68 per cent say Smith would make a better Prime Minister than Corbyn
Owen Smith would make a better Labour Party leader and Prime Minister than Jeremy Corbyn, according to a BMG poll for the Evening Standard.
Fifty-eight per cent of the public said Smith would make a better party leader, 16 points ahead of Corbyn at 42.
When asked who would make the best Prime Minister, 62 per cent said Smith, against 38 per cent for Corbyn – a lead for Smith of 24 points.
The poll comes after 84 per cent of local Labour Party groups came out in favour of Corbyn. 285 constituency parties voted to support corbyn in the leader race compared to just 53 for rival Smith.
Recent polling has been dire for Labour, with 2.7 million Labour voters saying they prefer Theresa May as Prime Minister over Jeremy Corbyn, and the Tories leading by up to 14 points.
Today’s BMG poll found little difference in how likely people are to turnout to vote in 2020 with either Smith or Corbyn in post. The result was also split among those who voted Labour in 2015’s general election by 51 to 49 for Corbyn.
However, there was a large generational difference in support for the two, with 57 per cent of under-24s backing Corbyn versus 21 per cent of over-65s.
The two candidates have been busy campaiging, with Owen Smith warning of a secret Tory plan to privatise the NHS, promising a yearly 4 per cent increase in the NHS budget, and Corbyn proposing a ‘National Education Service’ for training and skills, and calling for nationalising railways and bus services.
Corbyn and Smith will cross swords tomorrow in a televised hustings event on the BBC’s Victory Derbyshire programme at 9am.
See: Diane Abbott: Jeremy Corbyn’s vision can win a general election
See: I founded a Momentum branch – but will be supporting Owen Smith
13 Responses to “Owen Smith leads Jeremy Corbyn by 24 points in BMG poll of public”
Richard Pink
So that is what happens when you poll out front of Tory HQ lol!
Smithy
BMG is notoriously crap at their job, they were paid to do this poll by the Evening Standard which is owned by Lebedev, that Corbyn hating Russian billionaire. The poll was of less than 1500 people and if you want to read the full results and believe a word anyway, sunk deep in the results is a statement that Corbyn has a clear 50 pt lead over Smith with those who are likely to vote Labour…yes folks the Tories hate him and that IS A GOOD SIGN
Skembear
“2.7 million Labour voters saying they prefer Theresa May as Prime Minister over Jeremy Corbyn”?
When did this happen?
How did they get 2.7 million to respond, or was it a straw poll of 100 carefully chosen for the purpose?