One of the truisms that has emerged from this election is that maybe Gordon Brown was right to veer away from calling an early election after all. Pursuing a snap election turned out to be a grave error for Theresa May, and so perhaps the Labour Prime Minister was wiser than everyone gave him credit for at the time.
But while this may seem obviously true, what has actually happened is that May has confirmed her similarity to Brown. The latest YouGov polling on May’s personal ratings reminds us that both reaped a severe punishment for going anywhere near an early poll, regardless of whether they followed through and held the election. Theresa May is now where Jeremy Corbyn was last November in term of favourability, with the Tory leader on -34 (Corbyn was on -35 last November), and the Labour leader now on 0, which means voters are equally divided between favourable and unfavourable views.
This is a dramatic turnaround for both party leaders.
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