A few months back, I wrote a blog saying that with the huge lead in the polls, the only way the Tories could go was done and as Labour were so low, they only way they could go was up!
Well, in recent weeks, the Tory lead has been falling and today, a YouGov poll for the Sunday Times puts the Tory lead at just 2% (on 37%) with Labour on 35% and the Lib Dems on 17%.
The seats in the next House of Commons would have Labour on 317 and 263 for the Conservatives. Labour would be 9 seats short of a majority.
I must admit that I am rather surprised that the narrowing of the gap has happened so quickly, especially as the election has to be held by June at the latest and with everyone talking of 6th May as the likely day we go to vote.
We have had the credit crunch and the recession knocking us for 6 for the last 2 years and Gordon Brown has had all the flak thrown at him for everything under the sun and the recent bad news for him was the allegations of his alleged bullying of Downing Street staff. In addition, the ruling Labour Party has now been in Government for almost 13 years and won 3 General Elections. So could Brown go on and win a 4th for Labour?
As a reader of the Sun, since it gave its support to the Conservatives a few months back, its vitriolic stories and editorials against Labour and Gordon Brown have been rather shameful and could even be seen as verbal bullying.
As I a Liberal Democrat, I have no axes to grind to support or be anti to either of the main parties as I try to write my blog articles as an "independent" person, looking at everything around me, before I come to my conclusions.
So as my earlier predictions are coming true (sooner than I had expected!), I am now prepared to put into print my view that when the history of the 2010 General Election is written, that the political journalists might look back at Sunday 28th February as the day that the Conservatives LOST the election.
As we know, the losing main party leader invariably hands in his resignation to his party and the process starts to elect a new Leader of the Opposition.
I just cannot understand how Cameron has been so stupid to see their lead go down the pan, but the only way to consider it is looking at the Harry Enfield character of the 1980's of Tory Boy. Tory Boy grew up and he is now Tory Leader or Shawdow Chancello. Cameron and Osborne are both so rich and from their background, the public may be finally seeing that they have no realistic idea how so many millions live on or near the average wage. Then there's also those living on very low incomes, whether its on benefits, or minimum wage, or now taking part time work as there's no good quality jobs offering a better salary.
Cameron is speaking shortly at their Spring Conference and their election slogan is "For For Change". The only change is that to get rid of Brown, you must vote Cameron/Conservative. The messages have been VERY negative in what they promise us for the next 5 years. They will hack public services to reduce the National Debt.
But they havent said what they are actually going to give us. I don't want to vote for austerity as most of the cuts will undoubtedly hit those most on lower and middle incomes. Maybe the voters are realising that to vote Tory, they will be no different to a Tukey actually voting for Christmas? The Conservatives are lacking in total positivity and are running down Britain.
The actual General Election campaign, when it actually starts will no doubt be an interesting 3 week fight for the future direction of our country as whoever wins, there's still going to be very tough financial decisions to be made after the Golden Years the economy lived under from the early 90's, up to 2 years ago.
We all know that when the 3 week campaign starts, the Lib Dem vote will rise by at least 5% (currently around 17%), which means that Labour and/or the Conservative vote will drop. But equally, will Labour continue to increase its share of the vote as it starts its campaign.
There is much talk of a hung Parliament, so will that be the outcome or will Labour or the Conservatives actually win the General Election?
But in all honesty, the Conservatives, after all the mess of the last 2 years, should be 15 - 20% ahead in the polls, so why has Tory Boy managed to see his party continue to lose support? Well, Cameron does not have the charisma of Thatcher or Blair, but his messages for weeks now have been negative, bordering on proving that the Nasty Party is still alive and kicking. Maybe thats what the public and the electorate are seeing?
Still, its going to be a very interesting General Election and if they do lose, maybe the Conservatives will suddenly realise that they should have supported a change to the voting system, as Labour proposed a couple of weeks ago. I voted tactically at the 2005 General Election and no doubt I was not alone, so I look forward to the voting system changing, so that EVERY vote counts as we also know that under the current system, at least 80% of the current seats are safe Labour or Conservative. But Preseli Pembrokeshire will be followed by the media, especially in Wales, to see whether its wafer thin majority of 607 will be retaken by Labour or if the seat becomes a safe Tory seat.
So can David Cameron turn the polls round over the next 70 days? Or can Gordon Brown confound everyone and achieve the unexpected?
Watch this space....
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