Key facts
- Labour leads in a voter intention poll for the first time since March 2025, reaching 28% support.
- Reform UK dropped to 24% in the same poll, with the Liberal Democrats at 12% and the Tories at 22%.
- The shift follows negative headlines for Reform UK and its leader, Nigel Farage, concerning undeclared gifts and donations.
- Prime Minister Andy Burnham has made several policy announcements in his first week, including energy tax cuts and bus fare caps.
Britain's governing Labour Party has caught up with, or overtaken, Nigel Farage's populist Reform UK in the polls, according to three different surveys. The shift follows a bounce for new Labour leader and Prime Minister Andy Burnham a week after he became prime minister.
Burnham spent his first week as leader looking to give voters "breathing space" on the cost of living, removing a tax on energy bills, capping bus fares and cutting taxes for pubs and bars. A poll by Survation found that Labour was on 26% after Burnham's first week in office, overtaking Reform on 24%. The week before Starmer announced his resignation in June, Labour had been on just 19%, with Reform on 27%. Survation Chief Executive Damian Lyons Lowe said the poll was "the highest Survation has had Labour since 3 June 2025, and the first Labour polling lead since 3 May 2025".
Other pollsters reported a similar pattern. On Monday, More In Common showed Labour on 28% ahead of Reform on 24%, while YouGov had Reform and Labour tied at 22%, with Labour up 6 points since May and Reform at their lowest level of support since March 2025. YouGov also said more Britons saw Burnham as a better prime minister than Farage, or any other major party leader.
As Labour enjoys a bounce, Reform has faced questions over whether gifts from wealthy backers were properly declared, which Farage has angrily decried as a bid by the establishment to discredit him. The Guardian revealed a £5 million gift from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne shortly before Farage announced his candidacy for the 2024 general election. The parliamentary standards watchdog is investigating whether this gift was declared according to rules. Additionally, George Cottrell, a long-time aide to Farage and a convicted fraudster in the US, provided funding for Reform UK's operations. The Metropolitan police are also investigating payments made to the party via a company controlled by its deputy leader, Richard Tice, specifically two donations of £250,000 made by Britain Means Business before the general election. Reform UK has denied any wrongdoing.
Asked about the bounce in the polls on Monday, Burnham said he would not get "carried away" but was pleased to have "made a start where hopefully I've connected with people."