Labour boost in first post-G20 poll
A new YouGov poll in the Sunday Times is the first to test public opinion since the G20 meeting. The poll went live on Friday morning, so respondents would have had chance to see the news coverage of the conference.
The topline figures, with changes from YouGov's last poll, are CON 41%(nc), LAB 34%(+3), LDEM 16(-1).
Labour have enjoyed a small boost from the G20, but it seems to be at the expense of the Liberal Democrats and others rather than the Conservatives. This actually makes some sense - as I posted here, during the increase in Labour support at the end of last year that resulted from Gordon Brown's domestic recovery package we also saw support for others fall away. My guess is that we are seeing people who would normally be Labour supporters drifting over to abstentions and protest votes when the government are in trouble, and then returning to Labour at times when Brown and Labour are seeming more effective and competent.
The questions now are, firstly, how large this recovery is - polls vary, and it can take time for the public to react to events, so it could be larger than it appears here - and, secondly, how long it lasts. Will it be a brief blip on the back of positive publicity that rapidly vanishes again, or will it change the media coverage and perceptions of Labour enough to be the springboard for a wider and longer recovery? Time will tell.
It's worth remembering that, while the tail end of ComRes's fieldwork for their last poll would just have caught it, this is also the first poll taken after the bulk of the coverage of of Jacqui Smith's expenses claim and her husband's blue movies. For now, that doesn't seem to have damaged the government (or if it did, it has been cancelled out by the G20 effect).
