It was a calamitous defeat for Labour, and few saw it coming. Throughout the election campaign, the opinion polls stubbornly refused to move, suggesting the Conservatives and Labour were in a dead heat. On the day of the vote, 7 May, the polls even suggested a shift towards Labour. The consensus among political commentators and pundits was that Labour leader Ed Miliband was headed for 10 Downing Street: as the prime minister not of a majority government, but of a minority Labour administration propped up by the pro-independence Scottish National Party (SNP).
Opinion polls had been spectacularly wrong before — infamously predicting a Labour victory in 1992 (the Tories won) — and their methodology had since been radically overhauled. And then, at 10pm, as voting ceased, the exit polls declared a result that few had predicted — a decisive lead for the Tories. For Labour supporters, disbelief collided with horror, an unpleasant mix that has barely subsided since. Yet, as election night wore on, they found themselves wishing the exit polls had been accurate: because, contrary to the projection, the Conservatives ended with their first parliamentary majority for 23 years, albeit by the slender margin of 12 seats.
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