Survation have put out a new poll, the topline voting intention figures are CON 24%(-5), LAB 35%(-1), LD 11%(-1), UKIP 22%(+6). The 22% for UKIP is the first poll to show them breaking the twenty percent mark.

In many ways the high UKIP score here shouldn’t come as a surprise, for methodological reasons Survation tend to show the highest levels of UKIP support so if ICM have them at 18% and ComRes at 19% I would have expected Survation to have them in the low twenties. Striking it may be, but the increase in UKIP support is actually in line with what weve seen elsewhere, just using a method that is kinder to UKIP.

More interesting is the drop in Tory support, down five points on Survation’s poll in April. The poll was conducted on Friday and Saturday so at least partially after the “swivel eyed loon” story broke (it came out in Saturday’s papers, so broke about 10pm on Friday night). All the usual caveats I apply to any poll showing sharp or unusual results apply. Sure, it might indicate a shift in support, but just as likely its a blip – wait to see if it is reflected in any other polling. As Twyman’s Law of market research says “anything surprising or interesting is probably wrong”.

Two further comments, I’ve written before about people making the error of looking at the changes in a poll over a month and assuming that events in the last few days are the cause. Survation’s last poll was at the end of April before the local elections, so changes are just as likely to be down to the local elections and the Conservative infighting over Europe as anything more recent.

Secondly there is a tendency for the media and the denizens of Twitter to get all excited about unusual polls that give newsworthy stories when this is, of course, the exact opposite of what you should do if you actually want to understand public opinion. The correct approach is to look at the broad underlying trend and ignore the odd looking polls, the media normally do the opposite. The trend is that UKIP support has jumped substantially following their local election success, and that the Labour lead has been narrowing. The Conservative figure here may yet suggest a new direction, but let’s wait and see.

The first poll conducted after Cameron’s Europe speech, YouGov’s on Friday, didn’t appear to show any impact on voting intention. However, this weekend we have a further four polls conducted after the speech (the Opinium one was mostly done prior to the speech). Here they are:

Angus Reid/Sunday Express have the Conservatives on 30% (up three) and Labour on 39% (down three) – the online version of the article doesn’t mention the UKIP or Lib Dem scores. The poll was conducted on Thursday and Friday.

ComRes/IoS/Sunday Mirror has the Conservatives up 5 on 33%, Labour unchanged on 39%, UKIP down 4 points on 10%. As I wrote yesterday, some of this appears to be due to ComRes treating likelihood to vote differently in their December poll, but even with consistent treatment of likelihood to vote the poll would have shown the Conservatives up 4 or 5 points, though it would probably also have shown Labour down slightly.

Survation/Mail on Sunday has the Conservatives on 31%, up two, Labour unchanged on 38% and UKIP down two on 14%.

YouGov in the Sunday Times has topline figures of CON 35%, LAB 41%, LDEM 12%, UKIP 7%. Compared to the average of YouGov’s polls last week that equates to the Conservatives being up by about two, Labour down by about two and UKIP down by about one.

In each individual poll the changes are relatively small, but they are consistent across the pollsters, so we can be fairly confident that the Conservatives have enjoyed a small boost from the referendum promise and the positive publicity around it. UKIP appear to have dropped slightly, but not massively (the biggest drop they had, that in the ComRes poll, was mostly due to methodological variation). The shift is hardly a game changing degree though.

Looking at the other questions, there is some stark variation in how people say they’d vote in an EU referendum. YouGov’s figures are very similar to what they were showing early in the week – in a straight referendum question 37% say they would vote to stay, 39% say they would vote to leave. If David Cameron were to renegotiate and recommend a yes vote then 50% of people say they would vote to stay, compared to 25% who would vote to leave – the contrast is almost entirely down to Conservative voters, who would currently vote to leave, but would vote to stay on renegotiated terms.

Angus Reid asked how people would vote if Cameron did manage to repatriate some powers, 34% said they would vote to stay in, 34% said they would vote to leave.

Survation found 50% saying Britain should leave the EU, 36% that they should stay. If Cameron wins back some powers, 43% of those saying Britain should leave say they would consider voting to stay.

We are a year and a half away from the European elections, but the recent rise in UKIP support in Westminster polls has brought some attention to them, meaning we are already seeing voting intention polls for the European elections. ComRes have an online European elections poll in the People tomorrow, and Survation had one in the Mail on Sunday last weekend. Whether they mean anything at this stage is a different question, but here they are for the record.

ComRes/People – CON 22%, LAB 35%, LDEM 8%, UKIP 23%, GRN 5%, Others 8%
Survation/MoS – CON 24%, LAB 31%, LDEM 11%, UKIP 22%, GRN 6%, Others 6%

Both show Labour topping the poll – what we’d expect given their strong lead in the Westminster polls and the mid-term nature of the elections. What will get more attention is that both polls also show the Conservatives and UKIP closely placed for second place – Survation had the Conservatives narrowly ahead, ComRes UKIP narrowly ahead.

The other questions in the ComRes poll seem to show a slight movement towards support for the European Union since ComRes last asked them in October 2011. The percentage of people agreeing that EU membership was a costly mistake fell from 54% to 48%, people disagreed with the statement that they’d vote in favour of withdrawal by 42%-33%, when in October 2011 it had been evenly balanced at 37%-37%. I’ll write more about this tomorrow…

This weekend we are also due the weekly YouGov/Sunday Times poll and, assuming they are sticking to their current timetable, the fortnightly Opinium/Observer poll.

UPDATE: Opinium’s fortnightly poll for the Observer has topline figures of CON 31%(+2), LAB 41%(+2), LDEM 7%(-1), UKIP 12%(-3) – Observer write up here.