I’d been puzzled by the (numerous!) comments by Labour about how popular their plans to lock people up without trial for 90 days were. My post bag has been pretty 50-50 on the issue – and this is even despite me having gone forth with all sorts of media coverage standing in for our Shadow Home Secretary Mark Oaten – who’s been ill.

I know – you need to take with a pinch of salt what your postbag (real or virtual) tells you as it’s a self-selecting sample. But normally people are much happier to tell you they disagree with you than they agree!

Enlightenment comes with Saturday’s Guardian and a proper poll by a proper company. Not one of The Sun’s phone in polls – but a full opinion poll by ICM.

And the verdict? 18% think 28 days detention without trial is too long; another 28% think 28 days is about right. That makes 46% supporting 28 days or less. So much for overwhelming support for 90 days! It’s only a thin majority in favour of Labour’s position.

So – that makes my post bag make a bit more sense after all! For me, it is a very important point of principle which I’d have stood by and argued my ground on regardless of the polls – but I will admit it’s nice to see evidence that there are rather more people with me and other than Blair and The Sun would have you believe…

(There’s a great piece taking apart The Sun’s claims on Tim Ireland’s blog. And if you’re wondering about the YouGov poll sometimes quoted – well, that presented as fact the police’s claims that they need 3 months to investigate people before charging them. But the whole debate has been about whether or not this is true!)