Electoral Calculus is a political consultancy and pollster, known for its
political forecasting website that attempts to predict future
United Kingdom general election results. It uses MRP (Multi-level Regression and Post-stratification) to combine national factors and local demographics.
Main features
Electoral Calculus was founded and is run by Martin Baxter,
who was a financial analyst specialising in
mathematical modelling.
The Electoral Calculus website includes election data, predictions and analysis. It has separate sections for
elections in Scotland and
in Northern Ireland.
Methodology
The election predictions are based around the employment of scientific techniques on data about the United Kingdom's electoral geography.
Up to 2017, it used a modified
,
and it took account of national polls and trends but excluded local issues.
Since 2019, they have used MRP (Multi-Level Regression and Post-Stratification) methods to make their election predictions. Their model uses demographic, past voting behaviour and geographic data to estimate predicted vote shares on a seat-by-seat basis. The models are explained in detail on the web site.
Predictions
Across the 12 general elections from 1992 to 2024, the site correctly predicted the party to win the most seats in all but one (1992). They also correctly predicted the outcome, that is, the party winning a majority or a hung parliament, in six elections (majorities in 1997, 2001, 2005, 2015, 2017 (by a majority of only 3), 2019, 2024; hung parliament for 2010).
Reception
In 2004, the site was listed by ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'' as one of the "100 most useful websites", being "the best" for predictions.
With reference to the
2010 United Kingdom general election
The 2010 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 6 May 2010, to elect 650 Members of Parliament (or MPs) to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons. The first to be held after the minimum age for candidates was ...
, it was cited by journalists
Andrew Rawnsley and
Michael White of ''The Guardian''.
John Rentoul of ''
The Independent
''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...
'' referred to the site after the election.
References
{{Reflist
External links
Electoral Calculus
British political websites
Elections in the United Kingdom
Electoral geography
Opinion polling in the United Kingdom
Psephology
Mathematical modeling