August 07, 2008

Abstract: (Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The popularity of Britain’s main opposition party has increased over the course of this year, according to a poll by Ipsos-Mori. 47 per cent of respondents would vote for the Conservative party in the next election to the House of Commons, up five points since January.

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The popularity of Britain’s main opposition party has increased over the course of this year, according to a poll by Ipsos-Mori. 47 per cent of respondents would vote for the Conservative party in the next election to the House of Commons, up five points since January.

The governing Labour is behind with 27 per cent—down five points in six months—followed by the Liberal Democrats with 15 per cent. 11 per cent of respondents would vote for other parties.

In June 2007, Gordon Brown officially became Labour leader and prime minister, replacing Tony Blair. Brown had worked as chancellor of the exchequer. Blair served as Britain’s prime minister since May 1997, winning majority mandates in the 1997, 2001 and 2005 elections to the House of Commons.

Since December 2005, David Cameron has been the leader of the Conservative party. In October 2007, Cameron challenged Brown to call a snap election, but the prime minister later announced he would not hold an early ballot.

In December 2007, current parliamentarian Nick Clegg became the new leader of the Liberal Democrats, defeating environment spokesman Chris Huhne in a leadership ballot by just over 500 votes.

The Conservative party recently created the "implementation unit"—a group charged with planning what would be Cameron’s first days in office if he becomes prime minister. Francis Maude, a shadow cabinet member and former party chairman, is leading the group.

On Aug, 1, Maude said the unit’s job will be to ensure that Cameron does not replicate the mistakes made by Labour before, saying, "Blair’s biggest failure was his first term. (...) By the middle of the second term, he knew what he wanted to achieve and had a pretty good idea how to achieve it. But his authority was diminished, there was Iraq, and Gordon Brown was obstructing his public service reforms. We are not interested in winning for the sake of it. We have a vision of how Britain can be. It will take a long time to deliver it, so we had better start from day one."

The next election to the House of Commons must be held on or before Jun. 3, 2010. Sitting prime ministers can dissolve Parliament and call an early ballot at their discretion.

Polling Data

How would you vote if there were a general election tomorrow? Which party are you most inclined to support?

	Jul. 2008	Jan. 2008
Conservative	47%	42%
Labour	27%	32%
Liberal Democrats	15%	15%
Other	11%	11%

Source: Ipsos-MORI
Methodology: Telephone interviews with 1,016 British adults, conducted from Jul. 18 to Jul. 20, 2008. No margin of error was provided.