National buoyed by nine-point lead on Labour in poll

National MPs will go into the final week of the parliamentary year buoyed by the latest poll result that shows them pulling ahead of Labour.

The Television One/Colmar Brunton Poll released yesterday has National up 2 percentage points to 46 per cent support and Labour down 3 points to 37 per cent.

Labour MPs will be looking to weather the final attacks on its vulnerable political points knowing that they won the only poll that really matters - the election in September.

The poll shows that Labour has been hurt in the last month as fears of economic gloom deepen, questions were raised about the deal done with New Zealand First leader Winston Peters and the credibility of Cabinet minister David Benson-Pope was attacked.

As MPs scatter for the summer holidays both Labour and National will be looking ahead to the next three years of this Government.

Helen Clark was on 37 per cent as most preferred prime minister, despite losing 2 percentage points support since the last poll.

National leader Don Brash slipped 4 points to 20 per cent support, and the party's finance spokesman John Key was up, slowly rising another 2 points to 7 per cent.

The poll of 1000 people was conducted between December 5 and December 8 and has a margin of error of 3.2 per cent.

- NZPA