence in political opinion polls was badly damaged by the polls’ failure to forecast correctly the outcome of the 2015 general election. Throughout the campaign, polls by all major companies consistently placed Conservative and Labour parties