Increased minimum wage and a lower income tax starting rate among opposition's election proposals
Labour has a twin deficit problem. Ed Miliband is seen as less fit to be prime minister than David Cameron. And the Conservatives are a long way ahead on economic competence.
Parties sometimes win with unpopular leaders. Jim Callaghan was better liked than Margaret Thatcher in 1979. They can also win when they are behind on the economy, as Tony Blair was in 1997. But there is no recent precedent for victory when voters like neither a party's leader nor its economic policies.
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