The latest Gallup poll has Labour up two points since last month, the Conservatives down one, yet to judge from the Daily Telegraph's front page headline Friday (9.6.00) morning, its poll carries awful news for the government: "LABOUR'S LEAD OVER TORIES IS HALVED". What does that convey, knowing that Gallup polls for the Telegraph monthly and is published within a couple of days of the end of fieldwork? Surely that the government has suffered a catastrophic loss of support in the last month, and that this was the position as measured a couple of days ago. In fact, such an impression would be entirely untrue.
Brian Souter's privately funded "referendum" in Scotland on the repeal of Section 28/2A of the Local Government Act reached its conclusion this week in an inevitable flurry of recrimination about its significance, if any. The Scottish Executive, in dismissing it, described it as a "flawed opinion poll". This is entirely a misuse of the term.
Thirty years ago this week, Parliament was dissolved, and the last Labour government to have a working majority went to the country to appeal for a renewal of its mandate to govern. There is no consensus of opinion on why Harold Wilson lost that election and Edward Heath won, but one widely-held belief is that the final critical swing in the last few days may have been caused by England's defeat by West Germany in the quarter-finals of the World Cup. A government was ejected from office because England lost a football match.
The first poll taken entirely after the call of the election shows a widening of the lead for Labour, and on every measure, Labour gaining even further ground on the Conservatives.
So, no real surprises in Thursday's local elections, though most of the government's worst fears were fulfilled. Ken is Mayor, the Tories are back in business in local government. More surprising, the Liberal Democrats gained their first parliamentary seat under Charles Kennedy's leadership in the Romsey by-election.
Next Thursday will see local government elections being held in most of England, both the high profile contest for London Mayor and the much less heralded contest for more than 3,300 seats on around 150 district and borough councils. Turnout will almost certainly be dire, as it nearly always is these days; last year it was 36% in the shire districts, 31% in the unitary authorities and just 26% in the metropolitan boroughs.
