If 'it is the economy, stupid', the Tories can start smiling

A YouGov/ Telegraph opinion poll gives the Tories a (stable) 5% lead tomorrow.  Graphics will follow in the morning.

Perhaps more significant is the fact that the Tories have a 30% to 27% lead over Labour on economic competence.  That 3% advantage compares very favourably with a 22% disadvantage (49% over 27%) at the last General Election.  The Tories are not perceived as decidedly more competent but Labour (Gordon Brown) is seen as decidely less competent.  Perhaps that record tax burden, rising inflation and falling disposable incomes are beginning to bite!

Bob Worcester believes in an iron triangle of political success.  That triangle includes leader image, party unity and economic competence.  David Cameron still has a lot to do but he can be forgiven a broader smile tonight.

8.30am update on 23rd February:

Within the new YouGov survey there is strong support for David Cameron's analysis of the recent south London killings:

"Well over half of YouGov's sample, 57 per cent, agree with Mr Cameron that "the shootings reflect a wide malaise" and that "our society is broken, with a marked decline in the culture of responsibility, especially among children without fathers".  Only 33 per cent agree with Mr Blair that the shootings reflect only "a specific problem with a specific criminal culture to do with guns and gangs"."

Appearing to confirm Tuesday's Guardian/ ICM survey, the Tory lead widens to 9% in a Brown versus Cameron stand-off.

Comments

[Umbongo]

So back to reality: a 5% lead does not give an overall majority in the Commons and, against the present shysters in office, should be a major cause for concern not congratulation

[Richard Carey]

Cue Labour in-fighting. Brown is running for the leadership as a solid, doughty (sorry!!) manager of the economy. That's the armour we needed to keep chippiing away at between now and his (hopefully inevitable and bloody!!) succession, and this will help.

Aside from saying "pass the popcorn", I am pleased that we have a lead in polling on one of the biggest issues to the vast majority of the electorate, economic competence.

This does suggest that we have at least the preliminaries in place for all three legs of Bob Worcester'a iron triangle tonight. In the next couple of months, we all have the opportunity to help convert this into a solid lead in a real public vote.

[Afleitch]

'Our lead in both is disspointing. Quite frankly we should have an infinite lead. We should all stop what were doing and talk about Europe because to gain a lead in economic conifidence for the first time in 12 years is terrible. The poll is worrying for us because the 45 million they didn't poll might all vote UKIP...'

And so on and so forth. This poll is a solid indicator of our lead and while 5% may not mean much, if we swing in the right places we can gain a majority. I really do wish people would keep the '40% mark' and the idea of the uniform swing (which is never accurate) out of their mind because elections and the actions of voters no longer work like that and indeed may never have.

[Matt Wright]

Its good news and ecah day we now gain strength. Making this work depends as much on people like us on the ground walking the talk,

Matt

[CDM]

Excellent. When were we last drawing or behind Labour?

[D]

I like this strategy of certain posters of mocking the throw-back anti-Cam whingers with feigned outrage. If it keeps up they will give up and join UKIP and we can worry about winning the next election in peace!

Let the mockery continue...

[steppenwolff]

When Gordon Brown is named as the Labour leader, the lead increases to 9% with the Conservatives on 43%!

[Alexander Drake]

To me, the truly significant question in this poll is the 'better economic manager' one. When the policy review process starts to harden into policies for us to take into the campaign, this will hopefully see our share rise on that question. If that happens, then Labour will be in really serious trouble.

I hope YouGov keep polling this critical baseline question closely!

[Praguetory]

I would advise readers to consider polling in the run-up to last May's elections where the Tories hit 40% (near as damn it).

[TomTom]

Pollsters never like to admit to Don't Know/Won't Vote when the 40% in this Group overshadows any other group affinity for any party.

This basic lack of transparency is what makes polls nonsensical because parties fail to address the concerns of non-voters

[Alex Forsyth]

The Telegraph's analysis of today's poll results is, of course, correct.

Cameron's continuing lead is a function of negative perceptions of the government and, in particular, the uncertainly generated by Blair's ridiculous "long goodbye"

It is easy to put into context the Camerloon orgy of self-congratulation which takes place every time a favourable poll appears. Imagine the euphoria in the Labour camp at the time Howard announced his delayed resignation and Tory support, already poor, slumped. Labour thought they had it made then; ditto the Camerloons now. Both were/are wrong.

In fact, once Blair has gone it will be a whole new ball game. As with the Tories Labour will start by benefitting from a leadership contest that will dominate the press for days. However, Brown's one-sided contest against Meacher will be the equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel.

Recent polls have shown that Cameron is widely regarded as a lightweight, and that brutal fact confirms his status as a mere beneficiary of Labour woes.

Very occasionally (and I mean very occasionally) I meet people with something nebulously good to say about Cameron. I've noticed that after a few sharp words from me they say no more.

I find that very interesting. It implies that they really know very little about the man and that their support is "soft".

Something which could, of course, have been predicted a priori

With the possible exception of Major, Cameron is the most feeble specimen to lead the Conservative Party for at least 100 years.

[malcolm]

Oh God! Another missive from Alex Forsyth or whatever he's currently calling himself saying the same thing again and again and again...
To quote the great Robbie Williams 'your conversation is as boring as hell'.

[Mickey]

"With the possible exception of Major, Cameron is the most feeble specimen to lead the Conservative Party for at least 100 years."

Ho, ho.

Why the change in e-mail address "Alex"?

[Alex Forsyth]

Oh dear Malcolm. Did we get out of the wrong side of bed this morning?

Perhaps you'd prefer I wrote something you would find congenial rather than expressing my own genuine views as a Thatcherite Conservative?

I know that is the prevailing ethos in Blulabour these days but it's not my bag. Sorry.

[Alex Forsyth]

Why the change in e-mail address "Alex"?

Because, it the unlikely event that anybody wants to email me, that's the one I'm now using daily.

Why the interest?

[Mickey]

"Why the interest?"

Because you're clearly not "Alex Forsyth". At least my anonymity is plain for all to see. Yours is disguised and that feels deceitful to me.

The last person who had a stock line "did we get out of bed..." was Jamie Oliver’s Sausage. Whatever happened to that temporarily prolific poster? I suppose he met the same end as Mark McCartney, Monday Clubber, Tory Loyalist, etc.

[EML]

This shows no more or less than steady progress against a Labour government that has a huge client base that will support them come what may; that still has excellent control over news coverage; and that doesn't provide many day-to-day reasons for people to actively vote against them (e.g. a crap economy).

It presents a formidable challenge to us, and Cameron is leading the way very well.

[Alex Forsyth]

At least my anonymity is plain for all to see.

Along with your own patently phoney email address "Mickey"

I assume you are a sockpuppet of somebody currently posting under another name on this thread. No prizes for guessing who.

If you have evidence to back up your claim that I am using multiple IDs to inflate the Thatcherite presence on these threads I suggest you produce it. You can start by referring us to some recent post/s you think I have made under some other ID

Seems you have a problem with what I am saying about our party. I wonder why that is?

[Mickey]

Alex, I was wrong. I apologise and retract everything that I said.

[Alex Forsyth]

I accept your grovelling apology with the magnanimity of a Real Tory

[Denis Cooper]

Of course it's quite absurd to suppose that the rising popularity of the Tory party has anything whatsoever to do with the declining confidence in Gordon Brown's handling of the economy. It's true that the last Tory government presided over the longest and deepest recession since the war, but that certainly didn't lose the Tory party any votes. On the whole, people didn't mind losing their jobs and their homes or seeing the small businesses which they'd spent their lives building up go bankrupt. It's also true that the Tories plumetted in the polls immediately after Black Wednesday, when it became apparent that those minor sacrifices had been completely futile, and their rating has been slowly trending back up over the fourteen years since then, but that's pure coincidence. The real reasons for the relative resurgence of the Tory party are that under its new leader it's become a new party, a compassionate not a nasty party, and it's stopped talking about right wing issues like Europe and immigration which are never even mentioned on the doorstep. It would be a massive mistake to go back to the dark days of IDS when he was obsessed with peripheral issues like stopping the EU Constitution becoming our supreme source of legal authority, or of Michael Howard boring the pants off the electorate by going on about mass immigration, which is of course warmly welcomed by the overwhelming majority of the British public, even those who've now been priced out of their jobs.

[Jack Stone]

Alex Forsyth is a complete idiot. If Cameron is a lightweight than Brown must be a featherweight as virtually every poll gives the party incresed leads with Brown as Labour leader.
He and his like who show the party no loyalty and who would prefer another Labour victory to a Cameron government after the election should sod off and join UKIP. They will feel more at home there amoungst the looney tunes of the far right.

[Graham D'Amiral]

Another solid poll lead and once again the figures indicate voters find the idea of a Gordon Brown led labour party less attractive than a Tony Blair led one. When Blair's long goodbye is finally over Brown is going to have his work cut out to try and change that perception. Also of note once again how far behind the lib dems are.

[Curly]

What if it is not the economy stupid? What if the winner is "Son of Star Wars"?

[Sean Fear]

In fact, according to Yougov, we were slightly ahead on the economic competence figure on several occasions during 2003-2005.

Contrary to popular belief, we were also ahead of Labour on this issue in the weeks leading up to the 1997 general election.

[Denis Cooper]

Are you sure about that, Sean? I've just done a quick google and I haven't found any reference which supports that. Plenty saying that the Conservative's reputation for economic competence vanished in a puff of smoke on Black Wednesday, etc, etc but none saying that it had recovered before the 1997 election. This from March 2001 quotes some numbers:

http://www.newstatesman.com/200103260015

"Labour's advantage over the Conservatives in the voters' eyes, whether in terms of leadership, the economy, or the main issues, is decidedly greater now than four years ago. In February 1997, Blair was preferred to Major as PM by an 11-point margin; that has now stretched to 25 points over Hague. Then, Labour was nine points ahead as the party of economic competence; under the most popular Chancellor since the war that lead has widened to 19 points."

[Matt Davis]

Jack Stone for someone who regularly sees personal attacks upon him where there aren't actually any don't you think that you are now going too far in your personal abuse of Alex Forsyth, because I do. At least Alex can make a reasoned argument for his views which is factually more than you ever have. Your vicious intolerance of any view but your own is becoming not only very wearisome but also very very New Labour.

[Opinicus]

The others in this poll are 14%

Would someone from CCHQ like to comment?

[Alex Forsyth]

Alex Forsyth is a complete idiot.
He and his like who show the party no loyalty and who would prefer another Labour victory to a Cameron government after the election should sod off and join UKIP.

Well Jack Stone I'd like to see some evidence that you are actually a member of The Conservative Party. I've commented before that your knowledge of everyday party matters appears to be zero.

But then weren't you the chap who claimed to live in Southend (some boast!)and then hadn't a clue how many MPs the town had or which party they represented?

I smell troll.