October 2006
Posted on 09/17/2008 11:38:26 PM PDT by nickcarraway
THE Conservatives have smashed through the 50 per cent barrier in the polls for the first time since Margaret Thatcher's heyday, a further blow to Gordon Brown's struggling leadership.
An Ipsos MORI poll published today showed the Tories up four points on 52 per cent.
The news comes amid reports that another member of the government is set to quit within days over Mr Brown's leadership.
Eric Joyce, the Falkirk MP and parliamentary private secretary to John Hutton, the Business Secretary, is reportedly considering resigning after the Labour conference which begins this weekend.
And James Purnell, the Work and Pensions Secretary, added to Mr Brown's woes when he said in an interview with the New Statesman that it was "ridiculous" to condemn colleagues who voiced concerns.
"I think it would be ridiculous to pretend that you can't complain when you're worried," he said.
"I mean, I'm worried that we're 20 points behind (in the polls].
"I'm not going to condemn people or question their motives. (But] I don't agree with what they did," he said, referring to their call for leadership nomination papers.
Mr Purnell, who is tipped as a potential future leader, also refused to rule out supporting a future leadership challenge, saying merely that the question was "hypothetical".
The spate of critical outbursts which follow the resignation of David Cairns, the Scotland Office minister, have threatened to overshadow Labour's conference in Manchester.
And the eve-of-conference poll gives the Conservatives the biggest lead since August 1988, a year after Margaret Thatcher's third election victory. The survey shows the Tories are up four points since a similar poll last month, Labour unchanged on 24 per cent and the Lib Dems down four to 12 per cent.
The result undermines the Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg's attempts to rebrand his party as a tax-cutting challenge to the Tories after a week of media coverage at his party conference in Bournemouth.
People also have a more positive attitude towards the idea of a Tory government, as opposed to simply being tired of Labour, with 54 per cent of those questioned agreeing that Mr Cameron's party was ready to govern – up 19 since last month.
Another embarrassing resignation could be around the corner, however, after Mr Joyce was reported to be considering quitting after the Glenrothes by- election.
It came after a TV interview yesterday, when Mr Joyce offered muted support for Mr Brown when asked if he backed a leadership contest.
"Gordon is going to make a big important speech on Monday and lay out his vision and then we're going to go and win the Glenrothes by-election," he told BBC Scotland's Holyrood Live.
Asked if Mr Brown categorically had his 100 per cent support, Mr Joyce added: "It's absolutely essential that we are unified and see what Gordon has to say on Monday."
He later told The Scotsman: "I have no intention of resigning as PPS to John Hutton. I support Gordon Brown 100 per cent for conference and the Glenrothes by-election."
Asked if he would quit if Labour lost, he said: "It's not a question I can consider. I'm confident we will win."
Earlier, Defence Secretary Des Browne had warned would-be dissenters that there was "no alternative" to Mr Brown.
Seems the World is going Right and America is trying to go Obama, which is nearly left of Stalin.
That’s because they’ve already seen how F’d up socialism is. We haven’t. I predict will get there (some day), then have to udo all the mess just like Sarkozy is having to do.
Very true, because they have already tried and failed at what Obama represents.
So, if he wins, and we follow the British time table, we’ll be looking at turning this ship around about 2030.
Terrifying.
The leader of the Tories, David Cameron, met with and had an intimate conversation with Obama when he was in England. David Cameron also praised Obama profusely, probably coming as close as he could to actually endorsing him.
Great minds think alike. LOL
I love how the Liberals are all...”Obama will make the world love us again!!”
France moved right
Italy moved right
Britain is starting to move right
But I guess they all had to go through a period of leftist rule before waking up. I’m afraid Obama will put us to sleep permanently.
David Cameron is lucky. If Gordon Brown had zero experience, a racist pastor and had ties to shady characters, he’d be tied.
Another point: you can be sure that if Obama wins, a lot of capital will flow to the UK.
Good!
:) LOL
Well, after Sarbannes-Oxley passed, a lot of business did go to London. That’s one reason Wall Street was doing so much business in CDOs and so forth.
yes. it may annoy many freepers but Huckabee was the only republican who understood that *
HUCKABEE: Regulation isn’t the answer to this. In fact, if we go back and overregulate and tinker with it, we’re going to do more damage than we are in terms of a fix. The worst thing that happened in a long time is Sarbanes Oxley.
What did that do? It drove a lot of American investment right over to London, kept us from becoming and remaining the number one place for finance in the world.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,423881,00.html
*even fred Thompson voted for Sarbanes Oxley.
Since the Torries are death on the war effort, who should we really be supporting here?
But Cameron also asked John McCain to speak at the last Tory convention, which he did, and was well received.
Cameron knows McCain, and they have often complimented each other.
Do the Tories have any other issue besides Global Warming? Wasn’t there a leftist party that ran against them on the tax cut issue?
The Tories changed their party logo to "Green". It seems that UK conservative is the same as on the Continent.
A different shade of "red".
yitbos
Tony Blair? but he left, Brown did his thing and you can’t expect anyone to send troops to Iraq in 2008.
Cameron is trying to appeal to more than just the Tory grassroots, the same as when Labour suddenly realised that unreconstructed socialism was never going to see them back into power, they have to appeal to more liberally-minded types.
By the way, the Green Tory Logo was changed to blue again after an outcry. It was a silly idea in the first place. The colour green in British politics means either hippy enviromentalism, or Irish Republicanism. Neither appeals to the core Tory voter, so it was changed...
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