Poll to Poll

By any standards, the decision by the Labour leadership this week to suspend from the party its former leader, Jeremy Corbyn, over his response to the Equalities and Human Rights Commission report into the party’s response to anti-Semitism during his time as leader was a dramatic step. According to some reports it led some of Corbyn’s more supportive MPs to consider leaving Labour to form a new party entirely. Len Mccluskey, leader of the Unite trade union meanwhile warned that the move risked the party facing defeat at the next general election. But what evidence is there to support such a statement? The answer is not very much. Polling conducted by YouGov just after the news of Jeremy Corbyn’s suspension will embolden the party’s current leadership. Asked to compare Keir Starmer to Jeremy Corbyn, 52% of respondents said that Starmer has been a better leader than Corbyn, with just 8% saying that Corbyn was a better leader. Among those who voted Labour at the 2019 election, 55...

Labour has edged ahead of the Conservatives in respect of voting intentions according to new polling published by Opinium. The research finds 40% saying they would vote Labour, the same level as when Opinium published a similar poll two weeks ago. The Conservatives meanwhile are down 2 percentage points to 38%. The Liberal Democrats remain unchanged at 6%. When it comes to who would make the best Prime Minister, Kier Starmer has a 1 point lead over Boris Johnson, with 31% opting for Starmer (down 2 points from a fortnight ago) and 30% saying Boris Johnson. Following a week which saw the Mayor of Greater Manchester (GM), Andy Burnham, propelled into the national spotlight over the Government’s decision to place GM into Tier 3 COVID-19 restrictions, among those living in the North West, Burnham enjoys a net approval rating of +23%. Nationally, Boris Johnson has a net approval rating of -14% compared to Kier Starmer on +14%. Meanwhile, following in the footsteps of the Trump ad...

In a little over a weeks’ time we should (and I stress should) know who has won the US presidential election. But after the final debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump last Thursday and with the candidates that their supporters bouncing from one swing state to another, the question is what the state of the race is? A new ABC News/Ipsos poll out today helpfully sheds some light on the situation. Summarising the findings, its analysis notes that “views of the two candidates are largely unchanged since the Conventions.” It continues: “President Trump does appear to be rallying some of the groups who traditionally support him, but favourability towards him remains decidedly negative. Joe Biden, meanwhile, continues to break nearly even with as many viewing him favourably as unfavourable. This comes as the large majority of Americans continue to be concerned about potential coronavirus infection.” According to the poll , 35% of respondents said they had a favourable view of Trum...

That the popularity of the Conservative Party and Boris Johnson especially has fallen sharply since last year’s general election is beyond doubt, if the polls are to be believed.   The question however is whether this represents an inevitable short term blip given the difficult decisions needing to be made during the COVID-19 pandemic, or a longer term problem for the Government? The answer is that in the end we won’t really know until the UK goes to the polls again in four years’ time. What we do know though is that leading a Government through COVID-19 is not a one way street to plummeting unpopularity. Take New Zealand for example, where the Labour Party, led by Jacinda Arden, has won a crushing victory in the general election.   The party secured 49.1% of the votes cast, up 12.2% since the last election in 2017 and in the process making it the first time the party has been able to govern on its own with an outright majority since 1996. As Reuters notes voters “reward...

In any normal political week that had not been dominated by Brexit and COVID-19, the eyes of much of the British media and political establishment would have turned to Scotland following what can only be dubbed as an eye popping poll by Ipsos Mori of voters in Scotland. By way of background Ipsos MORI Scotland interviewed a representative sample of 1,045 adults aged 16+ across Scotland. Interviews were conducted by telephone between the 2nd and 9 th October 2020. Voting Intention Firstly, with voters set to elect a new Scottish Parliament next year, the poll found that the headline voting intentions for the constituency vote of the ballot were SNP 58%, Conservatives 19%, Labour 13%, the Liberal Democrats 8% and others on 2%. When it comes to the regional list section of the vote the results were SNP 47%, Conservatives 19%, Labour 13%, Green 9%, Liberal Democrats 8% and others on 3%. According to the Election Polling website if these figures were to be a reality in next yea...

Covid-19, the future of the UK as it currently exists, Brexit and the long term future of the Prime Minster. By anyone’s standards, Boris Johnson’s in tray is immense. With that in mind, a number of polls published over the past few days will be proving plenty of food for thought for Number 10. COVID-19 Ipsos Mori has published polling which should embolden those in government who feel that the principle objective needs to be to control the spread of the virus (as opposed to ensuring the economy remains as open as possible). The online poll of 1,879 adults in Britain which was undertaken between 9 th and 10 th October found that: 70% were concerned about the risk that coronavirus posed to themselves, with 86% concerned about the risk it posed to the country as a whole. 62% said that the country needed to take whatever measures are necessary to control the spread of coronavirus and reduce the number of deaths whilst 27% indicated that the country needed to relax measures to c...

With Donald Trump having left hospital following his coronavirus diagnosis, his strategy ahead of the election now seems simple – to  argue that he has fought and beaten COVID-19, that the rest of the United States can do the same and that the economy can return to something approaching normal again. The question is will the public accept this narrative? Based on polling, the answer is not really. According to a national poll for CNN by SSRS between 1 st and 4 th October, among likely voters, 57% said they plan to vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, with just 41% indicating that they will vote for Donald Trump and Mike Pence. Asked about their views of Donald Trump, 39% said they had a favourable opinion of him, with 59% having an unfavourable opinion. When it comes to Joe Biden, 52% had a favourable opinion of him, compared to 42% who had an unfavourable opinion. Asked about what issues were likely to be most important to them in determining their votes, among likely an...

As the Conservative faithful meet for their annual conference, albeit virtually, it provides an important opportunity to assess where the party now stands, less than a year after it won a landslide victory at the General Election with an 80 seat majority in the House of Commons. Thankfully, on cue, the former Treasurer and Deputy Chair of the Conservative Party, turned pollster, Lord Ashcroft, has released the results of one of his new mega polls which does not make for comfortable reading for the Prime Minister or the Conservative Party more widely. By way of background the 8,051 adults in Great Britain were interviewed online between 17 th and 24 th September 2020, with the data having been weighted to be representative of all adults in Great Britain. Impact of COVID-19 63% of all those questioned said that they felt the Government had under-reacted to the threat of COVID-19, including 50% of those who voted Conservative in 2019 and 82% of Labour voters. Among those who sw...

 “I do accept that what we’re doing is extraordinary: we’re taking away the ancient, inalienable right of free-born people of the United Kingdom to go to the pub, and I can understand how people feel about that.” With these words the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, announced in March that pubs would have to close as part of the initial national lockdown in the UK to address the COVID-19 pandemic. Ever since pubs began to open again, their role in the fight against COVID has been under considerable scrutiny, with the Government actively encouraging people over the summer to go out and support the country’s hospitality industry. By the end of last month however the Prime Minister took the decision that all pubs needed to be closed by 10pm, a decision which many now question as we have witnessed scenes of town and city centres packed with little social distancing as pub goers are all turfed out at the same time. But what does the public think of the Government’s approach to th...