There is a Populus poll due tonight. I’ve not seen any figures from it yet, but when it appears feel free to discuss it here. I’ll update later on.
UPDATE: As readers will probably know, the figures are CON 38%(-1), LAB 30%(+1), LDEM 20%(+2). Full report and analysis to follow in 15 minutes or so.
| 38 | 39 | 10 |
 | 8 Feb | 40 | 38 | 10 | Con +2 |
| 7 Feb | 37 | 42 | 9 | Lab +5 |
| 6 Feb | 41 | 40 | 8 | Con +1 |
| 3 Feb | 39 | 40 | 9 | Lab +1 |
| 2 Feb | 39 | 41 | 8 | Lab +2 |
| 1 Feb | 38 | 40 | 8 | Lab +2 |
| 31 Jan | 39 | 40 | 9 | Lab +1 |
| 30 Jan | 40 | 38 | 10 | Con +2 |
 | 30 Jan | 38 | 36 | 8 | Con +2 |
 | 29 Jan | 37 | 38 | 14 | Lab +1 |
| 27 Jan | 39 | 40 | 8 | Lab +1 |
| 26 Jan | 39 | 40 | 9 | Lab +1 |
| 25 Jan | 38 | 40 | 9 | Lab +2 |
| 24 Jan | 40 | 38 | 9 | Con +2 |
 | 23 Jan | 37 | 40 | 10 | Lab +3 |
 | 23 Jan | 35 | 37 | 11 | Lab +2 |
| 23 Jan | 39 | 40 | 8 | Lab +1 |
 | 23 Jan | 38 | 38 | 12 | Tie |
 | 22 Jan | 37 | 38 | 13 | Lab +1 |
 | 22 Jan | 40 | 35 | 16 | Con +5 |
| 20 Jan | 41 | 36 | 9 | Con +5 |
| 19 Jan | 38 | 38 | 11 | Tie |
| 19 Jan | 41 | 38 | 8 | Con +3 |
| 18 Jan | 40 | 39 | 7 | Con +1 |
| 17 Jan | 39 | 40 | 8 | Lab +1 |
Con 38
LAB 30
LD 20
O 12
Figures appear to be
Con 38 Lab 30 LDem 20
Good news for Labour then, back on 30 with the tories sub-40. Lib Dems can’t complain about 20 either. Anyone know the Other Breakdown?
There will need to be some spinning for the Conservatives to say that this poll is not bad.
We will know when the next polls come out whether we are heading for a hung parliament as hopefully that will take into consideration the Pre Budget Report. Could this be another brown bounce? If so how long will it last? Will it end? Will this mean an earlier General Election?
This poll seems to be in line with the last few which have shown Labour narrowing the Conservative lead. I dont think it has a huge amount to do with the class divisions the Prime minister has being trying to create, more to do with general perception of improvement in the party’s performance and returning confidence in the economy – but I think the class thing does give Labour some kind of narrative of attack on the Conservatves coupled with the inheritance tax cut.
Looks like Populus have had the two closer than most other polls for some time. So there may be a slight Labour bias.
All the same, it is further confirmation that the Conservative lead is not set in stone at 10+. Poll after poll tells us that at the moment.
Of course it could be short term.
On the other hand, the GE could see the Conservatives no more than 6 or 7 point ahead of Labour.
On the 25th Nov 2004 Labour polled 42 but got 6 points less in the 2005 GE. Also Labour polled 40 on several occasion in the months leading up to that election.
There is no good reason for thinking that Labour are doing better than 28. This is also considerably worse than what they were doing this time last year and the year before that. And we know what happened several months later each time. I recommend that people don’t get too excited by this poll.
@Philip JW
You are right in so far as you go. But I imagine it is the trend which people are “getting excited about”.
8 of the last 12 polls have the Conservatives below 40%.
For an ostensible ‘government in waiting’ to poll so low against such a clearly unpopular government must be cause for concern for them. And, I’m sure, it is.
If, against that, Labour can (note ‘can’, not ‘have’) recover to 30% – there will be quite genuine fear amongst the Conservative tacticians. And rightly so.
Whether or not it is another November blip. Or short term. Or a genuine change of opinion – none of us can tell.
I think the Tories would probably win a majority of about 20 seats if this happened on election day. The numbers are probably being affected by Scotland where there are hardly any crucial marginal seats that will effect the main battle between Con and Lab.
That’s weird – I accidentally wrote “effect”, changed it to “affect” and then posted it, and it’s come up with the original mistake.
This could be a blip for the Tories due to better press coverage for Labour recently.On the other hand it confirms a trend.
@Andy
Forget Scotland. It is not responsible for the drop in Tory support, which is the main cause of this narrowing. Labour have moved only marginally upwards (most of this was around Conference time), and only a small fraction of this can be down to Scotland which has just 8% of the population.
Would have been happier if this had been ICM or You Gov as Populus seem to score smaller con leads or have done in recent times but still cons less than 40% and others only 12 is interesting.
Of course 41/27 is within MOE but as the odd Angus Reid poll is diluted in its’ weighting the forecast will get tighter and Labour will be around 29 and the lead less than 12.
Only a 2-3% swing back to NOC territory which whilst still unlikely becomes more possible.
Accepting the usual UNS understating the Con majority.
Statto
“Forget Scotland.” I’m not sure how to take that!
However, I think there may be a problem with some polling methodology, since the demographics are set on a GB level, while Scots vote in a very different way. It’s entirely possible that while the Scots sub-sample contributes to the GB demographic, it does so in a skewed way, and distorts the pattern.
Anthony – any view on that theory?
Those figures, when passed through the parliament predictor on this site, give a hung parliament (labour 4 short). A sign of the lib-lab to come?
It is a rather tantalising situation because every time in looks like there’s no way back for Brown a poll comes out giving him some hope but it’s usually only one poll on its own – the next one shows a strong Tory lead.
Just another 1 percent swing to Labour, 37-31-20 and the two parties are equal in seats !
Long live FPTP ! I suddenly like it !!!
Many Tories are happy tonight. Their main concern was Brown would stand down as PM before the GE and his successor would get a polling bounce. After recent polls likelihood of Brown standing down in short term is low & in the New Year it may be too late.
Oh I would doubt that.
Labour supporters such as myself would do well to avoid getting too excited about a poll which, after all, could still mean an outright Tory win. But it does perhaps suggest that the poll which appeared not long ago, putting the Tories 6% ahead, cannot as easily be dismissed as a rogue as some correspondents have suggested. Only one poll of late has suggested a narrative other than a slightly reduced Conservative lead, and in any case those who wanted rid of Brown as Labour leader had already lost that particular battle.
Pretty solid trend now.
If this was labour rise ya could think maybe they were just piling on the votes in their strongholds with the class attacks, where it won’t matter anyway….but it’s a con fall.
Maybe partly the ‘party of the rich’ line…but I suspect some of it is the cons being…..quiet. Other than PMs questions I haven’t heard from them, Cleggesque.
Hoping for another marginals poll.
I have spent sometime looking at the data from the last few years of polls from Populus.
While I would love it to be a Labour Party revival, I do not believe this is supported by the data. Since 2008 the Cons have been between 38 – 44, and Labour 24 – 34.
My money would be on a polling day lead by the Tories of around 8%, but due to tactical voting, this will be amplified to create a small working majority, around 40ish.
@OldNat
No offense intended!
As I’m sure you know, I meant forget it as a reason for the current poll narrowing.
The latest data does suggest a narrowing of the Tory lead into the 8-12 point bracket. Quite how things will go from here is anyone’s guess but the polls have always underpredicted Tory support by 2-3 points.
I could see a scenario where the lead drops to 2-4 points in a couple of polls but come election time gets back to 6-8 with a result of 8-10.
I still think it will be a Tory win but maybe 25-35 seat majority based on the most recent results.
All very well and appealing, in that it creates the “Dream Team” prospect of a Conservative-Liberal pact, but I suspect this has a lot to do with Tory quietness. I suspect that, as with everything the Tories do, there is some dastardly plan being carried out by Con HQ.
Whether it’s a genius “quiet winter, loud spring” tactic or a foolish plan of “let the government lose the election”, I’m not getting optimistic. Then again, I’m Scottish, so that should surprise no-one.