The Sunday papers bring new poll headaches for Ed Miliband as his ratings hit a new low

By Jonathan Isaby
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Ed Miliband's aides may want to stop their boss from catching sight of the Sunday Mirror or Independent on Sunday tomorrow, for they contain depressing news for him.

The latest ComRes opinion poll commissioned for the two papers shows that his ratings are sinking - primarily because those who were giving him the benefit of the doubt by previously saying they didn't know whether he was turning out to be a good Labour leader are turning against him, the more they see of him.

In December last year, 17% of the public agreed he was turning out to be a good leader, 32% disagreed and 50% said they didn't know.

Six months later and 18% say he is a good leader, but the "don't knows" have reduced by 13 percentage points to 37% and - guess what? - the number of those disagreeing has increased by 13 percentage points to 45%.

The full results over recent months are in the table below and, significantly, whilst those agreeing has fluctuated a little, you will see that the number of people disagreeing that he is turning out to be a good leader has risen incrementally over time.

Even among Labour voters, only 41% agree with the statement, with 25% disagreeing and 34% saying they don't know.

As to whether "The Labour Party is unelectable as the party of government as long as Ed Miliband is its leader", 33% of the general public agree, 28% disagree and 39% do not know. Among Labour voters alone, 17% agree with the statement (52% disagree).

The second piece of bad news is that again Labour has lost its lead with ComRes when it comes to voting intention, finding itself level pegging with the Conservatives.

The latest numbers are:

• Conservatives - 37% (-1)
• Labour - 37% (-2)
• Lib Dems - 11% (-)
• Others - 15% (+3)

Change figures are a comparison with the equivalent mid-May ComRes poll. ComRes interviewed 2,008 people online on Wednesday and Thursday.

> Click here to listen to Tim Montgomerie discuss with former Tory leader Lord Howard of Lympne the challenges facing Ed Miliband on today's Week in Westminster on Radio 4.