Voters ignore The Sun as Cameron’s lead is slashed to 7 points

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

In spite of the Sun’s calculated and long planned attack on Labour today – orchestrated no doubt by Andy Coulson and designed to do the most political damage and reduce Labour’s conference poll bounce – Labour have received a significant rise in popularity this week.

According to a new YouGov tracking poll, released tonight, the Tories have dropped three points and Labour have gone up six – slashing the Tories’ 16 point advantage to just seven.

It’s Labour’s most significant poll spike for months, and shows that – in spite of the Sun’s best efforts – people are still willing to listen to Labour’s vision for Britain as set out by Gordon Brown yesterday.

The topline results of the poll, with the changes since last Friday in brackets, are:

Conservatives: 37% (-3)

Labour: 30% (+6)

Liberal Democrats: 21% (no change)

Of course this is the bounce that a political party normally receives with the added exposure of its party conference. The Tories will receive a similar spike after their conference in Manchester next week and it’s highly likely that we’ll end up back where we started before the conferences.

But it goes to show that the public is not convinced by the Tory argument and that in the few months remaining until the general election there is everything to fight for.