Labour make up ground on the Tories
Peter Hoskin 8:59am
Now this is an odd one. In spite of the 10p tax row – and the very public dissent by some Labour figures – the latest Guardian / ICM poll sees the Tory lead cut significantly. Cameron & Co. score 39 percent (down 3 on last month); Labour are on 34 percent (up 5); and the Lib Dems on 19 percent (down 2).
They're figures which may give our beleaguered Prime Minister cause for optimism. But – as Political Betting remind us – this is only one poll. The headlines remain poisonous for the Government, and if the 10p tax rebellion escalates – as well it might – then ground could be lost just as quickly.
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Comments
Dave B
April 22nd, 2008 9:19amGuardian ICM polls seem to produce results more favourable to Labour than Other Newspaper ICM polls. It's very odd.
Perry
April 22nd, 2008 10:14amWell it’s working isn’t it?
Make a nation dependent –(on your largesse and ‘benevolence’) – and people are bound to want you to stick around.
In any case, - what other option(s) do we hear about?
The old values of independence, free spirit, and getting on with life ourselves seem largely to have diminished in favour of a sickly, bereft, expectant (no pun intended!) culture.
Verity
April 22nd, 2008 1:51pmPeople simply cannot warm to Cameron. Everything about him shrieks insincerity. His lofty dismissal of people's real day-to-day concerns, which he doesn't share, of course, is a turn-off. He hasn't bothered to address the breakdown in civil order, 24-hour drinking, the closure of pubs due to the iron-fisted no smoking - even outside - laws. Labour is grinding the electorate under their boot. Taking governance away from this ghastly prime minister and the loutish, dictatorial nomenklatura that New Labour has built up ought to be a piece of cake. Everyone hates Gordon Brown. But no one warms to Cameron, and the more he fakes sincerity, the further away the electorate drifts from the Tories.
I think the days of a toff in No 10 are long gone in these democratic times. People want someone they can genuinely connect with, and who can relate to them.
Faceless Bureaucrat
April 22nd, 2008 5:11pmDave B - I agree that it seems every time ICM undertake a poll for the Grauniad, it favours NuLab. Then again, it all depends on who you ask and where you ask them - poll a cross-section of citizens around Islington and one can assume a left bias to the findings, although I'm sure ICM and other pollsters are wise to such things...
Fergus Pickering
April 22nd, 2008 6:19pmWhat IS this toff stuff, Verity? ALL the political class are toffs, including fat Prescott. Who is it you can genuinely connect with? Come on. Give us a clue.
Verity
April 22nd, 2008 8:20pmFergus Pickering - You know that your post is begging the question.
Obviously, John Prescott can never be a toff.
Cameron has been brought up to rank and privilege all his life and he has an air of entitlement about him. I find him patronising and disconnected.
The rich are certainly different from you and me, especially if they've had their money and titles for centuries. (Not that I'm knocking old money, or new money come to that. I approve of fortunes and wish I had one of my own.) But to imagine that Cameron can get his head round the concerns of the average Briton is silly, because he has not walked in their shoes. (It's Cliché Tuesday around these parts.)
All his life, Cameron has been isolated from the people he thinks he's qualified to lead. Yet every word out of his mouth, and every action (as in, perhaps, donning a parka and flying to Norway to pose with two photogenic Huskies; or donning a pair of obviously brand new work gloves and holding a just-out-of-its-wrapper paint brush up to a wall to demonstrate his commitment to ending grafitti)is disconnected from the life of the average voter. It's as though he's tone deaf.
He's also jolly-hockey sticks smug. Most damning was the ovation he commanded for the vile Blair and his own very apparent sense at that moment that he truly was the "heir to Blair" - as though that was what a sickened electorate wanted.
He's grown up isolated from the average person - and being moneyed and privileged is not his fault and I wouldn't wish to deprive him of his advantages, but they make him a poor choice to run a country full of ordinary people.
As an aside, by contrast, oddly enough, I think that in 20 years, Prince Harry, who enjoys much greater wealth and privilege than David Cameron, would probably make a wonderful prime minister.
I think on top of all his other faults, David Cameron is vacuous.
Simon Orr
April 22nd, 2008 9:30pm"Obviously, John Prescott can never be a toff."
He plays croquet and thought that multiple Jaguars were his right...
Verity your inverse snobbery is so very tiresome. How much do you really know about David Cameron's life? For example, under your criteria his personal experience certainly qualifies him to oversee the NHS. He's had to deal with it plenty since his son was born in just the same way any parents with a disabled or sick child has to.
Cameron isn't royalty or anything close to it and I really don't think his life to be all that different to that of the average Tory voter.
Lastly, actually listen to or read Cameron's speeches. He has a much better grasp of the problems facing poor communities than any other party leader.
Fergus Pickering
April 23rd, 2008 3:11amCome on, Verity. Who do you have in mind to connect with 'the average voter'? Which Prime Minister since the war connected with this average voter. I think Margaret Thatcher did, but not because she live an 'ordinary' life. Good old Dennis's money smoothed the way, as money has a tendency to do. Is it Cameron's schooling that bothers you? But Etonians are people too, you know. Anyway, didn't Harry go to Eton? Looking for an MP who went to a bog-standard comprehensive might be difficult. There is one, but I've forgotten who he is.