YouGov Lib Dem leadership poll: half of those yet to vote are undecided

Here’s what YouGov’s polling of party members makes of the Liberal Democrat leadership contest between Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne:

Clegg: 43%
Huhne: 33%
Undecided: 24%
Voted so far: 52%

Margin of error: +/- 3.8%

Notes:

1. The 56-44 lead for Clegg already reported is based on excluding the don’t knows. This is the usual method for calculating headline figures, though with such a high level of undecideds in this case the raw figures should also be looked at to understand the overall picture, especially as…
2. Assuming that no-one who has voted is undecided, 50% of those who have not voted yet are undecided.
3. The margin of error does not take into account any systematic sampling errors, e.g. YouGov’s Liberal Democrat members sample may (or may not) over-represent activists and therefore might not be representative of the party membership overall. And then again it might be.
4. There was only one published YouGov poll in the last leadership election. It took place before Chris Huhne’s entry into the race and also took place a significant period of time before votes were cast. It therefore doesn’t provide a useful guide to how accurate or not YouGov might be this time. They have a good track-record with Conservative internal elections, but not with Labour.