David Cameron faced another blow as Tory pollster Lord Ashcroft said his research suggested Labour could achieve a "comfortable working majority" at the General Election.
The Tory party faces a "very uphill struggle" to counter the core Labour support, bolstered by left-leaning Liberal Democrats who have drifted away since the coalition Government was formed.
Lord Ashcroft said the Prime Minister's best hope was to win over a "coalition of the willing" who are prepared to accept further austerity on the basis it will benefit the country and their families in the long run.
The former Tory treasurer's latest research examined 22 key seats, either held or targeted by Nick Clegg's party, to see which way they would fall in May.
His findings indicated that the Tories would win eight seats from the LibDems - but that Labour would also take the same number from the Lib-Dems.
Meanwhile, Ukip defectors "reckless Reckless" and "kamikaze Carswell" risk helping Labour leader Ed Miliband into Number 10, a senior eurosceptic Conservative has warned.
Former Tory deputy chairman Bernard Jenkin said ex-MPs Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless were impatient and had "kicked the table over" by deciding to join Nigel Farage's Ukip.
The Harwich and North Essex MP also called on the Prime Minister to unite the Tories and the country by clearly outlining the party's approach to the European Union in their 2015 General Election manifesto.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article