Tories pull ahead of Labour in opinion poll
LONDON: British Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative Party had pulled ahead of its nearest rivals, Ed Miliband’s Labour Party, before a knife-edge May 7 election, an opinion poll by TNS showed yesterday .
The poll put the Conservatives on 34%, up four percentage points from the previous TNS survey, and Labour on 32%, down one point. The Liberal Democrats, Cameron’s junior coalition partners, were on 9% of the vote, behind the anti-EU United Kingdom Independence Party (Ukip) which was on 14%.
Meanwhile, Cameron launched his party’s pre-election policy manifesto yesterday, promising to deliver the “Conservative dream” of a home-owning democracy, where more than a million more families could buy their homes cheaply.
With just three weeks before what is shaping up to be Britain’s closest election since the 1970s, Cameron chose to largely abandon negative campaigning
This was amid criticism that the strategy was backfiring.
He focused instead on what he could offer.
He made no mention of his rival, opposition Labour Party leader Ed Miliband, and did not repeat a robust personal attack on his opponent’s character made last week by Michael Fallon, his defence minister.
Instead, he held out the prospect of higher living standards after five years of austerity.
“The dream of a property-owning democracy is alive and we will help you fulfil it,” Cameron told supporters at a technical college in Swindon, in the west of England.
“We offer a good life for those willing to try because we’re the party of working people,” he said.
The election is about more than simply who will govern the £1.9 trillion (R34.2 trillion) economy: Cameron has promised a referendum on EU membership while Scottish nationalists, who want Scotland’s independence, are seeking a kingmaker role.
Cameron hopes to parlay his economic record into victory. – Reuters