The story’s familiar by now. A poll comes out; it puts the Tories 20-ish points ahead of Labour; and it contains a whole load of below-the-headline findings which are personally damaging for Gordon Brown. Today’s Independent/ComRes poll certainly follows that pattern. It has the Tories on 44 percent, Labour on 25 percent and the Lib Dems on 17 percent. But the sting for Brown is in findings such as that 20 percent of people like Labour but not him, whilst only 8 percent like him but not his party. And that 34 percent of Labour voters say that they’d vote Labour in spite of Brown, and only 3 percent say they’re backing the party because of its leader.
Polly Toynbee again recognises the electoral drag that Brown represents in her Guardian article today – and she does so in no uncertain terms. Here’s the first paragraph:
“The smell of death around this government is so overpowering it seems to have anaesthetised them all. One bungle follows another and yet those about to die sit silently by. So is that it – the great September relaunch, the great economic recovery plan?”
But who’s the alternative? The ComRes poll also asks how people would vote if different figures were leading Labour. If Miliband were leader, Labour’s share would remain at 25 percent. Straw would clock 25 percent as well; Johnson or Harman, 23 percent; and Ed Balls would score 22 percent. Only Tony Blair would significantly close the gap between Labour and the Tories – with him as leader, Labour’s share would stand at 31 percent.
Of course, those “imagine that someone else is leader; how would you vote”-type questions are among the most unscientific around. But it’s still revealing that these latest results are almost identical to those published by the Telegraph / YouGov over a month ago. It hints at the inertia gripping Labour. A handful of Labour ministers have tentatively signalled that they might – perhaps, possibly – have designs on the party leadership, but they’re unwilling to follow-through and develop those signals into full-blown claims. The result? No alternatives have truly captured the imagination of Labour members or of voters more generally. And that could just about save Brown yet.
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