Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has surged to a record poll high as both Labour and the Tories hit a six-year low.
The latest YouGov voting intention survey put Reform on 29%, up three points on last week.
The Conservatives have fallen three percentage points to 17%, a figure they last scored in the aftermath of the European Parliament elections in June 2019.
Then, the Brexit Party gained the most MEPs, 29, with the Tories losing 15 to end on just four, and Labour down ten to ten seats in the European Parliament.
Labour has dropped one percentage point from last week, and is now on 22%, according to YouGov’s poll for The Times, and its lowest since October 2019 when Jeremy Corbyn was party leader.
The Liberal Democrats are up one point to 16% and the Greens also up one point to 10%.
The latest findings suggest that Mr Farage’s party has enjoyed a poll boost on the back of its May 1 election wins.
Reform UK clinched the Runcorn and Helsby by-election by just six votes.
But in far more dramatic developments, it also gained 677 council seats, the Tories lost 674 to end up on 319, Labour lost 187 to finish with 98, the Liberal Democrats gained 163 to a total of 370, and the Greens increased their number by 44 to 79.
Reform now controls ten councils including Derbyshire, Durham, Doncaster, Kent, Lancashire, Lincolnshire, North Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Staffordshire and West Northamptonshire, and is the biggest party on four more.
Crucially for Reform, it gained 31% of the vote share, which meant that the first-past-the-post voting system worked in its favour, rather than the reverse when it was polling in the teens.
“In Staffordshire, Reform won 72% of the seats on 41% of the vote. In Kent, 37% of the vote delivered it 70% of the seats, while in Derbyshire the same share was rewarded with 66% of all the councillors,” said Sir John Curtice, Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University.
The election results have sparked talk about the Tories replacing Kemi Badenoch as leader but she has vowed to take her time in her attempt to rebuild the party after its July 2024 general election drubbing.
But there are warnings that the Tories face a potentially existential threat from the rise of Reform, with calls from some Conservatives to seek an election pact, a move flatly rejected by Mr Farage.
The results have also sparked unrest in Labour ranks, with calls for Sir Keir Starmer to row back on the cuts to winter fuel payments, which Health Secretary Wes Streeting has admitted was a “massive” issue on the doorstep, and to deliver more traditional old-Labour policies including further boosting public spending paid for by tax rises.
Having won power in so many councils, Reform has pledged to deliver far better value-for-money but its performance in these local authorities will come under close scrutiny.
