A new poll has suggested that Michael Howard is failing to improve the position of his party.

The scale of the task facing the Conservative leader was revealed in a YouGov survey for the Telegraph on Friday.

The Conservatives won 32 per cent of the popular vote at the 1997 general election and 33 per cent in 2001 under William Hague.

And according to the survey they are again on 33 per cent, having made no sustained progress over the past half-decade.

However, Labour is on just 34 per cent compared with 42 per cent at the last general election and the Liberal Democrats are up from 19 per cent three years ago to 23 per cent now.

Writing in the Telegraph Professor Anthony King of Essex University concluded that "the verdict of millions of unaligned voters is thus unmistakable: 'Anybody but the Tories'."

The good news for the Tories is that the government is suffering on several counts too.

But while Tony Blair and his party's trust, satisfaction and competence ratings have all fallen since 2001, many of those who have lost faith in Labour have become "don't knows" rather than Conservative sympathisers.

On five out of six key indicators more of the electorate had negative feelings about Howard's opposition party than Blair's administration.

Nearly two thirds of respondents felt the Tories "lack a clear sense of direction" while three quarters said the Conservatives "lack an impressive team of leaders".