Local council · Sunderland
Houghton South & Hetton Downs
3 seats contested on Thursday 7 May 2026. 14 candidates from 5 parties.
Predicted vote share
What the model expects
Predictions are point estimates: the model's best guess, not a guarantee. The "How this prediction was made" section below lists every step that shaped this forecast.
How accurate was the model here?
Our 7 May 2026 forecast for Houghton South & Hetton Downs
✓ Winner called correctly
, predicted Reform UK,
actual Reform UK.
Major-party MAE: 4.37pp
across the parties below.
| Party | Predicted | Actual | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reform UK | 45.7% | 46.1% | -0.4pp |
| Labour | 21.5% | 32.0% | -10.5pp |
| Conservative | 9.1% | 6.6% | +2.5pp |
Positive gap = we predicted that party would win more share than they did. See the full Sunderland accuracy summary or the national audit.
Candidates 2026
Parties on the ballot
- Conservative and Unionist Party
- Green Party
- Labour Party
- Lib Dem
- Reform UK
How this prediction was made
- Fallback (no historic match) . No prior contest results in DC bundle for this ward (likely 2026 boundary change). Synthesised prediction from council-level GE2024 aggregate + national 2024→2026 swing + county-2025 anchor where available, restricted to the parties on the 2026 ballot. Marked low confidence.
- National-share calibration . Aggregate-predicted vs national-polled mismatch corrected at strength 0.65. Multipliers — Labour ×0.82, Conservative ×1.00, Reform UK ×1.15, Liberal Democrats ×0.96, Green Party ×1.12, SNP ×1.00, Plaid Cymru ×1.00.