Does the end of the recession change anything?

Today is likely to be the last day before the recession is announced as officially over.

Actually the Q4 GDP figures that will be released with uncharacteristic fanfare tomorrow, will show that the recession ended at some time between September and December.

I gleefully announced this to a fed-up upscale Italian deli proprietor at lunch time, and he shrugged his shoulders. Tomorrow’s news might be similarly received around the country, if our exclusive ICM poll is right. 72 per cent of voters said that being officially out of recession would make ‘no difference’ to whether they would vote for Labour at the coming General Election.

The UK government (20 per cent) was the single most responsible factor in the recovery, followed by the Bank of England (14 per cent), said our voters.

Men, social class AB, northerners and Scots were much more likely to give credit to the government. Yet if the news doesn’t translate into a leg-up in the polls for Mr Brown, then the answer to our question on our voters’ current financial situation shows why.

Nearly half of respondents say they currently feel worse off (46 per cent) than they did last year, compared with slightly less for ‘no change’ (41 per cent) and a few, presumably bailiffs and bailed out bankers, who say they are better-off (11per cent).

This feeling of consumer confidence is absolutely key. As Capital Economics point out, the relationship between consumer confidence is uncanny. In the past months as this measure rapidly deteriorated, so did the government’s poll deficit. As it has begun to rebound, the poll gap has closed. The long-run connection can be seen on this graph:

As Capital’s Jonathan Loynes says: ‘Much could yet hang on how confidence and the economic recovery develop from here’. The embryonic pause in the length of dole queues, the smaller-than-expected repossession numbers and the still remarkable rises in house prices could yet lift consumer confidence. On the GFK measure it is already at the level consistent with a single digit Conservative poll lead, and therefore close to hung parliament territory. If the loose relationship holds over the next few weeks, it might make the poll numbers very interesting indeed.

* On tomorrow’s GDP number, what matters is the strength. Consensus forecasts see it at 0.4 per cent growth. I think it might be higher, and therefore higher than France and Germany.