Maybe, just maybe, voters are starting to believe that the NHS is safe in Tory hands

Maybe, just maybe, voters are starting to believe that the NHS is safe in Tory hands

Concern about the service drops to lowest level since election

Last night the Ipsos-MORI Issues Index for December was published and one of the highlights was the decline in the numbers of those saying that the NHS was an important issue facing the country.

The Index operates in a totally different manner from any other regular poll and has done for the past 37 years. For rather than ask how respondents feel about specific issues it seeks to test the salience.

All the interviews are carried out face to face and those questioned are asked to name as many important issues as they like which they think are facing the UK at the moment. It is important to note that this is totally unprompted.

    This month the proportion including the NHS dropped to 15% – the lowest level since the general election and, as can be seen from the chart, in line with the long-term trend.

If these figures are in any way accurate then, I’d suggest, it’s good news for the Tories. An issue on which they are almost always seen as doing worse than Labour has lost a lot of its salience.

Mike Smithson

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