The Tories' majority would be wiped out in a general election held tomorrow, a new poll shows, as Britain's looming cost of living crisis threatens to engulf Boris Johnson's government.
New MRP research, carried out by Survation for campaign group 38 Degrees, found 92 Conservative MPs would be voted out and Labour would be the largest party in a hung parliament, with an estimated 293 seats to the Tories’ 273.
The data, which brings together a new UK-wide poll and separate forecasting analysis, predicts that Prime Minister Boris Johnson would lose his Uxbridge seat to Keir Starmer's party by a nine point margin (50% to 41%).
The analysis also puts Labour ahead of the Conservatives among voters in the the 50 to 64 age bracket - which voted strongly in favour of Mr Johnson in 2019 - by two points (39% to 37%).
It comes just hours before Rishi Sunak's Spring Statement, as the Chancellor faces growing demands to intervene as households are braced for soaring inflation, shrinking wage packets and rising energy bills.
The research also underlined the scale of the cost of living crisis, with three out of four (74%) people saying their energy bills are higher and 55% saying they are paying more for transport than last year.
Four out of five (79%) said they were paying for more expensive groceries and 71% reported increased fuel costs.
The research also found deep unease among Red Wall voters in people aged 50 and older, with those living in the North East, North West and Wales reporting the worst impacts of the energy crisis.
Almost a quarter of people (20%) also said they had been hit by cuts to Universal Credit.
Ellie Gellard, Director of Strategy at 38 Degrees, called on the Treasury to act to help Brits struggling.
She said: “The country is crying out for help with this catastrophic cost of living crisis.
"People are struggling at home with crippling energy bills - and struggling to leave, with higher transport costs and the shocking price of fuel at the pumps.
"The message from Brits across the country couldn’t be clearer - we need help. And we need it now.
“If this picture of families struggling isn’t enough, Rishi Sunak can now see the political consequences of failing to act on Wednesday.”
It comes after Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis said he had "run out of tools" to help people and urged the government to step in.
He said on Sunday: “I’ve been Money Saving Expert since 2000. I’ve been through the financial crash, I’ve been through Covid which was mitigated by some of the measures the Chancellor put in place.
“This is the worst - where we are right now, this is the worst.
“When I’m reading messages from people saying money prioritisation used to be ‘do I go to the hairdressers, or do I go to the pub and have a takeaway’.
“Now it’s about prioritising ‘feeding my children over feeding myself’. That is simply not tenable in our society and there is absolute panic - and it has not started yet.”
Survation and Professor Chris Hanretty’s MRP analysis correctly predicted the outcome of the 2017 general election.
Prof Hanretty, of the University of London, said: "The cost of living crisis is a real headache for the Conservative party, because it's incredibly broad-based. We can think about a triple whammy.
"First, there are increases in fuel costs, which land more heavily with car-owners, who tend to be more affluent, and who are any way less likely to live in big cities, which lean Labour.
"Second, cuts in state support are more of a problem for working class voters who the Conservatives might want to appeal to on cultural issues.
"Third, the increases in energy costs are so big that they're a problem for just about everyone. You can't have a major increase in the cost of living for 80% of the population and not expect the governing party to pay some kind of price for that".
Survation and 38 Degrees conducted two separate polling research exercises. One was with 2,034 Brits and was based around Tory sleaze allegations and the cost of living crisis, with fieldwork carried out between March 4 and March 7
The second was the MRP (multilevel regression and post-stratification) analysis. Data on voting intention was input into the MRP model and used fieldwork conducted over three waves of polling, carried out between November 11, 2021, and March 7, 2022. The total sample size was 8,002.
