Tactical voting - where an individual
chooses to vote for a candidate that is not
their preferred candidate to top the
candidate they least prefer from winning
Protest voting - where voters
back a candidate/party other than
their normal choice in order to
send a message to their 'natural'
party or to the government
Often occurs in elections
where the outcome is less
crucial to the voter (e.g.
local elections)
Swing - a measurement of
the movement of votes from
one party to another, between
one election and the next.
Expressed as a %
2010 - 4.9%
swing from Labour
to Conservative
Differential swing - different
rates of swing in different
parts of the country
Churn - where large numbers of voters
switch their support between parties,
between elections, while the headlines
statistics remain the sasme