Worcester's Weblog - "Becalmed"
Asked to speak on "The Current Political Climate" at the English Speaking Union a few days ago, I thought I might open with just one word, "Becalmed". In preparing for the talk I realised I had picked the wrong word, as the dictionary definition of "becalmed" is "to render static (or nearly so) but not for a lack of wind". Politics in Britain is static or nearly so but not for the lack of the politicians' winds which blow across the land on every news broadcast and television current events programme, apparently making little impact. For the past three and a half months, with only one or two "rogue polls" clearly out of line,160the polls have been more or less in lock step (within the usual +/-3% margin of error). In May, 12 out of the 14 polls reported by the six polling organisations had the Conservative Party at 40%, +/-3%, and 10 of the 14 had them at either 40, 41 or 39%. Labour's standing in May was a bit more erratic with 10 out of the 14 within +/-3% of a 23% average. The Liberal Democrats 11 out of 14 at 18% (+/-3%) for the month. There was an even closer consistency in the 12 polls in June with 12 out of 12 within the margin of error for the Tories, 11 out of 12 consistent for Labour and all 12 out of 12 within just 2% of 18%, for the Liberal Democrats. Looking at July, again, consistency. All four of the parties were within +/- 2% for eight out of eight of the polls published in July and seven out of seven in August and so for four out of four in September. But, as the newspapers like to see something change every time they publish a poll, they headline the lead between Labour and the Conservatives. This gives the appearance of wild gyration. One day you have two published with their fieldwork over the same few days and they both have nearly identical findings for the share of each party within the normal margin of error, but a five point gap between the one's Tory lead and the other, 17% against 12%.
So what does all this add up to? Stasis. So, where do we go from here? At the time of party conferences there's a tendency, high visibility raises the standing of the party of the week which then drops back into its rut as the next party breathes in the oxygen of publicity. We will likely be seeing a series of poll findings which show chaos, stasis, chaos, stasis... over the next month, if within fairly narrow shares for each party. Since the beginning of the economic crisis nearly two years ago Labour's share has declined from a pretty steady low to mid 30s up, until April of this year Labour averaged its "core-vote level" of 30%. In May however it fell to just 18% recovering these past few months to around 25% well down as recently as the first quarter of 2009 both the Prime Minister and the Chancellor were expressing their confidence that the corner had been turned and recovery would be a visible fact by the end of the year. This strongly implied that their share of public support would recover from the mid 20s back to 30% and more. At that level they could be cutting into the Tory share and look hopefully toward at worst a very narrow Tory majority or Hung Parliament while at best a Hung Parliament with sufficient Labour support to do a deal with the Liberal Democrats to continue on in Government. Deal now looks even less likely now that Nick Clegg has fired his warning shot across Labour's bows.160 Our August poll published in the Observer newspaper (30 August 2009) put paid to the Prime Minister's hopes in my view. Public perception of any improvement in the country bottomed out at 7% in February and March 2008. By August it hit 43%, second highest for over 30 years. When I looked at the graph (below) a mental image popped into my mind of a shipwrecked Gordon Brown standing on a raft in tattered dungarees, the raft sinking below the choppy seas, sharks in the water, the slope of the raft sinking representing the decline in Labour's share of voting intention over this year. Brown, a look of anguish on his face, is stretching to reach the steep lifeline of economic optimism clearly out of his grasp. In the (far) distance you can see the shoreline, 6 May 2010, the date of the next general election.
Sir Robert Worcester is the Founder of MORI
