A YouGov poll based on results taken between 18 and 19 October put Labour three points clear of the Conservatives and four points clear of Reform UK. It was the second consecutive week Reform has placed third, a setback for Nigel Farage, whose party had been the most popular in the UK from March 2025 until August 2026. An aggregate of recent polls compiled by The Independent gives Labour 27 per cent, Reform 22 per cent and the Conservatives 21 per cent. In May, Labour sat at around 20 per cent at the local elections against Reform's 27, and Reform has since been hit by a fallout over donations, allegations of racism against some members and the threat from Rupert Lowe's Restore Britain party.
Data from the article text
Andy Burnham appears to be drawing back voters who drifted away under Keir Starmer. Only 49 per cent of former Labour voters said they would back the party when Starmer stood down in June, a share that has risen to 64 per cent in the latest poll. Among 18 to 24-year-olds, support rose from 14 per cent to 32 per cent over the same period, while only 7 per cent of that age group would vote Reform. Labour also won the Holborn and St Pancras by-election in October, a contest in which the Greens' leader Zack Polanski was standing and the party fell more than 3,000 votes short. Politico's Poll of Polls put Labour back at the top shortly after Burnham became prime minister, and Ipsos found at the end of September that he was the only politician with a positive net favourability rating.
Kemi Badenoch used her conference speech in Birmingham to stake a claim to the whole right-of-centre vote, and it drew a standing ovation.
“We are not uniting with that.”
Mark Wallace, in a column for inews, argues that both Labour and the Conservatives are trying to squeeze smaller rivals. Burnham's early moves include criticism of Israel and crowd-pleasing nationalisation policies, both aimed at the Greens led by Zack Polanski. The Greens were polling around 14 per cent when Burnham entered Downing Street and are now at about 9 per cent, the level they held in summer 2025. The column says the Greens adopted a 'Zionism is racism' motion at their conference in September and rejected an amendment protecting Jewish members from disciplinary action, while Polanski did not take part in the vote. Burnham called the policy antisemitic, a view the column says the Board of Deputies of British Jews shares, and Labour has given Green councillors a week to reject it.
Burnham's conference speech in Liverpool struck many as genuine, particularly a passage about his father, who had died a couple of weeks earlier, that he paused to compose himself before finishing. A commentary on his style contrasts him with Starmer, who often came across as wooden in front of cameras. Burnham must deliver tangible change before the next general election, due in 2029 unless he calls one early. Political analyst Sam Freedman said:
“So many in Westminster keep coming back to an early election, despite Burnham ruling it out”
Freedman also questioned how Burnham can sustain momentum for three more years with relatively little visible progress. Darren Jones, who served as chief secretary to the former prime minister, has criticised Burnham's devolution plans and asked whether mayors would face enough accountability if given more power.
Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle has repeatedly urged brevity during Prime Minister's Questions since Burnham took the despatch box. PMQs is scheduled for 30 minutes but routinely runs 10 to 20 minutes longer. A stopwatch analysis of Burnham's first three sessions found he averaged 22 minutes per session, between three and six minutes more than the other prime ministers examined over similar autumn sessions. Burnham averaged 51 seconds per answer, against 33 seconds for Liz Truss, 35 for Boris Johnson, 38 for Keir Starmer and 39 for Rishi Sunak. A senior Number 10 source attributes the length to the fact that Burnham answers the questions. Hoyle has complained again about the timing:
“We really are going to have to try and speed up some of the answers.”
Data from the article text
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Three months into his premiership, Andy Burnham's Labour is three points clear of the Conservatives in a new YouGov poll. Reform UK has slipped to third place for a second consecutive week.
AI text based on reports by The Telegraph, Al Jazeera Online, BBC and other publishers. Published .