In power for just 115 days, Sir Keir Starmer’s approval rating among a deeply pessimistic public has taken a historic nose dive, collapsing a record 49 points since post-election polling.
The left-wing leader of the UK Labour Party Sir Keir Starmer, who swept to power in July on the lowest popular vote count seen in a British election in almost a century but nevertheless beating the rock-bottom Conservatives, has seen a record-breaking collapse in public confidence in his first months in power. Shortly after the election Starmer’s net approval hit as high as +11 — showing slightly more Britons approved of him than disapproved — but it has now collapsed an enormous 49 points to -38 approval.
This is the fastest drop of any modern British Prime Minister. Starmer compares poorly to his Labour predecessor Sir Tony Blair, for instance, who polled as high as +46 in the aftermath of his 1997 landslide election, and didn’t find himself in negative territory for years after, until Summer 2000. Conservative leaders fighting elections also haven’t been so distrusted so quickly as Starmer, with David Cameron taking two years to plumb such depths.
Tory Boris Johnson even pulled off the achievement of becoming more popular after his election, going from -20 to +14 by the following year.
Luke Tryl, executive director of More in Common, a pollster-cum-campaign group who undertook the opinion rating research called Starmer’s collapse “unprecedented”, reports The Independent. The former government advisor said their focus-grouping showed issues that had soured attitudes including withdrawing winter heating payments from the elderly, the mass release of prisoners, and members of the new government being caught taking freebies and donations.
Separate polling on public attitudes by the same group underlines that further points of conflict for the near-four-month-old Starmer administration lie ahead. Tomorrow, his much-previewed punishment budget is due to be made official, setting government tax, borrowing, and spending rules for the coming year. While Starmer insists the tax hikes promised are for the good of the country and those disagreeing are little more than “populists”, he certainly does not appear to have popular approval, with More in Common stating “53 per cent say the priority should be keeping taxes low compared to 32 per cent who prioritise investing in public services – putting the Government in a difficult bind”.
Making clear much of the country will be left feeling disappointed in the budget, the group said they had found “56 per cent believe Rachel Reeves can avoid both tax rises and spending cuts in the Budget”
And some issues may well cut deeper than the here-and-now of the 12-month budget. The United Kingdom appears to be facing a full-blown democratic crisis, with More in Common saying: “Less than a third of Britons now think British democracy is working, and only a fifth think our politicians are up to the challenges our country faces. If Labour can’t prove this pessimistic public wrong, many more voters will turn away from mainstream politics altogether.”