More bad news for Brown
The mood music to yesterday was yet another raft of redundancies, from Merrill Lynch to JCB, and the recession is now clearly taking its political toll on the government.
This morning's has the Tories back to a 10-point lead over Labour (43% to 33%, with the Lib Dems languishing at 15%), the second poll to go against the government in as many weeks.
There is clearly much worse to come on the jobs front, with the British Chamber of Commerce forecasting that current unemployment of 1.8m will reach over 3m by early 2010, still the most likely date for the general election.
Many forecasters now think the economy will decline by over 2% this year, much more than the official forecasts, whose prediction that the economy would start to recover in the autumn must now be in doubt.
Undaunted, the government continues to be anxious to give the impression of activity: yesterday's job summit is now about to be followed by a new loan guarantee scheme for small and medium sized businesses, with the aim of getting credit flowing again.
The Tories have been pushing the government to do something along these lines for sometime, though the idea has its critics. We'll be looking at the details with Shadow Chancellor George Osborne.
The move comes as Britain's retail sector reports the worst Christmas trading figures on record ... we'll hear from businessman Mark Constantine.
And the former health secretary Alan Milburn will be joining us to talk about social mobility -- or the lack of it -- as the Government unveils new ideas for increasing the chances of the poorest in Britain.
All that on the Daily Politics on Ö÷²¥´óÐã2 from Noon today.
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