The latest polls: Brown needs a miracle, not props

The latest poll has the Tory lead narrowing to 13%, with the Labour share increasing to 25%:

CON 38%(-2), LAB 25%(+1), LDEM 20%(+1)

If that wasn't bad enough, we now move on to the news from the marginal seats:

CON 40% (33), LAB 28% (43), LD 15% (17)

Mike Smithson explains:

Because of the size of the sample it has been possible to isolate that section of those surveyed who live in the main LAB>CON marginals. So the figures above are based on the responses of the 446 participants from the 150 Labour-held seats which are most vulnerable to the Tories. The numbers in the brackets are how those seats voted in 2005.

What’s critical here are not the detailed numbers so much but that it further supports the idea that the marginals are behaving differently from others seats.

So in the non-marginals in this poll there’s about a 7.5% swing from Labour to the Tories - in the marginals it is 10 11%.

The poll just confirms the recent trend.  The shift of opinion in the marginal seats is most worrying for Labour.

The Times publishes extensive extracts on his pre-election, ‘This is the real me’ sympathy interview with Piers Morgan.  It is a Class A jaw-dropping performance and it will be interesting to see how this is reflected in the next set of polls.  On his relationship with Blair:

If I felt at certain points there were things that needed to be done soon and he disagreed with that then that was a cause of tension. But equally… the relationship between a Chancellor and a Prime Minister is incredibly difficult but it’s also incredibly difficult even if you are friends. Because you’re in a high-pressure world, you’re having to make decisions every day, and sometimes you will disagree on them.

I don’t deny that there were fights about different issues, but it’s always the case. In fact it’s better to be open and honest and say there were disagreements about certain things but at the same time we managed, I think in the national interest, to get, to get things sorted out.

So, Gordon Brown’s interests are now “the national interest”.

Obviously, the headline grabbing stuff is all about Sarah and his children.  All this from the man that said at the Labour party conference:

Some people have been asking why I haven't served my children up for spreads in the papers. And my answer is simple. My children aren't props; they're people.

Indeed so, but there is an election on and these are desperate times.

What Brown needs is a miracle, not props.