Poll List: ComRes polls has Tory lead down to 5; Labour as biggest party in Parliament

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

A new ComRes poll for tomorrow’s Independent shows the Tory lead has dropped from seven to five points in the past month.

The new poll puts the Tories on 37% (-1), Labour on 32% (+1) and the Lib Dems unchanged on 19%.

Translated to a general election on a uniform swing on the UK Polling Report’s Swing Calculator, the poll shows Labour as the biggest party in a hung Parliament, with 293 seats to the Tories’ 277 – with Labour 33 seats short of a working majority.

Andrew Hawkins, CEO of ComRes told Tory Radio:

“We’ve seen a continuous decline in the Conservative lead and it all points back to the publication of those Q4/2009 growth figures back in January. What’s interesting is that today’s poll also sees a continuation of this trend of Labour voters from 2005 returning to the fold. A very significant proportion of would be Labour voters, the sort of people in income groups who are most likely to vote Labour and have been saying they would stay away from election time altogether have been gradually coming back. We believe that this has been the main factor behind Labour’s resurgent poll figures.”

Gordon Brown and David Cameron are now also neck and neck on the economy, with Cameron on 43% to Brown’s 42% on which party leader “has the right skills” to lead Britain back to economic health.

But while 45% believe the Tory leader would reduce Britain’s debt if he wins the election, only 37% think the same about Gordon Brown. David Cameron is seen as a strong leader by 48% of respondents, to the 43% who feel the same way about Gordon Brown.

Meanwhile, the Andrew Rawnsley book seems to have done little damage; while only 20% of respondents say Gordon Brown is an “unpleasant bully”, 69% disagree with the same statement.

Another new poll for The Sun by YouGov gives Cameron a small bounce from the Conservatives’ Spring Forum. In comparison with a survey for the same pollsters conducted before the weekend the Conservatives are on 39 (up 2 since Friday) with Labour at 32 points (down 3), Liberal Democrats on 17 (no change) and others 12 (up 1). The number agreeing with the statement that Cameron “understands the concerns of people like you” is up 5 points to 30.