New ComRes and Opinium polls
ComRes have their monthly online poll for the Independent and Sunday Mirror out tonight. Topline figures are CON 28%(+2), LAB 36%(+1), LDEM 8%(-2), UKIP 18%(-1). The Labour lead of eight points is pretty much the same as we've been seeing in YouGov's daily polls, but ComRes's online polls still have UKIP up at around 18% (note the difference between ComRes's telephone and online polls on the UKIP front).
ComRes also asked whether various politicians were doing well or badly in their current jobs. Unsurprisingly Boris Johnson came out a mile ahead, the only figure with a positive score (+25). David Cameron's net score was minus 21, Ed Miliband minus 28, George Osborne minus 29, Ed Balls minus 28. Michael Gove was minus 30, Jeremy Hunt minus 26 (though in both cases around half of respondents said don't know... realistically questions like this aren't that much use when you get beyond the best known figures). The surprise hit was Theresa May, who enjoys a net score of only minus 4, in a job that's normally a political minefield.
Opinium also have their fortnightly poll for the Observer. They have topline figures of CON 27%(nc), LAB 38%(+1), LDEM 6%(-1), UKIP 19%(nc). Clearly there is no significant change there at all from a fortnight ago. The Liberal Democrat score of just 6% equals their lowest this Parliament, the other six pointer also having come from Opinium back in May - they do typically show lower Lib Dem scores than other companies.
A note on interpreting polls today... and on Monday/Tuesday this week. By a strange co-incidence we've got to a point where ComRes's online poll, Opinium's poll for the Observer and probably a Survation poll for the Mail on Sunday all come out on the same weekend... and are the three companies that tend to give the highest levels of support for UKIP. At the same time ICM and Ipsos MORI have also fallen into publishing their monthly polls at the same time each month, and along with YouGov they tend to show the lowest scores for UKIP. It's a veritable trap for the unwary observer trying to interpret polls! One weekend a month you're going to get three polls on the same day, all apparently showing that UKIP are actually doing much better than people think... and then two days later, you'll get two polls on the same day apparently showing they are actually not doing nearly as well as the weekend polls showed. Don't fall into it and start drawing wild conclusions, it's just the result of methodological differences and the way the polling rota happens to fall.
UPDATE: The Survation poll for the Mail on Sunday has topline figures of CON 28%, LAB 36%, LDEM 9%, UKIP 20%. Survation have changed their weighting scheme since last month, adding a weighting by household income. They say it's a minor change, implying it doesn't make much difference, but they don't regard it as comparable to last month in terms of changes in vote share. (For the record the Conservatives were five points lower in their last poll, UKIP two points higher, Lib Dems one point higher... but of course we don't know how much of that difference is down to different weighting).
