With all eyes on Washington this week, a clutch of British opinion polls haven’t received the attention they deserve. But the picture they paint is extraordinary. It’s basically a three-way tie between Labour, the Tories and Reform UK — each on about a quarter of the vote.
The precise order varies from pollster to pollster. Labour is ahead with YouGov and JL Partners, but trails with More in Common and Find Out Now. It’s all so close that first, second and third place is much less important than the fact that Labour is down substantially on its general election performance, Reform substantially up, and the Tories stuck where they were.
Of course, the next general election probably won’t be until 2028 or 2029, so Labour has years to rescue itself. That, however, assumes that the conventional view of British political dynamics is correct — i.e. that the polls depend on the success or failure of the governing party. If so, the current three-way split in the polls is a temporary aberration. With Keir Starmer’s government yet to get its act together and the official Opposition still reeling after a landslide defeat, Reform is merely filling the vacuum.
But what if the three-way split is the new normal? In fact, what if it’s been the natural state of British politics for at least a decade? This would be in line with politics on the continent, where electorates are typically split three ways between the Left, the centre-right and the populist Right. The only reason why this pattern hasn’t been more obvious in the UK is that our electoral system tends to destabilise protest parties, leaving populist voters drifting and homeless.
But not anymore. Reform UK is a more professional operation than Ukip ever was. What’s more, with about a quarter of the vote, it has reached a critical mass at which a protest vote is no longer a wasted vote, but one that can get a substantial number of MPs elected.
Rather than being transitory, it’s plausible that the current distribution of support between the parties represents a new and stable equilibrium. If that’s the case, then Labour is stuck in a deeper hole than it thinks. The same would be true of the Conservatives, of course, but they already know what life is like on a low vote share. In addition, they suffered their crushing defeat after 14 years in government. That meant that many of their top people were at the end of their political careers — or, like David Cameron, George Osborne and Boris Johnson, already out.
But if Labour is heading for a similar fate, then many of its champions will be cut down in their prime. Wes Streeting and Jess Phillips are both in vulnerable seats. In their cases, Muslim independents are the main threat, but Reform poses the greater danger. According to one projection, a populist surge could sweep away Cabinet ministers John Healey, Bridget Phillipson, Lisa Nandy and Pat McFadden. Even Angela Rayner isn’t safe.
Labour faces a struggle not to be kicked out after just four or five years in power, having not faced that sort of humiliation since 1979. The ensuing trauma almost destroyed the party in the early Eighties, and Labour may not survive it today.
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
SubscribeLabour has years to rescue itself. Itself?
Streeting has reportedly issued a challenge that the UK should ‘fight Farage’. What should be the response of Reform UK and the millions who voted for them? We accept the challenge?
Now it’s reported that Trump has praised Starmer. Ought a centrist praised by a ‘fascist’ be the metaphorical kiss of death?
I can’t work out why Trump complimented Starmer. What is Trump after ?
Isn’t it the ultimate humiliation for a Labour leader, to be praised by a right-wing Republican? This is expert trolling on Trump’s part.
He’s the master manipulator.
Yep, that’s my take too.
He’s softening him up before further humiliating him, not least for his interference on behalf of the Dems in the recent election.
Trump also praised Kim Jong Wonkyhaircut – might just be his sense of humour
Trump has a sense of humor that PC progressives lack. It is why Trump prevails over mirthless self absorbed globalists.
He also doesn’t play by their rules, which is why they can’t fathom how to deal with him.
Trump is hilarious. Master wind up artist. A joy to watch in action. Not perfect (who is) but a damn fine artist and politician.
He has sn endless urge to be liked as he terms it. Starmer isc PM aftercall, the polls at this point irrelevant.
. He looks forward to forthcoming images of international meetings. Trump understands media is message. Message, ideology irrelevant. He wraps aroundcMacron while Macron dabbles in intricate technical issues.
Europe is pathetic and Trump knows it.
I suspect he’s applying some soft soap before telling him that the Chagos deal is off and if he wants preferential trade terms he will have to support the US claim on Greenland.
Heh, heh. With Trump nothing is for free.
The Labour party isn’t incompetent and people ought to stop thinking otherwise. It is only incompetent if you believe that the Labour party has benevolent motives, that it wishes to actually improve the UK – it does not. The Labour party, whenever it is in power, does absolutely everybody that a enemy would do to a country if it sought to destroy it and on that view it is highly competent.
Labour Party must get rid of Starmer and Miliband as well as the current set of advisors. Peddling policies that the majority don’t want
If they want to hold on to power
It’s not clear what this article is trying to say but for what it’s worth I don’t think this Starmer Govt will see in 2026.
Of course we’ll still have a Labour Govt but one being controlled by the IMF … big welfare and public spending cuts are on the way.
Whether they can limp through until 2029 depends entirely as to whether the Labour Party splits or not.
The same dilemma faces the Tories, the likelihood of them splitting is increasing in every month that Kemi Badenoch fails to state what she and the Tory party stand for. Is she a One Nation Tory? We will find out in 2025 I suspect.
Which leaves Reform, who have had a huge rise in the polls, however do I see a miss-step? Is Farage becoming cautious and losing his cutting edge in fear of losing Reform’s new popularity. I think so.
A new leader of Reform beckons, a person who is not afraid to offer the radical changes this country needs, their next leader could well be Rupert Lowe.
What would finish Labour would be some kind of electoral arrangement, formal or informal, between Tories and Reform, in the process destroying the Lib Dems as well as Labour.
Kemi and Nigel are both too proud to do that, unfortunately.
Give it time.
Not at all. Reform must avoid a pact. The Cons have shown themselves worse than useless and cannot be trusted again.
A pact would just destroy Reform.
What the country desperately needs is for the left wing alternative to be be patriotic as well as the right wing, while the globalist progressive option gets stuck forever on <25% split between Labour, lib dems, green and assorted national parties.
Still having a genuinely patriotic party like reform is a realistic option is a pretty good start.
Timing is everything with talk of deals. Reform would be mad to even mention it until a few months before a likely election. They’ve plenty of time to garner a lot more votes yet.
Meantime if you love your country Vote Reform whenever you can.
The only arrangement Reform should accept with the Tories is the latter unconditionally surrendering.
What will finish Labour will be the arrival of the inevitable blackouts as Dunkelflaute meets the dimbo Miliband.
The Conservatives were punished for their indolence. Labour will likely be punished for its incompetence. The LibDems ignored (mostly) for their irrelevance. Reform have perhaps been held back by their low presence in the news and political debate.
Which party has less of a challenge to overcome?
Here in the South West, people seem to be happy with falling in the water as a political manifesto.
The south-west hippyish vote doesn’t carry far elsewhere though, and if you start seeing large amounts of immigrants/ immigrant crime and worsening energy prices even there it will prob falter (though of course Lib Dems can adapt). Not much holds up when people’s identity and standard of living are threatened.
Reform thankfully
Very well put.
The way Labour are going it’ll be a decade at least before they’re back in power. The Conservatives might be inspired enough by Trump’s radicalism to offer that to the electorate, but you wonder if the public would believe them, given their previous devotion to net zero and tolerance for mass immigration. Reform’s time may well have come.
I’m surprised this counts as news, quite frankly.
A week being a long time in politics, anyone making predictions four years out is on extremely slippery ground. Must be a slow news day.
The problem for Labour is that it is run by ‘progressive’ and ‘liberal’ MPs and advisors, while its traditional base is anything but those things. The same has been the problem for the Conservatives. The only party benefiting from such leadership has been and remains the LibDems. Reform are taking from both the Labour and Conservative parties because they are offering not so much populism as popular perspectives on life. The new Conservative leadership appears to be much closer to these perspectives, but with the benefit of long experience in the realities of governing. The next election could be both fascinating and surprising.
Hello. It’s 2025. Anything important happening in UK? Perhaps not.
hahaha
I fully expect there to be a leadership challenge in Labour (probably around next party conference time.) Starmer will call a “back me or sack me” election like Major did, only most likely with a completely opposite outcome.
Not impossible to end up with Conservative minority (or very small majority) government with Reform in opposition. Labour down to Lib Dem levels due to rise in independent MPs.
Allegedly H M the Queen refused Major a dissolution of Parliament because he still had a majority and his difficulty was internal party politics, not one of governance.
I have always said that Starmer would last about a year. He is a not-very-good figurehead. The problem is that after Starmer the Communists will rule everything so things will get worse.
The problem for us all is that everything has been corrupted. Nobody dares to say anything out loud because they would be hounded by the media. The Tories, I believe, will never come back to govern because they no longer represent anything or anybody. They used to represent business but now we hardly have any of that commodity. We don’t have industry, only a Green Economy, whatever that means.
What exactly does the UK have, except history? Even history is on dodgy ground. As people live longer and longer, who will pay for pensions and the NHS in the future? I notice that Starmer wants to give the civil servants a pay rise and take it from pensions. I would bite his hand off because there will be nobody to pay the pensions anyway.
Anew government would have to put forward concrete proposals for wealth creation. Any ideas? Please don’t say AI because it doesn’t mean anything; it’s just a thing for politicians to say like The Green Economy.
Taiwan became the world leaders in advanced computer chips because it directly funded the company start up. We have Rolls Royce and their modular nuclear power stations. They appear, with a high degree of likelihood, to be the future. We should inject public money into a combined project with them with the government taking a junior part of the equity. They should be encouraged to crack on with most of the regulatory rules suspended. We should have done this already. Initially maybee R R would take advantage of the public purse but if they can fly the business UK plc would benefit in the long run. Maybe we are already too late as the the Czech republic might already have beaten us to it.
Labour has absolutely no intention of going down the nuclear route for energy generation. Otherwise why would they have decided to effectively destroy our stockpile of plutonium which would provide the fuel for the putative new reactors, SMR or other type.
Slow News day? Or just a sense the Unherd Base needed a stroke because the 14 years of abject Right wing failure still causing an acute neurosis?
Alot can change in next 4 and half years. Sometimes forgotten Starmer will have 6months still, if he wants them, after Trump left White House for last time.
And just 5 years ago it was all about the dawn of a decade of Bojo. Things changed didn’t they.
1427 years of abject Right wing failureYou and JW are both wrong – the Tories haven’t been right wing for a long time. That’s why they got hammered in the election.
Have to say l’m impressed by how quickly Starmfuhrer and co have reminded people why it’s such a bad idea to vote for socialists – l thought it would take at least 2 years
People just don’t have the patience these days…
This is fantastic! The Tories weren’t right wing enough so the electorate punished them by voting in a left wing government with a historic majority!
Man, you people are dumb!!!
Not exactly, people just wouldn’t continue voting for a party that kept deliberately crapping on their supporters.
Labour’s ‘historic majority’ didn’t come from more votes (they got less than the previous election l beleive) but from a peculiarity of our electoral system.
In reality, Labour were only supported by about 20% of the electorate which, by your logic, means about 80% of Brits are not dumb enough to vote for Labour. Remind me again how many Americans voted Democrat?
Some truth in that. But Lab/Libs/Green got more votes than Tory/Reform. So Champers point holds.
the electorate punished them by voting in a left wing government with a historic majority!
Starmer got fewer votes than Corbyn in 2019. This is a government that literally nobody wanted. Not even you, I suspect.
I wouldn’t call it right wing anymore. Ultra globalist neoliberalism might have started on the right but it’s long since been adopted by the left (’97 was when the neoliberal left got elected in the UK, as you note).
27 years of New Labour do you mean?
Yep.
Good riddance
Here’s my bet: Reeves has already backtracked on non-doms and started pushing for a third runway. Within a year Starmer will sack Miliband, re-open the North Sea fields and start fracking. There will be a massive artificial house price boom and increased public spending paid for with increased immigration and with printed and borrowed money. This will all be carefully co-ordinated to ensure that the suburban economy is roaring in time for the next election – which Labour will win.
Within a couple of years thereafter there will be a banking crisis, the IMF will be called in, bankruptcies, unemployment, crime and terrorism will soar, millions of pensioners will freeze to death. potholes will make the roads impassable and the BBC will tell us none of it is Starmer’s fault because ‘it started in America’.
Let’s face it folks, we’ve been here before.
Good grief. Do you still “believe” in pollsters?
Talk to people. Feel the pulse
Oh, and vote Reform 😉
I could be wrong, but I suspect that what is going to destroy Labour in the short to medium term will be the torrent of revelations emerging from Northern towns and cities about the collusion between local Labour politicians, mosques, Pakistani gangsters and Pakistani paedophile rape gangs
That will be “done and dusted” by the time of the next election.
And the local police .
Yes indeed, thanks for remedying my omission.
I agree. Check this out. The headline is “UK Grooming Gang Rapist May Get Parole Despite Breaching Conditions.“https://thenationalpulse.com/2025/01/28/uk-grooming-gang-rapist-may-get-parole-despite-breaching-conditions/
Any byelections coming up?
If true, it would be an entirely bad thing. Britain’s political system is better than those of Continental Europe because elections are fought between two main parties, one of which pretty much always gets a majority.
As a very unenthusiastic Labour voter, there are 2 things that will seal Labour’s fate for their worse.
Starmer gets replaced by someone who doubles down (as opposed to Starmer who has rowed back to some extent) on the new Wokey Stuff as per SNP, Greens etc.. You know the lot Queers for Palestine antisemitism, pro-noun fascism / self-id, open borders, wave every flag ever except St George’s cross and Union Jack.
Reform moves to the left economically – maybe promise more money for schools, hospitals, police and defence. Sound familiar?
Puts huge pressure on Labour and makes the Tories look even crapper.
The defeat may be more humiliating than the polls or the projections presage, for several eeasons. For example, pollsters assume people are voting for a party. Often, they are voting against one. So at the last election, few people were not really voting for Labour – they were voting against a Conservative Government which had failed to deliver its promises. Similarly, Labour is failing and it’s likely that many people will vote against Labour, not for another party. Why does this matter? Because when people vote against, they choose the party most likely to defeat their target. Thus a tiny vote share for Labour and the LibDems delivered a massive over-representation in seats for both. A similar effect against Labour would see Labour wiped out in many areas, with Reform winning in former red wall Labour strongholds like Barnsley and Conservatives in the South, though still facing difficult battles against LibDems and others. The result? A much better result from Reform and the Tories than polling numbers might suggest. And a well-merited disaster for Labour.