Who would be Labour's most popular leader?

With the focus on Gordon Brown's teetering leadership, it was always inevitable that would start seeing hypothetical polls on how people would vote with David Milliband, Alan Johnson, Jack Straw, Uncle Tom Cobley and all as Labour leader. I expected it to turn up on Saturday, but according to the Telegraph blog the first such set of match-ups from YouGov will be in the Telegraph tomorrow morning.

There are all sorts of caveats about how much weight we should add to these sort of polls, which I go into later. The reason they are important is their political impact - if polls show other leaders would do better than Brown at the polls it will be extra pressure on him. I'm sure one of the reasons no alternative leader really managed to build up a media bandwagon before Blair resigned was that when the media commissioned polls like this they conspicuously failed to show Milliband or Johnson doing better than Brown. I wouldn't bet on that still being the case.

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What would happen if the Prime Minister lost their seat?

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Latest General Election Projection: Knife Edge Coalitions

Local Elections Expectations Management