Blair 'popular as Thatcher'

TONY Blair’s Government is about as popular now as Margaret Thatcher’s administration was in the middle of its second term.

But there has been a comparatively steeper decline in public satisfaction with the current Government in the six years since it came to power, the analysis of long-term trends by the Mori Social Research Institute found.

Although the Blair administration enjoyed a sharp rise in popularity to about 55% public satisfaction after the September 11 terrorist attacks, satisfaction has fallen rapidly since then to about 25%.

Report authors Bobby Duffy and Gideon Skinner said: "The key question for the current Government is whether they will continue on this steep descent or now lock on to a more gradual decline in popularity."