Confronted by the popularity of Ed Miliband’s proposed energy price freeze, the Tories have comforted themselves with polls showing little or no change in Labour’s lead. As Daniel Finkelstein wrote last week in the Times, “A graph of Labour’s lead over the Conservatives shows that it has been steadily, if slowly, declining since the beginning of the year and continues to decline. Mr Miliband’s intervention hasn’t altered this.” The Tories’ hope is that while the public overwhelmingly support the price freeze (with 80% of all respondents and 69% of Conservative voters backing it in today’s ComRes poll), few will actually change their vote as a result.
But five weeks on from Miliband’s speech, a period in which the policy has dominated debate, there is increasing evidence that Labour’s position has improved. After polls earlier this month showing the party as few as four points ahead, the five most recent YouGov surveys have put its lead at between six and nine points (today’s has Labour on 40% and the Tories on 31%), with its vote share also rising by several points.
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