Farage would win British election if held tomorrow, YouGov poll finds

LONDON – Mr Nigel Farage would be in pole position to become Britain’s next Prime Minister if an election were held tomorrow, according to new poll which shows his upstart Reform party would wipe out Labour’s overwhelming majority from 2024.

Reform UK would win 311 seats in the House of Commons in a national vote – up from five in 2024 – with Labour dropping to 144 from 411, according to the projection on Sept 26 from YouGov, based on polling of 13,000 adults. While the tally for Mr Farage is 15 shy of an outright majority in the 650-seat Chamber, he would be the best placed party leader to form a new government.

While British Prime Minister Keir Starmer does not need to call another election until as late as mid-2029, the poll underscores the challenge he faces in restoring Labour’s fortunes following a series of scandals and policy U-turns that have dented public trust in his administration.

Mr Farage, meanwhile, has used a series of public interventions –

largely on immigration

– to build public support for his right-wing populist party.

In an attempt to recover ground, Labour has tacked right on topics including migration and crime, touting deportations made in recent days under its new “one in, one out” deal with France.

In a speech on Sept 26, Mr Starmer announced plans for a

digital ID card to combat migrants working illegally

– though such plans have been condemned by Reform as an infringement on citizens’ privacy.

With the national ballot potentially a long way off, much could change before then, especially as Reform has yet to unveil detailed policy plans for how it would run the country, or a slate of candidates.

Of more immediate concern to Mr Starmer are local elections in May in which Reform could make gains at the expense of Labour in the Welsh Senedd and the Scottish Parliament.

The drop suffered by Labour in any general election would be worse than the historic wipeout suffered in 2024 by the Conservatives after 14 years in power.

The Tories would continue their slide, according YouGov, falling to 45 seats from 121. The Liberal Democrats would win 78 seats, adding six to the successful result in 2024 when they became the biggest third party in post-war Britain.

The YouGov projection also found Cabinet heavyweights such as Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson, Health Secretary Wes Streeting and Energy Secretary Ed Miliband would lose their seats to Reform. Former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner would, too.

YouGov predicts Reform will take 27 per cent of the national vote share, with Labour on 21 per cent and the Conservatives on 17 per cent. The pollster used so-called multilevel regression and post-stratification (MRP) modelling, which aims to give a more detailed electoral prediction than standard polling.

However, YouGov cautioned that British politics at present is unpredictable.

“High levels of uncertainty and volatility are now the norm in British electoral politics, and the results of this MRP projection are no different in that regard,” YouGov said.

“On our central projections, Reform UK are winning 82 seats by less than 5 percentage points. If they were to lose all such hypothetical contests, they would end up falling well short, rather than within touching distance, of a parliamentary majority.” BLOOMBERG