DAVID Cameron has insisted the fall in UK unemployment to below two million and the return to rising wages above inflation represent "an important moment for our country" as he warned Scottish voters not to vote SNP at the General Election because the Nationalists would do a deal to help Labour into power.
But as George Osborne announced the final Budget before the General Election would be on March 18, stressing there would be no "unaffordable pre-election giveaways", the unpredictability of next May's election was underlined by another opinion poll.
The ICM survey showed the Conservatives, following the Chancellor's Autumn Statement, had dropped three points to just 28 per cent; below what has been described as the "defeat threshold" and the lowest level since May last year.
Labour has edged upwards by one point to 33 per cent since a similar poll in November, giving Ed Miliband a five-point lead. Liberal Democrat fortunes continued to improve, climbing three points to 14 per cent; the same level as Ukip, which has stood still for the third month in a row.
On the back of more encouraging economic numbers, the Prime Minister last night addressed the 1922 Committee of Conservative backbenchers in an end-of-term address at Westminster, saying that the latest statistics showed Britain was "on the right track" and the election would be a choice between "competence" under the Tories and "chaos" under Labour.
His message to voters toying with supporting Nigel Farage was: "If you vote Ukip, you are almost certainly voting for chaos not competence."
And Mr Cameron had a message for Scottish voters too, saying that if they voted for the SNP, then it would result in a similarly disastrous result as Nicola Sturgeon's Nationalists would do a deal to get Labour into power.
Earlier during a raucous Commons question-time, the PM hailed the job statistics as a turning point for the nation, telling MPs: "What these figures show nationally is they show employment up, they show unemployment down, they show the claimant count falling for the 25th consecutive month.
"What is an important moment for our country is unemployment is now below two million and wages are rising faster than inflation; something which," he added, looking at Mr Miliband, "I am sure will be welcomed across the House."
The Labour leader concentrated on the scale of Conservatives cuts to get to what he described as Mr Cameron's "1930s vision".
He told MPs: "They are over £50bn - more than the entire amount we spend on schools, half of what we spend on the NHS and significantly more than in this parliament," and asked the PM: "Are you really pretending that cuts on this scale won't do massive damage to the frontline services?"
Mr Cameron, goading Labour that it was 17 points behind the Tories on the crunch issue of managing the economy, said the Opposition had been wrong on "every single count" in predicting fewer jobs, less growth and a rising deficit.
The latest UK jobs numbers showed that for August to October employment hit 30.8m, a rise of 115,000 for the quarter and 588,000 for the year. For the same period, unemployment was 1.96m, a fall of 63,000 for the quarter and 455,000 for the year.
Appearing before the Commons Treasury Committee, Mr Osborne highlighted the "encouraging" jobs and wages figures but warned progress could be easily undermined.
"You only have to look at the international economic situation at the moment to see there are lots of risks out there. We need increased vigilance and we need to go on ensuring our economic stability at home," he told MPs.
In response, Chris Leslie for Labour said his party would take a "tough but balanced" approach to getting the deficit down and decried the Tories for "pursuing increasingly extreme and ideological plans for much deeper spending cuts, which go well beyond balancing the books".
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