Back in January I predicted the outcome of the General Election, seat by seat. Since then, I have done more research and altered some of the predictions taking into account various issues including new updated constituency polls by Lord Ashcroft. Over the next ten days I will be revisiting each county and region giving my final predictions. I’d still welcome feedback, even at this late stage.

DYFED

Seats: 5
Current Political Makeup: Con 2, Lab 1, LibDem 1, PC 1
Predicted Political Makeup after May 7: Con 2, Lab 1, LibDem 1, PC 1
*Final Prediction: *Con 2, Lab 1, PC 2

1. Carmarthen East & Dinefwr

2010 Result:
Conservative: 8506 (22.4%)
Labour: 10065 (26.5%)
Lib Dem: 4609 (12.1%)
Plaid Cymru: 13546 (35.6%)
UKIP: 1285 (3.4%)
MAJORITY: 3481 (9.2%)

Sitting MP: Jonathan Edwards (PC)
Prediction: Plaid Cymru hold

A Labour win here is possible but unlikely.

2. Carmarthen West & South Pembrokeshire

2010 Result:
Conservative: 16649 (41.1%)
Labour: 13226 (32.7%)
Lib Dem: 4890 (12.1%)
Plaid Cymru: 4232 (10.4%)
UKIP: 1146 (2.8%)
Independent: 364 (0.9%)
MAJORITY: 3423 (8.5%)

Sitting MP: Simon Hart (Con)
Prediction: Narrow Conservative hold

A difficult one to call but I’m going for a narrow Tory hold based on the fact that the Labour vote has declined here at every election since 1997 and the Tory vote has gone in the opposite direction. The Ashcroft marginal seats poll shows the Conservatives outperforming the rest of Wales here too..

3. Ceredigion

2010 Result:
Conservative: 4421 (11.6%)
Labour: 2210 (5.8%)
Lib Dem: 19139 (50%)
Plaid Cymru: 10815 (28.3%)
Green: 696 (1.8%)
UKIP: 977 (2.6%)
MAJORITY: 8324 (21.8%)

Sittting MP: Mark Williams (LibDem)
Prediction: *LibDem hold
Revised Prediction: Plaid Cymru gain*

Plaid Cymru seem to be very confident they can take back this seat, which they unexpectedly lost in 2005. The LibDems will be badly affected by the loss of the student vote in Aberystwyth and Lampeter, but it’s difficult to work out how badly. I still think it’s a big call to predict anything other than a narrowish LibDem hold here, but I may well be proved wrong. UPDATE: I had a flood of correspondence suggesting I have got this wrong. Looking at some of the Welsh blogs and academic websites I’m tempted to agree. Plaid Cymru seem to be very confident they can take back this seat, which they unexpectedly lost in 2005. The LibDems will be badly affected by the loss of the student vote in Aberystwyth and Lampeter, but it’s difficult to work out how badly. I still think it’s a big call to predict anything other than a narrowish LibDem hold here, but I may well be proved wrong.

4. Llanelli

2010 Result:
Conservative: 5381 (14.4%)
Labour: 15916 (42.5%)
Lib Dem: 3902 (10.4%)
Plaid Cymru: 11215 (29.9%)
UKIP: 1047 (2.8%)
MAJORITY: 4701 (12.5%)

Sitting MP: Nia Griffith (Lab)
Prediction: Labour hold

Plaid are in a good second place here but there’s no reason to think they could take enough votes from the other parties to win here.

5. Preseli Pembrokeshire

2010 Result:
Conservative: 16944 (42.8%)
Labour: 12339 (31.2%)
Lib Dem: 5759 (14.5%)
Plaid Cymru: 3654 (9.2%)
UKIP: 906 (2.3%)
MAJORITY: 4605 (11.6%)

Sitting MP: Stephen Crabb (Con)
Prediction: Conservative hold

Crabb has built up a decent majority here and Labour will find him difficult to shift. However, they will hark back to 1992 when Nick Ainger overturned a majority of more than 5,000 to oust Tory minister Nicholas Bennett. But this will be Crabb’s fourth election and I suspect he will have built up quite a large personal vote. His cabinet status is also a boost.

If you’d like to see the rest of my seat by seat predictions, click HERE