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Signs of a Rishi Sunak-inspired revival in Tory fortunes in prosperous 'Blue Wall' territory, says Lord Hayward Middle-class British voters are starting to turn back to the Tories because they like Rishi Sunak, according to a polling guru. Labor has grown "overconfident" in recent months, elections expert Lord Hayward said, describing the wide polls enjoyed by Sir Keir Starmer's party as "overblown".
The influential Tory pair said: “Rishi seriously outclasses the Tory party. He has the potential, as long as Rishi doesn't mess it up, for Rishi to bring the party to his level.
Lord Hayward said there was "garbage in the wind" from national polls and local by-election results from a Sunak-inspired revival in Conservative fortunes that could see the party cling to the "blue territory" of the "wall". In the south of england.
He added there was evidence that Sunak's "competition" won over voters in prosperous areas. "The real shift [back to the Tories] seems to be the middle class, where the Lib Dems are the threat."
The pair said recent council by-elections in Dunblane and Cambridgeshire, "classic middle-class territory", saw a "massive" improvement for the Conservatives over the party's 2022 local election results.
Local elections in May will show whether the Conservatives can stop any significant advance by Sir Ed Davey's party in the wealthy parts of the south, he added. "I think the Lib Dems could face a bigger challenge than they thought."
The No 10 and Tory MPs were backed by the latest Delta poll which showed the Tories up eight points to 35 per cent, cutting Labor's lead to just 10 points. But other recent polls show Labor enjoying a 20-point lead.
Tory peer Lord Hayward says Lib Dems could be a bigger challenge in parts of the south
Lord Hayward said voters who backed the Conservatives in the 2019 general election but abandoned them because of Boris Johnson's Partygate fiasco and Liz Truss's disastrous prime minister have become a "nightmare" for pollsters as they many are undecided on how they will vote.
He said there was evidence that many of them "like Rishi" but are still not convinced the Conservative Party is getting its act together. "They left the party en masse, but they didn't necessarily go anywhere else," the couple explained. "They are not convinced by Keir Starmer."
Many former Labor pro-Brexit voters in the 'red wall' areas of the North and Midlands who backed the Conservatives in 2019 'still like Boris' and could turn to Reform UK or decide not to vote, Lord Hayward has admitted.
Boris Johnson's Partygate fiasco hurt the Conservative Party in the polls
Despite expectations of a Labor victory in the 2024 general election, Lord Hayward has suggested that a slow but steady Sunak-inspired renaissance could lead to a suspended parliament. "The balance of expectations is for a Labor victory in the next election, but it is not clear.
"Overconfidence is [how] I would describe the Labor mood, but I was with some Labor recently and they told me their mood was starting to change," Lord Hayward added. "They stopped measuring the curtains [at number 10]."
Lord Hayward said it was unclear whether the current moment preceded the 1992 general election, when the Conservatives unexpectedly clung to power, or 1997, when Labor won a landslide victory. "The clearest indication will come with the results of the local elections on May 4," he said.
He said Labour's vote share was regularly above 40% in local elections in 1994, 1995 and 1996, while in the last two local elections the party won just 30% and 35%.
The challenge for Sir Keir is to get "something like the numbers that Tony Blair was getting," Hayward said, but cautioned: "There are clear indications that the public has not taken Keir as they would have liked."
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Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak will face each other in the upcoming election, although no date has yet been set.
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