Poll: Britons believe that the circumstances were the worst since the Second World War

New surveys show surge in negative view of new administration and many more expecting rise in their taxes, notes ‘The Financial Times’.

More than half of Britons disapprove of the new Labour government, polling showed, as a separate survey revealed many more voters expect to be hit with higher personal taxes than before the general election in July.

The share of UK adults who have a negative view of Sir Keir Starmer’s government has surged by about 20 percentage points in a month to 51 per cent, YouGov said, with the proportion of people who approve of it falling from 29 per cent to 23 per cent.

Separately Ipsos polling provided to the Financial Times showed three-quarters of the UK public think chancellor Rachel Reeves will increase the taxes they pay personally, up from just over half in May.

Since winning the election on July 4, the prime minister has had to grapple with riots following the mass stabbing in Southport, faced allegations of cronyism and paved the way for tax rises this autumn. 

Starmer has argued he inherited a dire financial legacy from the Conservatives and in a set-piece speech on Tuesday blamed the violent disorder over the summer on 14 years of Tory “rot” in British society.

He also warned the public that things would get “worse before they get better” and served notice of a “painful” Budget on October 30, in his strongest signal yet that taxes will go up.

The YouGov survey came as a poll by think-tank More in Common conducted between August 24 and August 27 found Starmer’s approval rating had fallen to -16, the lowest score the think-tank has ever recorded for the Labour leader.

75 per cent of 1,088 British adults, surveyed online by Ipsos between August 23 and August 26, said they believed they were “fairly” or “very likely” to “personally” pay higher taxes, up from 56 per cent in May.

The share of people who expected Labour to increase spending on public services fell slightly to 55 per cent from 59 per cent previously.

Some said Reeves’s inheritance — which she has quantified as a shortfall of £22bn in the current fiscal year — was genuinely worse than anticipated.

Some party officials feel the new Labour government could have better landed their message that the Tories are to blame for the dismal state of the economy by involving more independent experts in auditing the finances of each Whitehall department.

But many voters have bought into the claims made by Starmer’s party about taking over the worst economy in decades.

Some 65 per cent of those surveyed by Ipsos said Britain’s economic problems were worse than the Conservatives admitted when they were in power, and 56 per cent said they believed that the circumstances Labour inherited were the worst since the second world war.

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