The boost continues – Labour lead up to 7 points
An ICM poll for the Sunday Telegraph has voting intentions (with changes from the last ICM poll) of CON 33% (-2), LAB 40% (+3), LDEM 19% (+2). Far from the slight drop in the most recent ICM poll representing the end of Gordon Brown’s bounce, it has clearly continued to gather strength in the last week. The 7 point lead for Labour is the largest in an ICM poll since September 2005 and would presumably result in an increased majority if repeated at a general election. On the subject of which, the newspaper coverage of the polls is predictably in the context of whether a snap autumn election is now on the cards – I suspect this is rather too soon: we now have a better idea about the first question we should be asking ourselves about the Brown bounce – how high it will go (to a seven point Labour lead – at least), but still have no clue as to how long it will last, and where it will settle once it is over.
The poll also asked about the possible Conservative policy of recognising marriage in the tax system. There was strong agreement that it was better for parents to be married (70% agreed) and 57% thought it was right for ministers to encourage marriage. However people were far more divided on whether this should be through tax incentives – 49% agreed, 44% were opposed.
A second ICM poll for the News of World (I say second poll, they were actually the same poll with both the Sunday Telegraph and News of the World both having some questions) has the rather suspicious figures of CON 28%, LAB 35%, LDEM 13%. Unless the “others” have jumped to 24% this is not a straight voting intention poll. It appears to have been a “which party do you feel warmest towards”. If these are the straight results from the poll they don’t tell us much, we know that party identification is about these levels – if not and, as implied by a comment from Ian Kirby on Iain Dale’s site, the News of the World have tried to do something clever and approximate a voting intention result by buggering about with recalled vote, why bother with faked voting intention when you’ve got proper figures from the same poll – ignore.
UPDATE: The News of the World data has been published on ICM’s site, with an admonition that “This poll has been reported in some places as containing standard ICM vote intentions. This is not the case, and ICM method vote intentions (state of the parties) should not, and cannot be inferred from this poll.” The actual question asked was “Now that Gordon Brown has taken over, and faces David Cameron for the Conservatives and Ming Campbell for the Liberal Democrats, do you feel that you are becoming warmer to the idea of supporting…..” and the high number of people not saying they felt warmer towards any of the parties was because 11% of people said their feelings weren’t moving.
The actual breaks in the question contain some interesting trends – of people who voted Conservative in 2005, 4% now feel warmer towards Labour and 3% feel warmer towards the Lib Dems. Of people who voted Labour in 2005, 11% now feel warmer towards the Tories, with 6% feeling warmer towards the Lib Dems. Of people who voted Lib Dem in 2005, 19% feel warmer towards the Tories, 23% feel warmer towards Labour. Intersting in itself, but obviously not a proxy for voting intention.
I said a couple of weeks ago that one of the really important considerations about the Brown handover will be whether or not it addresses the public desire for a change. ICM found that 38% of people thought that “Labour under Gordon Brown feels like a new government with a new direction”, but 55% thought “Labour under Gordon Brown feels like a change of faces, and that is about it”. A better finding for Brown was that 50% of people now expect the government to perform better under his leadership than Tony Blair’s, with only 27% disagreeing.
Filed under: ICM, Voting Intention
I think you mean +2 for the Lib Dems?
I guess the NofW warm feeling figures more relate to the Party Identifier figures that Yougov use in their poll weightings and from memory are pretty similar to what you said at one time YOougov use .
This poll would give a Labour majority of 114 according to ElectoralCalculus.
It would be weird if Labour does very badly in the forthcoming by-elections with this poll as the latest one to be published.
I can’t see the Tory vote dropping to 33%, but if it has and more polls point the same way then Cameron is in trouble. A few contributors to this blog have previously said Brown is a cautious man and won’t call an early election. Brown is an intelligent rather than simply cautious and if the polls keep going in this direction an Autumn G.E would be exactly the right move.An election soon with the Tories having no debated policies would cause them chaos and if I were Labour leader I would take advantage immediately! I bet Brown will too! Brown will be being advised to wait until May 08 after tax reductions come into force, but I take the view that it’s better to call when you are well ahead rather than chance unforseen problems raising their heads!
I would be surprised if a G.E result would be 40 – 33 – 19, if it were however it would give Labour a majority of near to 120.
What an interesting political fallout there would be if a G.E result gave the Tories a similar number of seats to last time, with Cameron gone Davies would be the new leader, the man who should have won it last time and he would reunite the Tories but would the electorate vote for them??
If the Libs, Labour, Greens could see sense and collaborate, then as another contributor wrote recently, the Tories would be consigned to oblivion because there are usually always 60%+ of the elctorate that do not vote Tory but of course politics gets very narrow minded sometimes and the long term goal is often overrun by short term ideas much like those of the SDP in the 80’s!
Richard-
Labour hates the Lib Dems, the ordinary voter may float between them, but Labour party members and MPs think the LDs are pure dirt. There would never be any collaboration. As for the Greens, i don’t understand why people talk about them at all- so what if they collaborated?? They have no seats, less than 1% of the vote and are well behind UKIP.
There is attraction for Brown in an early election , but would he not require a defined policy on Iraq before taking the plunge ?
[...] key figure, here, is not the small fall in the Tory vote – all margin of error stuff – but the rise in the Labour [...]
Not a good poll (from my point of view). Labour’s 40 per cent must be the highest for ICM since summer 2005. I’d urge David Cameron and Boy George to go harder on tax cuts.
But need to see more. I tend to agree with Harry Scott-Parker (I wish he would contribute to more seat threads). A lot of Labour MPs hate the Lib Dems. I also agree with Jack Straw “the scavengers of British politics”. Indeed.
Harry,
Yes it’s a shame that people cannot see their way to common ground, but I’m sure you are right. Absolutely re Greens, I just mentioned them for the sake of meaning ‘other’ parties.
Not all Lab members think that way about the Libs though and I know a few Libs who are not totally anti Labour so there maybe hope!
David Cameron should be pointing at this situation and using it as a means to drive change in his party, and quickly, if he wants to avoid another heavy electoral defeat.
I would guess that he needs to make some serious gains eg minimum 40-50 seats to stay leader but at the moment that looks unlikely.
As a regular reader of this site but, up to now, a non-contributor I remember seeing one or two comments that haven’t been very flattering about the Electoral Calculus site. Having read most of the detailed explanations about the methodology on the Electoral Calculus site I think it’s very useful although the rolling opinion poll averages aren’t updated frequently enough! Taking this latest ICM poll and inserting a 5% tactical swing from the Tories to the Libs and a 5% tactical swing from Lab to the Libs (recognising a personal vote benefit for the Libs in seats they already hold) reduces the Tories by another 7 seats to below 200 and gives the Libs an increase of 11 seats to 49 which doesn’t seem unreasonable–the Lab majority declines from 114 to 106. If these sort of poll results continue after politics gets going again in September then Brown is going to be sorely tempted to go to the country under the banner of a ‘new’ mandate for a ‘new’ government, hope for a really successful Olympics in 2012 win another election on the back of a bit of national euphoria and then hand over to ‘a Milliband’ a couple of years later. What happens to the Tories in the meantime if this all came about would be very interesting and very unpredictable!
Was at a Green Party fete yesterday. Not much talk of politics but someone did say how much their house had sold for.Brown’s trick is that he’s positioning himself as President above the dirty tricks of mere politicians.He has also moved in a lot of younger people to cabinet who havent as yet made any mistakes.Can’t help feeling Brown has got a problem in building more houses and at the same time keeping house prices up to protect people’s wealth.
I can’t see Labour increasing its overall majority after having seen it fall twice – it would defy all historical precedents.
I am yet to be convinced this is anything more than a “Brown bounce” and am quite confident that this is more or less its peak.
“If the Libs, Labour, Greens could see sense and collaborate, then as another contributor wrote recently, the Tories would be consigned to oblivion because there are usually always 60%+ of the elctorate that do not vote Tory but of course politics gets very narrow minded sometimes and the long term goal is often overrun by short term ideas much like those of the SDP in the 80’s!”
Richard the main problem with your scenario is that many Lib Dem voters hate Labour, at the recent local elections many Lib Dem voters went over to the Tories (or most likely back to them), I used to be a Lib Dem Councillor and we got into bed with Labour locally to run the council and boy did we suffer at the election, we went from 19 to 9 councillors, whilst Labour remained static.
Don’t be surprised if in the next few years, the Lib Dems implode becuase they are in effect two parties, SDP and Liberal, with the former closer to socialist Labour values and the latter closer to old one nation Tory values, I have seen many battles in my (ex)local party becuase of this.
Gordon bright is a very skilled political operator- and an avid student of political history. He will no doubt recall Harold Wilson’s huge mistake in 1970 when on the back of a few favourable opinion polls he foolishly went to the country and received quite a drubbing from Ted Heath. I feel sure he will focus on keeping his government ahead and different from his predecessor’s for some time yet. I do not see a General Election until Autumn 2008 at the earliest. Meanwhile David Cameron is helping the new PM to boost his lead by his lack of resolution and suspect leadership at a time when a party aspiring to government needs to be totally united with firm credible policies that the majority of the electorate see as fair and practicable. The grammar schools fiasco and the tax breaks exclusive to maaried couples are both examples of severe misjudgements. Lord Black’s recent court case drama reminds the public of the old Conservative Party as it was perceived in the unfortunate Major years
I think that the Labour Party will peak at this point and will begin to fall over the next few months. I cannot see an increased Labour majority as a possibility. The Conservatives WILL pick up more ground after a good result in Ealing Southall on Friday.
John, re your comments: I understand the Conservatives will be ready to produce a draft manifesto in November, once the findings of their policy groups have been debated. It will be interesting to see what effect that will have on the polls once there is some flesh on the bones.
WMA 35:37:18 so it seems to be straight switch from C to Lab – possibly driven by Brown sounding tough and Prime-Ministerial on security issues. It’ll be very interesting to see what happens when his interventionist tendencies and management style are put to the test.
Re: Ian
I accept your point fully. There are however a lot of Labour voters who, over the years have been quite happy to vote Lib in order to oust the Tories, Cheadle in Cheshire is a prime example. It is a pity that there is such ill feeling towards Labour in some Lib ranks – but hey, each to their own! Your point about the Libs and ex SDP members is absolutely right and it would be a shame for the Libs if these divisions were to ultimately cause real problems for them.
Re: David Bowtell
It’s nice to see a new contributor with intellect. I think your suggested scenario is very reasonable indeed. I am sure that Milliband will take over from Brown and at the right time too. Labour knew that in Milliband they have another Cameron and the timing just isn’t right!
What the Tories got wrong was to kick David Davies in the teeth at the last minute and bring in Cameron and Osborne. What they should have done was elect Davies who would have held the party together and increased their number of seats at the next G.E and THEN Cameron should have taken over and would have been their best bet for the election after next. I’m not so sure I would have had Osborne as Shadow Chancellor either – big mistake. i think the Tories have a big problem on their hands because if Cameron does not win the next G.E there are going to be some serious repercussions within the Tory ranks and with the greatest of respect to those of Tory persuasion, I just don’t think Cameron will do it – the timing is all wrong! All in my opinion of course!
If the polls are really showing that Labour is in the lead, then I would like to remind everyone that the Labour Party has already taken many of our liberties away and Gordon Brown will remove many more. We used to have a society based on innocent until proven guilty now we are guilty until we prove our innocence. Labour under Blair wanted to ‘do away’ with juries meaning that an accused person would be ‘judged’ by a judge- I feel sure that G. Brown will himself bring this in. G.Brown said that the public would have more say, yet he is denying a referendom on the constitution. Most of the Magna Carta has disappeared under Blair with all the new laws he passed. It appears that G.Brown approved of these. He is also a control freak. An ID card such as Labour proposes crimilises us all – in the past only criminals have had to give fingerprints ,DNA etc, although I can see a reason for bringing in ID cards for those wishing to enter Britain. G.Brown took so much money in taxes out of the pension funds that they have not recovered and many are near collapse. He is also ‘full of spin’ He will bring in a lot more taxes with the excuse they are green taxes but that money will be lost and not used to improve electric cars or to work on green fuels. He has taxed us more than eny other chancellor and yet services have diminished- NHS is in crisis and is fast disappearing, police have more and more powers and yet do not tackle crime only easy targets. They do not want to know about burglery, card cloning etc. Open door to immigrants etc without any thought given to water supplies. housing ,health. I cannot make up my mind whether we are and have been living under a fascist regime or a stallanist regime. I despair at the direction that Britain is now heading in. England needs her own Parliament too!
Cameron may be kicked out before the next election if the polls carry on in this direction; even Ming may go (less likely I feel). So the exciting thing will be the election after next when we will defiantly have new Tory and LibDem leaders. The depressing thing is that neither of these parties have anyone who even comes close to Brown. I feel that this latest poll will be very close to the final result of the next election.
I disagree with just about everything Gary has just written, I’m afraid. At least wait until the autumn – everything that bounces comes to the ground.
Pretty obvious comment from me:
Gordon Brown’s Labour party need only do as well as Tony Blair to win a working. Doing ‘only just as well/badly’ and still win – not a huge mountain to climb in an election campaign.
My feeling is that we are now beginning to return to “normal” politics after the Blair years. No more huge Labour leads, and substantially more volatility in the polls.
Nevertheless I still feel that, in this more normal scenario, the party of opposition needs to we well ahead at this stage of a the parliament to have any hope of keeping their lead as the election approaches. The governing party will undoubtedly tend to recover somewhat in the run-up to the election.
Even before the so-called “Brown boost”. Caneron’s Tories were only a handful of points in front; if Labour manages to hold on to any of its recent jump in the polls then Cameron is in trouble. Labour would have to drop about 7-8 points and the Tories gain a similar amount for him to be able to form a majority Government – in other words a swing of 15-16% from that most recently-published poll. Not impossible, but unlikely I think
As I see it, Cameron made a big mistake by gunning for Gordon Brown before he took over as PM; by coming out too early with the ’stalinist control-freak’ label, he allowed Brown to immediately counter that accusation in his first few days as PM – effectively wrong-footing the Tories.
I think he’s going to make another mistake by being panicked into producing detailed policies.
As we’ve seen already, he’s got to come up with things that don’t sound so ‘Old Tory’ that they scare the swing-voters, that aren’t so ‘New Labour’ that Brown can cherry-pick the good bits, and that aren’t so ‘Lib Dem’ that they alienate his core support.
He’d be better off skipping the detail and concentrating on the ‘time-for-a-change’ message.
Well, it seems obvious that the “Cameron Bounce” is over.
I wonder if Brown is doing a Jim Callaghan by not calling a general election now and delaying it, as in 1978-9?
It is interesting that most people are in favour of David Cameron’s policy on married couples – especially with the Conservative draft manifesto due to be published in the autumn. I think there are still exciting times ahead, and that there is all to play for.
Andy D, “It is interesting that most people are in favour of David Cameron’s policy on married couples”. I think you are wrong to say it is a policy, so far I don’t think Cameron has agreed to any of the “Policy Reviews”.
“If the Libs, Labour, Greens could see sense and collaborate”
Why would Greens want to back up two parties who talk a lot and deliver a lot less on our core issues?
Sian Berry has made it clear we would like to stand in every seat at the next General Election, and I’m confident we will stand in over 300 England and Wales seats.
While we haven’t had the financial resources to compete everywhere in the past, the fact that a core of votes will go to the Green candidate, no matter how marginal the constituency, means that the increased number of seats contested by us will have an effect similar to UKIP in 2005.
If seats like Crawley and Medway had Green candidates, this would have hurt Labour more than the Conservatives in 2005. Our own analysis shows the relationship is more complicated now, with localised variations, but we know that even in marginal seats, we still get a loyal core vote, who would otherwise vote tactically for who they see as the “least worst option”.
In Guildford in 2005, local Lib Dems actually contacted us because they said our votes had cost them the seat. If there was no Green candidate in Bromley and Chislehurst byelection, the tantalising question I’m often asked is whether the bulk of those votes would have gone to the Lib Dems?
While we might not be capable of challenging to win a FPTP seat outside of Norwich South and Brighton Pavilion, our presence will certainly be felt in the event of an early election.
We are in our best financial shape since late 1989 as our 2006 accounts will show. I’d like a Green contest every seat, but if we can’t manage candidates everywhere, it is an absolute no-brainer to say that it would be in our interests to see a hung parliament with electoral reform on the agenda.
We have a pretty clear idea of where might be a good or bad place to stand to achieve this. So while Harry is right to point to the lack of a Green electoral impact in 2005, that won’t be the case next time.
Re: Gary G
I think you are on the right tracks Gary an your last couple of postings.
On other matters, I think the Tories are quite wrong in their Policy Review of possibly rewarding married people to stay at home looking after their children – The Tories still do not get it, a policy that rewards people for not working is catastrophic for the economy – lost tax revenue, lost spending power – it’s recession politics like Thatcher’s ‘price worth paying’ for pushing millions on the dole and ever more on disability benefit. What they should be doing is encouraging people to work, not to sit at home! If this is typical of Camerons Policy Review findings then it’s disasterous – it can’t be funded and half the Tory party would be totally against it anyway!
What another clanger if the Tories select Boris to run as London Mayor! Are there really no brains left in the Tory ranks? I find it incredible that after having the likes of Heseltine, Clarke, Hurd, Howe, Portillo etc., who were articulate and had brains, even if they didn’t put them to use for the good of the many, that the Tories are left with the likes of Cameron, Osborne and Boris for Mayor! With respect, in my opinion, they are all lightweights with no substance when compared to the ‘real’ Tories! The only one of any intellectual ability now is the one they shunned – David Davies.
Friendly reminder to all about the comments policy – remember the site isn’t here for everyone to say what policies are good or bad, or which parties or politicians they like – nothing wrong with that, but there are a million other places to do that and once everyone starts partisan discussion it drives out neutral discussion. Coments here are for non-partisan discussion, we don’t care if policies are good or bad, only what effect they’ll have on polls and election results!
If David Cameron announced the new Tory policy on the slaughter of the first born tomorrow, the comments here should only be to wonder whether the polling evidence suggests it would go down badly with voters with children
I can’t see brown doing anything until he has announced some kind of pull out from iraq, even if it is only partcial and those leaving go straight to Afghanistan.
In addition surely no one in Labour in there right mind would be planning an election in the autumn without knowing whether cash for perrages is going to end up in the courts.
Imagine the headlines,
” Today Labour cancelled it’s morning election press conference as the PM Gordon Brown was appearing in court as a character witness for Tony Blair” ( or maybe the prosecution)
Peter.
Anthony Wells, one policy we can all agree on, not the slaughter of the first born but the effect policies have on polls and election results
Don’t the politicians have an effect on polls too? I mean we just swapped Prime Ministers and look what happened to the polls, yet the policies only seem slightly different.
And if Richard Nicholson’s comments about Boris Johnson are proved correct, then that will hardly help the overall impression of the Conservatives. I look forward to polls asking whether he was a wise choice or not.
When is the next poll due? Does anyone know?
The best indication of how the public, at least in the North and in London, is thinking will surely be the results from the by-elections on Thursday. With regard to Boris as Mayor of London, his candidature will certainly add to the gaiety of the nation, but would we really want him handling a budget of billions and being our front man on behalf of our great caplital city? No doubt we shall soon have an opinion poll in the capital to guide us as to how Londoners feel about a putative Mayor Boris. Anthony – thank you for your well-timed and diplomatically- worded reminder about the content of contributions. After all, this site bears the title ‘UK Polling Report’.
John – I’d be surprised if someone didn’t commission a Boris poll pretty soon (in fact I’d be surprised if someone hadn’t already done it!), though keep on eye on the source of it though. The Evening Standard has been carries polls from all sorts of cheap and cheerful outfits in recent months, so…let’s hope for a London poll from one of the main pollsters.
There are some people who think by-elections are wonderful guides to public feeling, some who think they demonstrate pretty much nothing. I’m in the latter camp (though they do have a big effect, they are important as a cause, rather than a symptom!), by-elections don’t normally have effect on who runs the country, so are too twisted by local factors and personalities to mean much. Equally in the last decade or so they’ve said an awful lot about Lib Dem by-election campaigning brilliance, which has probably obscured any other message!
Sedgefield is solidly Labour and doesn’t mean much at all – like most by-elections in safe seats the incumbents share will fall because of fringe candidates, protest votes and low turnout. It won’t mean that Labour are doing badly. If the Conservatives do well in Southall it won’t necessarily mean anything more than Sunrise radio or defecting Labour councillors carry a lot of weight. If the Lib Dems do well it’ll tell us they, and Lord Rennard in particular, are rather wonderful at fighting and winning by-elections, which we know.
Everyone will claim they’ve done well, everyone will claim it shows something wonderful about their party. It means nowt really. That isn’t to say that it won’t have a big effect on politics, it could well end (or sustain) the Brown bounce, or save (or doom) Ming Campbell, or put David Cameron back on track after a dodgy month (or put more pressure on him). What’s important is it’s potential effect, not what it tells us.
Gary – there should be a MORI, Communicate Research and a YouGov for the Sunday Times all relatively soonish.
Personally I don’t think at present that the By-Elections will affect the general political opinions of people at all. These two polls will be seen in isolation to the general political situation at present. Of course all three main parties will be claiming to have done well as Anthony says, but I do not believe there will be any effect on the general consensus of opinion at present.
My earlier comments re Boris for Mayor were just intended to highlight my opinion of how such a selection could damage the Tory vote both in terms of highlighting what some may see as poor judgement and the possibility that such a candidate could be a liability for the party in terms of lost appeal.
Re Peters remarks on the cash for peerages matter, I don’t really think that the public believe that something untoward has gone on in Labour ranks in isolation. I think most people will be of the opinion that party donors have been rewarded by all political parties in one way or another and many people I have spoken to think that this investigation was sparked by sour grapes from a party that doesn’t happen to get such vast backing for themselves. I really don’t think that now Blair has gone, the voters will perceive it to be all that big an issue when deciding who to vote for next time. I believe that Blair was tarnished by being the PM during the time that loans were taken in this way, but of course that practise was not confined to Labour. Most people realise that labour have tried to open up the issue on party donors rather than suppress it, so I think it will be pretty much neutral in terms of voting intention whatever happens.
I was wondering how much of Brown’s boost might be attributed to him not being Blair. If any significant portion of his boost is due to this, then there is no reason why it should vanish, unless Blair decides he wants another go at being PM.
It seems to me that Brown’s boost took a little longer than
John Major’s to get going (purely from memory), possibly the second part was due to people deciding he wasn’t such a terrible replacement after all. Either that or perhaps people didn’t watch the news till the weekend (?)
Oh well roll on the next poll.
Keith,
I think the point you raise about the boost for Brown because he is not Blair is significant.
As I have previously mentioned I believe around 3% of previous Labour voters had switched away because of Blairs stance on Iraq and another 2% had simply had enough of Blair and it is highly conceivable that some of them may return now Blair has gone and together with those who now consider Brown is not too bad after all, there is a real possibility that Labour will stabilise around 37% which will win them an election.
Well cash for peerages is out of the way.
Peter.
The Conservative polling figures of around 33% seem strangely similar to those 6 months or so before the last election. Added to that is 3rd place in the recent by-elections, either those two results are meaningless or terrible, certainly not a good platform for victory.
As always, more polls required!
And it seems like the endgame in Iraq, in terms of substantial British troop deployments, is in sight, which ought to give Gordon Brown more support from those core supporters offended by Blair and Iraq.
Surely it can’t be this good for a government after 10 years in power? Or is it the opposition?
While i don’t believe the Greens will have any where near the resources to contest all seats at the next general, as Peter claimed. But it would be wrong to say they have no impact on results. As for ukip being ahead, this is plain wrong. Greens nearly always get the same or more as ukip in polls, and the local elections proved that ukip is rubbish at getting elected any where except in euro elections.
It would also be interesting to see if the Greens allow the tories to sneak into some seats on 30% or less of the vote.
Despite the grumblings about Ming, the Liberals did well in the bye-elections as they always do which makes one wonder about the relevance of their poor poll performance come the General Election? With the exposure that a GE campaign brings and Ming’s improving media image as ‘a wise old bird’ I think they’ll do as well next time as they’ve done in the last 3 GEs. This could well be another nail in the Cameron coffin as a Lib vote at the GE might knock the Labour majotity down a bit but it won’t do the Tories much good at all. As I said in my previous contribution, I’m quite a fan of Electoral Calculus and using their predictor a straight vote of Labour 37%, Tory 33% and Libs 22% whilst it knocks 30 or so off the Lab overall majoriity compared to the current poll’s Lab 40%, Tory 33% and Libs 19% it only adds 3 to the Tory figure (201 to 204). Equally interesting, inserting a bit of tactical voting into the Electoral Calculus predictor (2.5% from Lab to Lib and 2.5% from Lib to Lab on the 37,33,22 base) knocks the Tories down to 183 and gives a Lab overall majority of 110 with the Libs about where they are now. These sort of voting figures aseem to me to be fairly realistic if Brown avoids major squalls, downgrades the Iraq presence and generally maintains the impression of seriousness and ‘getting on with the job,.
re the comment about cash for peerages above, are there any polls about whether the public thinks the verdict was correct or not, or more generally, about trustworthness of politicians in general? Or could we safely assume the result?
There’s a Guardian/Mori poll out, let’s just say things aren’t getting any better for the Tories.
The Result looks like its going be a Labour Victory by Narrow Margin.
Even the 2 Parties are still neck and neck still Labour win by Narrow Majority!
These are My 3 Forecasts shows this!
Neck and neck Scenario!
Labour 36.3% 335 MPS 36%
Conservative 36.1% 241 MPS 36%
Lib Dems 17.8% 42 MPS 18%
Others 9.8% 32 MPS 10%
TOTAL MPS 100.0% 650 MPS 100%
Labour win by Majority of 20 Seats.
Labour 0.2% Lead
Labour 36.7% 340 MPS 37%
Conservative 36.1% 240 MPS 36%
Lib Dems 17.3% 38 MPS 17%
Others 9.9% 32 MPS 10%
Total MPS 100.0% 650 MPS 100%
Labour win by Majority of 30 seats.
Labour 0.6% Lead.
Labour 36.7% 345 MPS 37%
Conservative 35.3% 231 MPS 35%
Lib Dems 18.0% 42 MPS 18%
Others 10.0% 32 MPS 10%
Total MPS 100.0% 650 MPS 100%
Labour win by Majority of 40 Seats.
Labour 1.4% Lead.
These are the Likely Result at the Next General Election either at 2008 or 2009 which is likely Brown to call this?
A hung Parliament could be likely but I think Labour Party will be largest Party even in a Hung Parliament.
But I would be Surprised if Hung Parliament was the result!
A Labour Victory is more Likely!