The government’s embroiled in a series of crises – so why can’t Labour land a punch?

The government has lurched from crisis to crisis and yet, somehow, the Tories remain 10 points clear in the polls. Sean O’Grady explains how that’s possible

Keir Starmer’s thoughtful conference speech was heckled by ranting leftists, confirming the impression that Labour’s policies are not yet fully cognisant with those of large swathes of their traditional electorate (EPA)

If some ghostly Dickensian apparition from the autumn of 2021 had visited Boris Johnson at Christmas 2019, just after he had won a thumping 80-seat majority at the general election, and told him what the next couple of years had in store for him then he’d have been rightly concerned for his political, and personal, future. A pandemic that would take the lives of more than 135,000 people in the UK (nearly including the prime minister); a simultaneous energy, cost of living and fuel crisis; the disgrace, eventual resignation and subsequent betrayal of his closest adviser; a severe economic slump followed by an uncertain economy; a string of high-profile scandals and ministerial resignations; Brexit going a bit awry; disappointing by-election results; incipient inflation; and the highest taxation and debt burden in postwar history – surely his party would be deeply unpopular, and he himself facing a leadership challenge?

Seems not. According to the latest YouGov poll, in line with recent trends, the Conservatives still enjoy a 10-point lead over Labour – a honeymoon level of support under nightmare conditions, and after more than a decade of various Conservative or Conservative-dominated administrations, austerity and all. At 41 per cent, they have slipped only a couple of percentage points from their December 2019 showing, when they “whacked Corbyn”, in the words of the prime minister. By contrast, Labour are stuck at a touch below the 32 per cent they registered then. The Liberal Democrats and the Greens split the third party vote neatly, at 9 and 8 per cent respectively, and also pose little threat to the Tory majority if an election were held now. Only the SNP, firmly in power north of the border, pose anything like a challenge to the Tory hegemony. If the lead sustains until the next election in 2023 or 2024, and another four- or five-year term follows, then the Conservatives will have been in power continuously for just about two decades, and Johnson will be approaching the longevity at the top of Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher. He has no shortage of rivals and detractors in his own party, but they cannot argue with such polling data.