Conservatives Whacked By Brexit Voters

A huge warning in plain sight for the next Tory Leader.

A new survey that dropped this weekend in many way defines the challenge for the next Tory Leader and Prime Minister.

What we do know in terms of the Conservative leadership race is that Liz Truss has consistent, massive poll leads over Rishi Sunak.

In hypothetical ‘Best PM’ match-ups it has been Liz Truss leading Keir Starmer, with Sunak trailing.

Up until now there has been a fairly consistent trend of Labour’s poll leading narrowing during the Conservative leadership contest.

I’m still very much of the opinion that if Keir Starmer is to become Prime Minister, it will be via a deal with the Liberal Democrats and SNP centred on rejoining the EU Single Market and a second referendum.

The recent underwhelming Labour poll performances have been somewhat offset however by YouGov’s latest data giving Labour their largest lead since 2013.

With Labour on 43% and the Tories down to 28%, it gives Starmer’s party a chunky 15-point advantage.

There is no doubt that Labour are licking their lips about the gift of no longer having to beat a Tory Party led by Boris Johnson.

Johnson still retains significant Conservative support and is preferred by Tory supporters to either Truss or Sunak.

Plenty who voted Conservative for the first time in 2019 are now pretty hacked off that they weren’t given the chance to ‘back or sack’ Johnson themselves at an election.

It means the next Conservative Leader is going to need to work hard and deliver - quickly - to win many Leavers over again.

The huge problem facing the Tories becomes clear when you drill into the latest YouGov figures and find that barely half of those who voted for Brexit in 2016 currently intend to vote Tory.

If anything like those figures play out at the next General Election, the Tories simply cannot win.

The Brexiteer voting coalition that rejected Labour and backed Johnson’s Conservatives has now splintered considerably.

Only 53% of Leavers are now backing the Tories. For context, YouGov’s calculation is that at the 2019 Election, 74% of Leavers went out and voted Conservative.

Indeed the decline in Conservative support from Remainers is tiny by comparison (19% down to 13%).

Worryingly for Conservatives, Leave-voting support for Labour has crept up from just 14% at the General Election to 22% in YouGov’s latest poll.

And what of Richard Tice’s Reform Party, who are pledging to stand in virtually every constituency at the next General Election?

Well even on just 4% nationally it means 9% of Brexiteers currently intend to vote for the party.

The Reform threat is obvious: whilst the Brexit Party stood down in all Tory-held constituencies at the last election, Tice is pledging not to give Conservative MPs a free run this time.

Rebuilding the Brexit-supporting voter coalition the Tories need onside is going to take far more than words.

Stopping the illegal migration crisis, reducing legal net migration, exiting ECHR, holding the EU accountable for breaking the Deal and implementing the Protocol Bill would all help to send the message that the next Tory PM is serious about delivering a Brexiteer agenda.

Whether that happens or not we will have to see. But the collapse in Leaver support for the Conservatives right now is plain to see. And so is the route to winning that support back.