Both Government and the Opposition up a little in this week’s MiC voting intention as Reform lead Labour by 7 ➡️ REF UK 29% (-1) 🌹 LAB 22% (+2) 🌳 CON 21% (+2) 🔶 LIB DEM 12% (nc) 🌍 GREEN 10% (-3) ❓OTH 2% (-1) 🟡 SNP 2% (-1) N = 2,211 | Fieldwork 29/5-1/6 | Changes w/ 25/5

Some reflections on Makerfield groups so far: 1. People really feel the weight of the vote. People are *far* more engaged than I've had in a by-election. For some its a burden, some a privilege. They don't see this as just electing 1 MP, but a decision with UK wide ramifications

Really enjoyed chatting to @peterwalker99.bsky.social about the political events of the week and beyond and what the public make of it all...

How do people describe main party leaders in their own words. The world clouds below give you a flavour of what the public say. For Starmer biggest word is weak, For Farage racist, For Badenoch OK For Davey don’t know How negative they are neatly captures an anti politics mood

Who do Britons think is the main party of the right in the UK today 43% say Reform (rising to 74% of 2024 Reform voters) 17% say the Tories (40% of 2024 Tories) 6% say Restore (rising to 12% of 2024 Reform voters) 5% say the Liberal Democrats (rising to 19% of Lib Dem voters)

Have some longer thoughts on the Blair intervention, but big challenge for him is, fairly or not, the public aren't particularly inclined to want govt to listen. When we asked about which ex-PMs (and podcasting MPs) govt should listen to he got lowest 'worth listening to' of any ex PM bar Truss.

The Makerfield byelection poll by Survation: nb, based on 369 respondents likely to vote and with a voting intention. Suggests it is close to a dead heat, Labour v Reform, at the start.

Tactical voting is now a growing feature of the landscape, and so as well as our normal voting intention we track negative voting intention (who would Britons vote AGAINST): 🌹Lab 35% (+1) ➡️ Ref 32% (-6) 🌏 Green 11% (+4) 🌳 Con 7% (-) 🐦‍ LD 5% (+2) changes w/ Mar 2025

A few people have asked about the difference between approval and favourability of the leaders - eg you think Nigel Farage is doing a good job objectively, but dont like him/his politics. We ran both this week to explore any differences. Here is our standard good job/bad approval tracker

Bit more on Burnham polling, here's the word cloud on how people would describe Burnham. Ambitious is in the middle (and i suspect how that ambition is received in Makerfield will determine a lot), but also good, hopeful, northern, popular Not bad compared to other's word clouds

New hypothetical polling with Burnham as leader turns a 7 point lead for Reform UK into a 3 point lead for Labour. Obviously hypotheticals are just that and things change when they become reality (see Your Party), but the size of the shift is striking.

V interesting polling from YouGov - only 26% of Labour Party members want to adopt a more liberal immigration policy. The poll finds 44% would like to see Shabana Mahmood’s current approach continued...

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Ahead of Saturday we looked at attitudes to Tommy Robinson & Unite the Kingdom march.Only 16% have a positive opinion of Robinson, 46% have a negative one. Voters for most main parties have negative majority view apart from Reform voters where 44% are positive. Oldest generations tend more negative

I know they already seem like a decade ago BUT Tomorrow (19th) at 11:00 we'll be hosting a post-local elections webinar looking at what this month's results mean for the future of British politics and the electoral map. Lots of interesting new data - open to all moreincommon.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Burnham another for my theory that looking like you enjoy/even relish public life is a pre-requisite for connecting with public. Starmer, May, Sunak, Reeves, Brown always look slightly pained. Johnson, Burnham, Farage, Polanski -even back to Blair/Cameron look like they relish it

Improvement for Badenoch, but also sums up the Tories brand challenge that -17 is their highest approval for a leader in 5 years.

On Tuesday we spoke to people in Tameside and Oldham areas that swung dramatically to Reform in last week's elections. Asked why they had lost faith in Labour, the mains reasons could be summed up as lack of change/things getting worse and too much time focusing on last govt.

It’s Thursday morning so the latest edition of our Opinion Brief podcast is out! We discuss the public’s views of Starmer’s premiership & what should happen next, and answer your questions about the locals AND would Brits press the red button or blue. Listen below tr.ee/KasOq-wGy2

In our first Westminster VI after the local elections, Reform’s lead increases to 9pts over Labour ➡️ REF UK 30% (+2) 🌹 LAB 21% (nc) 🌳 CON 19% (-1) 🌍 GREEN 11% (-1) 🔶 LIB DEM 14% (+2) ❓OTH 2% (-3) 🟡 SNP 3% (+1) N = 3,070 | Fieldwork 9-12 May | Changes w/ 4 May

May well not cut through in govt chaos. But if it does has potential to hurt Polanski perhaps more than other things in public opinion. Central to Green leader’s appeal is message people are struggling while others dont pay their fair share. But this cld look like that www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

May well not cut through in govt chaos. But if it does has potential to hurt Polanski perhaps more than other things in public opinion. Central to Green leader’s appeal is message people are struggling while others dont pay their fair share. But this cld look like that www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Someone who I think might be reasonably pleased with the election results is Emily Thornberry, big Green swing but less than I expected (esp given the Lib Dems did much better in the past and the seat contains a Hackney ward too now).

We often comment on low turn out is in local elections, so it's great to see Calderdale currently reporting turn out of... checks figures... 126.94%. Impressive truly.

This is excellent.

Just to round out looking at West Yorkshire. I think it typified the political earthquake. West Yorkshire has bits of everything - urban grad areas, more red wall seats, rural, mill towns, market towns, big minority communities. Reform now lead there, with Greens just behind Labour.

Special edition of @opinionbriefpod dedicated to pouring over the local and parliamentary election results and what most stood out to us. Want something to listen to while you do Sunday chores? Link below! tr.ee/KasOq-wGy2

Now the final results are just about in, comparing the council results to our final projection. Struck that all parties perform gains/losses broadly in line (within ~50 seats) of the projections, Greens a little under.

Chart that tells you so much about the shift in politics. Both in & out of London Labour lost most ground in areas of the most deprivation. Often they had higher to fall, but shift is stark as most deprived increasingly vote Reform or Green and Labour’s base becomes more affluent.

Gorton and Denton by-election really wasn’t a one off

The nature of the 2025 set of elections and results meant that the Tories and Reform were able to avoid the need for deals/coalitions but there are now a series of council’s where control might depend on the two working together, risks for both brands in doing so.

Set Calderdale as one of my other tests for how well Reform were doing at breaking out of Trad Tory land and the Red Wall - and they did exceptionally well, easily taking control of the council, Greens making some gains, Tories reduced to 0 seats and Labour to just 8.

Not sure the comparison to Blair's council losses in 1999 works. Blair did lose 1150 councillors, but there were many more councillors up for election. Labour's retention rate in 1999 was ~81% So far 2026 is about half that ~41% Labour topped the PNS in 1999: 36% Last night: 17%

Looking across Redbridge wards that make up Wes Streeting's Ilford North seat you get something like. Labour 32% Redbridge Ind 18% Tories 16% Reform 15% Green 14% Lib Dems 4% Other Ind 3% Not bad for Labour considering 2024 GE marginality

Labour lost *every single seat* on Kirkless, where the party holds 4/5 MPs. We are seeing some of the most fragmented results in councils that combine a white working class vote with a large ethnic minority population - e.g. with Mill Towns like Kirkless/Burnley.

Taking another look at London vs London va rest of the country. Labours vote drop in London is now almost as great as their drop outside London. But the Tories drop is 8 points lower in the capital than outside and their vote share overall 5 points higher in London

Wakefield is another one of those seismic results. It contains the Wakefield Parliamentary seat that marked Labour’s first by-election win in a decade. In yesterday’s elections Reform took 58 of the 63 seats on the council.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 🧵With all constituencies announced, wrap up thread on Wales: Labour’s Welsh losses look even worse than expected. Since the extension of the franchise, Labour has never got less than 20% in Wales - in General or Devolved elections. They’re now at half their previous low.

If Swindon was underwhelming for Reform breaking out beyond their strongholds, the results so far in Calderdale, my home patch are very good for them indeed. I often think of Calderdale as a microcosm of England (greens also gaining) and Reform doing well here.

In yet another “elections are weird” the classic Swindon bellweather sees the Tories gain 7 seats to become the largest party. Reform win 14 but suggests they can’t yet dominate middle England in the same way as the red wall. Labour massively squeezed drop 21 seats.

Absolute overhaul in Sunderland, a council that has been Labour since its creation in the Wilson era now has a commanding Reform majority. They are the undisputed party of the Red Wall, bigger question will be how well they’ve done beyond that which needs still more results

Thought it might be touch and go but in fact the First Minister was far away from winning a seat. So dominant were Plaid on top of the 6th seat, they also would have won a hypothetical 7th, both the Conservatives and Reform came closer to winning more seats Eluned Morgan.

Another way to map electoral fragmentation. In 2026 many more wards are being won by candidates on under 50% of the vote than in 2022. Distribution shifts clearly to the left.

These were our final council projections from our webinar last week. With credit to @jakedibden.bsky.social for his work on them. Still early days but don’t think they’ll now be too wildly wide of the mark.

Latest Rallings and Thrasher NEV for Sky News interesting. Modest Reform dip on last year, small Tory uptick, Labour down further, Greens up

Orkney Islands practically painted Lib Dem orange these days

Hackney Mayor result is perhaps the most dramatic showcase of what’s happening on Labour’s other flank. A 24 point swing from Labour to the Greens in a previous ruby red stronghold.

Again this might well change when Labour’s inner borough’s come in. But it is really striking that both the two traditional main parties are doing much better so far in London than outside of it.

Still lots of results to come in, but comparing the swing in local election results since 22 & swing implied by the polling average, it looks like the Tories are overperforming by about totally, Reform by 3, Labour on track, Greens underperforming and Lib Dems underperforming.

Here’s a chart using a selection of seats that shows you just how strong the gravitational pull away from the two traditional main parties has been in this election, a consistent pattern of flight from the Tories and Labour to ‘everyone else’.