Latest Polling Data

Just one poll published tonight, Sunday (so far at any rate), showing Lib Dem support holding up.

YouGov in the Sun … CON 34%(-1), LAB 28%(+1), LIB DEM 30%(+2)

So much for the charge - led by its sister-paper - that the Lib Dem bubble had burst. The poll suggests the party is continuing to hover at the 30% mark, and continuing to push Labour into third place.

There was incidentally one other poll published we omitted to report last night: BPIX (the firm which refuses to comply with polling industry standards) showed CON 34%(+3), LAB 26%(-2), LIB DEM 30%(-2).

It does seems as if the party is heading into the final full week of the election campaign in its healthiest poll position in modern history. Interestingly, it's usually in the final 10 days of the campaign that the Lib Dems begin to put on a few points in the polls. Now the TV debate and 'Cleggmania' may mean that's already been priced in to the polls. We shall see. Anthony Wells' UK Polling Report 'poll of polls' continues to show:

CON 34%, LAB 27%, LIB DEM 29%

Mori's Bob Worcester has an interesting article in today's Observer looking at where the new Lib Dem voters have come from based on his firm's polling in Labour-Tory battleground marginals. Here are the findings:

In these battleground seats, quite a lot more from women (+16%) than men (+9%), more from middle-class voters (+15%) than working-class (+9%), and more from the young, 18-34s (+16%), than middle-aged, 35-54 (+13%), or from older people, 55+ (+9%).

The retention rate is also a factor in the rise of the Lib Dems. From the data before the prime minister called the election and after, the Tory retention rate fell eight points, from 77% of those who recalled voting Conservative in 2005; Labour held its own and a bit more, from 52% before, and 55% this past week. The Liberal Democrats, however, bounced from a lowly 43% up 18 points to 61%.

This volcanic activity seems to be persisting; voters and now bookies signal a hung Parliament. That means Clegg, while not becoming politically king, could certainly