Polls Show Thatcher Comfortably Ahead

A sense of panic that had crept into the ranks of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Party eased Sunday when the results of three public opinion polls indicated that Labor’s unexpectedly strong challenge in the campaign for the June 11 general election has stalled.

The results, which placed the Tories in front of Labor by 11 percentage points in two polls and by seven points in a third, brought almost audible sighs of relief from Conservative campaign headquarters after a week that had shown an increasingly confident Labor Party narrowing the gap.

Dampens Upset Talk

Thatcher, 61, is attempting to become the first prime minister since the early 19th Century to win a third consecutive term.

Sunday’s poll results indicate that she is now strongly favored to succeed.

Only two days before, political observers were starting to believe that one of the biggest political upsets in recent years could be brewing after a potentially damaging gaffe by Thatcher.

Opinion polls then showed the Tory lead gradually evaporating. A Gallup poll published in Friday’s Daily Telegraph indicated that the Conservative margin had dropped to 4% from 13% in three weeks.

Analysis of this survey and of another poll conducted by the British Broadcasting Corp. indicated that Thatcher could lose her parliamentary majority and be forced to operate in a so-called hung Parliament, where the smaller Liberal-Social Democratic Alliance would hold the balance of power.

Showing uncharacteristic signs of fatigue and slowed by a tooth infection, Thatcher reportedly dressed down her senior campaign aides at a tense strategy session Thursday as confusion descended upon Conservative Party headquarters.

In sharp contrast to Thatcher, Labor leader Neil Kinnock, fighting his first general election as party leader, has presided over a well-organized campaign that has revived his party’s morale and given Thatcher a surprisingly strong challenge.

Only once over a period of three days did Kinnock stumble when attempting to justify his party’s controversial defense policy, which calls for unilaterally scrapping Britain’s nuclear deterrent and demanding the withdrawal of U.S. nuclear forces based here since the 1950s.

Kinnock remained confident Sunday that despite the latest opinion polls, his party could still win Thursday’s election.

“We shall defeat them,” he vowed at a rally in north London. “And the reason we will defeat them will be that they have wasted the past and left the future wanting.”

Labor Dictates Agenda

With the exception of the few days when the defense issue dominated, Labor has managed to dictate the agenda for the campaign, concentrating almost solely on high unemployment, low old-age pensions, a sputtering educational system and a deteriorating National Health Service notorious for long waiting lists for hospital treatment.

In addition to Labor’s strong showing, another unexpected development of the three-week campaign has been the near-collapse of the Liberal-SPD Alliance, currently running a poor third in the polls with the support of about 21% of the voters.

Barely a month ago, many of the country’s most respected political analysts had predicted that the Alliance would emerge as a major political force, possibly outstripping Labor in the popular vote and establishing itself as the principal opposition to the Tories.

However, an uninspiring election manifesto and confused, sometimes contradictory statements by its two party leaders, David Steel and David Owen, have given the Alliance an image of uncertainty that has sharply reduced its support.