Labour close the gap to 7% with the YouGov tracker.
CON 37% (-3) LAB 30% (+1) LD 21%(+3)
But most of fieldwork took place BEFORE the Sun’s news?
Peter Kellner has just been in touch with news of today YouGov tracker poll. He emphasises that “most fieldwork reflects impact of yesterday evening TV news coverage but not this mornings papers. Tomorrow’s figures will measure full impact of media coverage, Sun switch etc”.
It’s important to note that the numbers we are seeing each are essentially a reaction to the news of the previous evening.
So what these number tell us is that Brown’s speech and the coverage of it on TV helped Labour up a point – but provided the biggest boost for the Liberal Democrats who are up to 21%. The Tories are the big loser. Quite why the poll has moved in the way it has I do not know.
If it had not have been for the Sun overnight then Labour would have been ecstatic. A 7% deficit would have surely meant a hung parliament with Labour and the Tories very close to each other on seats.
The numbers tomorrow will start to show whether the bad news for Labour has had an impact. At the very minimum the Sun’s decision became today’s big political story over-shadowing the conference thus depriving Labour of a whole news cycle which it could have expected to be positive. My guess is that Labour will be back into the 20s tomorrow evening.