{"id":206533,"date":"2026-08-29T13:48:19","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T13:48:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/206533\/"},"modified":"2026-08-29T13:48:19","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T13:48:19","slug":"new-evidence-of-burnham-leap-frogging-farage-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/206533\/","title":{"rendered":"New evidence of Burnham leap-frogging Farage revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andy Burnham has cemented the \u201cbounce\u201d which saw Labour leapfrog Nigel Farage\u2019s Reform after more than a year, according to an exclusive poll for The i Paper, which sees his party maintain its lead in the polls and his own popularity with the voters increase.<\/p>\n

It comes after the new Prime Minister\u2019s summer blitz of cost-of-living help<\/a> and tour around the country. However, with Parliament due to return from summer recess next week, a difficult Budget in October and a number of tricky decisions over taxation and welfare cuts, Burnham\u2019s honeymoon with the electorate could yet be tested.<\/p>\n

Labour on 27 per cent now has a four-point lead over Reform UK, according to the latest BMG Research survey, with the Tories in third on 18 per cent. Restore, on five per cent, are taking one in ten Reform voters, BMG says, and attracting those who don\u2019t vote.<\/p>\n

The i Paper\u2018s exclusive poll last month was among the first to reveal the Burnham \u2018bounce\u2019, giving him a five-point lead over Reform<\/a> \u2013 the first time the party had been ahead of Reform in 16 months according to BMG polling.<\/p>\n

Although this month\u2019s polling shows a slight fall of one per cent in Labour\u2019s share, it defies suggestions that his initial rush of support would quickly dissipate.<\/p>\n

While this level of support would likely leave Labour short of a Commons majority if replicated in a general election, there were other encouraging signs for the party; voters now believe Labour is best placed to tackle all the major issues facing the UK other than immigration (Reform) and the environment (Greens).<\/p>\n

Burnham also most popular party leader<\/p>\n

The new polling signalled further bad news for Nigel Farage, as right-wing competitor Restore Britain took hold of five per cent of voters \u2013 around 1.5 million people \u2013 eating into Reform\u2019s support base.<\/p>\n

Trust in Labour on the cost of living \u2013 the most important single issue for voters \u2013 has risen to its highest level since October 2024 (25 per cent) after Burnham announced a wave of policies to put more money in people\u2019s pockets, including cutting VAT off energy bills and restoring the \u00a32 cap on bus fares.<\/p>\n

And in further signs that the Prime Minister\u2019s early emphasis on measures to make people\u2019s lives easier is paying off, Labour\u2019s lead on the economy (24 per cent) has grown to eight points over the Conservatives (16 per cent).<\/p>\n

However, Burnham will be mindful that voters may be withholding judgement on his economic credentials until October\u2019s Budget, with the Government already under pressure over the possibility of tax rises to fund increases in spending in areas like defence<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, with small boat crossings and asylum hotel use falling substantially, Labour (20 per cent) is closing the gap to Reform (24 per cent) on who voters trust to deal with immigration, with Nigel Farage\u2019s party\u2019s lead cut to four points.<\/p>\n

Burnham saw his personal ratings increase to +6 per cent from +1 per cent, the highest for a Prime Minister since Boris Johnson, and the only party leader to have a positive rating. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch was on a health neutral rating of 0 per cent, while Farage was on -20 and Green leader Zack Polanski on -21.<\/p>\n

By contrast, the former Labour leader and Prime Minister was on -44 at the end of June.<\/p>\n

However, BMG warned that the Prime Minister\u2019s support was still not strong enough to go for a snap election and win a personal mandate for power.<\/p>\n

Blow for Farage as Restore eats into vote<\/p>\n

Robert Struthers, head of public perceptions at BMG, said: \u201cWhat Burnham is doing is quite simple but in a fractured political landscape it\u2019s enough to hold a lead: winning back Labour voters and also winning over some 2024 Greens and Liberal Democrats.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn June, in the final weeks of Starmer, just over six in 10 of the party\u2019s voters were sticking with them. Now it\u2019s seven in 10.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe right, by contrast, is ever more fractured. This month, for the first time, we included a prompt for Restore, and they are backed by a solid 5 per cent, suggesting around 1.5 million voters would cast a ballot for Rupert Lowe\u2019s outfit if an election were held tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

Struthers said the party presents a \u201cmajor headache\u201d for Farage, as Lowe is \u201csplintering the voters\u201d that Reform \u201cmight have thought were its \u2018core\u2019 support\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne in 10 2024 Reform voters now say they would vote Restore,\u201d he added. \u201cThe caveats are that, as a new and relatively untested party, the Restore vote could be squeezed in the event of an election, and it\u2019s unclear how many seats they will actually stand in.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut they present a big electoral problem for Reform. At the current rate, likely the difference between Reform entering power or not.\u201d <\/p>\n

:: BMG surveyed a representative sample of 1,579 GB adults between 25 and 26 August. BMG are members of the British Polling Council and abide by its rules.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andy Burnham has cemented the \u201cbounce\u201d which saw Labour leapfrog Nigel Farage\u2019s Reform after more than a year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206534,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[73961],"tags":[28914,1579,49158,57001,12288],"class_list":["post-206533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-andy-burnham","tag-andy-burnham","tag-economy","tag-opinion-polls","tag-politics-exclusive","tag-reform-uk"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@people\/117179115699725856","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}