Rishi Sunak’s has achieved no positive conference bounce after trying to relaunch the Tories as the party of “change” at their annual gathering in Manchester last week.
Instead Labour, ahead of their gathering in Liverpool which starts this weekend, is up three points since last weekend and now stands on 42%, stretching its lead to 13 points.
Despite all the coverage of Sunak and the Tories, the latest Opinium poll for the Observer shows the Conservatives unchanged on 29%.
The Liberal Democrats are down one point on 11%, while the Greens and Reform are both down one point, on 6%. Tory strategists hoped the conference would mark the moment when Sunak would start to close the gap on Starmer and Labour.
The results suggest Sunak’s gamble of opting for a combination of eye-catching new policies and dramatic U-turns, has not worked in the way he hoped.
In Manchester Sunak tried to present himself as the leader strong enough to take long-term decisions in the national interest – even if they were unpopular.
They included ditching the Birmingham to Manchester leg of the HS2 high-speed rail line, launching plans to abolish A levels in favour of a new system in which pupils would have to study English and maths to 18, and moves to ban young people from smoking.
Keir Starmer’s party is seen as far more united than the Conservatives. Some 47% of voters think Labour is united, and just 29% that it is divided.
The Tories, on the other hand, are seen as divided by 50% of voters and united by just 30%.
Although Starmer is often criticised – even by some of his own MPs - for lacking detailed policies, he comes out better in the poll than Sunak on the question of policy.
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Some 48% think the Tories have poorly thought-out policies, compared with 38% who say the same about Labour.
Some 52% of voters expect Labour to be the largest party at the next general election, against 26% who believe the Tories will be.
Many Tory MPs conceded at their conference that Sunak’s approach of casting himself as a leader representing change would be a hard sell after 13 years of Conservative government.