Tactical Voting

How do we make recommendations?

Our Objectives

The next UK Government will have the unprecedented opportunity, and unenviable responsibility, to rebuild UK-EU relations after over a decade of Eurosceptic Conservative misrule. 

This is why Best for Britain has a double ambition for this general election:

  1. Lock the Conservatives and other populists out of power for a generation
  2. Elect as many pro-European  elected representatives sitting on the next (likely) UK Government’s benches as well as the opposition benches.    

Our Methodology

We determine our tactical voting recommendations by considering the circumstances of each Parliamentary constituency individually. To help us make the decision, we consider a number of factors including:

  1. The latest and most accurate MRP polling for the seat, to give us an indication of how much support each party enjoys in the constituency. 
  2. Party-political targeting information, to establish how much resource each party is putting into the seat.
  3. Local factors, such as how well established each party is in the constituency. Here we include consideration of local election results, and the size of the local party.

In England and Wales

In seats that are being defended by a Conservative incumbent, or seats where the 2019 General Election notional winners are the Conservatives, we will make a tactical voting recommendation for the opposition party most likely to win the seat from the Conservatives, or prevent a Reform UK candidate winning the seat, taking into consideration:

  • Which opposition party is best placed to beat the Conservatives and/or prevent a Reform UK candidate winning the seat.
  • Which opposition party is targeting the seat.
  • Which party has the most local party resources to run an effective campaign.

In seats already held by an opposition party incumbent,, we will only make a tactical voting recommendation for the opposition party incumbent if the MRP polling suggests they are only leading by up to 15% on vote share.

If the MRP polling suggests the opposition party incumbent is leading by over 15% on vote share, we will not make any tactical voting recommendation unless there are significant local factors, unlikely to be identified by the MRP polling, which mean the opposition party incumbent could be at risk of losing their seat. 

In Scotland

In seats that are being defended by a Conservative incumbent, or seats where the 2019 General Election notional winners are the Conservatives, we will make a tactical voting recommendation for the party most likely to win the seat from the Conservatives, taking into consideration:

  • Which opposition party is best placed to beat the Conservatives and/or prevent a Reform UK candidate winning the seat.
  • Which opposition party is targeting the seat.
  • Which party has the most local party resources to run an effective campaign.

In seats that are being defended by an SNP incumbent, or where 2019 General Election notional winners are the SNP, and there is no possibility of the Conservatives winning the seat, we will make a tactical voting recommendation for Scottish Labour to ensure the Scotland’s views are represented on both the next (likely) UK Government’s benches, as well as the opposition benches.

In Northern Ireland

Due to the vastly different electoral landscape where the five most popular parties do not stand candidates in Britain, we are unable to provide constituency-level MRP analysis for the 18 seats in Northern Ireland.For this reason, we are not providing constituency-level tactical voting advice but recommend that voters across Northern Ireland DO NOT VOTE  for the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), or Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV). This is because both the DUP and TUV have expressed support for the current Government and their policies, and both have been endorsed by Reform UK.

FAQs

Q: What is a ‘2019 General Election notional winner’? / How are you using the 2019 General Election results?

A: Since the last election in 2019 the UK Parliamentary constituency boundaries for many UK seats have changed. This means that, in many cases, the 2019 General Election results cannot be directly read across to the Constituencies in which the 2024 General Election is being contested. 

Instead, we are using something called the ‘notional’ 2019 General Election results. These are estimates of how the new constituencies would have voted, had the 2019 General Election taken place had the 2024 General Election constituency boundaries been in force. The results were calculated by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher at the University of Plymouth.

Q: Why are you recommending the Greens in Waveney Valley?
A: The Greens are heavily targeting this seat but not Labour or the Liberal Democrats. The Greens have had significant success in recent local elections in the region. In order for Tactical Voting to work, Green voters need an incentive to participate, so while the polling does not currently show them to be the main opposition party challenger we are happy to recommend them in Waveney Valley given the lack of targeting by either Labour or the Lib Dems.