LABOUR has increased its support among working-class voters since the start of the election campaign, while losing ground among professionals and managers.

The latest Times/ITV News tracker poll, by Populus, highlights how Labour’s high level of support has masked big shifts among different social classes. This suggests that, while the renewed controversy about the Iraq war has led to defections among professionals and managers, there has been no adverse impact among working-class groups.

Many manual workers and their families have responded posititively to Labour’s emphasis on public services and the economy and its warnings about alleged Tory cuts.

Overall, Labour is down one point compared with yesterday at 41 per cent, with the Tories unchanged on 29 per cent, the Liberal Democrats unchanged on 21 per cent, and other parties up one point to 9 per cent. This would indicate that Labour has shrugged off the various disclosures about the Iraq war.

Labour support among skilled manual and unskilled workers has been just over 50 per cent during the past week, up from a little over 40 per cent at the start of the campaign.

Labour is also doing well among white-collar, nonmanual, workers, where support has risen by six or seven points since the end of March.

By contrast, Labour support among professionals and managers has dropped by roughly ten points to 27-28 per cent over the month.

This is a measure of the Iraq factor, especially as the Lib Dems have increased their share in this group by between three and five points to the mid-twenties.

A consistent third of voters say that, while they are disappointed with Labour overall, they would prefer the party to be in power rather than the Conservatives Similarly, while half the electorate, (52 per cent) do not think Tony Blair has been a good Prime Minister, nearly two thirds (64 per cent) want him to remain in No 10; this includes a quarter who do not believe he has been a good Prime Minister overall, but still prefer him to Michael Howard. Just a quarter (26 per cent) would prefer Mr Howard.

For more details, log on to www.populuslimited.com

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