As pollster Peter Kelner notes in his Substack the Makerfield By-Election produced some remarkable stats
Turnout almost always falls in by-elections. Makerfield’s figures are remarkable: a rise of 6.2 points to 58.7 per cent. Not since the Liberals won Torrington in 1958 has turnout risen by more than that.
The high turnout also helped Burnham do something that no candidate defending a Labour seat when the party is in power has done for sixty years. He has not only seen Labour’s percentage rise, he has achieved an increase in the actual number of Labour voters, from just over 18,000 to almost 25,000. The last candidate to do that was Kevin McNamara in Hull North in 1966.
This can of course be put down to the impact of Andy Burnham. It also however underlines that whatever else the voters of Makerfield thought they really did not want Reform to win.
Kellner notes btw that raw polling reflected the 55-35 outcome. It was an attempt to weight it that caused error. One wonder why no political reporter picked that up before the day..
Kmflett's Blog 
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