Dying to know how Brits feel about their two major political parties? The firm Ipsos-MORI has assembled and studied a year's worth of polling data to give us a sketch of Britain's political leanings:
Over 2009, the Conservatives maintained a comfortable lead over Labour, averaging a 42% share among those certain to vote, compared to Labour's 26% and the Liberal Democrats' 19%.These figures are closely in line with the average of the 128 published polls conducted by all the polling companies in 2009, which found an average share of 41% for the Conservatives, 27% for Labour and 18% for the Liberal Democrats.Just over half the public, 51%, said they would be absolutely certain to vote in an immediate general election, but Conservative supporters were more likely to be certain to vote (66%) than those supporting Labour (52%) or the Liberal Democrats (59%). It is this turnout advantage that provides much of the Conservative lead: taking the views of all those who expressed a voting intention regardless of their likelihood of voting, the Tories' lead over Labour was only 37% to 30%, with the Liberal Democrats on 19%.
Does not bode well for Gordon Brown.
