Brown Aide: We Will Lose the Next Election-UK (Luntz polling for BBC)

(The cancer of Frank Luntz has spread to the BBC...)
From the new World Media Watch up now at http://www.zianet.com/insightanalytical
Tomorrow at Buzzflash.com

More headlines/summaries in also in my journal...)


1//The Guardian, UK Monday, June 19, 2006

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labour/story/0,,1800774,00.html



BROWN AIDE: WE WILL LOSE NEXT ELECTION

Labour must regain public trust or face 15 years in opposition, MP warns

Patrick Wintour, Political Editor


One of Gordon Brown's closest aides has warned that Labour on its current course will lose the next election and be out of power for 15 years, since voters have lost trust in the party and will no longer listen to its message.

The warning by Michael Wills, a former Home Office minister and the Labour MP for Swindon North, is the most public disclosure yet of the deep concern in the chancellor's circle that Labour may lose the election unless there is a radical renewal of the party.



Mr Wills said: "The trouble with the current approach is that we will go out of power and we will go out of power for 15 years." He warned that the party could not afford such a fate, suggesting the Tories would "salami-slice massively redistributive tax credits out of existence".



(SNIP)


He recounted how the American pollster Frank Lunz recently conducted focus groups for BBC Newsnight. He recalled footage of Mr Blair saying "the usual things about the health service and public service reform", which "got uniformly negative readings all the way through. So Frank Lunz asked them 'why are you responding so terribly like this, don't you like what he is saying? What they said is, 'it is him, it is you' - this is the experience actually most Labour politicians have on the doorstep with most Labour ministers, not just with the prime minister".



In an indication of what he believes the chancellor will need to do, he added that the electorate "have got to believe Labour politicians are on their side and 'understand concerns of people like us' ... They don't believe that at the moment".



(MORE)

Luntz was hired by Governor Frank Murkowski (Alaska) to try and improve his approval ratings and image.

After several trips to Alaska, Murkowski's approval rating is hovering around 14% in state polls, low 20's on SurveyUSA.

Hurry!