MORI have got it right?

It's not often that you come across an article that backs up some of what you had been saying.

In an earlier blog I had suggested that some of the fringe parties, like the Lib Dems, had been puffing up their expectations as to what they might achieve in a General Election. Now Bob Worcester of MORI, not my favourite pollster, has backed me up. In an article he has claimed that:

"(The Lib Dems) will put on about 20 seats, but I'm afraid the way the British electoral system works they are just a sideshow........When you ask people which party has the best policies on the issues they personally think are important to them the Lib Dems run a poor third on everything apart from the environment.

Questions: In your experience when a party gets bigger, as is the case with the Lib Dems, do policy contradictions and closer scrutiny inevitably lead to problems and a drop in support?

Bob Worcester: That's very possible and that would be consistent with the fact they are doing more poorly in areas where they have control of local councils."

As for the Conservatives he believes that:

"On virtually every issue the current Tory frontbench have eaten into the Labour lead. It is an important development because issues represent about 40 per cent of the determinant of which way floating voters vote. Image is about 60 per cent split between the image of the leader and the image of the party.

There's no easy answer to the Tory's problems but having said that the in-roads they are making into Labour's lead on policy is bound to have resonance.

I say that because those people on the margins, the floating voters, say those policies will attract them and that's where elections are won."