December 19, 2007

Abstract: (Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Britain’s main opposition party is maintaining a high level of public backing this month, according to a poll by YouGov. 45 per cent of respondents would vote for the Conservative party in the next election to the House of Commons, up two points since late November.

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Britain’s main opposition party is maintaining a high level of public backing this month, according to a poll by YouGov. 45 per cent of respondents would vote for the Conservative party in the next election to the House of Commons, up two points since late November.

The governing Labour party is second with 32 per cent, followed by the Liberal Democrats with 14 per cent. Nine per cent of respondents would vote for other parties.

In June, 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, Cameron challenged Brown to call a snap election, but the prime minister later announced he would not hold an early ballot.

On Dec. 16, Lib-Dem acting leader Vince Cable rejected an offer by Cameron to join the Tories in an alliance against Labour, saying, "The Liberal Democrats will continue to work with other parties on issues where we have common ground and can work together in the national interest. (...) However, this is not a serious proposal and David Cameron clearly lives in cloud cuckoo land."

In March 2006, the Liberal Democrats chose foreign affairs spokesman Menzies Campbell as their new leader. On Oct. 15, Campbell tendered his resignation. Earlier this month, current parliamentarian Nick Clegg defeated environment spokesman Chris Huhne in a leadership ballot of party members by just over 500 votes. In his acceptance speech, Clegg said he wants the Lib-Dems to be "the future of politics" in Britain.

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

If there were a general election tomorrow, which party would you vote for?

	Dec. 14	Nov. 28	Nov. 22
Conservative	45%	43%	41%
Labour	32%	32%	32%
Liberal Democrats	14%	14%	14%
Other	9%	11%	13%

Source: YouGov
Methodology: Online interviews with 1,481 British adults, conducted from Dec. 13 and Dec. 14, 2007. No margin of error was provided.