Opinion poll suggests massive loss of votes for government in a snap Spanish election

A SURVEY undertaken by the company SocioMétrica for a Spanish newspaper suggests that there would be a three way tie in the event of a general election today.

It forecasts that the biggest loser would be the ruling Partido Popular (PP) which would drop from 137 seats in Congress to 97 seats whilst its minority partner Ciudadanos would gain an extra 54 seats taking it from 32 to 86.

According to the poll published in El Español, the socialist PSOE would be likely to gain just four additional seats and the further left Podemos (with its associates) would be the second largest loser, dropping from 71 seats to 49.

Effectively, this would leave three parties all with similar percentages of the vote but if correct would mean that the coalition between the PP and Ciudadanos would be stronger in parliament than it is now but with Albert Rivera, leader of Ciudadanos in a much more commanding position than he is currently.

It is considered that the handling of the Catalan crisis by the current government has helped to turn voters toward Ciudadanos but as is always the case, opinion polls can be wildly inaccurate in the event of an election which is not actually due until 2020.