Labour rub up to Lib Dems in the hope that shine will rub off on them

The Times reports that the odds on a hung Parliament have shortened after the Lib Dem leader’s success in Thursday’s so called Prime Ministerial debate. A Populus poll for The Times reveals that the number of voters regarding Nick as likeable soared from 52 per cent before the debate to 81 per cent afterwards. David Cameron’s rating fell from 53 per cent to 43 per cent. What a shame they don’t give us the numbers for Gordon Brown but of course it is always possible that their poll wont stretch to negative numbers.

A YouGov opinion poll for today’s Sun puts the Lib Dems on 30 per cent, ahead of Labour on 28 per cent but behind the Tories on 33 per cent. Oh dear what has happened to that two horse race now. The Lib Dems popularity seems to be holding up indicating that the Nick Clegg victory is not going to be a one day wonder.

So what will the Labour party machines response to a third horse interloper be? Initially I thought that they would switch to digging for dirty on the Lib Dems in an effort to discredit them. They may still do this. But I guess a lead has been taken from the second in command himself. Old Cyclops that is and not Lord Petronella Voldermort the big smelly cheese at the top.

The Home Secretary postman Pat (Alan Johnson) speaking to The Times hours before the new poll showed how Mr Clegg’s winning performance had reshaped the election race, at least in the short term, by putting the Liberal Democrats ahead of Labour. Pat said that Labour and Mr Clegg’s party had a lot in common and that it was patronising to try to frighten voters about post-election pacts. “We have to kill this argument that coalition government is dangerous,”.

Pat went on to say that Labour and the Lib Dems were natural allies on key issues. He said that they agreed on voting reform and the dangers of Tory plans to cut £6 billion of government spending this year — although he also said that Mr Clegg’s party was “soft on crime, inept on asylum and bloody dangerous on national security”. So there we are the short term strategy is to cosy up to the Liberals and hope some of that glitter rubs off on old Gordo and his crew. Kind of like they tried to do when Barack Obama was elected. Well that didn’t work as we all know Mr Obama finds the Cyclops rather depressing. Join the club Mr Obama!

I suppose in fairness to this two horse race we ought to have a comment from the minority party. So shadow business secretary Kenneth Clarke chipped in by saying that a hung Parliament could trigger “another financial crisis” as credit-rating agencies forced up interest rates on government debt. So the response of the Tories is to wheel out their only remaining ace in the hole now that David has come over as a nice suit and tie and nothing else.