Public backs Darling over Northern Rock

Interesting poll in The Times showing that the punters (broadly) think the Government was right to nationalise Northern Rock, and a majority also don't think Alistair Darling should resign. Full story here. Notably Labour is also back in the lead in terms of the public's view of which party is best placed to handle the economy.

Although polls are notoriously volatile this is encouraging stuff for Labour, and reinforces the point that the Tories seem to have fluffed this one. The Pink Un in particular is unimpressed with the Dark Side and has openly criticised George Osborne's main line of attack this week:

"anybody who suggests that the Labour government has gone back to 1970s socialism deserves ridicule"

And yesterday it ran a piece suggesting that the Tory have "a basic misunderstanding of how securitisations worked", after they attempted to ramp up the scaremongering about Granite. Boy George has also been given a monstering by Simon Heffer (I feel nauseous just writing that!). Whilst I would normally interpret this as a good thing for the Cameroons, in this case I think he has a bit of a point.

It used to be the case that the Tories and their supporters would try and overplay a Labour mess-up or controversial policy by decsribing it as "Labour's poll tax". These days you are more likely to hear about "Labour's Black Wednesday". (We are apparently unable to understand current events unless we are given a historical comparison). However if it's a strange "crisis" for the Government that sees the public largely behind it, and the opposition given a pasting for politicking.

Not such a bad week for Labour afterall.