Sky News have reported on some “internal UKIP polling”, which the say reveals UKIP’s top dozen target seats. Ladbrokes have odds on every seat in Britain and, based on those, we can allocate a probability of UKIP winning each of these twelve seats.
| Seat | Win 2010 | Maj% | UKIP Odds | UKIP Win % |
| Thanet South | Conservative | 16.6 | 11/10 | 43.09% |
| Great Yarmouth | Conservative | 9.9 | 15/8 | 32.01% |
| Thurrock | Conservative | 0.2 | 2/1 | 30.34% |
| Boston & Skegness | Conservative | 28.8 | 5/2 | 25.76% |
| Thanet North | Conservative | 31.2 | 4/1 | 17.63% |
| Great Grimsby | Labour | 2.2 | 4/1 | 18.01% |
| Portsmouth South | Lib-Dem | 12.6 | 4/1 | 18.00% |
| Eastleigh | Lib-Dem | 7.2 | 5/1 | 15.03% |
| Sittingbourne & Sheppey | Conservative | 25.5 | 8/1 | 9.91% |
| Forest of Dean | Conservative | 22.7 | 12/1 | 7.02% |
| Worthing East & Shoreham | Conservative | 22.9 | 12/1 | 7.08% |
| Aylesbury | Conservative | 23.7 | 16/1 | 5.45% |
The top three in the list are especially promising as there is every chance they could be three-way contests and something around 35% of the vote could win any of those.
If UKIP high command had just looked at Ladbrokes’ odds, then the bottom four on the list wouldn’t have made the cut. All look like ultra safe Tory seats and it will take a huge effort to win any of these. Aylesbury has a majority of over twelve thousand, but I guess the party are hoping to exploit the HS2 issue here.
Party workers in Castle Point, Folkestone and Rotherham will be a bit disappointed not to have been included, as the betting would suggest that they are all much better prospects than the likes of Forest of Dean.
We’ve got some betting on how many seats UKIP will win in total next year; it’s 5/1 that they manage ten or above.
