I’ve been pretty silent on the forum for the past few months because, quite honestly, I’ve found nothing much to complain about.

I first joined the forum to express my horror at what was happening to our Party and my every post was critical of DC and was a plea to change his tack, but how things HAVE changed

David Cameron’s rise and rise has been spectacular since the conference when he finally took note of what everyone on the forum was saying, and released some amazingly sensible and long awaited policy statements.

Now that he is finally showing Gordon Brown to be the incompetent nincompoop we all knew he was, people are beginning to realise this and DC is steaming ahead in the polls.

The latest announcement regarding extra prison places and proper sentencing is another master stroke.

Keep up the good work and, who knows, as Gordon Brown slowly disintegrates into a gibbering wreck, we might even have an early election.

Broon may be dim, but not that dim. If you want an election you must bring the Government down. No sign that DC has enough moral high ground or killer instinct for that, sadly.

Thats right Yorker, and I wonder how our DC would have handled all the problems Labour has had this last fortnight....... some self inflicted by bad goverment, but still has to be faced up too

With all these cock ups and only 13points ahead!!! Team DC. has to try harder.....

Killer instinct? Seems that Brown can commit political suicide without DC's help!

The timing of the next general election will depend on the opinion poll results. If Labour fail to recover Brown could leave it until June 2010 - the latest legally possible date. The summer was a bit of a nightmare for Conservative supporters but I was ceaselessly trying to hammer home on this forum and others that the Brown Bounce was never going to last for ever - now the political landscape has transformed.

The latest poll has put the Conservatives 13% ahead, their biggest advantage in any poll since 1988. I say rejoice - but let's not be complacent. :)

VoteDave - the Tories are ACTUALLY 1 point down on the last poll.
They should be doing better than this. It's just that Labour are doing REALLY bad!

DC needs to continue to convince people that 'the Tory Party' has really changed.
DC must continue to decontaminate 'the brand'.

People are still VERY wary of the Tories of old. So - David Cameron really has a lot of work to do.

I often feel shivers when I hear the word - TORY...

yikes! It's enough to scare the life out of anyone! :)

Canvas, I agree with just about every word of that. :)

... except the last two paragraphs which you've just added. There are some very nice Tories about, like me. :)

My last straw poll was :
1 for cammeron
none for labour and
5 none voters.

He has a real lead but not big enough yet.

The results are C 40%, Labour 27%, LibDems 18%.

I was always led to believe 40% was the crucial milestone these days, although of course it would be nice to be even higher. There's still time so I would say this is encouraging for the future. In the late 1990s the Tories were lucky to get 30% on a good day!

27% is VERY low - Labour have hardly ever been lower than that and it hits the fringes of that party's core vote. Even Michael Foot managed 27.6% in the 1983 general election.

You are quite right 21parque.

When the Conservatives win the next election, the catastrophic situation left by Nulabour will be an enormous problem for DC .

We can only hope and prey he is up to the challenge.

The big thing to me is that they (Labour's polls) can only go down.

It is evident that after the Brown bounced splatted the sheer horror of what he had achieved, compounded that people realized that his "Vision" was same old same old and had been around for a very tiring 10 years already.

Brown has nothing to offer but gloom sleaze and despondency. He certainly has no charm.

Super-glue Brown!

Even with all that Jonjii cons aren't taking all the points Labours losing.. Dont you think they could have reached a plateau in the polls? Floating voters may be turning against Labour at the moment, but are they picking up actual Labour voters, which they must do?...

Not necessarily - there's still time. I think 2008 is likely to be the best year for the Tories for two decades in terms of opinion polls. That said, Labour managed only 43.2% of the vote even in their 1997 landslide - which isn't much higher. Similarly the Tories were on 42-44% in the four elections between 1979 and 1992.
As I say, I thought 40% was supposed to be the milestone these days. It seems the goalposts have been shifted to 45% just because the 40% mark has been achieved.
No party has managed over 50% in a general election since 1935 - a lot of it is down to an inevitable (but limited) rise in support for smaller parties.

A new YouGov poll has put the Conservatives on 43% - 11 points ahead of Labour!

Haven't heard about it yet! if cons gone up 3 point and dropped 2 points over Labour, Lib Dems up?

That's surprising Parkie, what with clumsy Huhne costing the LibDems what little support they have left.

Don't forget that Cable has been very amusing lately.
I'm sure Vince Cable warmed a few hearts - but he'll be out of the spotlight soon.

It's a different polling organisation, 21 parque. Comparing them is futile I'm afraid. YouGov is showing the Tory lead (and Tory support) up by 2 points. The 13% lead was by Communicate Research.

The results are C 40%, Labour 27%, LibDems 18%

These figures mean little one way or another. First there are 15% who have no opinion, these may jump either way secondly minor parties are given no mention and many "old style" Tories might well opt for one of these. Minor parties can be crucial in a maginal. I can assure you that having worked for one of these companies they are not too particular if there is no election in sight. After all no one will know whether or not the figures are right so they are not anxious to be accurate. Pollsters are far more fussy near an election and surprise surprise the figures change just before the vote. The pressure is on GB at the moment, there has been very little critism of DC as he hasn't been in the spotlight for long. I am far from sure that he will stand up to the scrutiny, the jokes were starting last week about him washing up on TV with his cuff links still in place, also GB bringing up the fact that he had little work experience and Carton losing millions when he was there, there was a similar attack on Question Time last night. Time will tell. The more the Tories rise in the poll the more attacks there will be. The word Tory has unpleasant historical connections I agree but is somewhat better than CON which is asking for jokes

A large bulk of that 15% will be hardcore supporters of parties such as SNP, Plaid Cymru and so on - in fact at the last election minor parties took about 10% of the popular vote so I don't think those voters will all be going to the major parties to such a huge extent come election time.
Conservative is usually abbreviated as "C" these days.