LONDON: Britain’s main opposition Labour party has a huge 33-point lead over the ruling Conservatives, new polling out on Thursday suggested, as the government struggles with the fall-out from its economic plans.

YouGov said a voting intentions survey of 1,712 adults carried out on Wednesday and Thursday put Labour on 54 percent compared to the Tories’ 21 percent.

The margin is the biggest ever for Labour since the heyday of its former leader and prime minister Tony Blair in the late 1990s.

When the same question was asked last week, 45 percent said they would vote for Labour and 28 percent for the Conservatives.

The results show the scale of the battle Prime Minister Liz Truss and her finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng have to convince the public of their plans to tackle a spiralling cost of living crisis.

They are on the back foot and under serious pressure just three weeks into the job against soaring inflation and energy prices.

But the markets reacted badly to their proposals for extra borrowing to fund un-costed tax cuts, sending the pound to new lows against the dollar.

Published in Dawn, September 30th, 2022