Sunday Polls
The weekly YouGov poll for the Sunday Times. Topline figures are CON 32%, LAB 41%, LDEM 8%, UKIP 12%. YouGov have had a couple of polls in recent weeks with polls leads up around 9 points, suggesting that beneath the normal random variation the Labour lead has crept up slightly over the last fortnight with energy prices back in the news. The rest of the polls was largely taken up with questions about confidence in the workplace, but there were a few questions on Labour and the Unions and unqualified teachers.
57% of people think the trade unions have a lot (23%) or a fair amount (34%) of influence over Labour, and on balance this is seen as a bad thing: 41% think they have too much influence, compared to 10% who think they don't have enough and 24% who think it is about right. This is largely due to Conservative voters though, amongst Labour's own supporters 48% think the level of trade union influence is about right. On Falkirk 41% of people think Unite probably did fix the selection, but almost half of respondents said don't know, suggesting it is an issue that has not really caught the attention of the general public at all.
People are evenly split on whether unqualified teachers can be as good as qualified ones - 42% think it's possible for people with expertise in other fields to be just as good, 43% that teachers with proper qualifications and training will always be better. Despite that a clear overall majority (63%) still think that schools should only be allowed to employ qualified teachers.
Meanwhile the fortnightly Opinium poll for the Observer has topline figures of CON 31%(+4), LAB 37%(-1), LDEM 7%(-2), UKIP 16%(-1). It shows a sharp decrease in the Labour lead, but it's almost certainly just a reversion to the mean after the anomalous eleven point lead a fortnight ago. Putting that one unusual poll aside a seven point Labour lead is typical of Opinium's polls over the last few months.
Opinium also asked about people's perceptions of BBC bias. 37% of people think the way the BBC covers the news is politically neutral, 27% think it is biased towards the left, 14% think it is biased towards the right.
