Ten years on: have the public still had enough of experts?

The Remain/Leave divide in trust levels is still present

Key takeaways

• Trust in doctors and nurses remains high
• Trust in weather forecasters, nutritionists, and economists has grown significantly since 2017
• Reform UK voters are noticeably less trusting of experts than other voting groups

Ten years ago, Michael Gove uttered the now-infamous words “people in this country have had enough of experts”.

The then justice secretary faced unfair ridicule for these remarks, with most opponents declining to quote the words that followed: “…with organisations from acronyms, saying that they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong”, a sentiment doubtless many would have agreed with.

But the brouhaha did raise the broader issue of trust in expertise, which was pertinent given that the Remain campaign’s strategy at the imminent EU referendum had leant heavily on warnings from experts that Brexit would be bad for the country and bad for them.

A YouGov study the following year would find that Leave voters were less likely than Remain voters to trust just about all kinds of experts on their own fields of expertise. Now, to mark 10 years since Michael Gove’s interview, we have re-run the survey to see how public opinion has changed.

Which experts do the British public trust?

Topping our list are nurses, whom 86% of Britons say they trust when they talk about their own field of expertise. Close behind are doctors on 83%, and more specifically ‘your own local GP’ on 76%.

Similarly popular are historians (77%) and scientists (76%), followed further behind by weather forecasters on 62%.

None of the other expert groups broke past the majority mark, with nutritionists (47%) and sports commentators (45%) coming next – although those who trust these professionals still significantly outnumber those who distrust them (29% and 23%, respectively).

However, it’s a different story for economists, on whom the public are divided – while 37% of Britons say they trust the number crunchers, 34% do not.

And civil servants are net distrusted overall – only 29% trust them compared to 42% who distrust them.

At the very bottom of our list come the politicians, with just 4% saying they trust them when they speak about their own areas of expertise.

How has trust in experts changed since 2017?

While economists might split public opinion, this is a marked difference from nine years ago, having seen their trust score increase by 12pts from their prior 25% tally.

Weather forecasters and nutritionists have also experienced an improvement in their perceptions, with their trust figures respectively growing by 11pts from 51% and by 8pts from 39%.

The only group to see their trust figures fall by a non-margin of error amount are ‘your own GP’, down four points to 76%.

Separately, political figures are also now worse off in the eyes of the public. While politicians have not seen their trust figures decline, their distrust figures have increased by 7pts, to 86%.

How does trust in experts differ between Remain and Leave voters?

Our previous study seemed to support what was in 2017 something of a stereotype that Leave voters were less likely to trust experts, and the results of this new edition continue to bear this out.

The difference is particularly stark when it comes to economists, in whom only 26% of Leave voters hold trust compared to 48% of Remain voters.

Differing attitudes towards civil servants (trusted by 37% of Remain voters 18% of Leave voters) and scientists (85% vs 68%) also stand out.

All of these expert groups weighed in on the EU referendum debate, which could account for the contrasts between pro- and anti-Brexit voters, but the differing levels of trust extend beyond these politically-adjacent groups. For instance, Leave voters are 7pts less likely to trust sports commentators and 10pts less likely to trust weather forecasters!

That being said, trust in the latter has grown since 2017, with Leave voters now 10pts more likely than they were nine years ago to have trust in those who predict the elements, at 56%, alongside a 5pt increase among Remain voters (to 66%).

This reflects the fact that, while both groups still often differ in their opinions, the direction of travel has been similar across the board since 2017. A key exception is for local GPs. While a minor increase in Leave voters’ distrust in doctors in general is detectable, when it comes to their own doctor specifically, there has been an 8pt drop in trust (to 72%) and a six point increase in distrust (to 16%).

By contrast, differences in Remain voters’ perceptions of their GP are within the margin of error from the 2017 study.

How does trust in experts differ between 2024 voters?

Looking to more contemporary voting groups shows that those who backed Reform UK at the 2024 general election are also less likely to trust experts than other voters – often to an even greater extent than the Remain/Leave gap.

For instance, where 87-91% of Labour, Tory, Lib Dem and Green voters say they trust nurses – the most trusted profession for each group – this figure falls to 79% for Reform voters.

And when it comes to less popular groups, a mere 19% of Reform voters trust economists, 11% civil servants, and a paltry 1% politicians.

While Reform UK did not exist as a party until 2018, in our 2017 study those who had voted for UKIP at the 2015 general election were also often less trusting than the rest of the pack.

Using these 2015 UKIP voters as a stand-in for Reform UK during that era shows that the shift in attitudes among this sphere of the electorate stands apart from the trends among past and present Conservative, Labour and Lib Dem voters.

For instance, while 2024 Labour, Lib Dem and Tories register 11-18pt increases in trust levels towards economists compared to their 2015 counterparts in the previous study, among Reform voters this figure is up just four points on their past UKIP peers (which, given the sample sizes, is within the margin of error).

Likewise, we can see a particularly stark drop in the number of Reform voters who trust their local GP (from 84% among UKIP voters to 71% now) relative to other voting groups (none of whom saw changes outside the margin of error). Reform UK voters are similarly 8pts less to trust nurses than their UKIP predecessors were, a decline not replicated among other voters.

That is not to say that the direction of travel is largely backwards, with most UKIP->Reform shifts within the margin of error, alongside a single notable increase in trust for nutritionists (from 25% to 34%) that is in line with increases among other voting groups.

See the full results here

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Photo: Getty