Half of British public say Tories don’t deserve re-election – poll

More than half of the British public believe the Conservatives do not deserve to be re-elected, but many remain unconvinced that Labour is ready to take over.

According to a poll by Ipsos, only 31% of the public think the Tories deserve to continue in power, compared with 52% who believe they do not.

The figures have changed little since April, when 51% said the Government did not deserve to be re-elected, but represent a slight improvement compared with January when the Tories were mired in the partygate scandal.

In January, Ipsos’s political monitor found just 28% of people agreeing that the Government should be re-elected.

However, a survey of 1,000 British adults carried out at the end of July found only 37% thought Labour was ready to take over.

Although this is among the party’s better scores since losing office in 2010, surpassed only by the 38% registered in January 2022, it is still well below the figures registered by parties that went on to win the next election.

In April 2010, some 47% said they thought David Cameron’s Conservatives were ready to take office, as they did in the following month.

In April 1997, a month before sweeping to power in a landslide victory, Tony Blair’s Labour Party had 55% of people saying it was ready for power.

Keiran Pedley, director of politics at Ipsos UK, said: “We have plenty of evidence that the public are not happy with how the Conservatives are running the country in several important areas.

“However, it is also true that the public are not 100% sold on Labour as an alternative either. Satisfaction with Keir Starmer is unspectacular by historic standards and the public are split on whether the Labour Party is ready for government.”

Sir Keir’s personal satisfaction rating is slightly below average for a leader of the opposition, with a net score of minus 20%. Both Mr Blair and Mr Cameron had positive net satisfaction ratings when they came to power.