Projected National Share
British political term
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Projected National Share (PNS) is a statistic used in British politics. It refers to the translation of local election results to reflect national party support in a future general election.[1] PNS shows which party has won a local election.[2] The numbers give an impression of how the political parties are faring if the entire country cast a local ballot.[3] PNS can be calculated in different ways.[4]
History
BBC News has calculated PNS since 1982.[5] They use key wards which are reflective of the country as a whole in order to calculate party share.[6] Two academics at the University of Plymouth, Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, calculate National Equivalent share (NEV) using a different approach.[7][8]
Author and peer Mark Pack maintains a historical record named LocalBase of both sets of results.[7][9]