The Conservatives remain as unpopular as they were under Iain Duncan Smith's leadership, according to the results of a Guardian/ICM poll.

The party is eight points behind Labour - the biggest gap since May 2003, when Duncan Smith was battling to save his job.

Howard is more unpopular than Tony Blair in the country at large and even less popular among Tory voters than the prime minister is among Labour supporters.

The regular monthly Guardian/ICM poll of the wider electorate shows Labour on 38 per cent, eight points ahead of the Conservatives.

It would be enough to see Labour returned with a Commons majority of more than 120.

The monthly ICM poll also shows that Howard's popularity has continued to slide with only 33 per cent of the country think he is doing a good job compared with 41 per cent who rate Blair's performance as satisfactory.