As the UK general election campaign moves into its final 48 hours, the Conservative Party has crept into the lead, with circa 35 percent of the national vote and Labour and the Liberal Democrats jointly on 28 percent.

The Labour campaign, always lacklustre, has become demob-happy since Gordon Brown's gaffe of last week, when he was recorded describing a lifelong Labour supporter in Rochdale as a "bigoted woman." Three government ministers have now urged Labour supporters in Conservative/Liberal Democrat marginal seats to vote Liberal Democrat rather than Labour to keep out the Conservatives, and one Labour candidate has even described Gordon Brown as "the worst prime minister in the history of Britain."

The Liberal Democrats, too, have faltered slightly, as the more rational 'floating voters' forget Nick Clegg's TV thespian skills and look more closely at Lib Dem policies, which include such turn-offs as amnesty for illegal immigrants and joining the Euro.

Conservative seats are generally larger and have higher turnouts than Labour seats, so the odds are always a little against the Conservatives -- they need around 40 percent of the vote to attain a majority, whereas Labour could achieve a majority with just 34 percent. Nevertheless, the Conservatives look likely to win with a workable majority (YouGov estimates 300 seats, to Labour's 230 and the Liberal Democrats' 90). The chief unknown factors are the performance, first, of the Liberal Democrats and, in a small number of southern English seats, the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP).