Nearly half of UK Labour voters want Starmer out by next election

A new poll shows how far the prime minister’s popularity has sunk after a chaotic briefing row and build-up to the budget.

Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer takes part in a youth Q&A session at Downing Street. Picture: AFP

Almost half of all Labour voters want Sir Keir Starmer out of Downing Street by the time of the next election, polling for The Times has found.

The YouGov survey of 2100 people reveals that 23 per cent of Labour voters think the prime minister should quit now and allow the party to elect a new leader. A further 22 per cent think he should stand down before the next election. Only a third, 34 per cent, think he should continue to lead the Labour Party into the contest.

The results of the polling, carried out on November 12 and 13, come after a week of chaos in government in which Downing Street figures accused Wes Streeting, the health secretary, of plotting to oust Sir Keir and insisted that the prime minister would fight any attempt to depose him.

In an interview with the Daily Mirror, Sir Keir vowed that he would lead Labour into the next election and criticised speculation on his future.

“Let me be really clear - every minute that’s not spent talking about and dealing with the cost of living is a minute wasted of the political work of this government,” he said. “That’s my response to last week. I remain utterly focused on what matters to me most, which is bearing down on the cost of living and making people feel better off.”

Significant numbers of Labour MPs are concerned that Sir Keir is now a liability and say that he could face a challenge after local elections in May.

The polling found voters drawing unfavourable comparisons with the last Conservative government: 29 per cent said that the Tories were a more competent administration than Labour; 25 per cent said Labour was more competent; and 29 per cent thought they were equally bad. Just over 40 per cent said Rishi Sunak was a better prime minister than Sir Keir, including 14 per cent of those who voted Labour last year. Over half said that Labour was either more or as divided as the Conservatives.

The polling was published just over a week before the budget, when Rachel Reeves will attempt to fill a £20bn ($bn) hole in the government’s finances.

The survey found that 14 per cent of the electorate as a whole, and 33 per cent of Labour voters, trust the Labour chancellor to make sensible decisions on tax and spending. The figure for the electorate as a whole is lower than for Kemi Badenoch (20 per cent), Nigel Farage (24 per cent) and the Green leader Zack Polanski (18 per cent).

Overall, if there were an election today, Labour would be on 19 per cent of the vote, Reform UK on 27 per cent and the Greens and the Tories would be tied on 17 per cent.

In terms of potential successors to Sir Keir, Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, continues to lead the field, backed by 18 per cent of voters overall and 30 per cent of those who voted Labour at the last election.

Mr Streeting is backed by 8 per cent of voters, while Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, and Ms Reeves are both on 4 per cent.

The Times