Since Andy Burnham took over from Keir Starmer as leader of the Labour Party, 18 opinion polls have been carried out looking at the nation’s voting intention.

Labour has been in first or joint-first place in 12 of them – that’s two thirds of all the polls conducted.

Labour has an outright lead in seven of those 12, and is tied with Reform in five of them. The six polls all have Reform in first place.

The scale of Labour’s lead in the polls in which the party is ahead varies significantly. The highest is with BMG Research (five points) and the second highest is with Opinium (4 points).

While none of these polls – if borne out in an actual general election – would lead to a substantial majority, they are nonetheless good news for Labour.

Prior to Keir Starmer announcing his resignation as Labour leader, the party had only one poll in the whole of 2026.

However, whether Burnham can maintain this strength of polling remains to be seen – either it is indicative of a long-term trend or of a short-lived honeymoon.

The full list of polls carried out since Burnham became Labour leader are below.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

Image credit: Simon Dawson / Number 10 – Creative Commons

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Labour has been in first place or joint-first place in the last eight opinion polls published by major polling firms.

The polls in question all had their fieldwork conducted since 24 July, following Andy Burnham becoming prime minister.

In every one of the eight polls, Reform are in second or in joint-first place. Labour’s lead is highest with BMG (five points) and Opinium (four points). Find Out Now, YouGov and Deltapoll all have Labour and Reform tied.

These polls are a massive turnaround in Labour’s position with the electorate. The last time Labour led in eight consecutive polls was almost two years ago October 2024. Most polls have had Reform in first place since then.

Since Burnham became prime minister, Reform have fallen around three points in the polls. The Lib Dems and the Greens have also fallen around one to two points each.

Despite the poll bounce, the scale of Labour’s lead at the moment means that it is unlikely Labour would win a substantial majority were a general election held now.

The BMG poll that has Labour with a five point lead would – according to Electoral Calculus’ prediction calculator – leave Labour seven seats short of an overall majority in the House of Commons.

The Opinion poll that has Labour with a four point lead – according to the same calculator – put Labour 23 seats short of a majority.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

Image credit: Simon Dawson / Number 10 – Creative Commons

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Polling firm Find Out Now carried out the poll from 24-25 June in the immediate aftermath of Starmer’s announcement.

The poll found support for Labour is up substantially on a week prior.

The full results of the poll were as follows:

• Reform: 24 per cent
• Labour: 21 per cent
• Tory: 18 per cent
• Green: 15 per cent
• Lib Dem: 12 per cent
• SNP: 3 per cent

That might not seem to be too positive for Labour at a first glance. However, the 21 per cent for Labour is up six points on the 15 per cent Find Out Now had the party on just one week ago.

Reform are down three points on the previous week, the Greens down two points and the Lib Dems down one.

It remains to be seen whether this poll is an outlier or instead part of a wider trend.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

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Over half of voters (53 per cent) who have stopped voting Labour to back other centrist or left wing parties cite the government’s response to Gaza as a factor in their decision. One-in-five (21 per cent) said it factored a great deal in their decision to switch and nearly a third (31 per cent) said it factored in to some extent.

These former Labour voters have switched to the Green Party, Plaid Cymru, SNP, Liberal Democrats and Independent candidates. Green voters were most likely to say Gaza was a factor, with over two thirds (67 per cent) saying it was a factor.

The polling also shows that progressive voters who switched from Labour overwhelmingly think that the government should take stronger action against Israel, such as imposing sanctions. Eight in ten (82 per cent) support the UK government taking this approach, including 64 per cent who strongly support it and 17 per cent who somewhat support it, compared to just 5 per cent who are opposed.

Four-in-five (80 per cent) switchers support a ban on all arms sales to Israel, and three quarters (75 per cent) support a ban on UK trade linked with Israel’s illegal occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

Nearly three quarters (74 per cent) of those who have abandoned Labour for centrist and left wing parties since Keir Starmer became leader in 2020 and 85 per cent of those who cited Gaza as a reason for their decision said that their opinion of the Labour Party would improve if the next leader were to adopt a stronger policy relating to Israel’s assault on Gaza, such as imposing sanctions or further restrictions on arms sales.

The poll was commissioned by Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Friends of the Earth, and conducted by Opinium.

Peter Leary, Deputy Director at the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, said: “The public is rightly horrified by the government’s ongoing support for Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinian people.

“This poll confirms that Palestine was on the ballot for millions of progressive voters during last month’s elections. Parties that supported the call for meaningful action – including a full arms embargo and wide-ranging sanctions against Israel – were heavily rewarded.

“If any new Labour leader hopes to win back these lost voters, they must urgently break with Keir Starmer’s shameful complicity in Israel’s genocide and other grave violations of international law.”

Finnian Murtagh, international campaigner at Friends of the Earth England, Wales and Northern Ireland, added: “The occupation of Palestine, including the genocide in Gaza, is one of the foremost issues of humanitarian crisis and environmental injustice in the world today.

“It’s no surprise that people in the UK want to see an end to the occupation and the brutal suppression of Palestinian lives and livelihoods. Voters want political parties – and a government – willing to stand up for Palestinians, protect lives and end decades of devastating environmental abuses.

“This polling sets a clear path for how Labour can uphold international law and it must start with issuing a full arms embargo on Israel.”

This polling comes at a time when evidence is mounting that Labour is losing more votes to parties of the left and centre rather than to the right. According to a recent poll conducted by YouGov, 80 per cent of the voters who switched from Labour between the 2024 general election and the May 2026 local elections voted for left or centrist parties rather than right wing parties.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

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The poll, from More in Common, has found that Polanski has a net approval rating of -8. The Lib Dems’ Ed Davey is second on -10, the Tories’ Kemi Badenoch comes third on -12 and Reform’s Nigel Farage is in fourth on -17.

The prime minister Keir Starmer has far and away the worst approval rating of the lot – sitting at -50.

Net approval ratings are calculated by taking all the people in a poll who say they think the leader is doing a good job minus all those who say they think they are doing a bad job.

While Polanski has the best net approval rating, a quarter (25 per cent) of respondents told More in Common they don’t know whether he is doing a good or bad job – the highest for any party leader. Another quarter (24 per cent) said that he is doing neither a good job or a bad job.

This implies that there is a substantial portion of the British public who are yet to make up their mind on the Green Party leader.

That’s a much better position to be in than Starmer’s. A whopping 68 per cent of the public think he’s doing a ‘somewhat’ or ‘very’ bad job. Almost half (47 per cent) said he was doing a ‘very’ bad job.

Elsewhere in More in Common’s research, there are the latest voting intention figures. Here there’s more good news for Polanski’s Greens. The headline voting intention figures are as follows:

• Reform: 29 per cent
• Conservative: 19 per cent
• Labour: 18 per cent
• Lib Dem: 14 per cent
• Green: 14 per cent

The Green vote share has increased three points since the last More in Common poll. All the fieldwork for the poll was carried out after the Gorton and Denton by-election, which the Green Party won.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

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Despite this, there’s evidence to suggest that support for Reform is now beginning to fall. It’s been three months since the local elections in May. Reform have been fairly consistently ahead in the polls throughout that period.

However, there does appear to have been a recent shift – and it’s against Reform.

In the first half of that three month period, Reform averaged support from 29.7% of the public across 37 opinion polls. In the second half, Reform have averaged 28.9% across 38 polls.

While this isn’t a major dip, it could suggest that support for Reform peaked earlier this year and has now started to fall.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

Image credit: House of Commons – Creative Commons

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Polling firm Survation has conducted its regular poll of Labour members on their thoughts on every cabinet minister for LabourList. The results of the poll indicate the ‘favourability’ ratings of each cabinet minister – ie. the percentage of members who have a positive view of them minus those who have a negative view.

Generally speaking, the poll shows that the Labour membership is happy with the cabinet. Only four cabinet members have a net negative favourability rating. In less good news for the government, two of those are the most high profile cabinet members – the prime minister Keir Starmer and the chancellor Rachel Reeves. The other two cabinet ministers with a negative favourability rating are the work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall and the international development minister Baroness Chapman.

At the other end of the table, the energy secretary Ed Miliband is the most popular cabinet minister among Labour members, closely followed by the deputy prime minister Angela Rayner.

The full results of the poll of Labour members are below. The percentages listed indicate the net favourability ratings of each cabinet minister.

• Ed Miliband (74%)
• Angela Rayner (71%)
• Hilary Benn (38%)
• Lisa Nandy (32%)
• Shabana Mahmood (31%)
• Bridget Philipson (31%)
• John Healey (30%)
• Jonathan Reynolds (29%)
• Heidi Alexander (25%)
• Yvette Cooper (23%)
• Darren Jones (19%)
• David Lammy (16%)
• Pat McFadden (14%)
• Baroness Smith (13%)
• Steve Reed (11%)
• Jo Stevens (10%)
• Ian Murray (8%)
• Lucy Powell (8%)
• Wes Streeting (7%)
• Ellie Reeves (4%)
• Alan Campbell (4%)
• Lord Hermer (2%)
• Baroness Chapman (-5%)
• Keir Starmer (-7%)
• Liz Kendall (-23%)
• Rachel Reeves (-28%)

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

Image credit: Lauren Hurley / Number 10 – Creative Commons

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According to the analysis – from Electoral Calculus – it is true that Labour are losing some voters to Reform. But that’s only part of the picture.

At the last general election, Labour won the support of 35 out of every 100 people who voted. Since then, three out of those 35 now say they’ll vote for Reform UK.

By contrast, two out of 35 say they’ll be voting Green and two out of the 35 say they’ll be voting Lib Dem. That means more former 2024 Labour voters are saying they’ll vote for one of these parties than for Reform.

More striking for Labour, though, is how many of their previous voters that are now saying they won’t vote at all. Six out of the 35 are now saying they don’t plan to vote.

Despite the fact this analysis reveals that Labour aren’t leaking votes en masse to Reform, it’s still bad news for Keir Starmer, as a large proportion of the party’s 2024 voters are no longer planning on voting Labour.

Nevertheless, it’s also pretty bad news for the Tories. A greater proportion of 2024 Tory voters are saying they’ll vote Reform now than 2024 Labour voters. Like Labour, the Tories are also losing people who voted for them in 2024 and now say they don’t plan to vote.

But crucially, despite Labour having been in government for almost a year, the Tories aren’t winning support from 2024 Labour voters.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

Image credit: Simon Dawson – Creative Commons

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The Conservatives are estimated to lose significant support and councillors to Reform UK, with their adjusted vote share (reflecting the new local authority boundaries) falling from 46% in 2021 to 25% in this May’s elections.

In terms of the number of councillors elected, the Conservatives and Reform, which won no seats in 2021, are expected to win around 700 seats each.

Meanwhile, the Lib Dems are forecast to win around 400 seats and Labour around 300.

The government has postponed elections in nine English local authority areas from May 2025 to May 2026 to help with planning for local government devolution and creating unitary authorities in two-tier local government areas.

Focusing only on elections that are going ahead as scheduled, the poll suggests Reform could gain control of or be the largest party on eight councils, while the Conservatives are projected to win 10.

As the seats up for election are in rural shire areas rather than cities, Labour is not expected to perform as well.

The poll, conducted by Electoral Calculus on behalf of the Telegraph using Multilevel Regression and Post-stratification (MRP) methodology, measured voting intentions for the local elections scheduled for 1 May 2025.

Polling took place from 1-10 March 2025, with a sample size of over 5,400 respondents.

Martin Baxter, founder of Electoral Calculus, said: “Our local election poll shows that the Conservatives are likely to make significant losses compared with their strong performance back in 2021. 

“Reform UK look like the main gainers as they could take control of eight councils to gain their first real power-base in local government. But the large-scale delays to elections, affecting over five and a half million voters, will soften the scale of Conservative losses and reduce Reform’s gains.”

Another MRP analysis by Electoral Calculus suggests that if an election were held today, Labour would secure the most seats in the House of Commons, with 189 MPs. However, this would be less than half of their current total, leaving them 137 seats short of a majority.

Notably, Electoral Calculus’ analysis suggests Labour would lose 121 parliamentary seats to Reform.

Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward

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Left Foot Forward previously took a look at who could be in the running to win, based on national polls and the way voters tend to behave in by-elections. Now, we have a little more of an indication as to what might happen as the first constituency level poll has been published.

Lord Ashcroft Polls asked voters in the constituency who they intend to vote for. The results offer grim reading for Labour. Despite Keir Starmer’s party winning the seat in 2024 with more than 50 per cent of the vote, the poll suggests Reform will win in the by-election.

According to Ashcroft’s poll, the current voting intention in the by-election is as follows:

• Reform UK – 40%
• Labour – 35%
• Tory – 10%
• Lib Dem – 8%
• Green – 6%
• Other – 2%

Despite the shocking results of the poll, it should be taken with a pinch of salt. All polls have margins of error, with those in individual constituencies being larger than those of national polls. Additionally, polls take a snapshot of opinion at a given time. A by-election is at least several weeks away, and voting intention could well shift considerably between now and then.

Nevertheless, it shows that Labour could be in trouble in one of its first big electoral tests since winning the general election last July.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward

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