If Gordon Brown was hoping that the row over his decision to abolish the 10p lower rate of income tax would not damage Labour, he'll be very disappointed by the latest monthly ComRes survey for The Independent. The Tories have doubled their lead since last month from seven to 14 points, the biggest since ComRes began polling for the paper in September 2006.
The small print contains even worse news for Brown ahead of Thursday's local and London Mayoral elections. The Tories are ahead among the DE bottom social group, which suggests that Labour's traditional working class supporters are very angry about the 10p decision. Last week's compensation package may be too little, too late to placate them, some Labour MPs fear.
One word of caution: local election results are usually patchy and rarely follow national opinion polls to the letter. But having said that, the survey suggests Brown will get a very bloody nose on Thursday. Full details in tomorrow's paper and at ComRes.
Who would have forecast six months ago that Brown would be in such a mess. I wish I'd put a tenner on him being out within a year of his accession. Now I shouldn't think I can get any odds at all.
Posted by: John-Boy | Monday, 28 April 2008 at 08:08 PM
Please don't refer to the DE social groups as "the bottom social groups". Some of them may be bottom when it comes to income but many are not. We have wealthy pensioners and high earning manual unskilled workers. Seems a bit "classist" to me and more worthy of the Telegraph.
Posted by: The Trainer | Monday, 28 April 2008 at 08:39 PM
about time- i think the public are waking up to the real cost of old hat 'new labour'. cummon gorden, one more time NO MORE BOOM AND BUST! haha
Posted by: giles moulden | Monday, 28 April 2008 at 10:53 PM
Now we are beginning to see a trend that's lifting the Tories in the polls. It is probably more likely this is anti-Brown rather than strongly pro-Cameron - and the LibDems are getting the benefit too - but it's a good platform. It will be interesting to see the actual results of the local elections on Thursday and how far they mirror these national polls.
Posted by: Diablo | Monday, 28 April 2008 at 11:23 PM
Diablo - the actual results will more than mirror these polls - they'll magnify the gap - they always do. Consider last year's results when the Tories had a 3% lead in the polls. It ended up 40 - 26 - 25.
Posted by: Praguetory | Tuesday, 29 April 2008 at 12:42 AM
Will he go - or will be be pushed?
Posted by: Neil McGowan | Tuesday, 29 April 2008 at 05:32 AM
He won't go. He's invested so much time and energy getting this far that he'll fight them tooth and claw to stay (which will be interesting viewing). I sense a damaging split coming up - the Brown/Blair divide was bad enough, but I think they're going to selfdestruct. It is their turn now after all.
Posted by: Jakers | Tuesday, 29 April 2008 at 09:29 AM