A week ago Anji Hunter, Blair's private secretary and one of his closest political confidants, was telling colleagues that she feared a rogue poll would show Hague fighting back. That, she concluded, might not be such a bad thing as it would motivate Labour supporters to vote. But as the campaign enters its third week there is no sign that Hunter's nervousness, shared by Alastair Campbell, is justified. Every night Philip Gould, Blair's personal pollster, receives pages of polling evidence from the firm NOP, which is paid to undertake polls for the party. The party has done three polls since the campaign began.
Every indicator is up.
On education, tax, the economy and education Gould says more people think Labour have the better policies as the campaign progresses. Over the last seven days confidence has grown. Before the campaign began Downing Street feared that attacks on crime, Europe, tax and the state of public services could make their campaign suffer. There have been wobbles but no resultant lift for the Tories. The key to this whole campaign has been getting the economic message across and saying that the Tories would ruin it by bribing you with tax cuts,' said a Millbank campaign team member.