Economic Woes Erode Support For UK`s Brown - Poll

The ICM survey for the Guardian newspaper put Labour on 32 percent, down one percentage point on last month.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's ruling Labour Party has lost more ground to the opposition Conservatives, with voters unconvinced by his latest attempts to prop up the ailing economy, a poll showed on Monday.

The ICM survey for the Guardian newspaper put Labour on 32 percent, down one percentage point on last month and 12 points behind the Conservatives, who rose six points to 44.

The figures will come as a blow to Brown, who has led a high profile campaign to try to turn round the British economy ahead of an election due by May 2010.

Brown and Conservative leader David Cameron have clashed repeatedly over the government's handling of the economy, which plunged into a recession for the first time since 1991 in the last three months of 2008.

The poll was conducted after Brown unveiled a second package of measures last week to increase bank lending to help companies and homeowners struggling to get loans.

Less than a third of those polled (31 percent) think Brown's latest steps will make things better.

Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) think it will either achieve nothing or make things worse, according to results of the poll on the Guardian's Web site (www.guardian.co.uk).

Less than half (43 percent) support the government's decision to buy large stakes in several British banks, while only four out of 10 would support their nationalisation.

Among those who voted for Labour at the last election in 2005, only 48 percent thought the measures would be a success.

Asked who they trusted most with the economy, Cameron and his finance spokesman George Osborne were two points ahead of Brown and his finance minister Alistair Darling. Labour led the Conservatives by seven points on the economy in January 2008.

On Monday, Brown repeated his calls for an international response to the economic crisis.

"The fragility of the global financial system must be addressed internationally," he told reporters.

Cameron said the level of debt in Britain was "truly frightening" and public finances must be brought under control.

"In terms of personal and corporate debt, Britain is, I think it is true to say, the most indebted nation on earth," he told Sky News in an interview.

* ICM interviewed a random sample of 1,003 adults by telephone by Jan. 23 and Jan. 25.