Berkshire Conservatives face a potential wipeout in next month’s general election according to a new set of predictions.
The party currently holds six of the eight parliamentary seats in the royal county, although the revised boundaries mean there are now nine constituencies – one more than 2019.
In the latest election projection from polling company YouGov, the party is expected to hold just two of those seats, with Labour taking five and the Liberal Democrats two.
The projection would see Labour winning the contests for Reading Central, Reading West and Mid Berkshire, Earley and Woodley, Slough and Bracknell.
This means that James Sunderland, the incumbent Conservative MP for Bracknell would lose to Labour’s Peter Swallow, while Labour’s Matt Rodda would win the new Reading Central seat, 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 against Conservative Pauline Jorgensen.
Among the current MPs who have decided not to stand are Sir Alok Sharma and Sir John Redwood, the Conservative MPs for Reading West and Wokingham respectively. Polling suggests that if they had stood they would have lost their seats.
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.
Sir John announced he would not contest the seat two days after the election was called. His successor, Lucy Demery, is projected to lose against cllr Clive Jones (Liberal Democrats, Hawkedon) who has been the Lib Dem candidate since February 2022.
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 is to the east of the country where Conservatives are expected to win.
Former Prime Minister Theresa May has stepped down as Conservative MP for Maidenhead, passing the torch to candidate Dr Tania Mathias, who is projected beat Liberal Democrat Joshua Reynolds.
And in Windsor, incumbent Adam Afriyie said he would not run again in July 2022, with Conservative candidate Jack Rankin selected last September.
The YouGov projection sees Mr Rankin beat Labour’s Pavitar Kaur Mann.
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. It is not a ‘prediction’ of the July 4 election, according to the firm, but an estimate of the results if an election was held on the day the poll was released.
Nationally, the result would be as follows:
Labour – 422
Conservatives – 140
Liberal Democrats – 48
SNP – 17
Green – 2
Plaid Cymru – 2
Reform – 0
