Sunak’s ratings hit a new low
As The Times observes
Rishi Sunak is now as unpopular as Boris Johnson was when he resigned as prime minister.
Polling from YouGov, carried out before last night’s crunch vote on the Rwanda bill, found 70 per cent of people said they had an unfavourable opinion of Sunak, compared with 21 per cent who had a favourable opinion.
It means the prime minister has been given his lowest ever net favourability score of minus 49, a drop of ten points from late November.
Sunak also faced a new low among 2019 Tory voters, whom he is keen to hold on to ahead of the next election. With that group 56 per cent had a negative view of the prime minister, compared with 40 per cent who had a positive view.
The new figures, seen by The Times, mean Sunak’s overall net favourability score is comparable with Johnson’s during his final months in office, which was minus 46 immediately after he resigned and dropped to minus 53 a month later.
However, it is not as low as Liz Truss’s, which dropped to minus 70.
Will Sunak soon be a drag on the Tory party?
Whilst Starmer is seen less favourably than his party his ratings are still much better than Sunak’s which is ideal in our de facto presidential system we have in the UK.
What should really worry Tories and particularly those Tories thinking about replacing Sunak is just how unfavourable the Tory brand is compared to the Labour brand, this sets up some rather epic anti Tory tactical voting at the next election.
The interesting thing is what will the Tory party do if and when Sunak becomes more unfavourable than the party? I do have sympathy for Sunak, a lot of his unpopularity comes from the decisions and actions of his two immediate predecessors.
TSE