The full tables for the weekly YouGov/Sunday Times poll are now online here, this week concentrating on George Osborne and the Olympics. Topline figures are, as mentioned in yesterday’s update, CON 34%, LAB 43%, LDEM 11%, UKIP 7%. On the regular leader trackers Cameron is at minus 23 (from minus 25 last week), Miliband at minus 20 (from minus 21 last week), Clegg at minus 53 (from minus 59) – slight recovery from Clegg from his worst ever figures last week, but otherwise steady.
George Osborne’s ratings remain very low – only 15% of people say he is doing a good job compared to 55% a bad job. Asked if he should stay in his role 20% of people think he should stay Chancellor, 48% think he should be replaced – very similar figures to those in the ComRes poll in the Independent on Sunday. Naturally a large chunk of this is Labour supporters, but even amongst Conservative voters only 48% think he should stay with 26% wanting him replaced. Asked who should replace him 47% of people say don’t know, indicating the relative lack of public awareness of most of the candidates. Vince Cable comes top with 22% (and is the most popular choice amongst Labour and Lib Dem voters), followed by William Hague on 16% (the most popular choice amongst Tories).
Confidence in the government on the economy has dropped since January – back then 38% said they had confidence in Cameron & the government to steer the country out of the economic crisis, that has now dropped to 33%. Over the same time period there has also been a turnaround in opinion on the deficit: back in March 38% thought the deficit should remain the priority with 34% saying the government should switch to a growth strategy. That has since gradually turned around with today’s figures showing 31% thinking the deficit should remain the priority, 43% supporting a switch to a growth strategy.
Turning to the Olympic questions, 44% of people say they are interested in the Olympics and 37% the Paralympics. 15% of people say they will be watching as much as possible of the Games, 29% that they will be watching the sports they are interested in. 20% of people say they will be doing their best to avoid watching the Games at all. 53% think they will be a success, 26% think they will not (a very slight fall since we last asked in May – back then 55% thought they would be a success, 22% did not). Asked whether, with hindsight, we were right to bid for the Games people are now evenly split – 44% say we were, 44% say we were not.
There are are also split opinions on how well the Games have been prepared for – 45% think they have been handled well, 47% badly. There is a lack of confidence that the transport system will be able to cope (only 25% have a lot/fair amount of confidence), and people are divided over whether they have confidence in the security provision – 45% say they do, 48% do not. On the specific issue of the lack of security guards, a majority (61%) of people think this is mostly the fault of G4S.