Andy Burnham would face a struggle to beat Reform UK in the next election if he replaces Sir Keir Starmer as prime minister, new polling suggests.
Labour led by Burnham would be backed by 20 per cent of voters at the next election – two points ahead of the party led by Starmer, but still three points behind Reform on 23 per cent, according to the latest BMG Research poll for The i Paper.
A Burnham-led Labour would cause two-point falls in support for Reform and the Greens (9 per cent), although there was a slightly higher proportion of voters saying they were not sure, or would not vote when compared with Starmer remaining leader.
The finding – on the specific question of who voters would back at the next election with Burnham or Starmer as leader, which operates differently to headline voting intention polling – defies a recent survey which suggested Labour would come out on top if the leadership frontrunner took over as PM because he would deliver an eight-point boost to the party’s support.
The Greater Manchester mayor was nevertheless the clear favourite to take over if Labour changes leader on 23 per cent, well ahead of his nearest rival Wes Streeting on 4 per cent.
Burnham was also the only frontline Labour politician with a positive perception score (+2), with Streeting in third place on -23, behind Shabana Mahmood (-19).
Jack Curry, pollster at BMG, said: “When we tested likelihood to vote for Burnham’s Labour against Starmer’s, there was a small increase in those who would back the party under Burnham, but even if he wins the Makerfield by-election and becomes Labour leader, it is by no means guaranteed he would turn around Labour’s electoral fortunes straight away.”
Burnham is currently fighting against Reform’s Robert Kenyon to become an MP in the Makerfield by-election on 18 June, with victory and a return to Parliament likely to be a precursor to a leadership bid to replace Starmer.
He has pledged to put Labour “solidly on the side of working class people” and promised to tackle inequality, saying the party’s failure to deliver change in this area has left voters going “further to the extremes”, thought to be a reference to Reform.
But he would face immediate pressure for a general election, with nearly half (48 per cent) of voters saying there should be an early poll if Labour elects a new leader, while only around a third (32 per cent) said they should continue until the next scheduled vote. Although much of the pressure for a snap election would come from Conservative and Reform supporters.
In a sign that Labour supporters may be thinking twice about ousting Starmer, the percentage of those wanting to replace him has fallen by five points to 37 per cent with a two-point increase in those who want him to remain (48 per cent).
Among the general public, many more voters want to see Starmer replaced than stay.
But there were signs that his attempted fightback was having some impact as support for Labour ousting him among the wider electorate fell by six percentage points and those backing him staying on rose by five percentage points.
Curry said: “There has been a slight shift towards those who want Starmer to stay as leader, with backing for him to remain ticking up since April. But the underlying picture remains uncomfortable for the Prime Minister, with a clear majority of those expressing a view still wanting him gone.”
There was small comfort for Starmer in headline voting intention figures on who people would back if there were an election today, with Labour up two points to 21 per cent, cutting the lead of Reform (stable on 29 per cent) to eight points.
This has been accompanied by a four-point drop for the Greens from a 16 per cent high watermark to 12 per cent, suggesting Zack Polanski’s honeymoon period as leader is over after his controversial response to the Golders Green attack. He also faced difficult headlines after the British Red Cross disputed his claim that he’d acted as a spokesperson for the charity and it emerged he was being investigated for possibly failing to pay council tax when he lived on a houseboat in London.
The Tories meanwhile remained stable in third place on 17 per cent while the Liberal Democrats were now neck and neck with the Greens on 12 per cent.
Starmer’s dire personal ratings improved by just one point with a net satisfaction score of -48 in the aftermath of local elections and the challenge to his leadership.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch continued to record the highest net satisfaction score among party leaders of -3, driven by the highest “satisfied” rating of her leadership so far on 28 per cent, although many more voters are still yet to make up their mind about her compared with others.
Farage’s net satisfaction rating remained consistent on -15, suggesting the standards probe into his £5m donation from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne was not impacting the public’s view of his leadership, although he recorded his highest-ever dissatisfied rating (45 per cent) since becoming an MP.
Reform also led among voters on 15 key issues, including the two deemed most important – cost of living (five point lead over Labour) and immigration (18 point lead).
Starmer’s party leads on only two issues – the war in Ukraine and education, although it was gaining ground on social care and the economy.
“Labour will take small comfort from this month’s numbers, but only small,” Curry said.
“The local elections and front-bench resignations have left the party visibly bruised, and the polling reflects a public that has largely stopped listening.”
A Reform UK spokesman said: “Reform has all the momentum in British politics and we have now had the lead in nearly 300 opinion polls in a row. This latest polling proves exactly the same as we are seeing in Makerfield – only Reform can beat Labour.”
:: BMG surveyed a representative sample of 1,511 GB adults between 26 and 28 May. BMG are members of the British Polling Council and abide by its rules.
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