Populus - CON 32, LAB 39, LD 12, UKIP 9 (plus MORI on Trade Unions)

The weekly Monday poll from Populus is out and has topline figures of CON 32%(+1), LAB 39%(nc), LDEM 12%(nc), UKIP 9%(-1). Changes are from last Friday and obviously show no significant change - Populus are planning to release a weekly poll on Mondays, and sometimes more. Full tabs are here.

While I'm here I missed some Ipsos MORI polling on attitudes towards trade unions at the end of last week. This is something that quite often comes up in discussion - we know, for example, that a proportion of people think that Ed Miliband is too close to the Unions, but are the Unions themselves any longer seen as some great threat as they might plausibly have been seen in the 70s or 80s?

Essentially, the answer is no. And while people still don't approve of how closely linked to the Unions Labour is, it's not such a widespread view as it once was.

The general principle of Trade Unionism still had widespread support - 78% of people agree that Trade Unions are essential to protect workers' interests. Fears that trade unions have too much power and are controlled by extremists have declined greatly since the 70s and 80s - back then around three-quarters of people agreed that Trade Unions had too much power and two-thirds thought they were controlled by militants and extremists. Those same two questions now find only 35% think the Unions have too much power and only 23% think they are controlled by militants and extremists.

That's not to say people are supportive of Labour's links with the Unions, people agree by 53% to 28% that Labour should not be so closely linked to the Unions and 55% disagree that is good for Unions to have a role in selecting Labour's candidates.