Reform UK Most Popular Party in Britain

Wowza. At least two recent polls this month have Reform UK as the most popular political party in Great Britain, although, given the way seats are allocated, it still wouldn’t win a majority in Parliament were the election held today. 

Since our tracker began in November, the main trend has been an increase in support for Reform UK (up 7 points) and a decline in support for the Conservatives (down 9 points) pic.twitter.com/DU1eoWm2F7

— Find Out Now (@FindoutnowUK) February 6, 2025

It’s a remarkable rise in a very short period of time. A bit over a month ago, Reform UK was the third most popular party, according to Bloomberg, and now it has edged into the lead. 

To put this all in perspective, Labour’s support has dropped about 45% in the past year while Reform’s has increased by 250% over the past year.

Notably, despite week-on-week fluctuations, Labour support has remained unchanged – their 25% support the same as it was in our first VI poll in November pic.twitter.com/3NqftRGcwA

— Find Out Now (@FindoutnowUK) February 6, 2025

Reform has taken a bite out of the Conservative Party’s support as well, although given how far they have fallen in recent years, it’s pretty hard to see them dropping much farther. They are third in popularity at 22% in Politico.EU’s poll of polls. 

Full write-up and data tables here: https://t.co/5frmttWBt7

— Find Out Now (@FindoutnowUK) February 6, 2025

If the election were held today Reform would net an extra 243 seats, Labour would lose 215 seats they have now in Parliament, and the Conservatives would almost be wiped out, losing 81 of 121 they hold currently. 

Ouch. 

Just one poll, and those Reform/Conservative numbers are somewhat outliers as things stand, but this is what it could look like in an election:

RFM: 253 (+248) – 73 Short
LAB: 196 (-215)
LDM: 77 (+5)
SNP: 45 (+36)
CON: 40 (-81)
GRN: 7 (+3)
PLC: 4 (=)
Others: 9 (+4) https://t.co/9qTTlxcFug pic.twitter.com/7cyk4HhKrr

— Election Maps UK (@ElectionMapsUK) February 6, 2025

Obviously, there is a margin of error in the poll, but YouGov did a poll earlier this young month that showed that Reform was ahead of everybody else as well, but only by one point. 

Our latest voting intention poll (2-3 Feb) has Reform UK in front for the first time, although the 1pt lead is within the margin of error.

Ref: 25% (+2 from 26-27 Jan)
Lab: 24% (-3)
Con: 21% (-1)
Lib Dem: 14% (=)
Green: 9% (=)
SNP: 3% (=) pic.twitter.com/eerJuTozLI

— YouGov (@YouGov) February 3, 2025

I think we can safely assume that Keir Starmer won’t be calling a snap election any time soon. 

Of course, there is a caveat to all this should you be hoping for Labour to be kicked out of Parliament any time soon: the next election can be put off until August of 2029. Local elections will be held well before them–the first ones will be held this May–but Labour has a lock on the majority (a big one) in Parliament for the foreseeable future. 

Not so much Keir Starmer, though. His future is much less certain due to his unpopularity, and Labour may want to throw him over the side long before 2029. Nobody seems to like him, and the “grooming”/rape gang scandals have harmed his political standing dramatically. 

Populism is on the rise, and Trump’s victory in America has accelerated the pace at which this is happening. No doubt the revelations coming out through DOGE will accelerate that trend even further as the corruption in government here will raise questions about similar corruption elsewhere. 

It’s going to be an interesting few months and years.