Clark, Labour have comeback in 3 News poll

3 NEWS: The latest 3 News poll provides some welcome relief after months of pain for Prime Minister Helen Clark - her Labour party has made some significant ground on the National Party.

John Key and his party can still govern, but need some help from their friends.

The poll also shows a massive turnaround in an area Clark holds dear to her heart.

John Key reacted this week to what he called "personal attacks" Labour had made against him. To that the Prime Minister indicated Key should just harden up, and the attacks on Key for being a vacuous, empty space appear to be working.

In the latest 3 News poll, National drops 3 to 48, Labour goes up 3 to 38.

The Greens subside slightly to 5.8, Winston Peters' New Zealand First is 3.4, up a nudge but clearly his attacks on immigrants and free trade deals appear to have failed to capture voter's imaginations.

The Maori party is up to 2.9, Act and United Future barely register.

Take those results into Parliament and despite National's 10 point lead - it needs two coalition partners Act and United Future and only just governs with 62 seats.

Labour, the Greens, the Maori party and Jim Anderton's Progressive make 60 - it shows MMP very much favours Labour, Clark and her friends.

And fresh from her China trip, and her party's attacks on John Key - Clark regains her prized preferred Prime Minister trophy after she has been trailing Key for exactly a year.

Clark leaps 4 to 32 and Key slumps 6 to 29 - Winston Peters is up one.

And despite the stolen clichés voters think Clark is performing better than she has for two years – she is up to 62, and down amongst those who think she is doing poorly.

Key's at times muddling leadership has him drop to 52 among those who think he is doing well, and up 4 among those who think he is doing poorly.

So there is a lesson in this for the National Party, it needs to take some positions on policy – that is different to Labour.

It needs to stand for something because the latest poll shows that Helen Clark is not dead yet - in fact the results give her a new spring to her step as she fights to make sure this is not her last dance.