Gavin’s Gaily Gigest

Well, that’s a generous spin at least, but we have climbed a statistically insignificant one per cent in the latest Guardian / ICM poll to 21%. The Tories are on 37% and Labour’s support stands at 34%, which isn’t bad considering the troubles they’ve had to go through in recent months, and might be a reflection of how poorly the Conservatives are at capitalising on Labour’s mistakes. Of course, you could level the same charge at the Lib Dems, given that we have remained fairly static ourselves.

The more interesting result from this poll, however, is its finding that economic confidence plummeted before the Northern Rock crisis this weekend, with over half the country feeling pessimistic about their economic prospects. How the nationalisation of a bank and an increase in public debt will impact on this figure when the next poll is taken remains to be seen - could be a lot, could be very little, as people focus on bread and butter issues, rather than what some might see as a City matter.